Apparently this one has been doing the rounds for a while, but I figure that there can never be enough discussion about the books we love.
The idea is that without thinking about it too much, and within the space of 15 minutes, you name 15 books that will always stay with you. I added a wrinkle – no more than one book per author, so there’s only one book by the divine Jane on my list, and Anna Karenina beat out War and Peace by the merest whisker.
My 15 books, with comments.
1. Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen
Sigh.
2. Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy
I understand these characters – I get inside their heads, and the ordinary events of my own life, over 100 years later, remind me of them. I especially love Dolly (Darya Alexandrovna).
3. Ring of Bright Water, by Gavin Maxwell
My granddad gave me his copy of this book, for my 10th birthday. It is the last tangible connection I have with him. There was something about the isolation and sheer beauty of Camusfearna that grabbed me. A piece of Innisfree, perhaps. I read the subsequent books by Maxwell, and found them very sad.
4. A Suitable Boy, by Vikram Seth
Beautifully complex, and interwoven, and I love the resolution that Lata comes too.
5. The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver
I think the focus on mother and daughters and sisters is what speaks to me here.
6. Towers in the Mist, by Elizabeth Goudge
I read, and re-read, and re-re-read this as a child and teenager. I don’t really know why, but I would happily read it again.
7. I, Clavdivs, by Robert Graves
Again, one I have read many times. I have found it fascinating to compare Robert Graves’ fictional account of Claudius with what we know from historians.
8. Middlemarch, by George Eliot
The psychological insights in this novel are astounding.
9. Frost in May, by Antonia White
Channeling my Catholic youth, perhaps.
10. The First Man in Rome, by Colleen McCullough
I have a bit of a thing for historical fiction, and in fact, this is how I’ve learned most history, by reading a fictional account, and then trying to work out what really happened. Also (don’t tell my supervisor), this was how I developed my understanding of politics and institutions in republican Rome.
11. The Eagle of the Ninth, by Rosemary Sutcliff
More historical fiction, this one set in Roman Britain. This was my brother’s book, but we all read it.
12. The Dispossessed, by Ursula Le Guin
Meditative. Also, I recommend this one to students when they are trying to work out what an anarchic society might actually look like.
13. The French Lieutenant’s Woman, by John Fowles
I think I saw the movie before I read the book. It’s the dialogue between modern and historical that fascinates me here. And the utterly ambiguous ending, ‘though as I have written before, John Fowles was not the first writer to pull this trick.
14. A Friend is Someone Who Likes You, by Joan Anglund
My beloved uncle gave me this for my 5th birthday, and I have it still, somewhat tattered, and treasured.
15. Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte
I so admire Jane’s integrity, and passion, and her determination to be true to herself. I think I first read this when I was about 10, and I’ve re-read it most years since.
10 women writers, 10 books centred around women or with women as lead characters, but 9 books set before the 20th century, and not much contemporary fiction. I think I may be a very conservative reader.
So many books, so little time and you’ve just added 11 more books to my to-read list.
Let me do this too. And I’ll come back and read it later, so that yours doesn’t influence me!
Which 11, HP? Or rather, which books do we have in common? And you will do this 15 books too, over at your place? I find it fascinating finding out which books I share with other people.
Unmana, let me know when you’ve done it, ‘though I will pick it up on my feedreader if you blog it.
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I’ve read Jane Eyre, The French Lietenent’s Woman (and studied it at university), Pride and Prejudice and Middlemarch.
And yes, I’ve done my own list – 8 by women authors, all 20th century and none British. The difficulty wasn’t finding 15 but restricting myself to only that number.
Here’s mine: http://www.unmana.com/2009/08/15-books-i-love.html.
I need to read quite a few from your list.
I told my daughter I would do this a while ago, never got round to it, but I think you have done it for me. I would also have had 1, 5, 8,11, and 12 on my list, with Middlemarch tops, would have willingly accepted 2, 7, 13, 14 even, and 15, and would have substituted Goudge’s The Valley of Song for Towers in the Mist, and some other rural idyll for Maxwell, who I don’t think I ever read, and stuck in some LM Montgomery and Dickinson or Hopkins poetry. Veth will be my summer reading.
Lord of the Rings?
A very fine list, Deborah. I’m much in agreement, except I think my favourite divine Jane novel is ‘Persuasion’. And ‘The Poisonwood Bible’ was not my favourite Kingsolver; that would be her first one, ‘The Bean Trees.’ Her essays are also very fine – particularly ‘High Tide in Tucson.’
But my absolute favourite book of all time is E. Annie Proulx’s ‘The Shipping News’. Although there is Primo Levi’s ‘The Periodic Table’ in close competition ..
And a word for Phillip Pullman and his ‘Northern Lights’ trilogy.
And Bruce Chatwin.
And for the science writers Steven Jay Gould and Richard Dawkins, and I’m also very fond of the American children’s writer Joan Aiken, whose books have inexplicably fallen out of favour in public libraries.
Heretical I know, but I preferred LOTR as a film. Usually books are not improved upon in film versions, but occasionally they are. ‘The Remains of the Day’ also springs to mind – I thought it was a tedious and mannered novel, but a gripping film.
Rosemary Sutcliffe – cannot remember, now, how long I have loved her books. But a very, very long time as I am now 65. And I re-read the ones I have every 2 or 3 years or so………. Am always on the look out in 2nd hand book shops, they are so hard to find.
My first place on that list would be, P&P, no wait, Persuasion, oh maybe, Emma. No, P&P after all, ummmmmmmmmmm! The divine Jane is re-read nearly every year. And still fresh still fascinating – amazing woman.
Gae, in Callala Bay
southernrata, Carol, it sounds every much as though we have read and loved all the same books. Carol, I like Kingsolver’s essays too, ‘though I find I need to read them in small doses, because I agree so much with her point of view. I like to be a little infuriated or upset from time to time as well. But she captures images so well; the thought of the hermit crab scuttling around at high tide in landlocked Tucson fascinates me. My mother lent me her most recent book – Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, which has in part pushed me to get underway with gardening with my children.
Shipping News, Dawkins, Stephen J Gould – yes yes yes! And Joan Aiken, whose books I have read and enjoyed too. As for Philip Pullman’s Northern Lights trilogy, ahh… I’m just re-reading it, right now. One chapter in the third book to go, which I am saving for bedtime tonight. There’s a small follow-up volume, Lyra in Oxford (I think), which I would like to get hold of.
Gae – welcome! Especially to a fellow Rosemary Sutcliff fan. She was the writer who hooked me on historical fiction. A few years back, I came across a compendium of The Eagle of the Ninth, The Silver Branch and The Lantern Bearers, and put it on the shelf for my daughters to find, but so far, none of them has taken to it. But maybe one day soon. One of my favourite dreams is about taking them all for a walking holiday along Hadrian’s wall. I would read The Eagle of the Ninth to them as we flew over to Britannia, and take them to Eboracum before heading up to the wall.
And Carol – yes. Agree entirely about LoTR the Movie vs LoTR the Book. That’s a book that I read obsessively as a teenager, and I can still quote great chunks of it, if you start me off. So probably I should have included it in my list. I think all the Lo-ing and Yea-ing got to me eventually in the book. Also, Tolkien just can’t do emotion or psychology at all. Or women. Nice trees, ‘though.
We did the walking along Hadrian’s Wall thing with our girls briefly when they were 9 and 11, and they still remember it. Sutcliff is the author who most inspired a sense of historical place in me too. The Eagle of the Ninth was the first book of hers I read, but I would probably have put Warrior Scarlet ahead on my list, despite her admission that she got some of the prehistory wrong. I love the way it links up with Knight’s Fee through the finding of Drem’s hand axe.
Yeah, and Tolkien would definitely be on my list.
Deborah, it sounds like our libraries are twinned! it’s lovely to hear someone else enthuse over the same books as me. I’m particularly impressed to find someone else who appreciates Joan Aiken. Her output was large and a bit uneven, but the early volumes in her ‘Wolves of Willoughby Chase’ series are absolute treasures
Speaking of Phillip Pullman, your girls might enjoy his ‘Sally Lockhart’ series. They are great fun, kind of Victorian detective fiction with a very comtemporary sensibility and a great heroine in Sally.
I have ‘Lyra’s Oxford’ – it is a slight but exquisite volume with beautiful woodcuts. There’s also another one following the adventures of Lee Scoresby, ‘Once Upon a Time in the North.’
Your girls have read ‘The Hobbit?’ I think I prefer it to LOTR in many ways.
Oh, and I also meant to enthuse over the merits of the English-born but Seattle-based travel writer, essayist and novelist Jonathan Raban. He is a very elegant and learned writer.
And Naomi Klein’s stunning book ‘The Shock Doctrine’. Oh, and Jonathan Frantzen’s ‘The Corrections’. And how could I forget Pat Barker’s Regeneration Trilogy?
I’d better stop …
Carol – keep going. It’s interesting. This will be my go-to thread when I need something to read.
Any time, Vibenna. I’d like to hear some your recommendations for good reads too.
I’ve just been thinking about the strange but wonderful American writer Russell Hoban – another favourite of mine. ‘Turtle Diary’ is one of my favourites and is very accessible; ‘Kleinzeit’ is playful and fun, and ‘Riddley Walker’ is rather difficult. He’s also written some children’s books; ‘The Mouse and His Child’ is well-known, and we’ve also enjoyed the ones featuring Frances the badger. I think the zeitgeist is moving away from animals-dressed-as-humans books, but Frances has great charm.
Some other totally random choices:
Michael Cunningham’s wonderful book ‘The Hours’ – I found it hard to believe that such an insightful book about women’s lives could have been written by a bloke. It was also made into a very fine film and about the only time I’ve been a fan of Nicole Kidman!
On a lighter note I’ve also greatly enjoyed the works of Ian Rankin and Alexander McCall Smith, both Edinburgh writers. So many books! So little time!
Surely a pro-choice feminist like you would have read and enjoyed “I LOVE KILLING BABIES”; the ultimate feminist guide to abortion.
Carol – I’ve published my list at my site.