GQ declares 21 novels you dont need ro read. Spoiler alert: all by white males
| Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | thirsty affirmative action | 04/20/18 | | sienna fiercely-loyal chapel | 04/21/18 | | sapphire useless incel toaster | 04/21/18 | | nofapping coldplay fan corn cake | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | Twinkling resort police squad | 04/20/18 | | costumed odious selfie | 04/20/18 | | Exhilarant center | 04/20/18 | | curious rehab | 04/20/18 | | thirsty affirmative action | 04/20/18 | | charismatic ultramarine laser beams famous landscape painting | 04/20/18 | | Provocative Magical Party Of The First Part Stag Film | 04/20/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/20/18 | | Tan buck-toothed garrison clown | 04/21/18 | | Big sepia national | 04/21/18 | | yellow stock car death wish | 04/21/18 | | Flatulent cuck orchestra pit | 04/21/18 | | swashbuckling pearl base | 04/21/18 | | Cerebral theatre knife | 04/21/18 | | pungent becky love of her life | 05/03/18 | | multi-colored mad-dog skullcap mad cow disease | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | Twisted cocky brunch antidepressant drug | 04/21/18 | | sienna fiercely-loyal chapel | 04/21/18 | | Cheese-eating striped hyena blood rage | 04/21/18 | | marvelous infuriating piazza | 11/03/18 | | marvelous infuriating piazza | 11/03/18 | | wonderful godawful brethren pit | 04/20/18 | | Fuchsia depressive | 04/20/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | Cheese-eating striped hyena blood rage | 04/21/18 | | ruddy aphrodisiac new version black woman | 04/20/18 | | Stimulating House | 04/20/18 | | Impressive market | 04/20/18 | | multi-colored mad-dog skullcap mad cow disease | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | Twinkling resort police squad | 04/20/18 | | Impressive market | 04/20/18 | | Provocative Magical Party Of The First Part Stag Film | 04/20/18 | | Zippy azn | 04/20/18 | | sienna fiercely-loyal chapel | 04/21/18 | | Trip State Nowag | 04/21/18 | | bonkers rose national security agency | 04/21/18 | | wonderful godawful brethren pit | 04/20/18 | | adventurous sanctuary cumskin | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | Galvanic ivory whorehouse wrinkle | 04/21/18 | | nofapping coldplay fan corn cake | 04/20/18 | | Fuchsia depressive | 04/20/18 | | wonderful godawful brethren pit | 04/20/18 | | marvelous infuriating piazza | 04/20/18 | | costumed odious selfie | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | Stimulating House | 04/20/18 | | Indecent crimson parlor | 04/20/18 | | Trip State Nowag | 04/21/18 | | Titillating University Travel Guidebook | 04/22/18 | | wonderful godawful brethren pit | 04/20/18 | | Bipolar Deranged Space Coffee Pot | 04/20/18 | | gaped glassy scourge upon the earth hell | 04/20/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | gaped glassy scourge upon the earth hell | 04/20/18 | | Stimulating House | 04/20/18 | | Cheese-eating striped hyena blood rage | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | Boyish Tanning Salon Legal Warrant | 04/21/18 | | cream lettuce kitchen | 04/20/18 | | Primrose mind-boggling cuckoldry | 04/20/18 | | nofapping coldplay fan corn cake | 04/20/18 | | adventurous sanctuary cumskin | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | costumed odious selfie | 04/20/18 | | vivacious abusive sound barrier spot | 04/21/18 | | Primrose mind-boggling cuckoldry | 04/20/18 | | multi-colored mad-dog skullcap mad cow disease | 04/20/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | wonderful godawful brethren pit | 04/20/18 | | multi-colored mad-dog skullcap mad cow disease | 04/20/18 | | Stimulating House | 04/20/18 | | Stimulating House | 04/20/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | Painfully honest vibrant box office | 04/20/18 | | charismatic ultramarine laser beams famous landscape painting | 04/20/18 | | yellow stock car death wish | 04/20/18 | | adventurous sanctuary cumskin | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | bonkers rose national security agency | 04/21/18 | | Diverse Aquamarine Fortuitous Meteor | 04/21/18 | | cream lettuce kitchen | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | wonderful godawful brethren pit | 04/20/18 | | Zippy azn | 04/20/18 | | Offensive Yarmulke | 04/21/18 | | thirsty affirmative action | 04/20/18 | | Dashing Black Senate | 04/21/18 | | sienna fiercely-loyal chapel | 04/21/18 | | Hairless Puppy | 04/21/18 | | domesticated site | 04/21/18 | | seedy casino macaca | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | chartreuse cruel-hearted cruise ship | 04/21/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | Misunderstood Temple Hominid | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | yellow stock car death wish | 04/20/18 | | poppy volcanic crater | 04/20/18 | | Twisted cocky brunch antidepressant drug | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | Trip State Nowag | 04/21/18 | | seedy casino macaca | 04/21/18 | | Irradiated charcoal preventive strike faggot firefighter | 04/30/18 | | Painfully honest vibrant box office | 04/20/18 | | sexy salmon property | 04/21/18 | | Misunderstood Temple Hominid | 04/20/18 | | Orange Tank | 04/20/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | Orange Tank | 04/20/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/20/18 | | Zippy azn | 04/20/18 | | Twisted cocky brunch antidepressant drug | 04/21/18 | | vivacious abusive sound barrier spot | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | Impressive market | 04/20/18 | | thirsty affirmative action | 04/20/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | Exhilarant center | 04/20/18 | | Indecent crimson parlor | 04/20/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/20/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | bonkers rose national security agency | 04/21/18 | | Painfully honest vibrant box office | 04/20/18 | | Histrionic translucent legend trump supporter | 04/21/18 | | Titillating University Travel Guidebook | 04/22/18 | | Fragrant station quadroon | 04/20/18 | | Impressive market | 04/20/18 | | Naked roommate address | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | Twisted cocky brunch antidepressant drug | 04/21/18 | | Fighting harsh idiot son of senegal | 04/21/18 | | Cheese-eating striped hyena blood rage | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | Cerebral theatre knife | 04/21/18 | | Offensive Yarmulke | 04/21/18 | | Boyish Tanning Salon Legal Warrant | 04/21/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/30/18 | | burgundy factory reset button | 04/20/18 | | Stimulating House | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | thirsty affirmative action | 04/20/18 | | domesticated site | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | multi-colored mad-dog skullcap mad cow disease | 04/20/18 | | razzmatazz meetinghouse | 04/20/18 | | Bipolar Deranged Space Coffee Pot | 04/20/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/20/18 | | Dashing Black Senate | 04/20/18 | | Fuchsia depressive | 04/20/18 | | multi-colored mad-dog skullcap mad cow disease | 04/20/18 | | Flesh heady chad locus | 04/21/18 | | Trip State Nowag | 04/22/18 | | Cheese-eating striped hyena blood rage | 04/21/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/20/18 | | Stimulating House | 04/20/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/20/18 | | Spectacular double fault french chef | 04/20/18 | | Stimulating House | 04/20/18 | | Spectacular double fault french chef | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | Dashing Black Senate | 04/20/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/20/18 | | Indecent crimson parlor | 04/21/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/20/18 | | Cheese-eating striped hyena blood rage | 04/21/18 | | Startling aromatic jap indian lodge | 04/20/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/20/18 | | multi-colored mad-dog skullcap mad cow disease | 04/20/18 | | Indecent crimson parlor | 04/20/18 | | costumed odious selfie | 04/21/18 | | free-loading set | 04/20/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/20/18 | | Twisted cocky brunch antidepressant drug | 04/21/18 | | nofapping coldplay fan corn cake | 04/20/18 | | razzle-dazzle aggressive shrine multi-billionaire | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | cyan judgmental ratface | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo | 04/21/18 | | adventurous sanctuary cumskin | 04/21/18 | | Dashing Black Senate | 04/21/18 | | Laughsome Grizzly Stage | 04/21/18 | | Misunderstood Temple Hominid | 04/21/18 | | Fuchsia depressive | 04/21/18 | | beady-eyed goal in life | 04/21/18 | | Fuchsia depressive | 04/21/18 | | beady-eyed goal in life | 04/21/18 | | buff concupiscible range mediation | 04/21/18 | | Trip State Nowag | 04/21/18 | | vivacious abusive sound barrier spot | 04/21/18 | | buff concupiscible range mediation | 04/21/18 | | Fuchsia depressive | 04/21/18 | | bronze home | 04/21/18 | | yellow stock car death wish | 04/21/18 | | bonkers rose national security agency | 04/21/18 | | yellow stock car death wish | 04/21/18 | | sinister vengeful indirect expression | 04/21/18 | | beady-eyed goal in life | 04/21/18 | | Offensive Yarmulke | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | yellow stock car death wish | 04/21/18 | | Insane hateful step-uncle's house | 04/21/18 | | Flesh heady chad locus | 04/21/18 | | vigorous disturbing library internal respiration | 04/21/18 | | Misunderstood Temple Hominid | 04/21/18 | | Big-titted Associate Round Eye | 04/21/18 | | Cheese-eating striped hyena blood rage | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | Fuchsia depressive | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | Fuchsia depressive | 04/21/18 | | Orange Tank | 04/21/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/21/18 | | wonderful godawful brethren pit | 04/21/18 | | Balding native mood | 04/21/18 | | Big sepia national | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | wonderful godawful brethren pit | 04/21/18 | | Zippy azn | 04/21/18 | | Misunderstood Temple Hominid | 04/21/18 | | Big sepia national | 04/21/18 | | burgundy factory reset button | 04/21/18 | | Fighting harsh idiot son of senegal | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | Orange Tank | 04/21/18 | | Big sepia national | 04/21/18 | | Cheese-eating striped hyena blood rage | 04/21/18 | | Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | Zippy azn | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | citrine school | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | Misunderstood Temple Hominid | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | Big sepia national | 04/21/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | bonkers rose national security agency | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | bonkers rose national security agency | 04/21/18 | | Balding native mood | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | Big sepia national | 04/21/18 | | Zippy azn | 04/21/18 | | Brilliant bateful location | 04/21/18 | | Big sepia national | 04/21/18 | | chartreuse cruel-hearted cruise ship | 04/21/18 | | racy juggernaut telephone | 04/21/18 | | Flesh heady chad locus | 04/21/18 | | Passionate old irish cottage | 04/21/18 | | motley fanboi locale | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | Trip State Nowag | 04/22/18 | | chartreuse cruel-hearted cruise ship | 04/21/18 | | Orange Tank | 04/21/18 | | Big sepia national | 04/21/18 | | Misunderstood Temple Hominid | 04/21/18 | | chartreuse cruel-hearted cruise ship | 04/21/18 | | Cerebral theatre knife | 04/21/18 | | Narrow-minded people who are hurt milk | 04/30/18 | | motley fanboi locale | 04/21/18 | | Impressive market | 04/21/18 | | yapping lodge really tough guy | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/21/18 | | Boyish Tanning Salon Legal Warrant | 04/21/18 | | Blue Glittery Organic Girlfriend Friendly Grandma | 04/22/18 | | Hairless Puppy | 04/21/18 | | Saffron gunner school cafeteria | 04/21/18 | | Bearded pozpig rigpig | 04/27/18 | | contagious know-it-all hissy fit | 04/27/18 | | Arrogant gas station | 04/27/18 | | Misunderstood Temple Hominid | 11/03/18 |
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Date: April 20th, 2018 10:42 PM Author: Mildly Autistic Doobsian Ape
21 Books You Don’t Have to Read
Books
21 Books You Don’t Have to Read
Photograph by Ryan Segedi
Photo of The Editors of GQ
BY THE EDITORS OF GQ
1 day ago
And 21 you should read instead (technically 20 books—Adventures of Huckleberry Finn did not fare well).
We've been told all our lives that we can only call ourselves well-read once we've read the Great Books. We tried. We got halfway through Infinite Jest and halfway through the SparkNotes on Finnegans Wake. But a few pages into Bleak House, we realized that not all the Great Books have aged well. Some are racist and some are sexist, but most are just really, really boring. So we—and a group of un-boring writers—give you permission to strike these books from the canon. Here's what you should read instead.
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1. Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
Instead: The Mountain Lion by Jean Stafford
I actually love Lonesome Dove, but I'm convinced that the cowboy mythos, with its rigid masculine emotional landscape, glorification of guns and destruction, and misogynistic gender roles, is a major factor in the degradation of America. Rather than perpetuate this myth, I'd love for everyone, but particularly American men, to read The Mountain Lion by Jean Stafford. It's a wicked, brilliant, dark book set largely on a ranch in Colorado, but it acts in many ways as a strong rebuttal to all the old toxic western stereotypes we all need to explode. —Lauren Groff, 'Florida'
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2. The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
Instead: Olivia: A Novel by Dorothy Strachey
I have never been able to fathom why The Catcher in the Rye is such a canonical novel. I read it because everyone else in school was reading it but thought it was totally silly. Now, looking back, I find that it is without any literary merit whatsoever. Why waste adolescents' time? Alternatively, I'd suggest Olivia, the story of a British teenage girl who is sent to a boarding school in France. It is short and written in a kind of levelheaded and deceptively straightforward style. Olivia eventually falls in love with her teacher Mademoiselle Julie T, who in turn, and without reciprocating that love out loud, is equally in love with Olivia. Julie never takes a wrong step, but there are signs for those who know how to read them. I read Olivia many, many times, bought it for many of my friends, and consider it the inspiration for Call Me by Your Name. —André Aciman, 'Call Me by Your Name'
3. Goodbye to All That by Robert Graves
Instead: Dispatches by Michael Herr
Goodbye to All That, the autobiographical account of Graves's time in the trenches during World War I, is entertaining and enlightening. It's also incredibly racist. Graves includes samples of near unintelligible essays produced by three of his students (“Mahmoud Mohammed Mahmoud,” “Mohammed Mahmoud Mohammed,” and “Mahmoud Mahmoud Mohammed”) from his postwar stint as an English instructor in Cairo. The joke is twofold—all these silly natives have similar-sounding names, and they lack the basic intellectual capacity to grapple with the literature. A better option is Dispatches by Michael Herr. It concerns a different time, country, and war, but this is still, in my mind, the most indispensable personal account of the cruelty and violence of modern warfare. —Omar El Akkad, 'American War'
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21 Books You Don’t Have to Read
4. The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
Instead: The Summer Book by Tove Jansson
My father loved The Old Man and the Sea, so I tried to love it. It left me unmoved. Mostly, I kept hoping the fish would get away without too much damage. (When my grandpa pushed me to catch a trout at a fish farm, I threw the rod into the pond.) I'd rather read Tove Jansson's The Summer Book. This series of vignettes about a grandmother and granddaughter living on a remote Finnish island is not just heartwarming: In its views of both Nature and human nature, it teaches us what it is to be in sync with the world. All of Jansson's adult fiction is deeply humane and beautiful. —Jeff VanderMeer, 'Annihilation'
5. The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Instead: Near to the Wild Heart by Clarice Lispector
Somehow, even at 208 pages, The Alchemist is 207 pages too long. A dude wanders the desert, trying to uncover his Personal Legend (capitalized as such throughout the book) while meeting people who speak in the inane aphorisms of a throw pillow: “Remember that wherever your heart is, there you will find your treasure.” If you're after a book of existential meandering by a Brazilian author, pick up the similarly slim Near to the Wild Heart by Clarice Lispector. Unlike the entitled desert wandering of The Alchemist, Wild Heart's contemplations are inward and complex. For Lispector, there aren't easy answers—and her universe sure as hell is not interested in your hopes and dreams. —Kevin Nguyen, GQ senior editor
6. A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
Instead: The Great Fire by Shirley Hazzard
Hemingway's novels—with their masculine bluster and clipped sentences—sometimes feel almost parodic to me. If you want to read about the intersection of love and war, Hemingway's subjects in A Farewell to Arms, consider Shirley Hazzard's The Great Fire, about the fallout of the Second World War. Though it was published in 2003, the book feels both contemporaneous with that period and wholly contemporary. Hazzard just writes so damn well, every sentence a gem.
—Rumaan Alam, 'That Kind of Mother'
7. Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
Instead: The Sisters Brothers by Patrick deWitt
I'm a great admirer of Cormac McCarthy's sparer masterpieces, but I'm ambivalent about Blood Meridian, the historical epic often cited as his greatest work. Set in the Old West and written in an impenetrable style that combines Faulkner and the King James Bible, Blood Meridian is a big, forbidding book that earns the reader bragging rights but provides scant pleasure. If you're looking for a more human-scaled, emotionally engaging novel set in the same time period, I'd recommend The Sisters Brothers by Patrick deWitt. It's a dark, funny, brutal Western about a pair of hired killers, at least one of whom has a conscience. It covers some of the same ground as Blood Meridian and has a lot more fun along the way. —Tom Perrotta, 'Mrs. Fletcher'
8. John Adams by David McCullough
Instead: Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard
David McCullough is one of our foremost historians, and his books are written with great care and impressive attention to detail. They also happen to be the driest, boringest tomes you'll ever sludge through. One time I read his book about the history of the Panama Canal, and it required about as much sweat and labor as it took to build the actual canal. For some kick-ass history, read Destiny of the Republic, about the assassination of President Garfield, the doctors who tried to save him but actually ended up killing him, and the frantic attempt by a deranged Alexander Graham Bell to invent a machine to find the bullet located in the president's body. All in a relatively tidy 339 pages. At no point will you feel like there's a test at the end. —Drew Magary, GQ contributor
9 & 10. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Instead: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave by Fredrick Douglass
The worst crime committed by Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is that it makes first-time Twain readers think Twain wrote tedious, meandering stories. He did, as is evidenced by this, his book of tedious, meandering stories—but he also wrote a lot of richly entertaining meandering stories that are not constrained by the ham-fisted narration of a fictional backcountry child or suffused with his sweaty imitation of a slave talking. Alternatively, read Frederick Douglass's firsthand account of slavery, which is equal parts shocking and heartbreaking. It's also an invigorating revenge story: Douglass identifies slave owners by name and hometown, detailing their crimes with such specificity that their descendants will be embarrassed forever. While Jim, the affable slave friend of Huck Finn, exclaims things like “Lawsy, I's mighty glad…,” Frederick Douglass makes observations like “I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land.” You were saying, Mr. Twain? —Caity Weaver, GQ writer and editor
Instead: The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll by Alvaro Mutis
Mark Twain was a racist. Just read Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. He was a man of his time, so let's leave him there. We don't need him. If you want adventure, or misadventure, read The Adventures and Misadventures of Maqroll, by Alvaro Mutis. It's one of my favorite books: sad, poetic, philosophical, and funny, with some of the best writing I've read. —Tommy Orange, 'There There'
11. The Ambassadors by Henry James
Instead: The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William L. Shirer
Several people described The Ambassadors by Henry James in such a way as to make me impatient to read it, but between those descriptions and my experience of the book lay a chasm of such yawningness that it will never be crossed. Alternatively, I recommend The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William L. Shirer. I suspect that contemporary readers feel no great urge to pick it up because—in a way that doesn't happen with fiction—it has been rendered somewhat obsolete by more recent books on the subject. It's actually still as gripping as any literary classic. —Geoff Dyer, 'White Sands'
12. The Bible
Instead: The Notebook by Agota Kristof
The Holy Bible is rated very highly by all the people who supposedly live by it but who in actuality have not read it. Those who have read it know there are some good parts, but overall it is certainly not the finest thing that man has ever produced. It is repetitive, self-contradictory, sententious, foolish, and even at times ill-intentioned. If the thing you heard was good about the Bible was the nasty bits, then I propose Agota Kristof's The Notebook, a marvelous tale of two brothers who have to get along when things get rough. The subtlety and cruelty of this story is like that famous sword stroke (from below the boat) that plunged upward through the bowels, the lungs, and the throat and into the brain of the rower. —Jesse Ball, 'Census'
13. Franny and Zooey by J. D. Salinger
Instead: Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather
I loved all of Salinger's books when I was young, but now I feel that they're shallow. It's not that Salinger isn't a very accomplished writer, but there's a sort of slick, brittle, midcentury veneer to his work. It's very polished and not very profound. With Franny and Zooey, there's some Buddhist-y stuff in there, and there's stuff about being disenchanted and the real world around you seeming fake, but is that really profound? Instead I'd recommend a hidden gem, Cather's Death Comes for the Archbishop. Cather is a beautiful writer. She's very unfashionable, and I love that about her. Death Comes for the Archbishop is about a priest in what I'm pretty sure is Santa Fe. And it's incredibly calm and contemplative and open. It's the opposite of the kind of glossy, slick New York narrative. When you read it, it's like having a spiritual experience. It's not too long, and it's not effortful. —Claire Messud, 'The Burning Girl'
14. The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien
Instead: Earthsea Series by Ursula K. Le Guin
I liked The Hobbit. A lot. But while Tolkien's Lord of the Rings books are influential as exercises in world building, as novels they are barely readable. It never seemed to me that Tolkien cared about his story as much as he cared about rendering, in minute detail, the world he built. Why not instead read Ursula K. Le Guin's magnificent (and as beautifully rendered) stories and novels surrounding Earthsea? Le Guin captures the world of Earthsea through a powerful, dark, gorgeous kind of storytelling that is irresistible. Perhaps Le Guin's work—along with an entire universe of fantasy fiction—wouldn't have been possible without Tolkien's influence behind it, but in its time, Le Guin's books are more influential and make for better reading. —Manuel Gonzales, 'The Regional Office Is Under Attack!'
15. Dracula by Bram Stoker
Instead: Angels by Denis Johnson
Gothic-horror classics like Dracula and Frankenstein always leave me cold. If you want to read a truly terrifying literary gem, try Johnson's Angels. It unspools as a sort of nightmare that begins on a Greyhound bus. Poor Jamie grew up in West Virginia and leaves her abusive husband back in their trailer when she runs off with her two small children. On that fateful Greyhound bus she meets Bill Houston, who's done everything bad except kill someone, although by the end of the book he will have done it all. —Matthew Klam, 'Who Is Rich?'
16. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Instead: The American Granddaughter by Inaam Kachachi
I never could get into Joseph Heller's Catch-22. It fails to capture the absurdities and impossible conflicts of war. However, one of the most arresting novels I've read about war is Kachachi's The American Granddaughter. Set at the beginning of the Iraq war, this book tells the story of Zeina, an Iraqi-American who signs up to be an interpreter for the U.S. Army and finds herself stationed in her hometown of Baghdad, where she must hide her work from her formidable grandmother. What follows is a thoughtful, nuanced, and often uproariously funny meditation on war in the 21st century. —Emily Robbins, 'A Word for Love'
17. Life by Keith Richards
Instead: The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard
I've nodded along—or maybe plain lied in agreement—when people extol Keith Richards's memoir, Life. Richards's cockiness and conceit about the wrong things jars; it's a book that somehow makes me sympathize with Mick Jagger. I'd rather read The Worst Journey in the World, a memoir in which the author spends no time at all trying to convince the reader of his own greatness. Quite the opposite. In 1910, a 24-year-old Cherry-Garrard joined a British expedition to the South Pole. As the title of his book hints, it didn't go well. Their leader, Captain Scott, was beaten to the Pole by a Norwegian explorer, and those who reached the Pole died on their return. Keith Richards suddenly looks very petty. —Chris Heath, GQ correspondent
18. Freedom by Jonathan Franzen
Instead: Too Loud a Solitude by Bohumil Hrabal
Freedom is intolerably boring. The risks of frustration and asphyxiation while reading in bed are equally high with this huge, much vaunted American über-tome. But freedom is at the heart of this tiny Czech novel, Too Loud a Solitude. In around a hundred pages, it tells the story of Hanta, who has found wisdom in his job, compressing paper and books in a totalitarian state. The jokes are funny, and the stories lead us to ever richer revelations. The book is over almost before it has begun. —Richard Flanagan, 'The Narrow Road to the Deep North'
19. Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon
Instead: Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon
When young Thomas Pynchon was writing Gravity's Rainbow, he was fixated on the Big Things (punishingly boring and confusing things) of a Big World War II Novel that would announce him as a Big American Writer in 1973. Fortunately for us, nearly four decades later he brought us his recollections of everything else that was swirling around him back then. The world Pynchon conjures in Inherent Vice (published in 2009) is the world he himself was living in while writing Gravity's Rainbow, when he was shacked up in a small apartment in the real-life Gordita Beach. Inherent Vice is where you should start if you want to dine on a small plate of Pynchon's stuff instead of a potluck platter. —Daniel Riley, GQ features editor
20. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
Instead: Veronica by Mary Gaitskill
When men on dating apps list a book, they invariably list Slaughterhouse-Five. I'd rather not get a drink with a person who's taking his cues from Vonnegut: The few women in Slaughterhouse-Five die early, are porn stars, or are “bitchy flibbertigibbets.” Instead, read Gaitskill's Veronica, in which emotions are so present and sensory they almost hold a physical weight. Gaitskill understands how you can sense a loved one's mood radiating from the next room as clearly as rain out the window. This empathy drives her characters closer to cruelty than to kindness. —Nadja Spiegelman, 'I'm Supposed to Protect You from All This'
21. Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift
Instead: The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne
Why Swift's dreary satire is routinely inflicted on high school English classes is a mystery to me. Tristram Shandy at least has the virtue of occasionally being funny. It's also deeply weird: postmodern 200 years before postmodernism, with a deeply unreliable narrator, typographic trickery (a death early in the book is followed by a solid-black page), and a list of character names that would make Pynchon jealous (Dr. Slop, Billy Le Fever, and a certain Hafen Slawkenbergius). It is an important achievement in the history of the novel, a reminder that literature is an ongoing experiment—which means you should treat it like Don Quixote and read the first half before calling it a day. One can admire the pyramids without feeling the need to scale them. —Christopher Cox, GQ executive editor
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This story originally appeared in the May 2018 issue with the title "21 Books You Don't Have to Read Before You Die"
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21 Mixed-Race Historical Figures You Thought Were White
21 Mixed-Race Historical Figures You Thought Were White
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886019)
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Date: April 21st, 2018 2:19 AM Author: Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo
While Jim, the affable slave friend of Huck Finn, exclaims things like “Lawsy, I's mighty glad…,” Frederick Douglass makes observations like “I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land.” You were saying, Mr. Twain?
Ohhhhhhh! She got Twain good! These people are literally delusional - she's implying that just because the book didn't focus on the horrors of slavery that Twain is denying those horrors existed.....
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886862) |
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Date: April 21st, 2018 2:21 AM Author: Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo
The odds are zero - I haven't met a single person who's attempted Catch 22 who didn't find it belly-laugh inducing hilarious.
But I'm sure the "story of Zeina, an Iraqi-American who signs up to be an interpreter for the U.S. Army and finds herself stationed in her hometown of Baghdad, where she must hide her work from her formidable grandmother" is a riot.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886865)
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Date: April 20th, 2018 10:49 PM Author: cream lettuce kitchen
I have never been able to fathom why The Catcher in the Rye is such a canonical novel. I read it because everyone else in school was reading it but thought it was totally silly. Now, looking back, I find that it is without any literary merit whatsoever. Why waste adolescents' time? Alternatively, I'd suggest Olivia, the story of a British teenage girl who is sent to a boarding school in France. It is short and written in a kind of levelheaded and deceptively straightforward style. Olivia eventually falls in love with her teacher Mademoiselle Julie T, who in turn, and without reciprocating that love out loud, is equally in love with Olivia. Julie never takes a wrong step, but there are signs for those who know how to read them. I read Olivia many, many times, bought it for many of my friends, and consider it the inspiration for Call Me by Your Name. —André Aciman, 'Call Me by Your Name'
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damn, that's like my 2nd fav book. salinger is 180
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886058) |
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Date: April 21st, 2018 2:25 AM Author: Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo
"the story of a British teenage girl who is sent to a boarding school in France"
Andre - you're gay we get it. His parents owned a knitting factory and I'm sure he knitted while reading Olivia, the story of a British teenage girl who is sent to boarding school in France, multiple times over. While knitting and fantasizing about being a British teenage girl.
"Aciman was born in Alexandria, Egypt, the son of Regine and Henri N. Aciman, who owned a knitting factory.[12][13][14] His mother was deaf.[15] Aciman was raised in a French-speaking home where family members also spoke Italian, Greek, Ladino, and Arabic.[7]
His parents were Sephardic Jews, of Turkish and Italian origin, from families that had settled in Alexandria in 1905" - odd case
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886876) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 10:53 PM Author: Primrose mind-boggling cuckoldry
hay, don't read the bible, which is, for better or worse, one of the key texts of all of western civilization
ignore all of that shit and focus on a marvelous tale of two brothers who have to get along when things get rough
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886077) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 11:00 PM Author: cream lettuce kitchen
"Also, William Shakespeare. I mean, really, is he even that good? Zoya Jackson's play, 'the african whore,' follows in similar line to 'the merchant of venice,' and, quite frankly, is superior in its characters, plot, and dialogue. I remember reading Shakespeare in school and thinking 'wow, i'd rather be smoking weed,' but with Zoya's recent rendition, I find myself thinking, 'wow, i'd like to see this play in the theatre, and i'd like Zoya's autograph as well because she's amazing!"
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886121) |
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Date: April 21st, 2018 12:40 AM Author: Dashing Black Senate
you laugh, but give it 10 more years.
10 years ago, could anyone imagine the ABOVE list? or that libs would SERIOUSLY be calling for the razing of George Washington statues?
this is the propaganda game they play. it's a jewish plot to *keep the pressure on*, incrementally, relentlessly moving us further afield into looney land, never letting you re-establish your bearings.
see: Cass Sunstein's 'Nudge' concept.
ABN = Alway Be Nudging.
this is how (((they))) operate. NUDGE, NUDGE, NUDGE.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886575) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 11:03 PM Author: Painfully honest vibrant box office
The winner for most audacious, retarded shitlibbery goes to:
If the thing you heard was good about the Bible was the nasty bits, then I propose Agota Kristof's The Notebook, a marvelous tale of two brothers who have to get along when things get rough.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886139) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 11:15 PM Author: Fragrant station quadroon
"I never could get into Joseph Heller's Catch-22. It fails to capture the absurdities and impossible conflicts of war."
The book literally introduced a phrase to the modern lexicon that captures absurd, impossible conflicts.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886215) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 11:19 PM Author: burgundy factory reset button
"Mark Twain was a racist. Just read Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. He was a man of his time, so let's leave him there. We don't need him."
LMFAO
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886236) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 11:25 PM Author: Bipolar Deranged Space Coffee Pot
12. The Bible
Instead: The Notebook
Lmao
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886267) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 11:30 PM Author: Dashing Black Senate
just... what the fuck?
a men's magazine makes a list of books that are 'bad' because they are too 'masculine'?
i'm just... at a loss at this point. where are we going here? we are now committed to the premise that men should be *less* male? and women are all BADASSES?
has anyone stopped to note the reasoning behind any of this?
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886287) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 11:33 PM Author: Spectacular double fault french chef
obviously this is mostly nonsense but some of the takes are correct; The Alchemist sucks, 'Freedom' sucks, 'Inherent Vice' is better than 'Gravity's Rainbow' and Blood Meridian is massively overrated (and so is McCarthy in general).
I am a little confused as to why Geoff Dyer thinks "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" is at all a substitute for "The Ambassadors". Is he a Boomer old? "Literary fiction is boring, let's read this Rommel biography!"
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886298) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 11:42 PM Author: Startling aromatic jap indian lodge
12. The Bible
Instead: The Notebook by Agota Kristof
The Holy Bible is rated very highly by all the people who supposedly live by it but who in actuality have not read it. Those who have read it know there are some good parts, but overall it is certainly not the finest thing that man has ever produced. It is repetitive, self-contradictory, sententious, foolish, and even at times ill-intentioned. If the thing you heard was good about the Bible was the nasty bits, then I propose Agota Kristof's The Notebook, a marvelous tale of two brothers who have to get along when things get rough. The subtlety and cruelty of this story is like that famous sword stroke (from below the boat) that plunged upward through the bowels, the lungs, and the throat and into the brain of the rower. —Jesse Ball, 'Census'
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886357) |
Date: April 20th, 2018 11:47 PM Author: Bearded pozpig rigpig
White Men Are Mad That This ‘GQ’ List Dismisses Books By White Men
BY TAYLOR BRYANT · APRIL 20, 2018
White Men Are Mad That This ‘GQ’ List Dismisses Books By White Men
Yesterday, GQ published an article titled “21 Books You Don’t Have To Read.” In it, the editors, along with many acclaimed authors, compiled a list of works they think are overrated and should be, if not struck from the canon, at least passed over in favor of other often overlooked, but excellent works.
Now, because some of the books GQ insists "you don't have to read" include Catcher in the Rye, The Alchemist, A Farewell to Arms, The Lord of the Rings, and Catch-22, and those books are very near and dear to many, some controversy was bound to ensue. But because all 21 of those books were written by men, and overwhelmingly white men at that, the controversy was particularly whiny, because, well: white men. They like to whine.
Not going to link to this GQ piece about 21 classic books you can skip (here's a suggestion: READ THEM), but I am going to gently suggest that the person who wrote this sentence not write about books again. Ever, please. pic.twitter.com/7zZJE0Wzn0
— Mark Harris (@MarkHarrisNYC) April 20, 2018
The whole point of GQ magazine was supposed to be to help guys become more like Hemingway, not to replace him with the latest chick lit. WTF is wrong with you people?
— Ricky Velasquez (@QueenMengerKarl) April 20, 2018
Ironically, the books that are replacing those that "you don't have to read" are also overwhelmingly by... white men. While there are more women authors included, those women are also mostly white. In fact, Frederick Douglass is the only black person listed and there is not one black woman or Asian author in the mix.
So while those whining white dudes should definitely try picking up some James Baldwin or Toni Morrison or Audre Lorde or Amy Tan, so should the writers who GQ's editors polled—as well as the editors themselves. They might learn something in the process.
https://nylon.com/articles/gq-books-dont-have-to-read-white-men?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=nylon
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886376) |
Date: April 21st, 2018 12:23 AM Author: razzle-dazzle aggressive shrine multi-billionaire
hey hey ho ho
western civ has got to go!
[100 years later]
fuck why did we piss away 2500 of wisdom?
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886519) |
Date: April 21st, 2018 2:05 AM Author: Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo
I actually love Lonesome Dove, but I'm convinced that the cowboy mythos, with its rigid masculine emotional landscape, glorification of guns and destruction, and misogynistic gender roles, is a major factor in the degradation of America. Rather than perpetuate this myth, I'd love for everyone, but particularly American men, to read The Mountain Lion by Jean Stafford. It's a wicked, brilliant, dark book set largely on a ranch in Colorado, but it acts in many ways as a strong rebuttal to all the old toxic western stereotypes we all need to explode.
-------
Is this satire? If not these people are a scourge on the earth - but seriously look what this paragraph implies. "I actually love Lonesome Dove" but.....
Translation: I'm smart enough to appreciate this great book but the common person, whom I stick up for politically, is not and will be negatively influenced by these stereotypes.
There are some great books on that list - authors should kill themselves if not satire.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886822) |
Date: April 21st, 2018 2:15 AM Author: Bat-shit-crazy chocolate plaza water buffalo
MORE STORIES LIKE THIS ONE
Not Every Gay Man Is DTF
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886849)
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Date: April 21st, 2018 2:18 AM Author: Dashing Black Senate
down with christian bible, down with manhood, down with white/european culture!
up with homosex!
kill these ppl
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35886860) |
Date: April 21st, 2018 8:03 AM Author: beady-eyed goal in life
12. The Bible
Instead: The Notebook by Agota Kristof
This is Onion level stuff.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35887289) |
Date: April 21st, 2018 8:38 AM Author: sinister vengeful indirect expression
The worst crime committed by Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is that it makes first-time Twain readers think Twain wrote tedious, meandering stories. He did, as is evidenced by this, his book of tedious, meandering stories—but he also wrote a lot of richly entertaining meandering stories that are not constrained by the ham-fisted narration of a fictional backcountry child or suffused with his sweaty imitation of a slave talking. Alternatively, read Frederick Douglass's firsthand account of slavery, which is equal parts shocking and heartbreaking. It's also an invigorating revenge story: Douglass identifies slave owners by name and hometown, detailing their crimes with such specificity that their descendants will be embarrassed forever. While Jim, the affable slave friend of Huck Finn, exclaims things like “Lawsy, I's mighty glad…,” Frederick Douglass makes observations like “I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land.” You were saying, Mr. Twain?
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35887360) |
Date: April 21st, 2018 10:14 AM Author: Big-titted Associate Round Eye
LJL:
The worst crime committed by Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is that it makes first-time Twain readers think Twain wrote tedious, meandering stories. He did, as is evidenced by this, his book of tedious, meandering stories—but he also wrote a lot of richly entertaining meandering stories that are not constrained by the ham-fisted narration of a fictional backcountry child or suffused with his sweaty imitation of a slave talking. Alternatively, read Frederick Douglass's firsthand account of slavery, which is equal parts shocking and heartbreaking. It's also an invigorating revenge story: Douglass identifies slave owners by name and hometown, detailing their crimes with such specificity that their descendants will be embarrassed forever. While Jim, the affable slave friend of Huck Finn, exclaims things like “Lawsy, I's mighty glad…,” Frederick Douglass makes observations like “I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land.” You were saying, Mr. Twain? —Caity Weaver, GQ writer and editor
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35887650) |
Date: April 21st, 2018 10:39 AM Author: Brilliant bateful location
as usual, xo is angry only because something white and male is being criticized
if this were a list of 20 books by female authors, for example, xo wouldn't give a shit. Or if the list were mixed. How predictable; I knew what the entire thread was going to be before I opened it.
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35887760) |
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Date: April 21st, 2018 11:37 AM Author: burgundy factory reset button
setting aside whether it would be possible to write those comparable lists, in the real world none of those groups are the targets of a public "THEY MUST GO!" campaign. lol @ bringing up xo's hypothetical lack of anger to an article tearing down Chicano lit (that you had to imagine because it obviously doesn't exist) as a point in your favor lmao.
anyway, do you agree with the spirit of the piece? essentially "they were men of their time, fuck them, we have nothing to learn from them". it kinda seems like insane and unhealthy fanaticism to me no matter who the targets are.
and lol how you have nothing to say about the article and immediately go after the identities of the other responders - so bored and tired of this standard evil shitlib tactic which seems drilled in your heads to the point of instinct now. every time: insane article gets written, staying quiet gets taken for acquiescence and something even more insane comes down the line next month. if any white men rise to the bait and say "this seems insane" nobody has to engage on substance and can just jeer at them for their "predictable" whiny white male tears. poor guys can't even bitch anonymously in a web 0.5 safe space without someone popping up to play this game!!
(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=3955424&forum_id=2#35888073) |
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