Swapping out a title -- Pepys for Pope.

July, 2014:  I'm updating my master list. Dropping Confucius and Palace Walk. Adding the 2nd and 3rd books in Robertson Davies' Deptford Trilogy.

December, 2013: I am firing Alexander Pope and putting Pepys in his place.  Pepys' 1660s London seems more ribald, raunchy and fun than Pope's of a few decades later.  See #44.

x1. The Red and the Black, Stendhal
2. Montaigne's essays -- the 20 in How to Live: A Life of Montaigne, Sarah Blakewell
3. Just So Stories, Rudyard Kipling
4. The Soul of a New Machine, Tracy Kidder
5. Siddhartha, Hermann Hesse
6. The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, Sogyal Rinpoche
7. Candide, Voltaire
8. Tartuffe, Moliere
9. Something by Montesquieu Common Sense, Thomas Paine
10. Germinal, Emil Zola
11. The Chouans, Honore Balzac
12. The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
x13. The Reivers, William Faulkner
14. Madame Bovary, Gustav Flaubert
15. Emma The Custom of the Country, Edith Wharton
16. House of Mirth, Edith Wharton
17. All Quiet on the Western Front, Erich Maria Remarque
18. Quick Service, P. G. Wodehouse
19. Breakfast at Tiffany's Other Voices, Other Rooms, Truman Capote
20. The Thurber Carnival, James Thurber
21. One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez
22. Silas Marner, George Eliot
23. The Day of the Locust, Nathanael West
24. Uncle Tom's Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe
25. Babbitt, Sinclair Lewis
26. Paul's Letters, New Testament
27. Augustine's writing
28. Sappho Narrative of Sojourner Truth, Sojourner Truth
29. Euripedes Medea
30. Plutarch's Lives
31. Hitty: Her First Hundred Years, Rachel Field
32. The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer Slaughterhouse Five, Kurt Vonnegut
33. Complete Stories, Dorothy Parker, edited by Colleen Breese
34. Simone de Beauvoir A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf
35. The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan
36. The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde
x37. Fifth Business, Robertson Davies
x38. Confucius The Manticore, Robertson Davies
x39. World of Wonders,  Robertson Davies
40. The Charioteer, Mary Renault
40. Palace Walk, Nahguib Mahfouz
41. The Adventures of Augie March  A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Betty Smith
42. Zorba the Greek, Nikos Kazantzakis
43. Trinity, Leon Uris
44. An Essay on Man, Alexander Pope Pepys' Diary -- an edited 1978 version which is about 1/12 of the original 1,300,000 word work.
45. The Tale of Genji
46. Studs Lonigan  Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
47. Working Division Street, Studs Terkel
48. The Water's Wide To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
49. Jerry Engels The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain
50. The Tastemakers Manon Lescaut, Antoine Francois Prevost...after all, I named this blog after her.

Still slogging through my first book........

Almost four months ago I started reading The Red and the Black by Stendhal.  I am still at it -- and it's not that I don't like the book.  I do.  But oh, what MTV started in the 1980s, the Internet continued in the 1990s and my smart phone managed to finally kill off in me around 2012:  my attention span.  Stendhal's Julien had no such distractions in the 1830s and therefore could spend thousands of hours happily concentrating on memorizing the Bible and Horace in Latin.   I expect to finish before Christmas, gad.  Next in cue will be something short from my list...perhaps some of the short stories in my list. 

I've been reading from my list for 6 weeks and have made progress mainly by making a pile of books and reading a few pages from each.  Have decided to dig in with Stendhal first. My reading around also led to several revisions to my original list. I guess I don't want to read Jane Austen, Simone de Beauvoir or Montesquieu after all.

1. The Red and the Black, Stendhal
2. Montaigne's essays -- the 20 in How to Live: A Life of Montaigne, Sarah Blakewell
3. Just So Stories, Rudyard Kipling
4. The Soul of a New Machine, Tracy Kidder
5. Siddhartha, Hermann Hesse
6. The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, Sogyal Rinpoche
7. Candide, Voltaire
8. Tartuffe, Moliere
9. Something by Montesquieu Common Sense, Thomas Paine
10. Germinal, Emil Zola
11. The Chouans, Honore Balzac
12. The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
13. The Reivers, William Faulkner
14. Madame Bovary, Gustav Flaubert
15. Emma The Custom of the Country, Edith Wharton
16. House of Mirth, Edith Wharton
17. All Quiet on the Western Front, Erich Maria Remarque
18. Quick Service, P. G. Wodehouse
19. Breakfast at Tiffany's Other Voices, Other Rooms, Truman Capote
20. The Thurber Carnival, James Thurber
21. One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia-Marquez
22. Silas Marner, George Eliot
23. The Day of the Locust, Nathanael West
24. Uncle Tom's Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe
25. Babbitt, Sinclair Lewis
26. Paul's Letters, New Testament
27. Augustine's writing
28. Sappho Narrative of Sojourner Truth, Sojourner Truth
29. Euripedes Medea
30. Plutarch's Lives
31. Hitty: Her First Hundred Years, Rachel Field
32. The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer Slaughterhouse Five, Kurt Vonnegut
33. Complete Stories, Dorothy Parker, edited by Colleen Breese
34. Simone de Beauvoir A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf
35. The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan
36. The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde
37. Fifth Business, Robertson Davies
38. Confucius
39. The Charioteer, Mary Renault
40. Palace Walk, Nahguib Mahfouz
41. The Adventures of Augie March  A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Betty Smith
42. Zorba the Greek, Nikos Kazantzakis
43. Trinity, Leon Uris
44. An Essay on Man, Alexander Pope
45. The Tale of Genji
46. Studs Lonigan  Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
47. Working Division Street, Studs Terkel
48. The Water's Wide To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
49. Jerry Engels The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain
50. The Tastemakers Manon Lescaut, Antoine Francois Prevost...after all, I named this blog after her.

Having just joined The Classics Club, this is to announce the first few books of what will eventually be a list of 50 classics.  My goal is to read 50 titles in 60 months...and I'm a slow reader so I'll have to get going soon.  I've chosen authors more than titles at this point so please suggest works you've loved by these writers.  I sense a definite 18th and 19th century French streak...not sure why, I've just wanted to read or re-read some of these authors.  So here's the first stab at a list of Lescaut's classics...

1. The Red and the Black
2. Montaigne's essays
3. Just So Stories
4. The Soul of a New Machine
5. Siddhartha
6. The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying
7. Candide
8. Tartuffe
9. Something by Montesquieu
10. Something by Zola
11. Something by Balzac...I heard he wrote about food.
12. The Great Gatsby
13. The Reivers
14. Madame Bovary
15. Emma
16. Something by Wharton
17. All Quiet on the Western Front
18. Something by P.G. Wodehouse
19. Breakfast at Tiffany's
20. Something by Thurber
21. One Hundred Years of Solitude
22. Silas Marner
23. All Quiet on the Western Front
24. Uncle Tom's Cabin
25. Babbitt
26. Paul's Letters, New Testament
27. Augustine's writing
28. Sappho
29. Euripedes Medea
30. Plutarch's Lives
31. Hitty: Her First Hundred Years
32. The Knight's Tale in Canterbury Tales
33. Dorothy Parker
34. Simone de Beauvoir
35. The Feminine Mystique
36. The Portrait of Dorian Gray
37. Fifth Business
38. Confucius
39. The Charioteer
40. Palace Walk
41. The Adventures of Augie March
42. Zorba the Greek
43. Trinity
44. An Essay on Man
45. The Tale of Genji
46. Studs Lonigan
47. Working
48. The Water's Wide
49. Jerry Engels
50. The Tastemakers