on a rainy library trip today i decided to foray back into some great american classics of literature. i really wanted to read something that i have never read, and when i tell people i’ve never read it they usually gasp aloud: catcher in the rye by salinger. apparently, though, this is a popular choice, seeing as it was completely absent from the library shelf. so instead i picked up the great gatsby by f. scott fitzgerald and of mice and men by john steinbeck.
i’ve now read the great gatsby (it is way shorter than i remember from english class), and i loved it all over again. the man sure had a way of creating mood, environment, visceral texture. the plot is interesting and dynamic in all of its own ways, but i really just love it for how it immerses me in the jazz age so fully. it’s just so wonderfully jazzy and breezy and swishy fabrics and expensive classic cars and cigarettes and dual worlds and mistresses and death and just well done. well, well done, f. scott.
5 Comments
June 16, 2008 at 12:14 am
It is a great book, isn’t it? Haven’t read Of Mice and Men. Must pick it up sometime.
Cheers,
Quirky Indian
http://quirkyindian.wordpress.com
June 16, 2008 at 12:23 am
Of Mice & Men will give you the same kind of flavor, but for a whole different world of America. Equally good, give it a try! Thanks for commenting!
June 17, 2008 at 12:15 am
Both faaaaaaaaaaaantastic books-
June 17, 2008 at 12:41 pm
I made the same decision a few years back; read Salinger and then got sidetracked. You see, I attend a public high school in your fair city (known for a good bball team, not literaries) that did not promote the classics; I had to make up for it as an adult.
June 27, 2008 at 8:04 pm
I concur!