Things are just going too quickly these days. I don't have time for long books. And my concentration's gone to pot because of too many things going on.
So, I was talking to a college student the other day--and she feels the pressure of too much responsibility, too. I told her the story of Ethan Fromme, and she said she'd like to read the book, but she didn't have time. And then I said (with a huge smile on my face): "It's a short book!!! Really short and really great!" And she was relieved and said she had time to read a short book!
So, I've got that question for you all. Have you read any great short books recently--even in this sometimes too hurried and harried world we habitate at times--that we could sit down and read with great eagerness, amusement, enjoyment, edification--in one quick sitting?
Thanks for responding if you have some suggestions...
Book regards,
Wild'n'Winded
Vivian Paley [Palay?], kindergarten teacher, is the only elementary educator ever to receive a MacArthur Fouindation Genius Grant. Among her books (all of which are brief) I'd particularly recommend You Can't Say You Can't Play.
Well, a great many people in the States seem to think "Who Moved My Cheese?" is a great book. I was not impressed, probably because I'm rather an anachronism: I long for the days when doing nothing but keeping your head down and doing your work well was the way to get promoted.
I only recently read Kafka's "Metamorphosis", and was astonished to see that it's only 70 pages or so! But good pages.
That's a good one and there are lots of others among the classics, "The Stranger," "Bartleby," "The Great Gatsby," and "Silas Marner." (I didn't like Gatsby, but most people seem to love it.)
A few not *too* recent short books I highly recommend are:
"The Cambridge Quintet," by John Casti. (historical fiction)
"Four Plays by Karel Capek"
"The Flanders Panel," by Arturo Perez-Reverte. (fiction)
"Enigmas of Chance," by Mark Kac. (Autobiographical)
Rather than focus only on the short book, one might consider expanding into the short stories. I like to keep collections of short stories and poems within an arm's reach of anywhere I spend a lot of time. So I have Rubaiyat next to one tube at home, collection of american poems next to another, book of american short stories next to my bed (along with a biography of Alan Turing). Other than science fiction, I really didn't care that much for short stories until fairly recently. A very few that I highly recommend are: Rothschild's Fiddle and Grasshopper (both by Chekhov), Harrison Bergeron (Vonnegut), and "Outcasts of Poker Flats" (Harte?). It's nice to have collections of people like H.H. Munro or O'Henry just sitting around, gathering dust but for the infrequent scrutiny.
I used to have this teacher who always said, "No intelligent person is ever bored." It's taken me a long time to come around, but I find that I almost believe this sentiment that formerly seemed so absurd to me. I think maybe intelligent people have interesting books in conspicuous places, and scraps of paper and pencils stuffed into crevices but generally within arm's reach.
k
Wonderful recommendations, FF and a few I haven't heard of. But what sort of tubes, pray tell, are those next to which you keep your books? And is Jekyll and Hyde one of those books?
I'm back on the children's-books bandwagon again, but if you don't have much time but want an entertaining read, hark back to childhood. Kids have some of the best literature written for them.
Some really enjoyable children's novels (easy to read in a short period of time):
- any in the Great Brain series by John D. Fitzgerald (stories about the Fitzgerald family growing up around turn-of-the-19th-century in Utah)
- the Narnia series by C.S. Lewis (starting with The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe)
- any of the Green Knowe books by Lucy M. Boston
- George Selden's charming series that began with The Cricket in Times Square
I would also love to recommend the Harry Potter books, but nobody could call them "short" - unless you're a fan and the end of a favourite one is looming (I was so sad when Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire was over - even though there are more than 600 pages of it!).
Short adult books: someone suggested poetry and short stories, both good - but what about plays, too? not all are short (it takes a while to wade through any meaty Tennessee Williams, for example) but some are and are well worth reading (eg Edward Albee's The Zoo Story, anything by Euripedes, Thornton Wilder's Our Town etc.).
And for a completely charming quick read, one of my favourite books: The Young Visiters, by Daisy Ashford.
Not a book, but I just read Waiting for Godot. I'm sure it's better on stage, but I really liked it. Heart of Darkness, though very verbose, is fairly short. The Old Man and the Sea is a quick read too. Course, I'm probably listing books that y'all read at least 20 years ago.
Bartleyby.com has quite a few short stories in their files. That's where I read the Melville's story that inspired the title for the website. That was an enjoyable read.
tube=monitor
J&H is not one, but it should be.
k
Agree reference "children's" literature.
I've read most of the Narnia series and all of the HP books to my kids (some multiple times). We all loved them. Also "A Wrinkle in Time" is good (a fourth grade substitute read it to us) and there's this series I read years back, but my kids aren't interested in called "The Tripods."
If you like Lewis and you haven't gotten around to The Screwtape Letters, that's a great one to read right before or after Twain's Letters from the Earth.
k
Just joking about the tubes there, FF. Was envisioning Dr Jekyll with his test tubes.
JazzO, Faldage likes to say his crowning glory would be to play the title role in "Waiting for Godot"
Ah .... a little too quick for me before the IV.
Note to Self: Watch for falling puns.
Conrads 'Heart of Darkness' is a short classic, for those who did not know it is where the story for Apocalypse Now ( my fave) came.
the Duncster
The novella "The Fox" by D.H. Lawrence. I don't think this was published as a seperate volume. I have only seen it in anthologies and the like. One of my favorites by D.H.
JazzO, Faldage likes to say his crowning glory would be to play the title role in "Waiting for Godot" Yeahbut, a read some analyses of the book after I read it and Beckett apparently said that Godot really comes from a French word for some type of boot worn in the military. (Or is Faldage implying that he wants to be a boot?)
Thin Books
Two of the three books that most influenced my mindset were thin.
One was Lonely Man, Lonely God.
The other thin book was The Pleasure- Pain Principal.
The fat book was entitled The Open and Closed Mind.
Strange- I don’t remember who wrote any of them. No matter, you wouldn’t want to grow up to be me, would you?
One thin book I would highly recommend would be The Fall of Rome by R.A. Lafferty. Gibbon was good but Rome never fell until it was written so by Lafferty.
One thin novel that is worth reading but much neglected by those who admire Hemingway is Across the River and into the Trees
In this little book Little Ernie Hemingway is at his best- for a while- but like many a ner-do-well salesman, he fails to close.
It seems that the american novel reading public doesn’t cotton to skinny books much. Remember Jonathan Livingston Seagull of the seventies, the best selling book that everybody read and no one knew why? Maybe that book ruined the chances for a future market.
I think the others on this thread are right. Read the best short stories. I'll tell what stories I think best on a post in a minute.
OMERTA by Mario Puzo sounds like it should be a SHORT book but it is not. It is very entertaining, however. Example: "You can't send six billionaires to jail. Not in a democracy." Stuff like this makes it SEEM short. Does that qualify?
For two good THIN books of excellent short stories, try "Harmony of the World" and "Through the Safety Net", both by Charles Baxter[Michigan writer, of course].