u/ol_saw_gills

Following my previous post, these are the novels I read from the 1970s. Inspired to post this by someone else here who shared they were trying to read every Pulitzer Prize winning novel. This project of mine began with the intention of reading every National Book Award winner since 1950. I wanted to fill in the gaps in my knowledge of American literature from the second half of the 20th century to today. Since I had already read a good number of the winners, it slowly turned into reading any American novel of my choosing that I had not read from each year between 1950-2025 (I finished early 2026), with preference given to the most well regarded unread-by-me text or whatever seemed the most interesting. Some of these impressions are a bit lazy but I am a lazy person.

I want to emphasize that I was not trying to find writers that I liked, even if I make value judgments or express my enjoyment or disapproval of their books in my reviews. The goal of this was project was to expand my understanding of American literature after the 1950s. Of course I have a subjective experience of everything I read (meaning I have likes and dislikes that are purely based on personal preference) and I find value in most everything I read, even if I'm not reaping the most immediate kind of enjoyment. All of these authors make some sort of sense within their milieu (none of them fell out of a coconut tree) and that is what I am attempting to grasp. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Losing Battles – Eudora Welty (1970): This just didn’t work for me. More or less a painful slog, not sure what people see in this author’s writing. It just felt dead. I have said it before and I’ll say it again, but I don’t like novels that insist on either their character’s zaniness or the nonplussed reaction to it. It is not a quality I appreciate. Whooooooaaaaaaaaa this person is way over the top in a provincial kind of way. Who cares? I recognize this is just a personal reaction, but clownishness is just grating to me.

Angle of Repose – Wallace Stegner (1971): Nicely layered text that deals with an interesting contradiction: on the one hand, Stegner asks whether or not we can ever see a place without our past and our beliefs clouding our vision, while on the other hand, he genuinely tries to celebrate place (namely, the West) as an aspect of human experience. This tension isn’t unique to Stegner but it’s the best executed attempt I’ve read. Genuinely a good writer, it takes one to examine a contradiction without dismissing it or finding a way around it. Loved the various framing devices the novel employs.

Chimera – John Barth (1972): Loathed it. I do not like anything happening here.

Gravity’s Rainbow – Thomas Pynchon (1973): (note: due to masochism, this is the only novel I reread for the project) What am I supposed to say about this novel? Overall I do not like it. There are some passages where Pynchon shines, but overall it feels like drudgery. Difficult novels are always attractive to me but this one did not bring me any joy. I don’t care for the child molestation, amongst other aspects. Even if it’s not as bad as in V, you can sense the Beat influence in the characters (aren’t they just a little bit gonzo . . . or zany . . .). Mason and Dixon is still the only Pynchon novel I like.

If Beale Street Could Talk – James Baldwin (1974): Baldwin is not only a great political thinker, but also a wonderful prose stylist. I’m not sure this is as good as Go Tell It On the Mountain, but it is still worthwhile. Beale Street dabbles in some of the religious themes his earlier novel deals with at length. It’s a book about love, of course, gentle love and fierce love.

JR – William Gaddis (1975): The third Gaddis I’ve read (after The Recognitions and Carpenter’s Gothic). While I recognize the talent, his writing has never really sparked me. There’s definitely plenty here and each time you open it you feel like you’re stepping into a fast moving river, it’s difficult to keep your feet. If I had infinite time on this earth I would reread it, but I don’t and I won’t. There’s an interesting play on the word “note” here. Musical notes, bank notes, written notes. I never put anything together regarding that, but perhaps there’s something there.

Flight to Canada – Ishmael Reed (1976): Of course this was a lot of fun and really good, coming from the guy who wrote Mumbo Jumbo. This is the kind of postmodernism I really like, as opposed to Barth’s hollow and forced style. Usually, I have a hard time with writing that is so relentlessly satirical and ironic but a) it’s quite short and b) it’s rewarding when you dig a little bit through the outermost encrusted layer to appreciate what he’s communicating with it. A more thorough understanding of the context and references, which I lack, would go a long way.

Players – Don Delillo (1977): I’ve read a good bit of Delillo before but not in the past decade or so, except for Ratner’s Star which I must have picked up more recently. Overall I think he’s compelling and when his writing strikes me as hackneyed I think it’s due to the fact that many have imitated (or drawn from, to be more generous) his voice and the themes he returns to, so that he can sound like just another writer concerned with the centrality of images in the postmodern era (and what not). One of the best writers I discovered through this reading project of mine, Rachel Kushner, shows his influence, which makes sense since he is one of her mentors. With all of that said and all due respect given, this isn’t his strongest work and I don’t find the subject matter (the disillusionment and sex lives of yuppies) compelling.

The World According to Garp – John Irving (1978): A good popcorn novel. For some reason it charmed me. Did we need this man’s perspective on all that this book gestures at, gender politics wise? Absolutely not. Was it a waste of paper? No, I don’t think it was. There are things about it that I look back on with some fondness. The titular character’s one successful literary excursion, a strange and dreamlike short story, followed by the many aborted attempts to write anything else that works. The scene involving a suddenly clenched jaw. The perhaps well intentioned, if not always totally up to date, portrayal of a trans woman (it really isn’t very good but I do appreciate that he wrote the character with love in his heart). All I’m saying is it could have been worse.

Sleepless Nights – Elizabeth Hardwick (1979): This one was painful from start to finish. The prose was well nigh unreadable to me. Do not recommend.

He's one of those writers whose most famous work is synonymous with his name. But does anyone here think Melville has better books? Has anyone read or heard of anyone making this point? Could be one of his other novels/novellas, a short story, or a poem. I personally think MB is his best (very uncontroversial opinion) but I am really interested in hearing arguments to the contrary. I'm currently trying to read all of his writing (except for Clarel, probably not going to make it through that) and I don't think anything I've read comes all that close to beating it, as much as I love Bartleby and Pierre and Benito and Battle Pieces. Thanks

Following my previous post, these are the novels I read from the 1960s. Inspired to post this by someone else here who shared they were trying to read every Pulitzer Prize winning novel. This project of mine began with the intention of reading every National Book Award winner since 1950. I wanted to fill in the gaps in my knowledge of American literature from the second half of the 20th century to today. Since I had already read a good number of the winners, it slowly turned into reading any American novel of my choosing that I had not read from each year between 1950-2025 (I finished early 2026), with preference given to the most well regarded unread-by-me text or whatever seemed the most interesting. Some of these impressions are a bit lazy but I am a lazy person.

The Waters of Kronos – Conrad Richter (1960): Lyrical, I guess. Good premise for a novel. Not the strongest execution. I’m underrating it probably but it just didn’t make a dent in my psyche.

The Moviegoer – Walker Percy (1961): Interesting but not genre-defining take on the southern gothic. It has the surreal and dark tone. In my opinion the writing was a bit clunky and misshapen. Exciting for me because I realized part way through that it inspired Remainder, a novel I love. For whatever reason literature dealing with repetition as a theme always interests me.

Morte d’Urban – JF Powers (1962): A writer with a little more style and strong first person skills writing the tried-and-true plot of depressed Catholic priests sent off to backwater parishes. There’s little spirituality here or really much in the way of action, which is what makes it work. Pettiness, DIY carpentry, and low level workplace conflict fill out the text. The narrator is thoughtful and well-intentioned but human and tends to approach religion as a job full of minor to middling inconvenience.

The Centaur – John Updike (1963): I do not like Updike and I did not like this novel. Totally fails at paralleling the mythic with the everyday. The writing is just bad and I do not understand how this man had any reputation.

Herzog – Saul Bellow (1964): I preferred Augie March but I still found this worthwhile. Another first person narrative, the novel follows the twinning of personal and intimate problems with GREAT WESTERN IDEAS AND PHILOSOPHY. Jernigan (farther down this list) takes directly from this novel and asks, what if Herzog was an even bigger scumbag and alcoholic?

Stoner – John William (1965): strong entry in the my-bitch-wife plot. Deeply resentful narrative, an airing of grievances. Depicts the many trials facing the bookish and slightly passive white man who just wants a loving marriage and for GREAT BOOKS to be given their due respect. Seriously, the villains are his sexually dysfunctional wife and an incompetent disabled man who takes another incompetent disabled man under his wing. When the normally passive protagonist stands up for WHAT IS RIGHT, the disabled character accuses him of ableism. Why do people love this book?

The Fixer – Bernard Malamud (1966): It was fine. Competent writing. Like a Safdie movie, things keep getting worse and worse and worse for the central character, except it isn’t any fun because this Jew lives in 19^(th) century Russia.

The Eighth Day – Thornton Wilder (1967): You know a guy named Thornton was not about to do any cutting edge writing. Sentimental, trite, and a bit contrived. Without being a loathsome experience, Wilder lacks something to say and literary techniques newer than 1900. Too awww shucks for me.

Steps - Jerzy Kosiński (1968): a truly interesting novel that I shortchanged and need to reread. Experimental form and quite short. I have failed this novel and you by not having more to say about it.

Them – Joyce Carol Oates (1969): Grim. Somewhat Brechtian approach to the novel’s unrelenting depiction of misogynistic violence. Them is on a mission that starts on the first page and then never abandons. The writing itself was somewhat featureless and not particularly memorable.

Inspired to post this by someone else here who shared they were trying to read every Pulitzer Prize winning novel. This project of mine began with the intention of reading every National Book Award winner since 1950. I wanted to fill in the gaps in my knowledge of this period. Since I had already read a good number of the winners, it slowly turned into reading any American novel of my choosing that I had not read from each year between 1950-2025 (I finished early 2026), with preference given to the most well regarded unread-by-me text. Below I'll paste my short impressions of each one from the 1950s. If there's interest in seeing more of them I'll post one for each decade. I was extremely ready to branch out in my reading after completing this list, a break I am still enjoying (and have since developed other less formal reading projects), but I am intending to start at 1949 at some point and work my way backwards. Thanks for looking. Please excuse any typos or opinions you think are stupid.

The Man With the Golden Arm - Nelson Algren (1950): Good storytelling and if I were one of those people who likes saying that certain novels elevate setting or place to the status of a character, I would definitely be saying it about this one. Nothing too earth shattering. Doomed, tragic, flawed, and betrayed protagonist. I think you could draw a pretty straight line between this novel and one lower down on the list, Ironweed. Interested in reading more of Algren’s writing.

The Holy Sinner – Thomas Mann (1951): Never a good sign when bending of the rules (or flagrant cheating) appear so early on in any endeavor, but Mann was living in California when he wrote this so I think maybe it qualifies as American. I love Mann. No one would tell you this is his best work and it is quite different from the rest of his writing. Arguably his most experimental or even postmodern novel, it plays with genre, myth, and language extensively. I think it was shortlisted for the National Book Award.

The Catherine Wheel – Jean Stafford (1952): I loved The Mountain Lion and while this was decidedly not as strong, it still had all of the same elements which made her earlier novel great. Strange, acerbic characters, sudden violent tragedy, and psychoanalytic influence seen in her focus on children, both actual and treated as a stage that characters don’t necessarily complete. One of the more interesting writers from the 40s-50s.

The Adventures of Augie March- Saul Bellow (1953): Deft execution of a first person narrative with a memorable and consistent voice throughout, mostly avoiding the many pitfalls of that perspective (except maybe the one avoided with most difficulty: narrator sounds too “author-like”). Kind of an American picaresque/road novel. Enough sex to keep it interesting. Bellow’s not beating the misogyny charges.

The Dollmaker – Harriette Arnow (1954): belated but compelling naturalism and a truly social novel. I would love to read a real review of this book that focuses on its treatment of race/class/gender because there is a lot going on here. A little this-happens-then-this-then-this, which you could describe as not the best writing (and you would be right) but it gets the job done, even if you could excise just about any part without leaving too noticeable a scar.

Ten North Friedrick – John O’Hara (1955): WASP the novel. Traces the decline of great American men and the disappointing subsequent generation with their jazz music and (implied) miscegenation. A Leyendecker advertisement in literary form. Solid B- grade writing (not an insult), not as strong as his idol Fitzgerald, but I guess that’s a given. Features the most unintentionally funny sex scene of anything on this list.

The Field of Vision – Wright Morris (1956): one of the worst novels I read for this project. I have an understanding of what Morris was going for but it just felt so bizarrely pointless. Luckily it was short.

The Wapshot Chronicles – John Cheever (1957): There are some strong moments here but overall I don’t feel that it coheres or produces anything beyond its collection of episodes. Probably too zany for my taste. Don’t care for the lighter side of irony I guess. I find it difficult to say much else about it. Cheever has his fans but I am not one of them.

The Ginger Man – JP Donleavy (1958): Awful, didn’t finish. I do not care for the worst-guy-in-the-world novel. He isn’t interesting to me. Stream of consciousness technique isn’t at its best here either. No thanks.

The Haunting of Hill House – Shirley Jackson (1959): I wish it had held my hand a little less as it developed, but sufficiently spooky I suppose. Didn’t live up to the expectation I developed before going in. The characters were just a little bit . . . stupid. You can make a stupid character do anything.