1. Who is/are your favourite author(s)?*
Have a bleedin guess
Actually if we can name more than one:
George Eliot, Jane Austen, Tolstoi, Salinger, Astrid Lindgren, Carson McCullers
2. And your least favourite?
If we're talking authors whom I've read, then probably that guy who wrote to worst book I've ever read, see question 5.
3. What is your preferred genre to read?
I don't read specific genres
4. What is/are the best book(s) you ever read?*
That is such a hard question because I find it hard to separate best from favourite. But anyway:
-Middlemarch for George Eliot's insight in people, her wisdom and tolerance, and her stunning intelligence
-War and Peace, and Anna Karenina by Tolstoi, because Anna Karenina is the most true to life book I've ever read and War and Peace is more flawed but also more rich in scope. Tolstoi is amazing at vividly describing very complex mental states that shouldn't be describable
- I read it long ago, but remember Hemingway's For Whom the Bell Tolls being basically flawless
-East of Eden maybe. I read it two years ago I think and it's still sinking in
-in terms of style, Under Milk Wood is my favourite thing
Also I'm reading In Search of Lost Time now and it may end up in that list, it's unlike anything I've ever read
5. And the worst?*
A book called Vita by some Dutch guy. It's about a girl who just wants to die (and she's called Vita, SO DEEP), no reason for her death wish is given, nothing interesting is done with it, it's just for random drama. And it's abysmally written. I don't know how it ends because I didn't finish it
6. Who do you believe gets more credit than they should as an author?
Dickens, and Marieke Lucas Rijneveld
7. What determines, generally, if you stop reading/lose interest in a book?
If it's really, really bad. Which is to say, it has neither beauty or insight in any form
8. Do you have a Kindle/reader and if not, do you ever intend to get one?
Nah, I love physical books and bookcases. I used to climb up the living room bookcase as a kid, I think the love started there
9. How large (approximately) is your book collection (to the nearest hundred, say)
See the bookshelf thread
10. What is the best line you ever read in a book?
There are so many great lines it's impossible to say, but (even though in terms of style it's not the best line I've ever read) this metaphor from Wives and Daughters is a line I think about a lot:
Quote:
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But after all, those were peaceful days compared to the present, when she, seeing the wrong side of the tapestry, after the wont of those who dwell in the same house with a plotter, became aware that Mrs. Gibson had totally changed her behaviour to Roger, from some cause unknown to Molly.
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Comparing the hidden ugly side of a scheming person to the back of tapestry is brilliant
If we're talking beautifully written lines then the opening lines of lolita, even though it's more than one:
Quote:
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Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta. She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock. She was Lola in slacks. She was Dolly at school. She was Dolores on the dotted line. But in my arms she was always Lolita.
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11. What is/are your favourite non-fiction book(s)? *
Probably Hardy's A Mathematician's Apology
12. What book(s) have you never read, but would like to?*
Let's read Das ****ing Kapital bitches