21 May 2011

Willa wants to Read... Great American Literature!



I am sure you know the feeling that there are books that we really should have read but that we haven't managed to read yet. Those ones that are on the top of the TBR... My TBR seems to have quite a lot of those Great American Novels on it. Not sure why but they seem to pile up on the TBR without ever getting read by me... So here is a little list to remind myself that I need to set time aside to read them.
If you have read any of them and can recommend them, please leave a comment and tell me what you think of the book in question.

"A Farewell to Arms" by Ernest Hemingway
From amazon.com: In 1918 Ernest Hemingway went to war, to the 'war to end all wars'. He volunteered for ambulance service in Italy, was wounded and twice decorated. Out of his experiences came A Farewell to Arms. In an unforgettable depiction of war, Hemingway recreates the fear, the comradeship, the courage of his young American volunteers and the men and women he encounters along the way with conviction and brutal honesty. A love story of immense drama and uncompromising passion, A Farewell to Arms is a testament to Hemingway's unique and unflinching view of the world and the people around him.

"To The Lighthouse" by Virginia Woolf
From Wikipedia: A landmark novel of high modernism, the text, centring on the Ramsay family and their visits to the Isle of Skye in Scotland between 1910 and 1920, skilfully manipulates temporality and psychological exploration.



"Revolutionary Road" by Richard Yates
From amazon.com: Frank is mired in a well-paying but boring office job and April is a housewife still mourning the demise of her hoped-for acting career. Determined to identify themselves as superior to the mediocre sprawl of suburbanites who surround them, they decide to move to France where they will be better able to develop their true artistic sensibilities, free of the consumerist demands of capitalist America. As their relationship deteriorates into an endless cycle of squabbling, jealousy and recriminations, their trip and their dreams of self-fulfillment are thrown into jeopardy.

3 comments:

  1. A Farewell to Arms was my first Hemingway, and so far it's the only one I've read. I liked it, but I didn't love it.

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  2. A Farewell to Arms was my first as well. I didn't like it as much as his other works. I really just want to punch the leading lady at times. No offence to all those who liked her. :]

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  3. Thank you so much for your comments - I will probably start with a different hemingway novel then :-)

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