5 ms·
I love old Best Sellers. Don't think that article was real helpful in listing any. For example, pretty much everything by Michener is amazing, but nobody cares
by scottlocklin 6y ago
I love old Best Sellers. Don't think that article was real helpful in listing any.
For example, pretty much everything by Michener is amazing, but nobody cares about him any more. He's dismissed as some kind of trashy or middlebrow post WW-2 writer; maybe he was -but he's also almost always a lot of fun to read, and occasionally incredibly interesting.
The Bjorndal Saga by Trygve Gulbranssen is largely forgotten in the US (maybe less so in Norway), but won all kinds of presidential awards and was a big deal in its day. It's sort of like "The Leopard" which is less forgotten, since they made a decent movie out of it (probably the great Italian novel). Greater novel though, in my opinion.
Another one I picked up because of an interview with Jim Simons; Jan de Hartog's "the Captain" -so far so good; was a big deal back in its day; it's predecessor "Captain Jan" was important enough it figured into Holland's war story. Totally forgotten now in the anglosphere anyway, and I'd have never heard of it if it weren't for a one off statement by an important guy who could hardly remember the name himself.
Dennis Wheatley is another huge best seller from the Ian Fleming era of trash novels; loads of fun to read -vastly better than Fleming. Alas, the movies they made of his books were all "video nasties" rather than James Bond.
None of these are Nobel Prize in Literature tier books, they vary wildly in quality, but they're loads of fun to read now as they were back then. Books don't always need to be an exercise in self improvement.
- devindotcom 6y agoAs the article notes, this is just the introductory note for an upcoming series of posts discussing forgotten bestsellers. If you come back in two weeks, when the series has run its course, you ought to find quite a few listed: https://annotated.laphamsquarterly.org/page/forgotten-best-sellers https://annotated.laphamsquarterly.org/page/forgotten-best-s...
- folio 6y agoI'm a big fan of "fun to read" "trashy" novels. Raymond Chandler (author of the Philip Marlowe detective novels) once said that when he got stuck writing he would have a man come through a door with a gun in his hand.
- anarbadalov 6y agooh man, Wheatley. I read "The Devil Rides Out" on a bus when i ran away from home at fourteen. Brings back some memories. Probably would find it pretty hokey today.
- scottlocklin 6y agoIf you like Tom Baker and Sean Pertwee cheese, it will stand the test of time. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/dec/05/dennis-wheatley-devil-gentleman-review https://www.theguardian.com/books/2009/dec/05/dennis-wheatle...
- 082349872349872 6y agoMichener is the mundanes' Stephenson?
- ims 6y agoI randomly picked de Hartog's "The Captain" off the shelf while wandering through the stacks at my local library last year. It was a wonderful read, and the experience was a valuable reminder that serendipity can still be found in an age of Amazon shopping lists and infinite scroll ebook readers. Mechanically popping the next book off of my self-assigned queue rarely inspires the same sense of reading purely for curiosity or pleasure.