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Underground > Books, Criticism & Writing >

Old favourites rediscovered

20:06 / 12.02.02

One exception to the general 'ZoCher is more hobbity than I am' rule of our relationship is my fondness for rereading books I particularly liked the first time around, whereas ZoCher rarely returns to a book once it's finished.

Was thinking about this today because I've suddenly rediscovered Raymond Chandler, particularly the Marlowe stuff I first read and enjoyed when I moved into University halls in my late teens. I found them good then and they're unputdownable now. Interestingly, they tend to appeal at times of my life when I've moved to a new city, lodge in a single room and live a rather rootless existence. Unlike Marlowe (and Chandler himself) I'm not a natural loner, and there's perhaps a need at such times to romanticise the experience, make it somehow more palatable, more sensual.

In general, I go back a second time to particular books in order to linger, to enjoy the wording, the description, the dialogue. Chandler's a prime example, as is Thomas Harris (probably enjoyed 'Hannibal' more the second time around).

Which books do/have you reread, and why?

20:25 / 12.02.02

The Master and Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov. When I first read this book, I found it to be a beautiful story. When I re-read it in a different translation, suddenly all of the satirical elements sprang out at me, and it was one of the funniest, sharpest books I've ever read. I reread it a lot to re-experience that interplay.

Snow Crash, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy,respectively Neal Stephenson and Douglas Adams. These are my pure feel-good books. I can reread them and laugh and be excited every time. In a similar vein, pretty much all of the works of Louis de Bernieres, which aren't heavyweight, but have beautiful moments and monstrously mirthful ones. Also The Diamond Age, also by Neal Stephenson.

Finally, The Satanic Verses, because I find it to be a complete enigma. I like the writing style, but what brings me back over and over is trying unpack all of the meaning in the interplay of the plotlines...it's like literary Legos.

[ 12-02-2002: Message edited by: [monkeys violating the temple] ]

20:32 / 12.02.02

The two most salient to me are Mating, by Norman Rush, and <blush> of course Howard's End. Mating I wish I were exaggerating I think I read about 1,000 times. Pretty much no book will hold up to that many readings, which I wish I had not done because the flaws are too apparent to me now. I have been more moderate with Howard's End, which I return to now & again because I love that house and because it agrees with my prevailing philosophy.

20:39 / 12.02.02

Joel Rosenberg's "Guardians of the Flame" series, simply because they were the first books I ever read other than the wonderful tales written by Dr. Seuss.

I don't really reread books from beginning to end, I will on occasion pick a book up flip to a random place in it and read from there.

22:27 / 12.02.02

The book I've re-read the most is Writing Down The Bones - for inspiration - whenever the doldrums set in, this book always gets me writing again ....

I've made it through INFINITE JEST three and a half times -- (and I still don't have my head wrapped completely around it) -- it's like a favorite sitcom that you've seen a thousand times but will still watch again ... the characters are family. Another that I've read countless times is FORCE MAJURE by Bruce Wagner --

I usually only return to books when I have nothing else to read but sometimes certain books keep calling you back to them and those two definately do that for me ....

22:29 / 12.02.02

I'm with you 100% Ganesh. Chandler's one of my favorites. I have almost a full shelf of his books and books about him.
I just reread James Ellroy's American Tabloid in preparation for his new one The Cold Six Thousand. (which I'm halfway through now and it's amazing). I enjoyed it even more the second time around (The first time was for a Contemporary Lit. Grad class and that might have something to do with it). Ellroy's writing style and characterization are even better the second time. Like Chandler it's his use of language that gets you. Though while Chandler paints a picture, Ellroy flashes images in front of your face.
And I find if a book has good characters it's always fun going back and reading about them again. Corny as it sounds it's like visiting old friends. (I can't beleive I just said that)

Regrettable Juvenilia

07:22 / 13.02.02

Somewhat disturbingly, I find re-reading most of Bret Easton Ellis' stuff quite rewarding...

08:01 / 13.02.02

This week I've been searching through my Kerouac collection in search of a suitable passage to have read at my wedding. As a result I've spent most of my time speed-re-reading almost all of it. On The Road, despite its undeserved reputation as a bit of sixth-form twaddle, always gets me in the gut. I can read it and re-read it constantly. It also evokes the first time I read it, on a bus to Spain when I was 21.

I can always read Catcher in the Rye, too, and The World According to Garp. Books seem to summon up a certain time in my life, a feeling, an emotion.

08:40 / 13.02.02

i always struggle with this dilema: if i re-read a book, then i'm not reading a new one. but i do remember picking up the good soldier svejk for the second time and feeling quite joyful about it, like bumping into an old friend.

08:40 / 13.02.02

I am a flipper-through of already-read books. Usually on the loo. 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas' is one of the very few books I've actually properly re-read, 'cause it's just so fucking great. And 'Use of Weapons' by Iain M. Banks, too, and possibly 'Player of Games'. I'd read more of his stuff again, but I don't own any of it.

'My family and Other Animals' got a few readings too, when I was younger.

08:40 / 13.02.02

1984
I start reading it, I finish reading it, I start reading it again.

10:02 / 13.02.02

Every now and then i get to a point where for some reason i can't start a new book.I get restless and spend half an hour reading the first few pages of various books then throwing them down and trying to get into something else instead. Then i invariably go for an old favourite.

Currently i'm halfway through re-reading Amis' London Fields...Wonderful stuff to read again for the genius of the language and the great characters...Keith Talent, Nicola Six, Guy Clinch

I also re-read a lot of Ian Banks same as Cholister. Ian Banks was my first 'crush' on a writer when at 15 i went and started obsessivly buying everything he'd ever written...Same goes for Kurt Vonnegut who joined Ian Banks soon after...

Will Selfs' My Idea of Fun is also something i've seemed to have read about 200 times...

The Return Of Rothkoid

10:06 / 13.02.02

quote:Originally posted by shortfatdyke:
but i do remember picking up the good soldier svejk for the second time and feeling quite joyful about it, like bumping into an old friend.Ooh! That's good to hear: I've a copy of it waiting to be read. Yer giving me the impetus to do so!

I find that I reread Haruki Murakami's stuff and find it refreshing. And I've read Oscar And Lucinda a couple of times, and it feels familiar, which I like.

Nick Cave's And The Ass Saw The Angel has gone around a couple of times, too.

13:05 / 13.02.02

It's years and years since I've re-read a book .. I've always got so many new ones I haven't read yet..

about the closest I get is picking one off the shelf (my own or in a book shop), flicking through it reading the odd paragraph and thinking "boy, that was a good book! I ought to read it again sometime".

I did re-read stuff loads when I was a child though - I read the Hitchhikers Guide.. about 6 times or something stupid like that, same with Lord of The Flies, Day of the Triffids, the Death of Grass .. kind of a diturbing selection now that I think back..

13:18 / 13.02.02

Hesse's Siddhartha
Rob Sawyer's Golden Fleece
The whole Hitchiker's Guide series.

I'm sure there's more, but those three popped into my mind. Each fucking brilliant for absolutely different reasons. I try to read Siddhartha at least once a year to center myself. Golden Fleece is 2001 done way, way better. And the guide speaks for itself really. The Bible in my universe.

Zoom.

13:27 / 13.02.02

quote:Originally posted by Flyboy:
Somewhat disturbingly, I find re-reading most of Bret Easton Ellis' stuff quite rewarding...

I find myself um, referring back to the threesome scene in Glamorama with disturbing regularity.

12:38 / 14.02.02

I've read Anthony Burgess's first 2 "Enderby" books about 4-5 times now. I don't know what it is about them, but he makes the life of a lonely middle-aged poet entertaining..

..I re-read The Ginger Man by J.P. Donleavy usually around Christmas, and Douglas Coupland's Generation X every spring... it usually gives me a great boost of energy.

13:11 / 14.02.02

Time Enough For Love and Starship Troopers. I'd also say Stranger in a Strange Land but I don't own that one.

14:53 / 14.02.02

Yeah a me too with certain Iain Banks books, mainly his sci fi stuff as apart from The Crow Road his other stuff can be a tad heavy.
And if I'm confort reading its a choice between Anne Mccaffrey and some Honor Harrington Sci-fi nonsense.
Trying to re-read the Narnia books for the first time in years but having trouble getting started at the mo.

12:52 / 17.02.02

Snow Crash is a old freind, funny every time.
John King-Human Punk I must have read it thre times now and I'm onot my second copy after lending the first one out and not getting it back. Human Punk is one of those books that you pick up someting new evertime you read it.
I have a large collection of Gemmel,Prachett,Wyndham,H G Wells that I can dip into time and time again.
Books should be read, time and time again.
Youe woudne spen £13 on a CD and only listen to it once would you?

Suedey! SHOT FOR MEAT!

13:11 / 17.02.02

I find myself re-reading things, mostly because I never seem to get round to getting anything new to read.

I've re-read the whole hitchhikers malarkey a few times. Oh, and carrying on with Douglas Adams the Dirk Gently ones. As well as a few *cough* Terry Pratchett offerings.

I'm re-reading The Electric Kool-aid Acid Test right now as well...

Oh, and The Dark Knight Returns. Does that count?

I guess these books, and ones of their ilk, are just the ones that always seem appealing to me. Easy to pick up, fun, entertaining... and with room for thought throughout.

12:55 / 20.02.02

I've been trying to avoid thinking about this, but wotthehell...

The only books I really re-read are ones I read when I was much younger - primary school age, or early teens - and I re-read them for comfort purposes. So I will re-read Georgette Heyer, DWJ, Susan Cooper, Tolkien, T. H. White, Ursula Le Guin, Don Marquis and so on... but I'm very unlikely to re-read books I have read recently (even ones I enjoyed). So I'm highly unlikely to return to - for example - Against Nature; unless it's out of a sense of duty, or relevant to something else I'm reading.

This is because, when my brain is in decent shape, I feel bad about rereading something just for pleasure when there are so many other things out there which I not only want to read but ought to have read. And when my brain is in feeble shape, I return to books which allow me to just sink back into the frame of mind where the book is the universe. Kundera doesn't really let you do that...

13:14 / 20.02.02

I actually re-read quite a few books. The reasons vary.

Sometimes I re-read just because I really, really love the book. I must've read "Footstool In Heaven" by Brett Singer several times yearly between the ages of 14 and 22. It was purely out of for the story and its characters. And even now I must admit to... re-reading some of the Laura Ingalls Wilder "Little House" books because I absolutely adored them when I was little girl - I still remember hiding under the covers at age 6, reading 'Little House In Big Woods' by stealthy flashlight).

Books I think have quite a few layers to them I take a break from and then re-read. "Poisonwood Bible" was such a book. The story was so well-written, I found myself rushing through to find out what would happen next, rather than lingering with the symbolism. I read it two more times to pick up that.

The other reason I re-read is probably a bookgeekgirl thing, but I find you get different things out of different books when you read them at different ages in your life. "The Women's Room" was totally different book when I read it at 17 than when I read it at 22 (not a book I love, just the example I can think of). Same with "The God of Small Things," which I can't believe I actually didn't like the first time I read it, and now I think it's one of the most amazing and powerful pieces of literature I have ever come across.

[ 20-02-2002: Message edited by: Cherry Bomb ]