UPDATE: 4046 44 books are currently in the queue and 1446 pages of finished books. (02/19/05) Also, yes, I understand that "pages" sucks as a counter - for example Pattern Recognition was about 75 pages longer than F/32 but the latter had more words and took longer. Oh well, I'm not going back to estimating words in a book, I don't care that much. Yet.
Another thing I don't keep track of is how much I listen to the CDs which I do purchase (and have purchased.) This would be easy to do if all of my listening was at my computer from digital music... but that's so far from the case that it's ridiculous (and music listened to while at my computer is a non-representative subset of what I listen to that I can't just project from what data I do have)... but this is not what I was starting to discuss.
I was inspired by this post from the (possibly) soon to be renamed Waffle-Like Silicon Waffle House:
Keeping track of Books Bought and Books Actually Read .... [and] not allowing myself to buy new books (with few exceptions), thus forcing me to read the ones I already have. This could be combined with another gimmick, say, starting from authors beginning with A and seeing how far I get.
My first response was that it's impossible to not buy new books in order to force yourself to read the ones you have in the queue (or, at least, it is impossible for me to do that because I have self-discipline.) I love browsing bookstores (especially used bookstores) as much as I love browsing CD stores (especially used CD stores)... but inevitably I end up wanting to buy a few souvenirs... I mean, what fun is it to just find F/32 if you can't take it home with you? to commemorate the event? Then I decided that... well, it might be worth a try anyway. Or, rather, making overtures in that direction should produce more results than just hoping for the best... thus I shall list, for all to laugh at, my queue.
This list is going to be all fiction (including dramatic fiction, i.e. plays) mainly because that's the brunt of my reading.
For plays I'm only going to include books with a single play... I'm not going to, for example, list plays in Six Plays of Strindberg I have yet to get to; there are a number of collections like this that I'm cycling through non-linearly... which makes tracking difficult.
I also read a lot of poetry but it's more difficult to deal with. Also there are about 9 books of poetry that I'm semi-actively reading through (cycling through non-linearly) and a few others I haven't started. I'm not going to include philosophical or religious texts because I'm not going to. I'm not going to include Durant's Story of Civilization series but I am going to keep soldiering on through. I'm not going to include any other historical partially because there are almost none and partially just because. I'm not going to include anything else because that's all I can think of.
Let's see, I just finished Autobiography of Red by Anne Carson so that doesn't need to be here and I have no in-process novels. I'm in the middle of 60 Stories by Donald Barthleme and The Eye of the Sibyl (Vol 5 of the Collected Stories) of Philip K. Dick but I'm not going to read them straight through like novels (the same holds true for the short story collections that made it on the list.)
Yikes. Oh, well. Here goes nothing:
Acker, Kathy: Don Quixote - I've read two books by her (Empire of the Senseless; Blood and Guts in High School) and like both. I don't see her stuff used very often so I tend to pick it up when I do.
same: Great Expectations - (continued from above:) Hence two books from that same auther where neither is exceedingly high in the queue. Other than alphabetically, that is.
Barthleme, Donald: The Dead Father
same: The King
Calvino, Italo: The Baron in the Trees
Cervantes: Don Quixote - Bought at the same time as Acker's take-off. It's very long.
Conrad, Joseph: Lord Jim
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor: The Idiot - I've come a long ways from reading one chapter of Crime and Punishment for senior (high school) English.
Eco, Umberto: Foucault's Pendulum - This was recommended to me (sort of) like 8 years ago when I jokingly wrote a rather paranoiac analysis of the lyrics of Dream Theater. This book isn't mine; a friend loaned it to me... uhh... a year ago (to the day.)
Erudice: F/32 - OK, fine, I didn't find this in a used bookstore; I bought it on eBay for about $4 (all told) which still shocked me... I didn't expect to find this. Ever. I've been on the notification list at Powell's for this one for a while but I had started to doubt that there were enough copies out there for that to yield anything. Also I forget why, exactly, I wanted this one - that is to say where I got it in my head that I needed to read this. I finished this while camping and went fairly directly into the Gibson. This book was, well, odd. This is one reason I wanted to read it. Anyway the bit with Jessey Norman was just sublime.
Faulkner, William: Soldiers' Pay - My favorite author, hands down.
same: The Reivers
same: The Hamlet
Fitzgerald, F. Scott: The Short Stories of... - Almost 800 pages yet still only a collection.
Fo, Dario: Johan Padan and the Discovery of the Americas - I think I have one or two remaining in a separate book of plays that I'll read before getting to this one.
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von: The Sorrows of Young Werther - his plays are good.
same: Egmont - did I mention that I adore Iphigenia auf Tauris?
Ionesco, Eugene: Killing Game - Of the books on this list this may be the one I've had the longest. I've read a lot of Ionesco, have not yet gotten to this one (duh.)
Joyce, James: Finnegan's Wake - I also have A Shorter Finnegan's Wake as edited by Anthony Burgess. I'm going to read this book.
Lem, Stanislaw: The Star Diaries
Mamet, David: The Cryptogram
Nabokov, Vladimir: Bend Sinister
same: Ada
Proust, Marcel: Swann's Way - I figured eventually I need to get to A la recherche du temps perdu ... but not in French.
Rand, Ayn: Atlas Shrugged - OK, I hated We the Living but... I don't know how to finish that sentence.
Robinson, Kim Stanley: The Years of Rice and Salt - He has a newer one that I, surprisingly, have not yet bought (because I haven't started this one.)
Rowling, J. K.: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - I haven't read any of these books. And I've only seen one of the movies (the 2nd one, because my sister had seen the first one and was kind enough to stick around while I was drugged up after having my last wisdom teeth out. I may read the first one first, I may not read any of them; occasionally it's nice to rip right through a long book - which is what I expect here.
Shaw, Bernard: Man and Superman - I haven't read any Shaw. There, I've admitted it.
Steinbeck, John: The Grapes of Wrath - I have, however, read Steinbeck. Just not this one.
Stephenson, Neal: The Confusion - Speaking of ripping right through a long book.... Just borrowed this one (from the same guy I got the Eco from - yes, he's willing to loan me another book) and this is the next one I'm going to start. Then, eventually, someone else will loan me The System of the World or, who knows, I could give in and buy it myself. Only having read the first one of the cycle I'm figuring that it all could easily be considered one 2700 page book; we'll see how that turns out. Eventually. I predict I'll be done with this one before the new moon.- Wow. I do need a break before I go and get The System of the World but.... Anyway F/32 is next.
Sturgeon, Theodore: The Cosmic Rape - I need to go back to Ellison's intro to Angry Candy (which was better than any of the shorts) and see what other sci-fi authors he lamented. The two Alfred Bester novels I read were necessary and I liked the first Strugeon novel I read. Here's another.
same: Starshine - And here's some short stories.
Queneau, Raymond: Zazie in the Metro - Louis Malle directed a film adaptation of this book. I haven't seen any Malle. There, I've said it. As much as I'd like to end this little note on that I don't have any more Queneau in the queue so I need this space to say that Queneau is an odd one.
Welsh, Irvine: Filth
Welsh, Irivine: Marabou Stork Nightmares - Trainspotting was brilliant, I tried to start... I think this one. Several years ago. I need to try these again.
Woolf, Virginia: Jacob's Room - I bought this one to get The Waves (two novels in one volume.) Now I'm trying to figure out if I liked that one more than To the Lighthouse. Her prose is just gorgeous... Nabokov (when he tries for that sort of thing) and Faulkner are the only I know that are in the same class.
same: Orlando
same: A Haunted House and Other Short Stories - I've actualy read 3 (of 18) so this could count as in-process (along with the Dick and Barthelme.)
Wright, Richard: Native Son
Aldiss, Brian: Supertoys Last All Summer Long and other stories of Future time - short stories, so I guess it doesn't belong here... but it still was a lapse so I guess here it goes. OK, this is how this works. I can't count the Dick because I started reading it before the new year. This, however, will all be read in 2005 (assuming I finish it this year.) OK? Also I'm using this purple-ish bit for new comments on books I've yet to finish.
Burgess, Anthony: A Dead Man in Deptford
Card, Orson Scott: Shadow Puppets
Egan, Greg: Diaspora
Gibson, William: Pattern Recognition - yes, I eventually broke. Sheesh. Done. Less than seven days, this one. See comments in their own entry on 02/19/05. I don't know what's next.
Lawrence, D.H.: The Complete Short Stories (volume 2)
Mamet, David: Wilson
Now what I'd really want would be for the massive readership of this blog to comment upon these works; which one's should head the list, which ones I should not bother with, what's missing, how long I you think I can hold out before breaking (I did recently receive a $20 gift certificate to Bookmaster so there'll be more to add to the list, plus eventually I'll really break and get Gibson's Pattern Recognition) that sort of thing. Not that I'll listen, mind you, I just think it'd be interesting. I wonder if there's a way to turn on comments after posting. *UPDATE: Yes, yes there is. Unfortunately this also means all the old posts now have comments turned on; this was not supposed to happen and I don't know how to get rid of them. Then again I doubt the traffic here would call for spam.*
Also: This color means I have yet to read the book, let's say I'll use mauve (or whatever that is) for what I've finished and green for short comments on what I thought (longer comments will have their own blog post, presumably.)
UPDATE: D'oh. I lasted, what, a dozen days? On two days during the second full week of JanuaryI bought 7 more books. I had not finished a single book on my list and I went out and got more. And not even using the gift certificate (I stayed closer to home at less well stocked bookstores.) Alas, they are listed in a new alphabetical block after the main one. I can only assume that I'll do the same for the results of further lapses.
