I am looking for a fascinating book where one of the themes is literature itself, from quoting Dante to Shakespeare. As if you were in a thought provoking discussion about the rich Western literary tradition.
Heard of figures like Borges, don’t know where to start there tho.
by Niceguy555L
11 Comments
I don’t know if this is what you are looking for, but Green Grass, Running Water by Thomas King is not only a novel, but every character, scene, or setting is an allusion to literature, history, or pop culture.
if on a winters night a traveler -calvino
*An Unnecessary Woman*
for Shakespeare specifically, check out if we were villains by ml rio
The Silent Patient unironically
Too Loud a Solitude. Beautiful, and quietly heartbreaking. Very short. You could probably knock it put in a day
The novels of Enrique Vila-Matas are very literature-centric
The Name of the Rose, by Umberto Eco
“Sunrise on the Reaping” by Suzanne Collins
A prequel to the Hunger Games, based in the not-so-distant future of a dystopian USA. One of the main themes is enduring loss, and it *frequently* references “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe. Like, *really frequently*.
Hmm… maybe…
– Dictionary of Lost Words
– Babel
(Not sure if either is quite right. They are both obsessed with language more than ‘literature’).
The Shadow of the Wind might be fit this bill if you go into it understanding that the main protagonist and his father are book sellers in Barcelona and how much they love books and being a part of that tradition is a main theme in the book.