STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

splash · Kenneth Cole

good books?

lsubatgirl · Gucci

Here are a few top 100 lists if you are interested (for books):

http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/bigread/top100.shtml

http://www.randomhouse.com/modernlibrary/100bestnovels.html

Top 100 Movies of all time:

http://www.afi.com/tvevents/100years/movies.aspx

You might be able to get some ideas from this. I love classics like Emma, Jane Eyre, Pride and Prejudice (any Jane Austen or Bronte Sister Books). Vanity Fair was a good book. The movie that was recently filmed was a bit choppy but did follow the book pretty well.

-- Edited by lsubatgirl at 15:37, 2005-06-28

blubirde · Chanel

I recommend getting into Russian lit. It's my personal favorite when I want to read classic literature. Tolstoy, Dosteovsky, Chekov. My favorite novel of all time is Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dosteovsky. Brothers Karamov is good too. As is anything written by Tolstoy, especially Anna Karenina. I've read War and Peace too but I recommend skipping through some of it unless you are into detailed war sequences.

Wodehouse is freakin' hysterical if you like 20th century British humorists. He's got a ton of books. I tried to read them in order one time but it was too hard. And not necessary.

Of course Jane Austen rocks the world and the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice is probably the best book adaptation I've ever seen. Period. (Well Clueless does hold its own too.)

I'm looking at lusbatgirl's links (wow! the bbc one is a good list), so this might be kind of random. I picked up a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy recently and I'll be checking that out this summer. Marquez - fabulous. You can never go wrong with any Marquez. Oh and I want to read more Atwood. She's so wonderful and pertinent I think. Especially as a modern woman. And depending on what style of lit you like, Morrison is good (always) and Faulkner will make you look at things funny for a few weeks. Okay and I almost forgot one of my favorite authors: Edith Wharton. Every book ends badly, so be prepared but they're great commentaries on the social and economical world of turn of the century New York.

lynnie · Chanel

wow, i want to read every book on that list! My favorite novels are A tale of two cities (boring pick, but i loved it) and I capture the castle by Dodie Smith (coming of age story for a young girl, cute but not overly precious). I am ashamed to admit that I've only really read the famous ones (Gatsby, Catcher in the Rye) which I also love. I want to go back and read my childhood favorites like Treasure Island again.

laken1 · Hermes

I mostly read trashy books so I don't feel qualified to give book rec on "serious" grown up literature although I love White Oleander by Janet Fitch - I thought it was very introspective.

ILoveChoo · Hermes

blubirde wrote:

I recommend getting into Russian lit. It's my personal favorite when I want to read classic literature. Tolstoy, Dosteovsky, Chekov. My favorite novel of all time is Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dosteovsky. Brothers Karamov is good too. As is anything written by Tolstoy, especially Anna Karenina.

ITA- Crime and Punishment is one of my fave's too.

Also if you haven't read it yet, Reading Lolita in Tehrain is a really good more modern book.

halleybird · Hermes

Ahhh! What a fun summer project! lsubatgirl's list is great...here are my personal favorites.

My favorite classics:

Hemingway -- A Farewell To Arms, The Sun Also Rises (both are good for the 20th-c. history aspect as well) and very especially The Old Man and The Sea

Steinbeck -- Of Mice and Men

Harriet Beecher Stowe -- The Minister's Wooing (it's sometimes overlooked because of Uncle Tom's Cabin, but it's so beautifully written)

Golding -- if you haven't read Lord of the Flies as an adult, you should.

The Brontes -- Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre

Tolstoy -- The Death of Ivan Ilych (this is a good starter before Anna Karenina)

Sylvia Plath -- The Bell Jar

Margaret Atwood -- The Handmaid's Tale

Garcia Marquez -- Love In the Time of Cholera or 100 Years of Solitude are both incredible.

Wizard of Oz - L. Frank Baum. The book is actually an allegory for the economy and politics in the US in the early 20th century.

Their Eyes Were Watching God -- Zora Neale Hurston. One of my favorites ever -- about an African-American woman in the 1930s.

Death of a Salesman - Arthur Miller. Still one of the most powerful pieces I've ever read.

Oh, and I can't forget Gone With the Wind, even though it's not quite as smarty as some of the others.

Some modern recs:

A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry. It's about India in the mid-20th century. So beautiful!

Angela's Ashes - Frank McCourt. Memoir of Irish boyhood in the early/mid 20th c.

White Noise - Don DeLillo. Sort of a re-imagining of America in the late 20th century.

Devil In the White City - Erik Larson. this book isn't my favorite, but it's a good read and gives lots of info about the place and time (Chicago in the late 1890s).

That's all I can think of right now. HTH!

cc · Marc Jacobs

Since all those lists can get kind of overwhelming, I think it could be fun to come up with a few different categories of books and then choose one from each.

For example, you could decide to read a classic:

-Southern novel (e.g. Huck Finn, something by Faulkner, To Kill a Mockingbird)

-Russian novel (I agree with others that Crime and Punishment or The Death of Ivan Ilych are good books to start with if you haven't already read them).

-modern political novel (e.g. 1984, Brave New World, Catch-22)

-set of plays (e.g. pick a few plays by Shakespeare, Chekov, or Miller etc.)

Also since you are interested in 20th century history I just wanted to recommend
All the President's Men. I couldn't put it down.

Movies are a bit easier to tackle. The AFI list that lsubatgirl posted is a good place to start. I really love the site Filmsite.org which compiles lists such as the AFI ones as well as others and has tons of information.
Roger Ebert also does a series called The Great Movies in which he reviews movies from all different countries, eras and genres.

I would also try to pick a set of directors and genres and then select one movie to watch as an introduction. So maybe watch something by Hitchcock, Scorcese, Allen, John Ford and so on and then a silent film (Keaton or Chaplin), a film noir (e.g. The Big Sleep, Touch of Evil, Third Man, Maltese Falcon), a screwball comedy (Bringing up Baby, Philadelphia Story, His Gal Friday) and then pick a few foreign films (Truffaut, Bergman, Fellini, etc).

poptart · Coach

I'm sure you have plenty by now, but I'll weigh in with some favorites/good things I've read lately. Great post! I'm getting lots of summer reading ideas.

Anna Karenina - Tolstoy
Tender is the Night - Fitzgerald
To Say Nothing of the Dog - Willis (Blubirde, I just have a feeling you would love this if you haven't read it - very Woodhouse/Wodehouse/whatever-esque)*
Ship of Fools - Porter
Glimpses of the Moon - Wharton
All Nick Hornby*
All Jane Austen
The Center of Everything - Moriarty*
The Namesake - Lahiri*
Princess de Cleves - Lafayette
Much Ado about Nothing - Shakespeare

*modern

splash · Kenneth Cole

Thanks so much!! I'm so excited to start reading all these!

I have to say - I just watched Jules et Jim by Truffaut - it's AMAZING!

jen · Kate Spade

Death of a Salesman is freaking awesome! I loved it.

I also like waiting for godot.

The metamorphosis is a classisc.

blubirde · Chanel

Lisa wrote:

To Say Nothing of the Dog - Willis (Blubirde, I just have a feeling you would love this if you haven't read it - very Woodhouse/Wodehouse/whatever-esque)

I just added it to my wishlist on amazon on your rec, Lisa!

halleybird · Hermes

jen wrote:

Death of a Salesman is freaking awesome! I loved it. I also like waiting for godot. The metamorphosis is a classisc.

I loved both of those! Thanks for reminding me.