Pure Pleasure: A Guide to the Twentieth Century's Most Enjoyable Books by John Carey

Pure Pleasure: A Guide to the Twentieth Century's Most Enjoyable Books Reviews

• 
  David

  Somewhere else on this site, and undoubtedly at several other locations on the web, there is that infamous list. You know the one.
  The one that makes us all feel like semi-literate philistines. 1,001 books you Should Read Before You Die. (Or was that 10,001?) Compiled by the self-anointed, self-important guardians of the shrine of high literature. People whose primary goal seems to have been to make us all feel bad about ourselves.
  
  "Pure Pleasure", John Carey's "guide to the 20th century's most enjoyable books", is a welcome antidote to the kind of supercilious high-mindedness exuded by most critics. In his refreshingly down to earth introduction, he asks rhetorically of lists like the infamous 1,001 books to read before you die: 'Who are these daunting league-tables meant for? Not, surely, other human beings."
  
  As a counterpoint, he has compiled his own list of fifty books written in the 20th century, with the only criterion being the amount of pleasure that reading them brought him. "Pure Pleasure", which first appeared as a series of weekly essays in the London Times,
  is nothing more than that list, with an essay on each book in which he tries to isolate what it was about that particular selection that made it enjoyable to read. As he explains in the introduction, he has not included "books he never managed to finish" (so no Proust), or given a place to books solely based on their critical acclaim (so Joyce is represented by the "Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man", rather than "Ulysses".
  
  Both the list, and the accompanying essays, are terrific. Carey casts new light on old favorites ("The Hound of the Baskervilles", "The Man Who Was Thursday", "The Great Gatsby"), has an excellent representation of poetry (T.S. Eliot, Edward Thomas, W.B. Yeats, A.E. Houseman, W.H. Auden, Seamus Heaney, Stevie Smith, Ted Hughes, Philip Larkin), and has a way of loading each essay with unforgettable gems:
  
  "Those who think of Evelyn Waugh as a venomous old snob should try the early novels, written when he was still vulnerable and adrift"
  "Brighton Rock is a novel that got out of hand."
  "Why one of our supreme poetic masters should have needed the help of beliefs that would disgrace a fairground fortuneteller is a question that takes us to the heart of the modern poet's predicament." (on Yeats)
  "His words seem to light up avenues in the brain that have never been opened before, but that we immediately recognize as the dwelling-place of our own feelings." (on T.S. Eliot)
  
  In addition to its predictable pleasures, John Carey's list includes a few authors who you may not have come across before: Sylvia Townsend Warner, William Empson, Keith Douglas, Edward Thomas. Carey is so persuasive about the authors you already know, that you will be moved to add these unfamiliar authors to your reading list.
  
  This is an extraordinary book, which I strongly recommend.
  
• 
  Ryan

  If I could pick one book to be given out free to every home with the weekly newspaper, it would be this. Fifty short, beautifully written essays on Carey's favourite books.
  
  At the time of publication lists of ‘best books’ were everywhere; all of them seeming like term reports intended for the Almighty to let Him know well His children were doing on the cultural front. What became embarrassingly clear was how many titles were being tossed in less not because of the pleasure they’ve given but out of false swank and ‘refinement.’
  
  Carey's list is an antidote to all that. Books the author doesn't like or finds unreadable haven't slimed their way to impress others - no Proust, no Woolf, no Faulkner. The personal approach brings familiar names, if not always titles. That alone justifies the book.
  
  I first discovered Stevie Smith, SJ Perelman and Keith Douglas through these pages, and gave blimps like Evelyn Waugh and Kingsley Amis a second go.
  
  I feel like cheering at the essays on the joys of Steinbeck, Graham Swift, Clive James and Ian McEwan. The phrasing and concision are a marvel as are its many insights.
• 
  James Henderson

  I acquired this book through a recommendation that I have subsequently forgotten, but for which I am thankful nonetheless.
  John Carey, whose fine book The Intellectuals and the Masses (St. Martin's 1993) I read some years ago, has prepared a guide to the "most enjoyable books" of the twentieth century.
  While tastes may differ I find I have already read almost half of the fifty books he lists and of those there is only one that I remember not enjoying. Based on that evidence and the books I have enjoyed by writers for whom he includes different titles than those I have read, I must conclude that he truly has included at least some of the most enjoyable books of the century just past. He notes with apologies his methodology precluded more than one title per author in order to avoid a few authors taking up the whole list. He also consciously avoided "masterpieces" for less well-known works. The advantage for the reader being the inclusion of Mann's great picaresque novel Confessions of Felix Krull Confidence Man instead of The Magic Mountain or Buddenbrooks, or the listing of Decline and Fall, Waugh's great comic first novel instead of Brideshead Revisited. He thoughtfully includes both poetry and works in translation on this list to ensure the enjoyment of readers is not limited to novels written in English. This guide will provide me one more reason to never be without a good, and enjoyable, book.
• 
  Anton

  Not sure if rating this book is appropriate. It is essentially a collection of 50 book reviews. A great resource to discover new reads from what one may call classic / world literature.
  
  This book attempts to highlight particularly good ‘entry level’ stories from the big name authors, even if these stories are slightly less known (aka were not force-fed to you during school years). All suggestions included here were shortlisted based on pleasantness of the reading experience, which is an intriguing way to go about it.
  
  I am personally not sold on all 50 frankly - but there is a bunch of recommendations I am very keen on!
• 
  Janet

  In these short pieces originally featured in the Sunday Times, Carey chooses a chronological and personal selection of 50 works of fiction, memoir and poetry of the 20th century. Thankfully, Carey's choices reflect his own reading biases and are not even remotely similar to those awful 1000 Books to Read Before You Die lists that have the air of being generated by marketing department drones in publishing houses. (Or maybe they should now be called "media conglomerates"?)
  
  American readers may find some of the works hard to track down. My God, you may actually need to visit a library. Imagine. But reading his essays is also pure pleasure. Carey's style is so unaffected and transparent it belies the artistry and intelligence beneath it, not to mention a lifetime of thoughtful and passionate reading. (Isn't that how we all aspire to read, if we just knew how? He makes it seem so simple!)
  
  On Clive James:"he is the kind of stylist who does not just cross Niagara on a tightrope. He cycles across, backwards, juggling." Or John Updike: "He writes a couple of sentences about a tube of toothpaste, and you feel you have never looked at one before."
  
  After reading these essays, Christopher Isherwood's Mr. Norris Changes Trains goes on my TBR list, as does Stevie Smith's poetry, ditto G. K. Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday, George Orwell's Coming Up For Air and Mikhail Bulgakov's A Country Doctor's Notebook. And more. Thank you, John Carey!
• 
  Kaethe

  2020 August 2020
  There's no reason why reading for one's own entertainment shouldn't be fun. I hold that truth to be self-evident, and while I'm not alone, it is nowhere near being a truth universally recognized. A list of anyone's favorite books of a hundred years (in English or translation) should be idiosyncratic, the sort of thing people could disagree over while remaining cordial. The title suggests something more objective though. Still debatable, but you can imagine book sales, or library borrows, or even a list suggested and voted by some group of readers. Those would still appeal.
  But apparently today for the first time I read the blurb. Yeah, no. I still haven't seen a complete list, but the ten authors listed didn't include a single woman. Even a list of more than half the authors in the Amazon blurb mentioned there were only five. No person of color, really nothing but dead white men of the upper class. It looks like an AP reading list.
  And also, it seems rather Victorian -heavy. Probably Conan Doyle and Kipling would appear on quite a few enjoyable lists. But despite the first publication date of any specific title, they wouldn't come to mind: Holmes is always tearing around 1880's London in a cab.
  I suppose the upshot is that John Carey's enjoyment list bores me to tears. It's colorless and drab. It's like saying your comfiest outfit is a wool uniform. You may not be lying, but if that's your favorite it must be tailored to you exactly.
  Enjoyable? Dude, you need to get out more.
  
  Not actually read
• 
  Ivy-Mabel Fling

  I suppose I am biased because I very much like John Carey's critical writings, but I do feel that this has a lot more to offer than many books of its type. John Carey has dug out some unusual books but, beyond that, he has described them in such a way that his own description could (in my view) be described as pure pleasure. If you are looking for new ideas for your reading (and you don't want extremely modern literature), I would recommend this!
• 
  John Bohnert

  Carey's taste in pleasurable books is too different from mine.
• 
  Tweedledum

  Pure pleasure us such an apt title for John Carey's collection of Essays about 50 books he loves. Some of the books I knew already and Carey opened.my rates to new depths. Some I had heard of but dismissed as " probably boring or just not for me" and Carey persuaded me to think again. A miscellany of fiction, poetry and a smattering of autobiography, I think that this is a book I will want to dip into many times over as I seek out or revisit some of the gems he has chosen. None of these books are on bestseller lists and there were several I had never heard of but here are three I might seek out soon :
  Unreliable Memoirs,
  Mr Fortune's Maggot and
  The Inheritors.
• 
  John

  Book lovers! Here's a place to find something for you "to read" list that hasn't crossed your mind. Plus the great pleasure of finding a vigorous appreciate review of a book you love. For me, Huxley's These Barren Leaves goes on the "to read" list. And of old favorites, I loved Carey's review of The Good Soldier Svejk.
• 
  Elizabeth

  I enjoyed this collection of reviews by one of Britain's top book critics - and added many of his suggestions to my to-read list!
• 
  Nick

  Brilliantly incisive, but also gentle and guiding.
• 
  Sunny

  I'm a big fan of John Carey.
  
  The way he writes is extremely simple and really really really easy to read. Deeply philosophical and from London as well. This book is about some of his favorite books and why he likes them. Simple as that. Here are some of the best bits from the book:
  
  The Imaginative power reading uniquely demands is clearly linked psychologically with a capacity for individual judgment and with the ability to empathize with other people. Without reading these faculties may atrophy.
  
  Put your books aside and switch on the television and the sense of relaxation is instant. That is because a large part of your mind has stopped working. The pictures beam straight into your brain. No input from you as needed. What this means is that a democracy composed largely of television watchers is mindless compared to a democracy composed largely of readers.
  
  Standing by his father's open grave, he noted some frogs at the bottom, two of which had managed to climb onto the coffin lid. When the gravediggers started shoveling in earth, they tried to climb up the sides, but the clods of earth knocked them back. Afterwards their fate was very much on his mind, and he went around asking any adults who would listen whether the frogs had got out. This was on “my childhood” by Maxim Gorky.
  
  But perhaps everything we cherish is illusory in the end: a Valley of Ashes.
  
  English poetry has always been ambiguous. Other European languages being more tightly bound by grammatical rules lack this potential, which may explain the relatively high count of great English poets.
  
  But its senselessness is what frees it. His poetry is like music, not because it sounds beautiful, though it does, but because it conquers rationality. Listening to a Beethoven Symphony you do not ask does it make sense? Because you know it has got beyond that. So it is with Yeats.
  
  Sunny: reading books can make you empathize with others or it can make you lose your empathy. How can you deal with hearing about your child complaining about the cold after reading about Auschwitz or a day in the life of Ivan Denisovich? So the following three are absolutely key: number one: be nice to everyone no matter how menial their worry. #2 be the hardest working in the team. #3 be humble: don't brag at all.
  
  The other was from a student I taught when I had a temporary job at Christ Church Oxford 40 years ago who is now serving a life sentence. His string of crimes included torturing a rival art dealer, and the judge described him as highly dangerous. Not a good advertisement for the humanizing effects of English literature.
  
  
  
• 
  Holly

  This was a good introduction to/reminder of some great books and I will be adding many to my TBR pile. Unfortunately I found the theme running through the book of the author decrying how stupid people are these days and how only a select few of us cool dudes read while the rest of those yobbos sit and watch television really grating. I preferred his history of poetry book that I read earlier this year!
• 
  Tim Pieraccini

  Some seemingly odd choices, but he justifies every one, even if not quite to the point where I'd rush out and buy. Particularly pleased to see A Suitable Boy listed, and intrigued by Carey's poetry choices to the extent of actually buying a couple I didn't have (E. Thomas and Houseman).
• 
  Dan

  50 books that are each a pleasure to read.
• 
  Ian Banks

  I like book lists (I cannot deny) and this is a good one: most enjoyable (rather than best) books of the twentieth century and the reasoning thereby. Mr Carey appears to be well-educated and thoughtful and knowledgeable but also comes across as a person who really likes reading as well. He summarises beautifully: his chapters on Yeats and Mansfield are excellent and give insights that explain aspects of their work succinctly and he gets what makes some authors more accessible than others perfectly. Great read to make you feel smart and thirsty for more knowledge.
• 
  Gail

  John Carey is a British literary critic and here he brings us brief reviews of 50 favorite books. He often chooses one of the lesser known works of a well known author, thus reminding the reader of someone they are familiar with but leading them to a previously undiscovered work. About 1/4 of the reviews concern poets. I will be checking out some of his suggestions.