Not sure how well I’ll be able to get this across, but I basically only read classic literature and I desperately feel like I need to break out of that bubble. I always feel a little pretentious when people ask me what I like to read and I just rattle off a list of “Books Everyone Read in Their Lives”. Outside of that, I really want to be excited to hear that an author I enjoy is working on a new book, and for obvious reasons you don’t get that with classics.
My favorite authors are Camus, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, and Steinbeck. I guess I really like philosophically deep or thought provoking books. I’m also really into religious iconography, but not necessarily overtly religious. Not a huge fan of fantasy, but could be convinced with some low fantasy.
Any and all recommendations would be much appreciated.
Thanks!
by CraftyWoodpecker3904
5 Comments
Try Louise Erdrich. Love Medicine, The Round House, The Last Report on the Miracle at Little No Horse, The Night Watchman. Love Medicine is her first and considered a modern classic – it’s a good place to start. She’s still publishing new work as well.
Kazuo Ishiguro, especially Remains of the Day & Never Let Me Go but he’s brilliant you can’t go wrong. Remains won the Nobel
Piranesi by Susanna Clarke is geared to be a classic in fantasy one day. Kinda Kafka-esque
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell also Susanna Clarke
Demon Copperhead is a modern retelling of David Copperfield by Charles Dickens, won the Pulitzer
You could try other pulitzers like The Goldfinch or Lonesome Dove
You mentioned not loving fantasy, but I’m curious if you’ve tried “Jonathon Strange & Mr. Norrell” by Susanna Clarke
It’s as close to classic-esque as I’ve found, and I really adore the way she writes
Frederik Backman’s novels are like this for me. Timeless human interaction stories, but with a modern voice.
Borges’s labyrinths immediately came to mind if that’s modern enough when you mentioned philosophical depth but it is a bit different to the authors you mentioned.
In terms of things more in the lineage of the authors you mentioned Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro and The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera both came to mind as existential fiction.