What Books Stand Up to Repeated Readings?

[Maurice Picarda]

I don't trust your opinion as you're a piss-taking bastard

I would never jest about lit-fic, and Wolfe is perhaps eighty years past the time when he could plausibly have written a campus novel.

 

[5t3IIa]

I would never jest about lit-fic, and Wolfe is perhaps eighty years past the time when he could plausibly have written a campus novel.

K k k <addstolist>

 

[Belushi]

Dune I've read roughly once every couple of years since I was 14. So about five times. I'll read Messiah with it.

I first read Dune at the same age and the imagery has always stayed with me - the desert planet, the navigators in their tanks of spice gas, the blue in blue eyes etc. Must have been an impressionable age. Years later when I used to take a lot of acid my hallucinations were very often Dune related.

 

[Mrs Miggins]

It was free on the front of a woman's mag, irrc

How funny! I found it in a pub

 

[Termite Man]

I've re-read Henry Millers Rosy Crucifixion triliogy a few times as well as Quiet Days in Clichy . There is just something I love about his style of writing that means I can re-read all the books so easily and just get lost into them !

 

[quimcunx]

I like to pick up a Bill Bryson if I'm caught out between books. I have easily read most of his several times. (this will pleas you I think Dot)

I think if it's funny I can pick it up again, so Dave Gorman's little adventures. Spike Milligan's larger adventures. Less so dramatic fiction.

The House of the Spirits I read lots of times, mostly because I'd gotten out of the habit of reading after school and was a bit lost over what to read at all.

 

[Dillinger4]

I wonder if I should reread Life After God. I read it once and found it immensely unsatisfying apart from one part of it which persuaded me that I needed to split up with my partner. What makes it worse was that she had bought it for me.

It probably made you see the light, as it were.

 

[Dillinger4]

I tend to re-read the light stuff (Hitchhikers Guide type stuff) rather than the heavy stuff. If I want serious reading I'd rather read something new. I only re-read when in need of comfort or sleep.

I sometimes think about reading Gravity's Rainbow again though. I loved it but only understood about two thirds of it.

I could read gravity's rainbow over and over again for the rest of my life and still be left with a feeling of not 'getting' it.

 

[ThierryEnnui]

I could read gravity's rainbow over and over again for the rest of my life and still be left with a feeling of not 'getting' it.

I've heard a lot of people go on about how good it is, but I don't know if I can be arsed to read a book that I will end up not fully understanding. Is it worth it?

 

[Dillinger4]

I've heard a lot of people go on about how good it is, but I don't know if I can be arsed to read a book that I will end up not fully understanding. Is it worth it?

I would say no.

When I read it the first time, it was like learning to read all over again. Its not quite like anything else I have read.

 

[sojourner]

I would say no.

When I read it the first time, it was like learning to read all over again. Its not quite like anything else I have read.

seconded

Interesting though

 

[Vintage Paw]

I would say no.

When I read it the first time, it was like learning to read all over again. Its not quite like anything else I have read.

Is there an echo in here?

The Bell Jar is the one book I've re-read more times than anything else, although I'm only up to about 5 times and I haven't read it for about 5 years now.

I think everything else I've re-read has been for courses - when I've read it for pleasure then found it on a reading list a while later. I'm not averse to re-reading though - some books are clearly worth it. Some aren't.

 

[yield]

The Dictionary.

“I was reading the dictionary. I thought it was a poem about everything.”
Stephen Wright.

Never read any Pynchon but this thread is making me want to.

I've not reread that many books. I'd only return if I thought there was something I misunderstood or missed. Dune, many times, Dhalgren, Left Hand of Darkness, Dispossessed, Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch.

 

[tufty79]

everything is illuminated/extremely loud and incredibly close by jonathan safran foer
if nobody speaks of remarkable things/so many ways to begin by jon mcgregor.
death of the heart - elizabeth bowen
the heart is a lonely hunter/the ballad of the sad cafe - carson mccullers

all in my 'comfy duvet' list of books to read and re-read.

 

[Dillinger4]

“I was reading the dictionary. I thought it was a poem about everything.”
Stephen Wright.

Never read any Pynchon but this thread is making me want to.

I am going to steal that quote.



Here is a sort of introduction to Gravity's Rainbow

http://www.themodernword.com/pynchon/pynchon_grintro.html

Don't worry about spoilers, there is nothing anybody could tell you that would spoil the plot....

 

[Dillinger4]

everything is illuminated/extremely loud and incredibly close by jonathan safran foer
if nobody speaks of remarkable things/so many ways to begin by jon mcgregor.
death of the heart - elizabeth bowen
the heart is a lonely hunter/the ballad of the sad cafe - carson mccullers

all in my 'comfy duvet' list of books to read and re-read.

Whats the Jonathon Safran Foer like Tufty? Its a name I keep coming across but don't know anything about. That fills me with shame.

 

[Mrs Magpie]

Cold Comfort Farm

 

[Dillinger4]

Cold Comfort Farm

Another I have always meant to get round to reading.

This was really a sly recommendations thread.

 

[Maurice Picarda]

Cold Comfort Farm

The liddle mop. Yes.

 

[tufty79]

Whats the Jonathon Safran Foer like Tufty? Its a name I keep coming across but don't know anything about. That fills me with shame.

he's a bloody genius he is.
there's some samply bits here.. www.613sadnesses.blogspot.com. gotta scoot!

 

[Vintage Paw]

Whats the Jonathon Safran Foer like Tufty? Its a name I keep coming across but don't know anything about. That fills me with shame.

I have both. I'll lend them once I've finished my essay on them

However, with EL+IC do I lend you my proof or my limited signed ed? Are you careful with books, or will I have to supervise the reading - like hold it and turn the pages for you

And Cold Comfort Farm. Bloody cracking that is.

 

[Dillinger4]

I have both. I'll lend them once I've finished my essay on them

However, with EL+IC do I lend you my proof or my limited signed ed? Are you careful with books, or will I have to supervise the reading - like hold it and turn the pages for you

And Cold Comfort Farm. Bloody cracking that is.

I wear gloves as not to leave finger marks on the page.



I have OCD when it comes to books. Especially special ones. I keep my copy of Poloroids From the Dead by Douglas Coupland in a Drawer.

 

[Vintage Paw]

I wear gloves as not to leave finger marks on the page.



I have OCD when it comes to books. Especially special ones. I keep my copy of Poloroids From the Dead by Douglas Coupland in a Drawer.

Ah, then I shall allow you to have the limited signed copy then. And I won't tell you about how I used it to prop up shelves as I built my bookcase

 

[Dillinger4]

Ah, then I shall allow you to have the limited signed copy then. And I won't tell you about how I used it to prop up shelves as I built my bookcase

Have you ever read Harkuki Murakami, btw?

 

[Vintage Paw]

Nope. I keep meaning to.

I have also meant to read the Death and the Penguin books for ages. I think I even have a copy somewhere.

 

[Vintage Paw]

A book I decided to revisit today: Richard Brautigan's Revenge of the Lawn.

Brautigan's writing is so beautiful. In this book of ultra-short stories sometimes I feel like I'm not worthy enough to read such beautiful words.

 

[tufty79]

Ah, then I shall allow you to have the limited signed copy then. And I won't tell you about how I used it to prop up shelves as I built my bookcase

*makes plans to ninja said copy out of dillinger's hands*

(i remember bidding and losing on signed copies sometime last year, and being very saddened by it)

and YES to cold comfort farm too

 

[Star Dove]

I hardly ever read anything more than once. The only books I can think of are Catch 22 and 100 years of solitude.

Norman Mailer's death has made me want to re-read something from him and the OP has made me think of reading the unbearable lightness of being again.

 

[mentalchik]

Golly i re-read a lot of my books a lot of times.......


some of them are like old friends and i read them for comfort (specially Dune)