It's pretty standard to put out annual best books lists well before the actual end of the year. But what about the books read in between? It ain't over till it's over. The result is that it comes out a little later. So here is my list of the ten books read in 2015 that I find most interesting/notable/enjoyable. The books were in chronological order of when I finished reading them, with the original publication date in brackets.
Key West Hemingway (2009) -- Editors Kirk Curnutt and Gail D. Sinclair
Subtitle: "A Reassessment."A fascinating collection of essays originally presented at the Eleventh Biennial Ernest Hemingway Society Conference that took place in Key West, Florida in 2004. Includes discussions of the Key West literary context, aspects of Hemingway's life on the island, To Have and Have Not -- his novel set there, other little known works by the author, his cats and much more.
Six Records of A Floating Life -- (1809) Shen Fu
Born into the minor gentry in Qing dynasty China, Shen Fu never really got it together. These memoirs, whose tone is wistful but not defeated, describe a bohemian life of aesthetic appreciation, travel and scrambling to keep body and soul together, darkened by the death of his beloved wife. A glimpse into a very different world.
The Palm At The End of The Mind (1971) -- Wallace Stevens
This was the collection of poetry I read in the past year that made the most impression on me. From perhaps Steven's most widely known poem, Thirteen ways of looking at a Blackbird:
"I do not know which to prefer
The clarity of inflections
The beauty of innuendoes,
The blackbird whistling
Or just after."
Out of Time (2013) -- Lynne Segal.
Subtitle: "The pleasures and perils of aging" An excellent investigation of "the complexities of mental life within aging bodies." Segal writes: "I am most interested in the less familiar cultural narratives that we might draw on to provide more nuanced thoughts on aging."
Segal, who was just short of 70 when the book was published, is a seasoned socialist-feminist activist in the UK, which informs the book, whose jumping off point is work on aging by Simone de Beauvoir, along with other commentators on women's experience. She also looks at the attitudes expressed by men, e.g. Philip Roth, Martin Amis and John Updike on the more or less negative side, and John Berger, Stuart Hall, etc. on the more positive.
Swann's Way/Within A Budding Grove (1981) -- Marcel Proust
The two books in Volume I of the Penguin edition of Terence Kilmartin's translation of Marcel Proust's A La Rechereche Du Temps Perdu, titled The Remembrance of Things Past. I enjoyed my first dip into Proust's
roman fleuve for its evocative descriptions and extended reflections on experience and memory. The novel as whole will be an ongoing reading project.
Philosophy And Feminist Thinking (1986) -- Jean Grimshaw
British university lecturer Jean Grimshaw takes a philosophical look at feminist theories about topics such as women's nature and self development, maternal thinking and the idea of a distinctive female ethic.
"…The questions which feminists have seen as central to philosophy are questions which should not be seen just as the preserve of women. Taking them seriously will involve a re-evaluation of concepts, theories and priorities that will have to concern men as well as women."
Hour Of The Red God (2013) -- Richard Compton
Compton's vividly written debut novel follows Masai detective Mollel, an anomaly on the Nairobi police force, on his hunt for a killer in the high and low places of a city rife with tribalism, corruption and violence.
The Revolt Of The Elites (1995) -- Christopher Lasch
Twenty years on, much of what American social critic Christopher Lasch has to say about the ills of contemporary society continues to resonate. Lasch focuses strictly on the U.S., but there are major parallels to Canadian thinker George Grant's analysis in "Lament For A Nation."
"The trouble with our society…is not just that the rich have too much money, but that their money insulates them, much more than it used to, from the common life."
History Of The Latin And Teutonic Peoples 1494-1517 (1824) -- Leopold Von Ranke
The earliest published work by celebrated historian Von Ranke, who produced many books and continued to research and write until his death at the age of 91. The study spotlights a brief but important period in the history of six great nations whose fates he sees as inextricably entwined: the French, the Spanish and the Italian, in which the Latin element is conspicuous, and the English, German, and Scandinavian, in which the Teutonic element predominates.
Von Ranke's prose is easy to read -- particularly for a 19th Century German historian -- even light-hearted on occasion, and it was enlightening to read the work of an intelligent author whose presuppositions are often very different from my own.
"It is, doubtless, sweet for a young man, after glorious achievements, and in the midst of great successes and hopes, to die, yet free from the blame which later years bring all too easily. Memory immortalizes youth."
The Great Good Place (1989) -- Roy Oldenburg
In this acclaimed work, sociologist Roy Oldenburg makes a case for society's need for the "third place" -- taverns, pubs, coffee counters and other places for informal socializing, as an alternative to the two major places in which our lives go on, home and work. The advantages are both personal and civic. A great book, but of course Oldenburg is preaching to the converted here.
"Precious and unique benefits accrue to those who regularly attend third places and who value those forms of social intercourse found there. The leveling, primacy of conversation, certainty of meeting friends, looseness of structure, and eternal reign of the imp of fun all combine to set the stage for experiences unlikely to be found elsewhere."
The worst book I read in 2016 was:
Mutant Message Down Under (1991) -- Marlo Morgan.
Originally presented as a true account of of walkabout in the Australian outback the author was to forced to take with an unassimilated group of Aborigines, and the wonders she saw and wisdom she gained on it, the book was denounced as a fraud for its many implausibilities and discrepancies. It is now billed as a work of fiction. Unbelievable, and the writing is bad to boot.
