poplin's 999 challenge

I'm new to the challenge, but I just love the idea! I'm going to use my nine categories either to allow myself to delve deeper into favorite categories (Southern U.S. literature, prize-winning books) or to force myself to explore areas I tend not to visit as much (everything else!). I'm going to try not allow overlaps, but I will allow myself move books between categories is they fit more than one.

All books were read after January 1st, 2009.

And my categories are:

1. Female authors
2. Non-American/European authors
3. Southern U.S. authors
4. Nobel Prize winners
5. Authors who are new to me
6. Plays
7. Books written before 1900
8. Books written after 2000
9. Books from the "1001 Books To Read Before You Die" list

1. Female authors: I find that I read very little by female authors--easily less than 5% of my total reading. I know there are wonderful women writers out there, and I'm going to read them this year.

a. Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
b. Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather
c. Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
d. The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein
e. Bonjour Tristesse by Francoise Sagan
f. Passing by Nella Larsen
h. Under the Net by Iris Murdoch
i. Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion

2. Non-American/European authors/cultures: Similar to my male/female author split, I am very Western world-centric in my reading, and I would like to branch out here as well.

a. Shame by Salman Rushdie
b. The Autumn of the Patriarch by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
c. The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles
d. An Artist of the Floating World by Kazuo Ishiguro
e. Sputnik Sweetheart by Haruki Murakami
f. Cry, The Beloved Country by Alan Paton
g.
h.
i.

3. Southern U.S. authors: I've fallen in love lately with novels that depict the Southern U.S., particularly those that fall into the category of Southern Gothic. I intend to delve even deeper into the subject.

a. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
b. A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories by Flannery O'Connor
c. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers
d. The Optimist's Daughter by Eudora Welty
e.
f.
g.
h.
i.

4. Nobel Prize winners: Although I go out of my way to read the "greats" of fiction writing, I discovered that I've read relatively few Nobel Prize winning authors.

a. The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
b. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn
c. The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum by Heinrich Boll
d. Herzog by Saul Bellow
e. East of Eden by John Steinbeck
f.
g.
h.
i.

5. Pulitzer, Booker, Orange or PEN/Faulkner winners: I decided to switch *back* from "Authors who are new to me" to Pulitzer Prize winners (albeit expanding it to include Booker, Orange and PEN/Faulkner winners as well). The new author category was just too much of a cope-out; this is a challenge, after all!

a. Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner
b.
c.
d.
e.
f.
g.
h.
i.

6. Plays: I *never* read plays, but I intend to change that!

a. Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
b. A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen
c. Six Characters in Search of an Author by Luigi Pirandello
d.
e.
f.
g.
h.
i.

7. Books written before 1900: I admit, I'm often scared of 19th century and earlier works, but there's no time like the present to conquer my fear.

a. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
b. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
c. A Modest Proposal by Jonathan Swift
d. Daisy Miller by Henry James
e.
f.
g.
h.
i.

8. Books written after 2000: Just to keep me up-to-date with recent works.

a. Ignorance by Milan Kundera
b. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon
c. Life of Pi by Yann Martel
d.
e.
f.
g.
h.
i.

9. Angry Young Men: This is movement really intrigues me, so I decided to switch from "Books from the "1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die" list" (which, like author who are new to me, felt like a cope-out for me). If you're unclear about what the Angry Young Men movement was, here's the link to the Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angry_Young_Men

a. Saturday Night and Sunday Morning by Alan Sillitoe
b. Look Back In Anger by John Osborne
c.
d.
e.
f.
g.
h.
i.

If I may, I'd like to suggest Borden Deal and Robert Penn Warren for your Southern US Writer's category.

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Thank you for the recommendations! Robert Penn Warren was on my radar, but not Borden Deal--I will have to check both of them out.

My first addition to my first category: Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf.

To my great chagrin, this is my first Virginia Woolf book. Her writing style daunted me, but I since have made a resolution to read more female authors. I am very glad that I gave this book my all, because it is absolutely stunning. There is one particular storyline (involving a WWI veteran and his Italian wife) which touched and moved me more than anything I have read in recent memory--to the point tears actually came to my eyes. This is definitely a book that requires a reader's complete attention, and I moved much slower through it than through most books, but it was a thourghly enjoyable journey.

I think, unfortunately, my next book is going to fall back into my catch-all ninth category. I really need to push myself to branch out, as that is the whole point of the challenge.

One step forward, one step back: I finished a play (Waiting for Godot), but then I also finished a book than only fit into my catch-all category (The Leopard).

But at least now I'm working on one that fits into three of my categories (female authors, Southern U.S. and 1001 Books To Read Before You Die)!

It's been a while since I updated, so I've added three more: one to the Southern U.S. Authors category, and two to the Nobel Prize Winners category.

You have an impressive Challenge set out for yourself! Mrs. Dalloway is one of those books that reward persistence. She can write, can't she? If you liked Mrs. Dalloway you might enjoy The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton which is about a woman seeking to "marry well". It also rewards attentiveness with a beautiful use of language and an interesting heroine. It would fit both into your women authors and books written before 1900.

Well, I'm back to update my list! I changed my fifth category from "Pulitzer Prize winners" to "Authors who are new to me," for the reasons I have listed above.

I've also added five more books: Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates and If on a winter's night a traveler by Italo Calvino to "Authors who are new to me"; Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather and Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton to "Female authors"; and Shame by Salman Rushdie to "Non-American/European authors" (which, I admit, is a bit of a cheat since he has lived in England for decades--but I figured that the facts that he was born and at least partially raised in India, and that the book takes place in a pseudo-Pakistan, were enough for it to qualify).

I also shifted some books to my new category from my ninth category.

Message 16: I didn't ignore your advice, but unfortunately I happened to have Ethan Frome but not The House of Mirth laying around, so I thought it might make a good stand-in. :^) I'll get to The House of Mirth later this year!

I'm pleased because I haven't read Ethan Frome and now I can find out what you think to determine whether or not to read it.

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I loved it. It's a nice, quick read; I read it in a day and a half of only semi-dedicated reading. I was *supposed* to read it in English class in high school, and never did; to bad for my teenage self! It's a very beautiful and tragic love story, and I typically don't like books described as such. The most beautiful part about it, though, is the language; it perfectly captures a New England winter.

In other words, I highly recommend it!

Since my last update, I was able to add two books: The Music of Chance by Paul Auster to "Books from the '1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die' list" and The Optimist's Daughter by Eudora Welty to "Female authors".

Sadly, I read one book (The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka) that sadly does not seem to fit into any of my categories. Darn it!

I'm always trying to recommend All in the Timing by David Ives for plays - I know it's 14 plays in one book, but I promise that it's a much faster read than that (I believe they're all one-acts). The cover of the book is from Variations on Trotskey's Death which is exactly that - several versions of what might have been the events of Trotskey's death (the premise is that an encyclopaedia makes it back in time and Trotskey is able to read that he died 3 days after an ice pick was buried in the back of his skull - he then begins to obsess on why the article chose to omit the particulars as to the ice pick burial).

Each of the plays is rather funny, but outstanding in it's own right. Words, Words, Words is about chimps and typewriters and is righfully funny. If you're familiar with David Mamet at all, Speed the Play is hilarious (and true!). Mere Mortals shows construction workers sharing their true identities over lunch break. Even language is toyed with in Philip Glass Buys a Loaf of Bread (better read outloud).

I am a fan, but I promise David Ives is witty!

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stephmo, thank you so much for the recommendations! I'm not very well versed on playwrights, so any guidance is much appreciated. I checked out All in the Timing on Amazon, and though obviously longer than most plays, I don't think it's too much to bite off. :^)

I'll definitely check out your other recommendations as well; I'm pretty such I want to read something by Mamet, something by O'Neil, something by Albee and Rhinoceros, but I (clearly) haven't made much headway in that category yet!

I believe in Speed the Play, it's Speed the Plow (ha!), Glengarry Glen Ross and Sexual Perversity in Chicago...and I can't remember the 4th...

But Oleanna is really good if you want Mamet's great ability to give you characters that you really don't want to care about but really want to know what happens to them anyway.

Is The Metamorphosis really not on the list of 1001 books to read before you kick it? What an omission.

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I'm 99.9% sure that it isn't, and I agree--what an omission! But, although the list is a wonderful reference, it is far from perfect; they left off a LOT of wonderful stuff.

I've finally updated my categories, and added six new titles:

The Autumn of the Patriarch by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles and An Artist of the Floating World by Kazuo Ishiguro to the "Non-American/European authors" category; The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain and Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll to the "Books written before 1900" category; and Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs to the "Authors who are new to me" category.

I feel somewhat itchy about adding The Sheltering Sky and An Artist of the Floating World to the "Non-American/European authors" category. Paul Bowles was an American, even though he lived in Northern Africa while writing The Sheltering Sky (and for the rest of his life) and the novel takes place there. Similarly, though Ishiguro was born in Japan, he moved to Britain when he was four and has lived there ever since--but An Artist of the Floating World takes place in Japan!

I'll probably move these to another category (or remove them) if I am able to otherwise fill the category. What do you guys think: are these kosher additions?

Your categories, your choices. A couple of thoughts, since you asked for them:
*If you call it "Non-American/European CULTURES" you can avoid worrying about author origin/location at all, and have a rule that at minimum the author has to have experienced the culture, bonus points for growing up in it.
* Not knowing the biographies of Bowles and Ishiguro, I'd say the latter still has a very strong case. I'm guessing it's likely Bowles came to Northern Africa as an adult/outsider. And I'm guessing Ishiguro was living with Japanese parents in Britain, which made him a bit of an outsider there for all he arrived at the age of four. Of course, I could be completely wrong....

ReneeMarie:

Thank you for your suggestion! I amended the category to "Non-American/European authors/cultures" (just to add in even more slashes!). I'm making good progress, and I hope to be able to change it back to just authors in good conscience; however, your solution makes a lot of sense for right now.

Well, I think I'm making rather good progress! I've read 35 Challenge-qualifying books so far this year, which puts me about 5 books ahead of schedule to complete the challenge by 9/9/09.

Here are my latest additions:

The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas by Gertrude Stein, Bonjour Tristesse by Francoise Sagan and Passing by Nella Larsen to "Female Authors"; The Thirty-Nine Steps by Paul Buchan to "Authors who are new to me"; A Doll's House by Henrik Ibsen to "Plays"; and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon to "Books written after 2000"