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The Klaw 100, part five.

Part one (#100-81)
Part two (#80-61)
Part three (#60-41)
Part four (#40-21)

I doubt there will be too many surprises here, as I’ve discussed most of these last twenty books somewhere before. The complete list of 100 is available as a spreadsheet at Google Spreadsheets. But don’t click now or you’ll spoil the top 20…

20. Red Harvest, by Dashiell Hammett. Dark and violent and completely gripping, Red Harvest was Hammett’s first novel and established the format of the hard-boiled detective novel with its sparse style and unblinking descriptions of bloodshed. It may have been the basis for Kurosawa’s Yojimbo as well.

19. Wuthering Heights, by Emily Brontë. Perhaps the archetype of the brooding male hero, although I kind of felt Heathcliff was just an asshole. It’s a tremendous story of anger, vengeance, and cruelty, unfolding in layers as one might peel back an onion. Also available in a much-beloved semaphore version.

18. If on a winter’s night a traveler, by Italo Calvino. If you love inventive or just plain weird books, this is for you. The subject of the novel is the reading of a novel. Alternating chapters show a dialogue between the Author and the Reader, interlaced with opening chapters from various fictional novels. Calvino, one of the great fabulists of the twentieth century, takes his inspired silliness to a new level.

17. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald. It’s all about the green light. Jay Gatsby’s ill-fated chase of the American Dream, set in the Jazz Age as the automobile begins to make its presence felt on our culture. It ranked first on the Radcliffe Publishing Course’s list of the top 100 novels of the 20th century, and second on the Modern Library’s own list.

16. The Good Soldier, by Ford Madox Ford. A classic English novel of betrayal, The Good Soldier describes a web of infidelities that destroys the lives of five people, with incredible dialogue and the powerful, recurring symbol of the human heart. I’m pretty sure that at $2.50 it’s the cheapest book on this list.

15. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter , by Carson McCullers. Full review. An amazing achievement of prose and of literary introspection. McCullers looks into the human soul and finds a lot of dusk, if not dark night.

14. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, by Haruki Murakami. Like stepping into a lucid dream, and indeed, the protagonist finds the line between reality and dreams blurring while searching for his wife, who has either left him or is being held against her will. You’ll have a hard time putting it down, although there is one scene of graphic torture that was tough to get through.

13. A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole. Ignatius J. Reilly with his dyspeptic valve is one of the great hero-antiheroes in American literature as he’s forced to get his lazy ass a job. The book was published posthumously after Toole’s suicide through the persistence of his mother, who is portrayed in an unflattering light in the book, and novelist Walker Percy; twelve years after Toole’s death, Confederacy won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction.

12. Tess of the d’Urbervilles, by Thomas Hardy. Hated it in high school … okay, that’s not fair, I hated the first twenty pages and rented the movie. I went back for a re-read 16 years later and saw what I’d missed: One of the greatest ironic novels I’ve ever read. It’s bleak in its portraits of English society and its strictures, of human emotions, and of fate, but Hardy (who also was a noted poet) writes beautifully and slips numerous bits of wordplay into the text.

11. The Woman in White, by Wilkie Collins. Collins, a protégé of Charles Dickens, believed that nothing in the novel was more important than the plot, and he wrote perhaps the first suspense novel in this story of mistaken identities, ghost sightings, and the unctuous, nefarious villain Count Fosco. Its use of multiple narrators was revolutionary for the time, and while it has the potential to be confusing, it’s critical for the way Collins wants to unfold the plot before the reader

10. Scoop, by Evelyn Waugh. Full review. A hilarious and absurd satire of the news media that was written in the 1930s but is just as relevant today, as a man who wants no part of the job becomes a foreign correspondent to an African state on the brink of civil war.

9. The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, by Henry Fielding. Fielding made his bones as a novelist by parodying Samuel Richardson’s Pamela with his own work, Shamela, and then moved to a broader satire with Joseph Andrews before stepping out with an entirely original work, the comic picaresque Tom Jones. The story is built around Jones’ romantic pursuit of the daughter of Squire Western, who is constantly trying to pair his daughter up with the villainous son of Jones’ foster parents. Along the way Jones is arrested, accosted, consorts with prostitutes, and runs into no end of conniving, selfish secondary characters.

8. One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel García Márquez. The history of Colombia told as the history of one family, with a heavy dose of magical realism and the sweeping feel of an epic despite the focus on individual characters. The Buendía family plays a role in the rise of the fictional town of Macondo until a banana plantation, owned by foreigners, arrives and triggers a lengthy and ultimately complete collapse.

7. Absalom, Absalom!, by William Faulkner. The history of the American South told as the history of one family, mostly limited to the decline of the region after the Civil War. Patriarch Thomas Sutpen builds his fortune, but sets the seeds for his family’s downfall through his greed and racism. Told in Faulkner’s usual style of multiple perspectives and winding prose.

6. Cry, the Beloved Country, by Alan Paton. The best book ever written about Africa was written by a white South African, decrying the country’s apartheid system while offering threads of hope for its future once the system is dismantled. Preacher Stephen Kumalo leaves his rural village to go to the city to help his dissolute sister, Gertrude, and find his son, named Absalom, who went to help Gertrude earlier but never returned and ends up in jail.

5. Beloved, by Toni Morrison. And here we have African-American history, dating back to their emancipation from slavery. Sethe and her daughter Denver are trying to establish a live for themselves as free women when a young woman, known simply as “Beloved,” arrives at the house. Is she the reincarnation of the child Sethe killed to keep her out of slavery? Sethe’s obsession with Beloved opens the door to a host of questions – are African-Americans held down by the weight of their past, or are they complicit in allowing their past to weigh them down? No one writing today does so with prose like Morrison’s or with as much literary depth.

4. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. The greatest one-hit wonder in literature and perhaps in the arts. The story alone makes it a classic, but Lee’s use of language, combining a Southern dialect with the unmistakable voice of a child, elevates it to its legendary status.

3. Emma, by Jane Austen. Austen herself wrote that she didn’t expect anyone to like her meddling, imperious protagonist, but nearly two hundred years after publication the book remains extremely popular, and the title character is a major reason. Character development was never Austen’s strength, but Emma grows up across the book’s 400-odd pages, with the usual cast of comic-relief supporting characters, including her worrywart father and the garrulous Miss Bates.

2. Tender is the Night, by F. Scott Fitzgerald. To the reviewer who called Lolita “the only convincing love story of our century,” I submit Tender is the Night, the story of the gradual, inexorable breakdown of the seemingly perfect marriage between two beautiful people by way of infidelity, drink, and mental illness. If Fitzgerald had to go out early, he could not have gone out on a higher note.

1. The Master and Margarita, by Mikhail Bulgakov. An absolute masterpiece, banned by the Soviets for decades for its subtle yet severe indictment of communism’s many, many failures. The Devil comes to Moscow and exposes its society for all its vapidity, running into the frustrated author The Master and his faithful girlfriend Margarita, a story intertwined with a dialogue between Pontius Pilate and Jesus, all stacked with allusions to the Bible and major works of 19th century Russian literature. It is a work of unbridled genius, of acrimonious dissent, and most of all, of hope and faith in humanity.

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Comments

  1. David F
    Jul, 5 2008 / 2:41 am

    Hey Keith, have you ever read American Psycho? If so, what are your thoughts?

  2. John
    Jul, 13 2008 / 8:58 pm

    Keith, what about Middlemarch, by George Eliot? I saw Silas Marner made the list, but Middlemarch is universally known as her classic. What say you? (I’m especially surprised given your fondness for Austen and Bronte.) Also, no Virginia Woolf?

  3. Patrick
    Jul, 16 2008 / 10:45 pm

    I was surprised that *Clarissa* didn’t make your list. Is this a reflection of some deep-seated fear of commitment or actual dislike?

  4. keith
    Jul, 16 2008 / 10:58 pm

    John: Haven’t read it. Hated Mill on the Floss. Middlemarch is in the Novel 100’s top 10, though.

    Patrick: No appeal. I believe it’s on the list of the ten most boring novels in the English language according to Thursday Next. Besides, isn’t Richardson the one Fielding was always satirizing?

    David: Again, no appeal. I’m not a fan of brutal violence. It’s part of why I’m not enjoying The Road and probably wouldn’t have started it if I’d known what I was in for.

  5. Patrick
    Jul, 17 2008 / 9:59 am

    The literary relationship between Fielding and Richardson was reduced to that false and overly simplistic binary by mid-century critics of the novel. While Fielding certainly parodies Pamela in Shamela and to a lesser extent in Joseph Andrews, the humor in Tom Jones is far more broad in its interest and stands on its own. That said, Fielding’s last novel, Amelia, does a Richardsonian type of work in how it locates good nature in a female character. BTW, while Clarissa is insufferably long, it is also a tremendous piece of writing with a level of psychological depth perhaps unachieved since. Moreover, it is widely accepted that Richardson’s big book is Austen’s primary influence. Moreover, it has had a direct and undeniable influence on the majority of books on your list. Its reputation, however, has suffered one bad abridgement and a change in the taste of readers that makes its girth somewhat intimidating. Give the penguin classic edition a 500 page test drive and you either won’t be able to put it down or you will set the beast ablaze…

  6. John
    Jul, 17 2008 / 8:47 pm

    Not a catcher in the rye fan?

  7. John
    Jul, 18 2008 / 5:14 pm

    Keith,

    Ever read “The Emporer of Ocean Park”? I found it rather intriguing and racially profound. Of course it was written by Stephen Carter, a Yale Law guy so it might burn your eyes to read it.

  8. keith
    Jul, 18 2008 / 6:41 pm

    Hated Catcher. Read it twice.

    Hadn’t heard of Emperor, but it sounds more in the Grisham/Crichton vein of popular thrillers, which isn’t really my style.

  9. Ozzie
    Jul, 19 2008 / 8:38 am

    Keith, thanks for the list, and I am a big fan of your chats on ESPN.

    I was a little surprised not to see any Ayn Rand on this list.

  10. Modest Beerboy
    Jul, 22 2008 / 8:10 pm

    American Psycho may be one of the few cases where the movie translation does a good job (better?). Even Bret Easton Ellis said reading the violence later shocked him.

    Thanks for M&M, I wouldn’t have read it without you.

    I found Bukowski to be the most “readable” author. No interest or dislike keeps him out?

  11. keith
    Jul, 22 2008 / 9:28 pm

    Who’s Bukowski? Don’t know him.

    Ayn Rand is definitely in the “no interest” pile. I’m not really on board with her ideas, and the snippets I’ve seen of her writing are awful.

  12. Modest Beerboy
    Jul, 23 2008 / 12:30 am

    Ah Bukowski….also remembered as “The Poet Laureate of Skid Row.” Not meant to speak to the elist in us (me being a chemical engineer), but to the everyman when literature spoke to only a few. He spoke to me on a basic level about the day to day struggle we all feel. Not up there with “Grapes of Wrath”, but a fine American author. “Post Office” is his most know work (in my top 100). In my opinion one of the greatest opening lines “It began as a mistake.”

    http://www.amazon.com/post-office-Novel-Charles-Bukowski/dp/0061177571/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1216787060&sr=8-1

  13. Kramer
    Jul, 24 2008 / 4:12 pm

    You have fine taste (for the most part). For example, it’s great to see Calvino, Fitzgerald, and Ford in a row — three really terrific novels. I love Moravia; if you haven’t read Contempt, you should order it immediately.

  14. mike
    Jul, 29 2008 / 6:18 pm

    Have you read any of neal stephensons other work besides snow crash? I just finished reading cryptinomicon and it was really good.

  15. Adam
    Dec, 9 2008 / 4:31 pm

    I can’t believe I just found this. I’ll have Tender of the Night again, soon. First read through I didn’t like it–well, the first 30 pages, but I was a dumb 18 year old then. Now I’m 19 and totally mature–but I like your sell-job, KLaw.

  16. Ted Gioia
    Dec, 18 2008 / 5:56 pm

    I luckily stumbled upon this incredibly interesting list. It is good to see a ranking that gives the comic novel its proper respect because it is an underappreciated genre in academia. I love British comic literature and appreciated the mention of Waugh, Powell, Wosehouse, and Greene. Scoop is the funniest book I’ve ever read, but Viles Bodies/Handful of Dust/Decline and Fall are all great as well. I would strongly recommend The Loved One, which is a short masterpiece (and is also interesting because it is the only Waugh novel set solely in America). I really like Master and Margarita, but the best novel in Russian literature I think is Brothers Karamazov, which actually has many comic elements and scenes with slapstick humor.

  17. james v
    Jan, 10 2009 / 10:03 am

    Great list, Keith. Many of your selections are on my 2009 reading list. I’m interested to know if you’ve read Darkness at Noon by Koestler? I found it intensely compelling and quite moving, though it does drift into a bit of Koestler’s personal, albeit relevant, beliefs (but thankfully this well-disguised interjection doesn’t even begin to approach Rand-ian levels). Highly recommended!

  18. bev
    Jan, 15 2009 / 10:23 pm

    Ever read Dawn Powell? Writes of the absurdity of human behavior like no other American writer. You won’t stop laughing. Turn Magic Wheel is wonderful, as is The Wicked Pavilion. Comic Genius!

  19. Chris in Dallas
    Jan, 16 2009 / 6:48 pm

    Keith: You probably should check out at least one Bukowski novel and give him a shot. He’s pretty insightful and downright funny at times (if you don’t mind some foul language). I’d recommend Post Office as a starting point. You could read it in one sitting with no problem. His is a very blunt and direct writing style.

  20. Dave
    Jan, 16 2009 / 9:40 pm

    Keith, thanks for the list. You’ve listed some of my favorites. But I humbly recommend the work of David Mitchell. I especially enjoyed “Cloud Atlas”. My top ten would also include Ann Patchett’s “Bel Canto” and Don DeLillo’s “Mao II” (though “White Noise” is also great).

  21. Esteban Loaiza
    Jan, 23 2009 / 2:39 am

    I thought Capote wrote Mockingbird? I kid I kid.

  22. Pat
    Jan, 23 2009 / 3:07 am

    Just saw this list after your reference in prospect chat. Nicely done. In the baseball mood or any other, D J Duncan’s “The Brothers K” blew me away.

  23. The missing one
    Feb, 6 2009 / 8:34 pm

    I love the list, but one that you left off and (I think) bears mention is Steinbeck’s Cannery Row. Curious as to whether you read and discounted or just plain haven’t read it.

    Keep up the good work Klaw.

  24. keith
    Feb, 7 2009 / 1:10 pm

    Haven’t read Cannery Row. The Grapes of Wrath is on my to-be-read shelf now.

  25. John
    Feb, 18 2009 / 10:10 pm

    Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, your thoughts?

  26. Jesse
    Feb, 19 2009 / 8:50 pm

    Great list! I’m glad to see someone else who loves M & M as much as I do. Since you’re a fan of both Dickens and Wilkie Collins, I would point you to Dan Simmons’ “Drood,” and for some of the more modern lit out there, Chabon (though I see you aren’t a huge fan of his “Amazing Adventures…”) is amazing. I much prefer “The Mysteries of Pittsburgh.” And Lethem’s “Fortress of Solitude” is absolutely as good as it gets…As is pretty much anything by Denis Johnson.

  27. Rob
    Sep, 4 2009 / 3:42 am

    I’m way late in joining this conversation, and subsequently might not be read. But here’s my two-cents worth on a couple of earlier comments. I loved Confederacy of Dunces – one of the funniest satires I’ve read. However, The Neon Bible is not in the same ball park. Toole wrote this while he was still a high school student. It’s impressive, considering that. But, if you read it with the memory of CoD in mind, you will be disappointed – not even close to the same quality. I might as well throw a couple out there that I recently read and thoroughly enjoyed: Notes from Underground (I know, too short) and Infinite Jest (huge, a monumental task, but well worth the effort).

  28. Jacob
    Nov, 21 2009 / 7:56 pm

    I’m surprised that A Sportsman’s Sketches by Ivan Turgenev didn’t make the list. I read it for my historical readings class last year and loved it.

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Trackbacks

  1. The Brothers Karamazov « Perpetual Memory Loss says:
    July 8, 2008 at 12:49 am

    […] book the last few months from ESPN’s Keith Law.  In fact, he recently released a list of his top 100 novels on his website, The Dish, and  The Master and Margarita was his #1 novel.  So a big thanks to […]

  2. The dish » Blog Archive » The Klaw 100, part one. says:
    August 13, 2008 at 2:37 pm

    […] Part two (#80-61) Part three (#60-41) Part four (#40-21) Part five (#20-1) […]