According to a recent reprint of The Atrocity Exhibition.

Quite a few...popular choices - I don't know why, but I was expecting more esoteric flavours.

I was very tempted by the Sheakspeare, but Graham Greene isnt mentioned on this forum enough, imo, so went for our man in Havana.
A very versatile writer Greene, O,M,in Havana being equal parts humour and drama.

Hmm, the Loved One isn't nearly as good as any of Waugh's first five novels, I didn't think.

Jim's probably taking the piss with this list, no De Sade or Burroughs? He did one of those "what to read" things with a bunch of pseud-y writers in The Guardian once and he chose a telephone directory! :applaud:

I think this list is at least fairly legitimate, and in his own twisted way, so was the whole directory thing- we must remember that his sense of humor is not as separate from his intellectual positions as it is for many so-called intellectuals. He never stops taking a piss, and is smirkingly serious about it. This is a man who once spent days reading office memos he had pilfered from some company or other. His weirdness seems more personal than ideological in the long run, as per his running commentary in the Re/Search edition of The Atrocity Exhibition, which is loaded with astounding quotes.

Tempest for me, though I like everything on the list except for the Waugh, which I haven't read.

An anonymous vote for Chandler, tho I've only read half the books in this list.

Ha, that's the sort of thing I was expecting - he's such a kidder. And yet so serious. It's almost as if he knows some of the things he writes will shock, coming from a man as 'normal' as him, and yet he is heartfelt rather than cynical. I'm sure he genuinely got something out of reading office memos, nothing self-consciously 'wierd' about him.

Of this list voted Moby-Dick - an awesome thing.

Would have expected Naked Lunch and/or The Ticket that exploded. -_-

But isn't Ballard in general quite a traditional writer (form etc) (with the honourable exception of Crash)? It's the ideas which are unusual.

Moby Dick for sure.

I would hazard that the from of The Atrocity Exhibition is not traditional. I'm really really enjoying it again though - I like his notes and the reassurance in his brief introduction about 'how' to read it, takes the pressure off.

In a (more) public forum I would vote for Kafka, cos The Trial is more relevant now than ever, what with identity theft and all, but to answer the question honestly it would be the Billy S play, cos it's so eminently re-readable and arguably the most use in the Island (not a toilet paper joke obviously, otherwise I'd be taking Heller's confused soldier with me).

Good list.

Kafka

Ballard's use of character (or lack of), is fairly un-traditional, metinkus....

Ballard is a bore but there are a few good books on the list, every one better than his overrated work. I'll take Orwell. I loved the book but more than that Orwell was one of the most important commentators from the left at the time who wasn't afraid to critique the Soviet Union. In fact he was one of a few socialists who saw Stalinism for what it was at the time and didn't have to wait for Khrushchev's thaw to be told about it.

Would have voted for Moby Dick, no contest.

Had to choose 1984 though.

The only novel i have re-read 3 times, and as pertinent now as ever before.

chandler

but hard to see why ballard would choose this (although the doped out ambience and corruption as a theme might, in some ways, be precursors for cocaine nights and afterwards era ballard and the very strong sense of place/interaction with place something ballard is good at too

kafka, orwell, huxley in for that sf/poltical/satirical common to nearly all of ballard?

kingdom come, for example, could have been written by nearly half thepeople on his list

think the one common theme in his list is a very strong sense of the moral and stylistically, none of the texts are realist (and neither are ballards

Only slightly off-topic, but can anyone recall a Ballard doc that was on UK television in the mid 90s, i think.

He spoke about depression, raising his children alone and dropping acid in the 60s.

Think the concept of these docs was to discuss favourite personal objects.

One of his was a human skull in a box, i'm sure.

I'm sure i didn't imagine this programme.

http://www.jgballard.com/index.php

a good site

might find something there?

Cheers for the nod, Marvell.

Think i will order the autobiography.

As I may have mentioned, in real life I'm named after Sebastian in The Tempest , and it's subsequently a play I've come to really love, although I'm never absolutely certain if that or Timon of Athens is Shakespeare's finest work.

I think Evelyn Waugh was very good, but that particular choice of Ballard's is inferior to Scoop, Scott-King's Modern Europe, Put Out More Flags, Decline and Fall and the really excellent The Ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold.

catch 22

i need to read moby dick mind