I started and finished A Sense of Direction in one evening; I couldn't really stop thinking about it, so I couldn't put it down. I found it...
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What a meticulously imagined picture "Wolf Hall" offers of London and the circles surrounding Henry VIII in the 1520s and 1530s. It is a book full of pleasures, somehow urgent and leisurely at the same time, and rendered through a fascinating voice and protagonist.
In his book on Rossini in Paris in the 1820s, Benjamin Walton recalls that Stendhal suggested once that an ideal emblem for the art, music or literary critic could be found in an anecdote concerning an Italian tour guide, who would mutely indicate with an extended arm where his clients ought to be looking, all the while saying nothing. I think of this when I think of how one reader might suggest "The rings of Saturn" to another. My friend Emily leant me her copy sometime in June 2010: her bookmarks stayed with the book, two ticket stubs showing trips between Philadelphia, New York and Washington. One of my own bookmarks has stayed, too, a boarding pass for a flight from Toronto to Glasgow, from the last week of June 2010. I only read the book this spring; when I first tried it, it didn't catch, although I did recall the scene of generations of fishermen and their huts on the east coast of England. But it would be wrong to say more about the book, as its unexpected qualities... ah... I almost said too much. I did say too much. I am sorry. Let's just go back to that church interior somewhere in, oh, probably Venice, sometime around 1818, stand beside the guide, and point in the direction of "The rings of Saturn."
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second gary has commented on (3) products.
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
second gary, January 5, 2012
What a meticulously imagined picture "Wolf Hall" offers of London and the circles surrounding Henry VIII in the 1520s and 1530s. It is a book full of pleasures, somehow urgent and leisurely at the same time, and rendered through a fascinating voice and protagonist.The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald
second gary, September 30, 2011
In his book on Rossini in Paris in the 1820s, Benjamin Walton recalls that Stendhal suggested once that an ideal emblem for the art, music or literary critic could be found in an anecdote concerning an Italian tour guide, who would mutely indicate with an extended arm where his clients ought to be looking, all the while saying nothing. I think of this when I think of how one reader might suggest "The rings of Saturn" to another. My friend Emily leant me her copy sometime in June 2010: her bookmarks stayed with the book, two ticket stubs showing trips between Philadelphia, New York and Washington. One of my own bookmarks has stayed, too, a boarding pass for a flight from Toronto to Glasgow, from the last week of June 2010. I only read the book this spring; when I first tried it, it didn't catch, although I did recall the scene of generations of fishermen and their huts on the east coast of England. But it would be wrong to say more about the book, as its unexpected qualities... ah... I almost said too much. I did say too much. I am sorry. Let's just go back to that church interior somewhere in, oh, probably Venice, sometime around 1818, stand beside the guide, and point in the direction of "The rings of Saturn."(2 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)
The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolano
second gary, January 26, 2011
It is an exhilarating read; he makes you feel he can do anything. He does things with pacing and scale which are tremendous.(1 of 2 readers found this comment helpful)