I only read nine books last year (I keep a list). This is pretty paltry compared to the early and mid 00s when the average was closer to 25. There are real reasons for the lower number that aren't important here, but I should hope I'll be closer to at least an average of one a month this year. I've already read four so there is a chance.
Some of the books I've read over the last decade (when I started keeping the list), I've read because I 'thought I should.' These are very often classics or books espoused to be influential or on some of the Top xx list of books.
Three stand out that I'm glad I read. Not because they are good, but because they are terrible. I've previously mentioned Under the Volcano, so while it could be included here, it won't explicitly be. Admitting I don't think these books have much in the way of redeeming qualities is an invitation for criticism as these books have strong defenders, "It changed my life." I do think they could make good roughage for a goat.
Sure to inflame even more passion, I'm suggesting alternatives that are similar in flavor, but worth far more than the paper and ink.
Book 1: On the Road by Jack Kerouac
What is most surprising about this book is that it is a story where absolutely nothing happens. There really is no plot.
It is widely told that Jack Kerouac wrote this in one feverish event on one scroll of paper. It doesn't matter whether this is true or not, but the stream-of-consciousness is evident throughout the book. In addition to bringing a tedium to much of the book, it also means that what doesn't happen in the book could be mixed up in any order and essentially be the same book.
Tolstoy is quoted as saying there are only two stories ever written: A man goes on a journey and A stranger comes to town. On the Road is both and neither. Since this book is credited with helping to start the "Beat Movement," it says something about that movement.
Of the three books, On the Road is probably the least objectionable.
Read Instead: A Walk on the Wild Side by Nelson Algren
This book tells the story of the fringes of society, the lost soles who are made better through hardship if also low ambition. While it is set in the '30s, it could be set at just about any other time in American History by changing some of the details.
In contrast to Jack Kerouac's book, it has a beginning, middle and end and includes trivial things like character development. Nelson Algren (and A Walk on the Wild Side) is said to have been influential to the beginning of Hunter Thompson's writing, specifically his book Hell's Angels.
Book 2: Naked Lunch by William Burroughs
I'm probably not the right generation to have read this book and I've never self-injected drugs so I'm probably not the right audience. How this book consistently ends up on many of the top-100 lists says something about the types of people who popularize these lists. William Burroughs has an interesting life-story and his various biographies are worth investigating, if a bit on the hairy side. William Burroughs was quick to point out that Naked Lunch was not a novel and part of the intent was a book that could be opened up to any page at any time an read. Mission accomplished, gibberish published.
The book has several parts repeated verbatim so I guess it could be gibberish repeated as well (with apologies to Robert Frost - And miles to go before I sleep and miles to go before I sleep).
The best part of the book is the epilogue not published in the original version where William Burroughs gives his theories of drugs and addiction based on strong personal experience.
As an aside, the movie Naked Lunch written and directed by David Cronenberg is excellent. The movie contains the essence of the book within an actual story that includes a lot of the commentary that William Burroughs might have been trying to communicate if he wasn't quite so drug addled. Naked Lunch is one of the few exceptions where the movie is much better than the written prose. "I advise avoiding the book." -Charles Poore
Read Instead: The Rum Diary by Hunter S. Thompson
It would be almost too easy (cliche') to advise reading Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, but The Rum Diary is a much better book (the movie version of The Rum Diary is beyond terrible though). Like Naked Lunch it is loosely based on autobiographical events while Hunter Thompson was living in Puerto Rico and tells the story of a man realizing something lies beyond the lack of accountability many of us wish we could live in. "There was an awful suspicion in my mind that I'd finally gone over the hump, and the worst thing about it was that I (sic) didn't feel tragic at all, but only weary and sort of comfortably detached."
Book 3: The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
I have a hard time deciding whether The Catcher in the Rye or Under the Volcanoe is worse. The Catcher in the Rye tells the story of a self-absorbed student. After being expelled from school, Holden Caulfield goes on a field trip to New York to rid himself of all the phoniness exposed in the world. J.D. Salinger is reported to have done little writing and publishing after the attention given to The Catcher in the Rye but perhaps that happened too late.
Read Instead: Sounder by William Armstrong
Sounder was one of those books I read in junior high, reread as an adult and was very glad that I did. It tells the story of a share-cropper family in the Jim Crow South. In addition to the more obvious themes of race, justice and of gaining maturity, it also touches on deeper subjects such as loyalty, and justification for doing wrong.
In retrospect, On the Road, Naked Lunch, and The Catcher in the Rye made an impression on me, even if it was a negative one; these books are much more memorable than other books I read and honestly enjoyed. A world with only positives would be pretty monotonous so I guess there is at least one redeeming quality.
These books make it tragically hard for me to pick up other titles that I think I should read. I have picked up books such as Gravity's Rainbow many times and put it back down every time out of the sheer horror its promise induces. However, I also avoided A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess, but finally read it about three years ago and really enjoyed it, especially since the edition I read contained both the US and the UK endings.
The reading of these books doesn't have to be an either/or. But, definitely make time to read A Walk on the Wild Side, The Rum Diary and Sounder.
Flame on.
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