Literary Exposure

Whenever chats about the greatest movies of all time strike up around the office or social scene, I am not loathe to admit that I usually end up referencing AFI’s list of 100 Greatest American Movies. Typically I do this when someone says they’ve never seen Citizen Kane or The Godfather. I think mentally mock them and imagine they spend their weekends watching Steven Segal marathons while eating KFC by the bucket and wearing sweatpants purchased at Wal-Mart. Yes, I jump to conclusions, but that’s neither here nor there.

Along these same lines, years ago, I tried to find a similar list for great books to read and make myself feel accomplished. Alas, most of the sources I found had a dramatically English slant and I ended up just buying whatever hardbacks were on clearance at the book store, or occasionally whatever I could remember having been mentioned in Esquire recently.

So I was pleasantly surprised when I found this list on Yuri’s blog

Then I realized that while I knew and could relate the store is the vast majority of these works, I’d only actually read 10 of them. Compared to Yuri’s 56, I seemed nearly illiterate.

Aaaargh! I swear, I’ve read more than 10 books in my life. I promise.

Then I took solace in the idea that since Yuri is foreign, maybe they indoctrinated him differently and he had an innate advantage over me. Additionally, I’ve probably read tons more Spider-Man and really anything written by Brian Michael Bendis or Frank Miller. Plus where’s my credit for the non-fiction works I read, like Machiavelli or Gladwell or Hawkings or Pollan? I’m totally at a disadvantage due to my habit of alternating between fiction and non-fiction everytime I finish something.

So I shared the list with fellow podcaster (and gaming blogger), Swabby, and he told me his total was only 22. Crap, that’s like double mine.

Ok folks, so it’s time for a plan for action. I need to come up with a number of these books and get to work on reading them.

Comics…

For a while now I’ve been tossing around an idea to do a series of blog posts about why I love comic books, and how they apply to life.

I say “tossing around an idea” because the more I think about it, the more psyched I get, and thus the more complex it seems and bigger it becomes…and I never finish…

In the mean time, in accordance with my on-going minimalist slant, I’ve wondered how to get my love of books & comics to match my love of not having a lot of stuff.  So I sent a question to twitter superstar, and current holder of every nerd’s dreamjob @agent_M:

So I checked out the link he supplied, and came across a bevy of shelf porn.

Now, comparing that to my one-and-only bookshelf:

(Yes, that IS a live shot I took just for you)

I started out going for hard-back books that would look good on display, though clearly I ended up filling the space with various other things.  Suppose it’s time I allocated more resources towards more/bigger shelves.

Book Wheel

I have been one-up’ed yet again.  Here I was yesterday pricing bicycles, and this guy has found an even cooler way to get around.  Now I have to figure out where to buy one of these things.  Thanks a lot, Guy!

I would totally live in this tunnel

like some kind of book-loving ninja-turtle.

Huxley Vs. Orwell

So damn true.  I just finished “Brave New World” a few months ago and it does seem very much like the world we’re in.  When I went to see Avatar 3D I swore I was 1 step away from a “feelie”.

And thus it begins….

“Android Karenina” by Leo Tolstoy and Ben H. Winters, coming soon. In the vein of “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” and “Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters.”

Bye-Bye, Jane. Hello, Leo: Quirk Books Takes on Anna Karenina in Next Quirk Classic!
Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters coauthor Ben H. Winters is back with an all-new collaborator, legendary Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy, and the result is Android Karenina (Quirk Books, $12.95, June 8, 2010)—an enhanced edition of the classic love story, now set in a dystopian world of robots, cyborgs, and interstellar space travel.
As in the original novel, our story follows two relationships: The tragic adulterous love affair of Anna Karenina and Count Alexei Vronsky, and the more hopeful marriage of Nikolai Levin and Princess Kitty Shcherbatskaya. These characters live in a steampunk-inspired world of robotic butlers, clumsy automatons, and rudimentary mechanical devices. But when these copper-plated machines begin to revolt against their human masters, our characters must fight back using state-of-the-art 19th-century technology—and a sleek new model of ultra-human cyborgs like nothing the world has ever seen.
Filled with the same blend of romance, drama, and fantasy that made the first two Quirk Classics New York Times best sellers, Android Karenina brings this celebrated series into the exciting world of science fiction.
LEO TOLSTOY wrote two of the greatest novels in world literature: War and Peace and Anna Karenina. BEN H. WINTERS is coauthor of the New York Times best seller Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, which was hailed by The Onion A.V. Club as a “sheer delight” and by Library Journal as “strangely entertaining, like a Weird Al version of an opera aria.” Mr. Winters lives in Brooklyn.

Whoa! No way.

a tattoo from my favorite Children’s book of all time.

I also credit this book with some of my “problems with authority” as I learned at a very young age that respect should be earned and not immediately given to adults just because of their age.

Also, when I was young, I really sucked at drawing and thought that it was also just because the audience couldn’t see what I saw.  Not sure how I became better 20 years later.

You know you're curious…

Zombie-ification of Literature Shambles Onward

By Jason Boog on Sep 30, 2009 12:23 PM

Following the monstrous trend brought to life by bestseller success of “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies,” Del Rey Books just bought Porter Grand‘s “Little Women and Werewolves”–remixing the classic novel with a wolfish twist.
Editor-in-chief Betsy Mitchell acquired the title through Adam Chromy of Artists and Artisans. Ever since Quirk Books combined zombies and Jane Austen, we’ve seen more monster mash-up deals: “Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters” and “Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.” If you want to read the good-old-fashioned “Little Women,” Project Gutenberg has a free eBook version.
Here’s a description of the forthcoming werewolf version: “In this retelling of Louisa May Alcott‘s classic, the beloved little women must keep not just the wolf, but the werewolves, from the door…and the kindly old gentlemen next door and his grandson may have some secrets to hide–or share with the March girls.”