It's really too soon to be thinking about reading plans for next year, but I find myself doing so anyway. Mostly I want to have very few plans and just see where my reading takes me, but there are a few things I would like to do next year. One of them, and I've already mentioned this, is read more challenging books than I normally do. I think on the whole I read pretty good books, but I get in lots of comfort reads and fluffy sorts of books, too. I probably won't stray too far from my norm, but I'd like to read a few books that stretch my mind a bit. Either they can be award winners, or more likely books that in some way are experimental. Experimental is sort of a scary word for me when it comes to books, but I think I sometimes make things harder than they really are. Experimental to me means the author may try new things with narrative or language or have something unusual with form. I'm not quite sure what I'm looking for, but I have a few books in mind that might work well.
- If on a Winters Night a Traveler, Italo Calvino
- Goldberg Variations, Gabriel Josipovici
- Mezzanine, Nicholson Baker
- The Rings of Saturn, W.G. Sebald
- Jacob's Room, Virginia Woolf
- Labyrinths, Jorge Luis Borges
- Flaubert's Parrot, Julian Barnes
- The French Lieutenant's Women, John Fowles
- In Cold Blood, Truman Capote
- Consider the Lobster and Other Essays, David Foster Wallace
- Hopscotch, Julio Cortazar
- 2666, Roberto Bolano
- Black Spring, Henry Miller
I'm sort of excited about the prospect of doing this, but strange as it sounds I'm a little afraid, too. I'm afraid I'll either be totally lost (my greatest fear in some cases, and why I avoid authors on occasion) and won't "get it" or maybe worse, I'll find I don't like this sort of book. I don't consider myself a reader of a lot of highbrow literature, but I like to think I can read it, enjoy it and understand it. Then again I sometimes think I worry about these things too much and shouldn't put labels on books and just enjoy whatever I do read--wherever it happens to land on the literary spectrum. In any case I bet if I do pick one of these to read and do a little shout out someone else in the blogosphere will either have read the book and can offer advice or might be persuaded to read along.
On a side note, I just realized I have only one woman author on my list. When I was thinking about this earlier I was just jotting down random titles that came to mind. Surely there must be loads of women who would fit this category. Any suggestions?