21st century Literature Recommendations

[kanafani]

The Guardian recently compiled a list of the 100 best books of the 21st century:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/ ... st-century

I don't read much recent fiction, so unsurprisingly I've only read one book from the list, and it's non-fiction (The Shock doctrine, which is excellent).

I'm looking for recommendations for 21 century literature from champs. I don't feel I can trust this list much (it's got Malcolm Gladwell on it, so how good can it be really?)

[pabs]

I've read from that list Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay and enjoyed it very much. Top stuff!

also:

Atonement, by Ian McEwan (EXCELLENT)
Sapiens, by Yuval Noah Harari (ENJOYED very much, even though I knew most of it already and didn't learn very much that was new, coz I'm a nerd).
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night‑Time by Mark Haddon was FUN, but ultimately a bit of a novelty and forgettable.


It'll be impossible to adapt the terrific The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay to film, I think. Maybe Wes Anderson can, but I think it'd be too hard for someone like him, too.

[mesnalty]

Yeah, not a great list, though from this list I particularly like Harvest, The Infatuations, Half of a Yellow Sun, and Austerlitz. Most of the titles in the top 35 or so are worthwhile.

[wba]

haven't heard of much from the list and read nothing of it.


21st century books which are personal favorites of mine:

Being John Malkovich (Charlie Kaufman, USA 2000)
Ich habe mit Antonin Artaud über Gott gesprochen (Sylvere Lotringer, Germany 2001) - at the center of this book is an older verbal dispute between the French author and Antonin Artaud's former psychiatrist Dr. Jacques Latrémolière
Kar "Snow" (Orhan Pamuk, Turkey 2002)
Fundbüro (Siegfried Lenz, Germany 2003)
Lunar Park (Bret Easton Ellis, USA 2005)
Geschichten vom Kino (Alexander Kluge, Germany 2007)
Schweigeminute (Siegfried Lenz, Germany 2008)

[brian d]

the only book i've read on there [edit: that i enjoyed] (out of maybe 5) was the true history of the kelly gang. didn't like white teeth, amazing adventures of kavalier and clay, oryx and crake, not sure if i missed anything else. not surprising that 80% or so of the list is originally english-language, though i suppose it would be better than a list made in the us.

i don't read much contemporary literature but i'd probably have included some horacio castellanos moya (senselessness), josé eduardo agualusa (the book of chameleons), or josef winkler (natura morta).

[kanafani]

josé eduardo agualusa (the book of chameleons)

I've read that one! Probably saw it on one of your lists.

[nrh]

trying to cram fiction, non-fiction, poetry and comics all on one 100-book list is a really bizarre choice, especially since nobody involved seems to have much interest in the latter two categories. if you're going in that direction why no theater?

[kanafani]

trying to cram fiction, non-fiction, poetry and comics all on one 100-book list is a really bizarre choice, especially since nobody involved seems to have much interest in the latter two categories. if you're going in that direction why no theater?

NRH, give me some recommendations!!

[nrh]

reading a lot of work in translation kind of warps what i think of as 21st century but off the top of my head -

-the shape of a pocket and bento's sketchbook, john berger
-sergio pitol's memory trilogy, which started with art of flight ('95) and ends in magician of venice.
-ghachar ghochar by vivek shanbhag
-target in the night and the emilio renzi diaries by ricardo piglia
-the whole range of 21st century translated work from enrique vila-matas and patrick modiano
- human matter and severina by rodrigo rey rosa
- neutral hero by richard maxwell (the plays:1995-2000 was published in 2003 but i guess the work is from early so doesn't count? otherwise would pick that)
-lydia davis last few books of short stories
-songs of the dragons flying to heaven, young jean lee
-an elemental thing, eliot weinberger


feel like i'm forgetting a dozen things, just because i'm not at home looking at the bookshelf.

and for the hell of it, because they felt they needed a few token comics -
-peplum, blutch
-the gus books, christophe blain
-if and oof, brian chippendale
-no. 5, taiyo matsumoto
-arsene schrauwen by olivier schrauwen
-barrel of monkeys, ruppert & mulot
-the voyeurs, gabrielle bell
-gloriana, kevin huizenga
-travel, yuichi yokoyama
-susceptible, genevieve castree
-pretending is lying, dominique goblet

[Roscoe]

Really, Guardian? A list of the best 100 books of the 21st century that includes GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO, and WOLF HALL?

[karl]

The Guardian recently compiled a list of the 100 best books of the 21st century:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/ ... st-century

Hey, that Bechdel Test lady's on there. I'd forgotten about her, thanks for the reminder. Bechdel Test! That's hilarious!

Other than that, I'd also forgotten that Austerlitz was a 21st century book. And that Svetlana Alexievich is recommended for those interested in the post-Soviet experience of regular folk (note how many long for the Good Old Days). And someone mentioned Pamuk's Snow and I'd add Coetzee's Diary of a Bad Year: who knew that writer had a sense of humor? I used to read at least one book by each of the Nobel winners until that award went to the folk singer and so struck itself off that already very short list of current events worth paying attention to.

That's four, I'm sure there are several more - probably Ismail Kadare's written one or two good ones since 2000 - but nothing could convince me that the last 20 years have been anything but a literary desert. Certainly not the Guardian's silly list. But then the Guardian is a pretty silly rag.

[brian d]

probably Ismail Kadare's written one or two good ones since 2000

based on the two i've read (the successor and a girl in exile), he hasn't. shame considering how good he was in the 70s and 80s.

just a few others: the elephant's journey and death with interruptions (josé saramago), the people of paper (salvador plascencia), agapē agape (william gaddis), the long dry (cynan jones), the goddess chronicle (natsuo kirino).

[kanafani]

Thanks everyone! This is great. I'll be reading some of those real soon

[Roscoe]

Of the ones on the list I've read, the ones that made an impression were:

THE CONSTANT GARDENER
NEVER LET ME GO
ATONEMENT

I know I read THE CORRECTIONS, but now can't remember a thing about it, but that's Franzen for you.

[kanafani]

THE CONSTANT GARDENER
NEVER LET ME GO

I've read and liked other stuff from le Carré and Ishiguro, so those two should work!

[Curtis, baby]

The Guardian recently compiled a list of the 100 best books of the 21st century:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/ ... st-century

Hey, that Bechdel Test lady's on there. I'd forgotten about her, thanks for the reminder. Bechdel Test! That's hilarious!

Not exactly eager to "debate" this or anything like that, but I feel like it should mostly be incumbent on men to do the labour of explaining these sorts of things to other men, especially when they're as straightforward as this.

The Bechdel test is not supposed to be taken literally. Almost no one actually uses the Bechdel test to value (or disvalue) films, or to decide whether to watch them, or anything like that. The Bechdel test, even in Bechdel's writing, is not presented as some academic shorthand for judging films. A character in a comic says she only watches films which meet a certain criterion. It's just something a character says she does. The tendency to take an element of fiction from a woman's work and then judge it like you'd judge nonfiction (e.g. how you'd judge a 'test') is nothing new (see https://www.vox.com/culture/2017/12/12/ ... hort-story - Ctrl+F for "trivializing") but obviously bears addressing.

That being said, it has been used a test in practice, and so that's something to think about. But once again, not as an academic shorthand for judging a film. Using the Bechdel test on a single film is like testing a single person in the population for an STD: pretty inefficacious. Have you ever kept data on how many films you watch pass the Bechdel? And how many pass the Reverse Bechdel? Like for 1000 films maybe? Because that would be useful. Not to figure out whether men or women are more represented in film, as we all know the answer, but to at least help understand the extent to which the imbalance exist. Are films 2x likelier to fail the Bechdel than the Reverse Bechdel? Probably more. 5x? 10x? 50x? Do you have a clue? Do I? Does damn near anybody?

I guess the test is pretty hilarious if you:
a) already know the exact extent to which gender representation in film, both as a whole and as a medium you specifically consume, is imbalanced; or
b) don't care at all, and can't imagine why others do.

It's not a), and well, I would hope it's not b).

Also, pretty bizarre to refer to Bechdel as "that Bechdel test lady". I mean, like, that's almost comically verbose. Do you refer to Schrodinger as "that Schrodinger's cat guy" as well?

[grabmymask]

^^And Fun Home is a pretty good book too

[josiahmorgan11]

atonement is a really really good shout;
the age of surveillance capitalism is a really really great book from the guardian list;
i'm a huge fan of dennis cooper's the sluts, as well as god jr.
tusiata avia's poems are the best indigenous poetry coming out in the contemporary era

[Curtis, baby]

Not exactly eager to "debate" this or anything like that, but I feel like it should mostly be incumbent on men to do the labour of explaining these sorts of things to other men, especially when they're as straightforward as this.

Sorry, this sounds pretty obnoxious to me upon my rereading it. My apologies. I didn't mean to come across like some guy who thinks he's That Woke Dude who needs to mansplain feminism to everyone. Truthfully I get my ass served to me reality-check-wise regularly by the smart, progressive people with whom I surround myself, and for that I'm thankful. Anyway, I just meant to say in my OP, as something of an explanation for my going off on what is clearly a women's issue, that women in communities like this often have to do a lot to make the women's perspective heard, and men should do some of the labour when feasible, especially when the idea needing explication is more academically than personally sourced. IMO?

Anyway, cheers to all, no obnoxiousness intended

[Holymanm]

"21st century literature"... are we pretending like that's a real thing now

[thoxans]

that's my boy holymanm

[josiahmorgan11]

i actually highly recommend a few books by my friends who are in the process of rebelling against the idea of literature itself at the moment, most specifically...

grant maierhofer's INCREDIBLE peripatet: http://www.insidethecastle.org/peripatet/

[MrCarmady]

Not a huge fan of that Guardian list, which treats non-fiction and non-English language fiction as an afterthought, and generally is pretty safe.

This, I think, is a superior attempt to capture what's been great about this millennium's literary output.

http://www.vulture.com/2018/09/a-premat ... canon.html

In the last year I really fell in love with the Rachel Cusk novels though I still have the last book in the trilogy ahead of me, saving it as a treat.

[sally]

seconding
berger ♥
sebald
horacio castellanos moya
pitol
vila-matas

(although tbh i'd read anything nrh and brian recommend)

also i like the odd tokarczuk and mathias enard and jean philippe toussaint and anything cesar aira has written but actually genuine 21st century authors that didn't write before that....not so many

also i have read every terry pratchett ever and still find them hilarious, but god that guardian list is middle-class english cack, fingernails on blackboard excruciating

(and then there's my parochial interest in the locals, meaning british, which might not be as evocative for those off these damned isles - ben myers, max porter, will eaves, jack robinson/charles boyle

i used to try to read at least one book from the booker prize shortlist, but they were all AWFUL

[sally]

oh i forgot, the best book i read last year - tim etchells' endland

[kanafani]

seconding
berger ♥
sebald
horacio castellanos moya
pitol
vila-matas

(although tbh i'd read anything nrh and brian recommend)

also i like the odd tokarczuk and mathias enard and jean philippe toussaint and anything cesar aira has written but actually genuine 21st century authors that didn't write before that....not so many

also i have read every terry pratchett ever and still find them hilarious, but god that guardian list is middle-class english cack, fingernails on blackboard excruciating

(and then there's my parochial interest in the locals, meaning british, which might not be as evocative for those off these damned isles - ben myers, max porter, will eaves, jack robinson/charles boyle

i used to try to read at least one book from the booker prize shortlist, but they were all AWFUL

Oh thx for all these recommendations! I shall be looking into them in the coming months.

[sally]

Oh thx for all these recommendations! I shall be looking into them in the coming months.

would be really curious what you make of enard's compass, if you ever get to it.

[rischka]

and thx for reviving this thread so i can read bure's feminist rant again

[MrCarmady]

Also, pretty bizarre to refer to Bechdel as "that Bechdel test lady". I mean, like, that's almost comically verbose. Do you refer to Schrodinger as "that Schrodinger's cat guy" as well?

such a great finale

[sally]

and thx for reviving this thread so i can read bure's feminist rant again

amazingly have developed the ability to see the word bechdel and skip forward 400 posts