What is East Dulwich reading?

[katie1997]

Townleygreen and Jah you have good taste in books, I'm def going to read the follow-up to Kite Runner :)

Stopped readng irvine welsh after ecstasy for some reason but the food and sex one sounds like it would be an interesting read.

We never got Dickens at school either and I vaguely remember trying to read The Pickwick Papers, maybe I chose the wrong one. I might give him another try now I'm a lot older.

[catriona]

If you're giving Dickens a go, I would recommend David Copperfield and Little Dorrit (along with Great Expectations, which others have mentioned). All wonderful books.

[civilservant]

If you're new to Dickens,I suggest reading him backwards i.e. start with Great Expectations or Our Mutual Friend and then work back through Bleak House and A Tale of Two Cities. Pickwick Papers is hard to read now - it's dated badly and sags all over the place.

I find Stieg Larsson over-rated for the same reason (don't all shout at once!). Good stories but there is so much boring and unnecessary detail - a decent editor would have taken a vigorous blue pencil to his manuscripts.

If you're after a good Scandi thriller, try something by Hakan Nesser or Arnaldur Indridason instead.

[maxxi]

civilservant Wrote:

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>

> If you're after a good Scandi thriller, try

> something by Hakan Nesser or Arnaldur Indridason

> instead.

Or Anne Holt.

[PeckhamRose]

Am currently reading the autobiography of Rupert Everett. Great fun.

[El Pibe]

Am with you on the Larsson meh reaction.

The first one was intriguing enough and clearly benefitted from a decent editor, the follow ups were pretty awful. Were they published posthumously? That might explain why they were so much flabbier (and sillier).

[katie1997]

I love the forum at times, brilliant tips on here for reading Dickens. Now I really do have great expectations :)

[Alan Medic]

I've just finished reading this.

[El Pibe]

what did you think?

I rather enjoyed it.

I was born into Franco's Madrid and have seen it change dramatically over the years.

I did like that it picked an unfashionable period/place in history, it was wonderfully evocative and really caught the nature of 'el olvido' very well.

[Alan Medic]

I enjoyed it. I'd imagine it would translate into a good movie too. I have an actual history book of that period to tackle now.

[civilservant]

I quite liked it, and yes, wonderfully evocative. I also liked his (her?) Matthew Shardlake novels to begin with, but just couldn't be doing with the latest - Heartstone - talk about superfluous detail and contrived plot!

Fred Vargas and Commissaire Adamsberg, anyone? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Vargas - each one of her books is quirky, completement French and delicieux! I think John at Chener stocks them

[Ruffler]

Am nearing the end of 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami and really wish I hadn't bothered. What a disappointment!

[Moos]

Just finished Cloud Atlas (David Mitchell) and enjoyed it tremendously. Not a perfect book but really interesting and unusual.

My favourite Dickens is Our Mutual Friend.

[civilservant]

One of the nicest things about Dickens to a Londoner is the London connection. It's especially strong in Our Mutual Friend and Great Expectations - although I don't think he ever made it to ED!

[Jah Lush]

I believe Charles Dickens lived in Dulwich Village for a short while. Hence you get Pickwick Road.

[catriona]

Not sure about East Dulwich, but he rented a house for his mistress in Linden Grove, Nunhead from 1868 to 1870 (when he died).

[civilservant]

well! Jah Lush, Catriona, hats off to both of you! I should have done my research first - see http://www.southwark.gov.uk/info/200159/history_of_southwark/1020/dickens_southwark/1

"In Great Expectations, Dickens indicates that Camberwell was a more genteel place to live as '...anyone who could lay claim to an acquaintance with people of rank and title had a sure passport to the table of the Maldertons who lived at Oak Lodge, Camberwell'

In the southern tip of the present day borough, Dickens was a regular visitor of the Dulwich Club which used to meet at The Greyhound in Dulwich Village, which stood opposite the site of the present Crown & Greyhound. Dickens is also known to have rented a house, under the pseudonym Charles Tringham, for himself and his mistress Ellen Ternan in Linden Grove, Nunhead between 1868 and his death in 1870.

In the Pickwick Papers, Dickens describes the wedding of Mr Snodgrass and Emily Wardle at a 'Dulwich Church', after which the wedding party was said to have returned to Mr Pickwick's for the wedding breakfast. 'The house I have taken,' said Mr Pickwick, 'is at Dulwich. It has a large garden, and is situated in one of the most pleasant spots near London.'

Dulwich remains much as Mr Pickwick describes it, an almost rural retreat in the middle of the urban sprawl of London, where he was seen 'contemplating the pictures in the Dulwich Gallery, or enjoying a walk about the pleasant neighbourhood....' There is even a Pickwick Cottage in College Road that is commonly thought to be the house that Dickens was thinking of when describing Mr Pickwick's retirement idyll at the end of the book"

[Huguenot]

In 1858 he lived in Windsor Lodge, in Linden Grove, Nunhead :)

I'll be betting he downed a few at the EDT.

Ooops, sorry, didn't see the other posts.

[Burbage]

For other localish settings, George Gissing's "In the year of Jubilee" is set around the top end of Camberwell during a Jubilee year. It's not the best of his novels, by some way, and he wasn't the best of novelists. But it's not entirely unreadable, especially if you're fond of ham-fisted victoriana.

I doubt the political burden of it will impress many, though parts of it might strike a few delightful nerves. Gissing was fond of portraying misery, but wasn't in the business of campaigning against it, which might look a bit exploitative in these more censorious times, at least to those unfamiliar with daytime telly. On the other hand, being mostly mired in misery himself and not, apparently, one to easily forget a grudge, there's a plausibly autobiographical pretext for his unfashionable opinions.

[El Pibe]

From Hell has a nice picture of the Half Moon and the railway viaduct in the victorian era.

Someone has done a sort of mash'em'up between the picture and a photo...

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3344/3345542460_f10a2086f5_o.jpg

[Otta]

Anyway, bollocks to all this high brow rubbish.

If, like me, you enjoy a page turner thriller on the train to work, I recommend Linwood Barclay. Found his first novel for 40p at a book stall, really enjoyed it, and am approaching the end of his second, which I've also enjoyed a lot.

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

Bollocks indeed. (Though G.Expectations is the best Dickens by far.)

Don't read this on public transport or you will come across as a loon:

Mystery Man by Colin Bateman.

Set in Belfast, a Crime Bookshop owner becomes a private eye by default. He is in the usual heroic mould: borderline autistic, an agoraphobic, hypochondriac virgin.

It is very silly but fun to read.

[Jah Lush]

civilservant Wrote:

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> well! Jah Lush, Catriona, hats off to both of you!

> I should have done my research first - see

> http://www.southwark.gov.uk/info/200159/history_of

> _southwark/1020/dickens_southwark/1

Thanks. I also believe he mentions The Grove House Tavern (it's called something else now, can't remember what) at the bottom of Camberwell Grove in A Tale Of Two Cities but gives it a different name.

[Marie81]

I'm currently reading Street Boys: 7 Kids. 1 Estate. No Way Out. The True Story of a Lost Childhood. It's about 7 kids marred by guns, gangs and violence growing up on Angell Town Estate in Brixton and their life in the PDC gang.

[Alan Medic]

Kite Runner

Just finished reading this. Has anyone read it and seen the movie? Just wondered if the movie did it justice (if you liked the book)?