Generous Beth Fedyn sent me an Advanced Reading Copy of Francine Prose’s What to Read and Why, a book that will be published in July 2018. I’ve been a fan of Francine Prose since I read her Blue Angel (2000), a novel about a college professor who becomes obsessed with a female student. But, Francine Prose has another side. She’s a gifted reviewer and essayist. What To Read And Why provides plenty of evidence of Prose’s wit and knowledge. I really liked “On Clarity” and “What Makes a Short Story?” When I read Francine Prose writing about Dickens, Balzac, Gissing, Mavis Gallant, Elizabeth Taylor, Jane Austen, and Alice Munro I wanted to drop everything and read something by these writers. If you’re looking for an excellent literary essay collection, I highly recommend What To Read And Why. GRADE: A
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Author’s Note v
Introduction xv
1. Ten Things That Art Can Do 3
2. Mary Shelley, Frankenstein 15
3. Charles Dickens, Great Expectations 28
4. Honore de Balzac, Cousin Bette 41
5. George Eliot, Middlemarch 48
6. George Gissing, New Grub Street 63
7. The Collected Stories of Mavis Gallant 70
8. Roberto Bolano, 2666 82
9. Complimentary Toilet Pater: Some Thoughts on Character and Language–Michael Jeffrey Lee, George Saunders, John Cheever, Denis Johnson 86
10. Edward St. Aubyn, The Patrick Melrose Novels 111
11. Paul Bowles, The Stories of Paul Bowles and The Spider’s House 118
12. Patrick Hamilton, Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky: A London Trilogy; The Slaves of Solitude; Hangover Square: A Story of Darkest Earl’s Court 125
13. Isaac Babel 138
14. Lolita, Just the Dirty Parts: On the Erotic and Pornography 143
15. Gitta Sereny, Cries Unheard 154
16. Andrea Canobbio, Three Light Years 163
17. Diane Arbus: Revelations 174
18. Helen Levitt, Crosstown 186
19. Mark Strand, Mr. and Mrs. Baby 193
20. Karl Ove Knausgaard, My Struggle 198
21. Elizabeth Taylor, Complete Short Stories 209
22. Louisa May Alcott, Little Women 213
23. Jane Austen 217
24. Charles Baxter, Believers 224
25. Deborah Levy, Swimming Home 229
26. Alice Munro, Lives of Girls and Women 233
27. Jennifer Egan, Manhatten Beach 238
28. Rebecca West 237
29. Mahsin Hamid, Exit West 251
30. On Clarity 261
31. Reiner Stach, Is That Kafka? 99 Finds 281
32. What Makes a Short Story? 292
33. In Praise of Stanley Elkin 304
Permissions 319
Acknowledgements 322
Looks like an interesting book—I will request a copy through our library’s ILL system. Prose write a wonderful book a number of years ago about various artists and their muses in which she absolutely destroyed the myth of a John & Yoko. Devastating but fair was my assessment.
Deb, I remember The Lives of the Muses: Nine Women & the Artists They Inspired from 2002. WHAT TO READ AND WHY is just as good!
Always glad to see Elizabeth Taylor on a list. She is woefully forgotten.
Patti, I pick up books by Elizabeth Taylor whenever I spot them. Maybe I’ll review one for FFB.
This is definitely going on my list.
Jeff, Beth really knows my tastes in books!
Do I need someone to tell me what to read? Do I need to be handed a required reading list at the beginning of the semester? I know that’s not the case here, but I have so darn many books to read already, I’ve even stopped reading reviews, so this is a skip for me.
Rick, I have just as many stacks of books as you do. But, there’s always room for more Good Books!
I’m with Rick! I know who and what I want to read and I don’t need some sensitive belle telling me what to do!
I know I’ve shared my favorite Schopenhauer quote here before: “We buy books in the hope we will live long enough to read them.”
Deb, I keep buying books even though I have thousands waiting to be read! It’s the triumph of hope over reality.