Favorite Books

As I looked at my shelf of favorite books, I noticed that there were two kinds of favorites: those that were very important to me at one time, but that I didn't want to read again, and those that I return to and continue to find new ideas in. Here are some of the second type.

Fiction

Gravity's Rainbow, Thomas Pynchon

Everything is in this book.

I had really liked V and The Crying of Lot 49, so when Gravity's Rainbow came out, I bought it right away. I read it straight through that night, and was just dazzled. Each time I re-read it, I enjoy it more.

Ficciones, J L Borges

This was the first book I read by Borges, and I still think it's the best and most focused. {Story: Borges and I}

The Sinking of the Odradek Stadium, Harry Mathews

I like this best of Mathews' work.

Life: A User's Manual, Georges Perec

The culmination of the

Oulipo.

Science Fiction

Same thing with science fiction; most of it is worth reading once but once I've read it, why read it again? These are some that I go back to for more enjoyment. I don't mind hard science in the fiction, but I like it better when the science is taken for granted.

A Short Sharp Shock, Kim Stanley Robinson: Novella, in the book Down and Out in the Year 2000. This is a powerful dream, sharply seen, rapidly told. So strong and dark I have to rest between re-readings.
Whipping Star, Frank Herbert: Great aliens, hilarious plot.
Riddley Walker, Russell Hoban: Language & myth after the apocalypse.
Ringworld, Larry Niven: Great aliens, grand scope, thorough science.
Definitely Maybe, Boris & Arkady Strugatsky: A perfect story: nothing extra, nothing missing.
Roadside Picnic, Boris & Arkady Strugatsky: This is what science fiction should be. (Tarkovsky made a great movie of this, called Stalker.)
Solaris, Stanislaw Lem: Lem's finest. Facing alien life, we learn about our humanity. (Tarkovsky also made a movie of this book, called Solaris.)
Engine Summer, John Crowley: Post-technological, sociological, wonderful calm narrative tone. But so sad.
The Space Eater, David Langford: Hard science fiction, great plot.
The Gameplayers of Zan, M A Foster: Absorbing tale of an alternate sociology.
The Shadow of the Torturer, Gene Wolfe: Another post-tech romance.
Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson: Hacker fiction. Good crypto. Funny, fantastic, exciting, even some sex. Stephenson has obviously read and loved Gravity's Rainbow and has the sense to write his own book instead of copying.

Nonfiction

Brief Lives, John Aubrey: Aubrey lived in London in the mid 1600s and partied with everybody famous; then he staggered home and wrote a page of gossip about the people he met.
Silence, John Cage: Besides the lectures, there are wonderful stories. This is the book that got me interested in mushroom hunting.
Rebellion in the Backlands, Euclides da Cunha: A translation (by Samuel Putnam) of da Cunha's Os Sertões, which describes the 1896 rebellion of Antonio Consilheiro in northeastern Brazil.
Self-Consuming Artifacts, Stanley Fish: This new look at classics from Plato to Edwards surprised me.
On Having No Head, D E Harding: More Zen-in-the-west. Hilarious.
Beyond a Boundary, C L R James: Autobiography of a West Indian cricketer and sportswriter.

Poetry

Dream Songs, John Berryman: I like the diction & the multiple levels of honesty & concealment.
The Art of Love, Kenneth Koch: Contains "Some General Instructions," funny & beautiful.