best book you've read

[GUT]

I don't think any non-aussies will have heard/read any John O'Grady who wrote a series of books looking at the Australian way of life, about the 60's.

Their a Weird mob
Cop This Lot
Aussie English

being just three, they were a good lighthearted read basically written from the point of view of an Italian immigrate coming to grips with the customs and language of a strange land.

[Amanda]

Travel & Customs..

Some of my favourite books are novels about travel & customs, especially those which are well-researched & have a factual base. Here are a few:

Burial Rites - Hannah Kent

Water Touching Stone - Eliot Pattison

God's Fool - Mark Slouka

Sky Burial - Xinran

Burnt Shadows - Kamila Shamsie

Amanda

[PaulB]

I much enjoyed
Augustus Carp, Esq. By Himself Being The Autobiography Of A Really Good Man
Diary of a Nobody
Anything by P.G. WOdehouse, but obviously the Jeeves and Blandings Castle books. And Ukridge.

Day of the Triffids has already been mentioned, but is classic science fiction (The Walking Dead is pretty much the same story, both begin in with the main character in hospital; in both the characters live in a fenced compound; and so on. The only difference is that one group are fighting killer plants, the other is fighting zombies).

As far as science fiction is concerned, at one time I liked pretty much all of Robert Sheckley's early work.

[Robert]

'Wuthering Heights' is tough to beat.

[Robert]

Saint-Exupery's stuff....Nietzsche....complete MR James ghost stories.

[Magpie]

Shakespeare's plays are not meant to be read by a bunch of bored, spotty teenagers. They're meant to be watched as a performance. My drama profs used to regularly curse the high school system for ruining Shakespeare for virtually everyone.

[GUT]

Shakespeare's plays are not meant to be read by a bunch of bored, spotty teenagers. They're meant to be watched as a performance. My drama profs used to regularly curse the high school system for ruining Shakespeare for virtually everyone.

That wisdom explains why they are professors. I never appreciated Shakespeare till way after school.

[Robert]

Yes, meant to be watched but in my case I have to read them before watching. Otherwise the unfamiliarity of the language, and sometimes the sheer speed of the line delivery, leaves me gradually losing touch with the play because I literally cannot understand it.

[Richard Dewar]

Favorite Books

"Metamorphosis" Kafka
"Crime and Punishment" Fydor Dostoyevsky
"Hunger" Knut Hamsun

[Cogidubnus]

Hi Robert

Yes, meant to be watched but in my case I have to read them before watching. Otherwise the unfamiliarity of the language, and sometimes the sheer speed of the line delivery, leaves me gradually losing touch with the play because I literally cannot understand it.

Isn't it curious how different human minds work?

In my case, (and I stress it's purely personal), I've found that truly understanding the plays is far more linked to watching them on stage rather than reading them...it was often the on-stage activity and body language that ameliorated the unfamiliarity of language...

Those I watched prior to reading, I tended to understand better...

All the best

Dave

[Robert]

Hi Dave

Well, I can see that watching the play first might be helpful. What I'm saying is, for me the reading would be essential at some point, unless I were to watch the play, say, six or seven times, preferably on video so that I can rewind it to get the bits that passed me by. You know how quickly they speak sometimes.

The interesting thing is that a man with a mega-huge vocabulary got ordinary people to turn up and watch his stuff.

[GUT]

Herself just bought me the new "Poirot" unfortunately unlikely to get to t til Christmas [damn work, but herself and bank manager insist], will try to remember to comment when I've read it.

[pinkmoon]

Half way through all the presidents men and it is absolutely gripping ten out of ten so far

[Cogidubnus]

All the President's Men

Hi Jason

Sadly in my case it's one of the ones which went...but the good news is that, now my den is almost complete, (well it IS complete except me and my computer aren't yet installed therein), I'll perhaps be able to replace it...It's a real corker isn't it?

Cheers

Dave

[pinkmoon]

Dave I'm amazed at the books content and to think that a serving president could have involved himself in such things is beyond believe the guy was light years ahead in the polls he would have been re-elected anyway there was no need for any of what went on