The Second Best

[OverTheMountains]

Hi Everybody,

I thought it would be fun to play a bit with the whole "what's the best work by that Nobel Prize Winning writer?" and promote, instead, the question of what constitutes the second best book by that Nobel Prize Winning writer. How it works is quite simple - going through the list of Nobel winners, outline which work of theirs you consider to be their second best "masterpiece". And - because lists don't lead to discussion, but words do - outline why. I would suggest you only do this for authors that you've actually read more than two books by, but I obviously can't control that. If you want to do this based on the reputation of a work the you're free to do so.

Feel free to also turn this into a notelist of the works that you've read by the Nobelists. It would be interesting to see just which books all of you have read from each other these writers.

I've attached a full list of all of the winners, feel free to copy and paste it to make your job a bit easier.

2015 - Svetlana Alexievich​

2014 - Patrick Modiano
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2013 - Alice Munro
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2012 - Mo Yan
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2011 - Tomas Tranströmer
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2010 - Mario Vargas Llosa
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2009 - Herta Müller
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2008 - Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio
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2007 - Doris Lessing
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2006 - Orhan Pamuk
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2005 - Harold Pinter
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2004 - Elfriede Jelinek
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2003 - John M. Coetzee
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2002 - Imre Kertész
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2001 - Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul
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2000 - Gao Xingjian
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1999 - Günter Grass
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1998 - José Saramago
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1997 - Dario Fo
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1996 - Wislawa Szymborska
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1995 - Seamus Heaney
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1994 - Kenzaburo Oe
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1993 - Toni Morrison
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1992 - Derek Walcott
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1991 - Nadine Gordimer
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1990 - Octavio Paz
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1989 - Camilo José Cela
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1988 - Naguib Mahfouz
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1987 - Joseph Brodsky
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1986 - Wole Soyinka
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1985 - Claude Simon
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1984 - Jaroslav Seifert
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1983 - William Golding
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1982 - Gabriel García Márquez
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1981 - Elias Canetti
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1980 - Czeslaw Milosz
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1979 - Odysseus Elytis
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1978 - Isaac Bashevis Singer
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1976 - Saul Bellow
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1975 - Eugenio Montale
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1974 - Eyvind Johnson, Harry Martinson
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1973 - Patrick White
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1972 - Heinrich Böll
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1971 - Pablo Neruda
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1970 - Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn
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1969 - Samuel Beckett
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1968 - Yasunari Kawabata
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1967 - Miguel Angel Asturias
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1966 - Shmuel Yosef Agnon, Nelly Sachs
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1965 - Mikhail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov
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1964 - Jean-Paul Sartre
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1963 - Giorgos Seferis
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1962 - John Steinbeck
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1961 - Ivo Andric
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1960 - Saint-John Perse
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1959 - Salvatore Quasimodo
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1958 - Boris Leonidovich Pasternak
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1957 - Albert Camus
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1956 - Juan Ramón Jiménez
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1955 - Halldór Kiljan Laxness
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1954 - Ernest Miller Hemingway
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1953 - Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill
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1952 - François Mauriac
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1951 - Pär Fabian Lagerkvist
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1950 - Earl (Bertrand Arthur William) Russell
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1949 - William Faulkner
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1948 - Thomas Stearns Eliot
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1947 - André Paul Guillaume Gide
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1946 - Hermann Hesse
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1945 - Gabriela Mistral
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1944 - Johannes Vilhelm Jensen
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1939 - Frans Eemil Sillanpää
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1938 - Pearl Buck
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1937 - Roger Martin du Gard
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1936 - Eugene Gladstone O'Neill
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1934 - Luigi Pirandello
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1933 - Ivan Alekseyevich Bunin
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1932 - John Galsworthy
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1931 - Erik Axel Karlfeldt
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1930 - Sinclair Lewis
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1929 - Thomas Mann
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1928 - Sigrid Undset
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1927 - Henri Bergson
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1926 - Grazia Deledda
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1925 - George Bernard Shaw
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1924 - Wladyslaw Stanislaw Reymont
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1923 - William Butler Yeats
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1922 - Jacinto Benavente
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1921 - Anatole France
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1920 - Knut Pedersen Hamsun
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1919 - Carl Friedrich Georg Spitteler
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1917 - Karl Adolph Gjellerup, Henrik Pontoppidan
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1916 - Carl Gustaf Verner von Heidenstam
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1915 - Romain Rolland
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1913 - Rabindranath Tagore
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1912 - Gerhart Johann Robert Hauptmann
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1911 - Count Maurice (Mooris) Polidore Marie Bernhard Maeterlinck
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1910 - Paul Johann Ludwig Heyse
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1909 - Selma Ottilia Lovisa Lagerlöf
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1908 - Rudolf Christoph Eucken
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1907 - Rudyard Kipling
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1906 - Giosuè Carducci
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1905 - Henryk Sienkiewicz
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1904 - Frédéric Mistral, José Echegaray y Eizaguirre
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1903 - Bjørnstjerne Martinus Bjørnson
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1902 - Christian Matthias Theodor Mommsen
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1901 - Sully Prudhomme
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[OverTheMountains]

Thanks for getting this started Vazquez. I'm glad that somebody else is willing to explore this question a bit - personally, I think that the idea of Second Bests allows us to question the Best of the Best as much as anything. I'll take your route and go with 5 Nobelists thus far, but I honestly haven't read many writers more than once or twice, so my contribution to this process can only be quite limited. I could add a few more to this, but I will save those for as the threads (hopefully) develops.

2013 - Alice Munro - "Moons of Jupiter"

Munro is one of my favourite writers, and in the top two or three of my favourite living writers. However, as her work is entirely that of Short Stories it is hard to know what kind of output to note here - individual stories, or full collections. I've opted for full collections, though I could point out individual stories as well if it is preferred. Moons of Jupiter is a fantastic collection of stories, as all of her collections are, but I think it rises slightly above the rest for its technical prowess as it starts to play with the form and structure of stories in ways that her previous work never did and her following work developed. Some highlghts include "Dulse", "Bardon Bus", "Labor Day Dinner", "Visitors", and "Moons of Jupiter".

Also read: Runaway, Lives of Girls and Women, The View from Castle Rock
Next Up: Friends of My Youth

2007 - Doris Lessing - "Briefing for a Descent Into Hell"

To be honest, I'm not sure that I have a right to promote this book as her second best, but I will anyways. I haven't read any of her masterworks, though exactly which of her works, aside from The Golden Notebook, are considered masterworks is up for constant debate. Of the three I have read, though, this is certainly the second best. It is remarkably inventive, has some truly fantastic writing, and is a wonderful satire of how we understand mental illness in the world. It is also a piece of science fiction (though I suspect Margaret Atwood would contend that it isn't all that science-fiction-ey), which is the body of work that Lessing thought was her most important contribution, and which is a genre that I often struggle to enjoy. That wasn't the case with this one. It felt grounded while also playing with the immense possibilities of the world around us. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Also read: The Fifth Child, The Good Terrorist
Next Up: The Grass is Singing

2001 - J.M. Coetzee - "The Age of Iron"

As Vazquez points out, Coetzee is damned fine. I would content that he might be the most important fiction writer we have right now, and the most consistent. His work is damned good, awe-inspiring, a mixture of nightmares. And it is changing. He never stops changing his form and theme. His work from the 80s is very different from his work from the 00s, which is proving to be very different from his work in the 10s. And, as far as I'm concerned, everything is worthy of reading - and, everything that I've read is going to be re-read.

I've selected Age of Iron, after some careful consideration, because it made too much sense to me that this kind of violence was possible. When I read it I thought I was reading fiction was it was meant to be written, some kind of vision of the future. It gave me nightmares, and it entered my understanding not only of South Africa but also of Canada - this is the kind of violence that could, possibly, come to dominate my country. As a product that discusses the idea of fear, the project of decolonialization, and the complex relations between settler and colonized that result, it is perhaps without equal. It is really damned good.

Also Read: Waiting for the Barbarians, Foe, Life and Times of Michael K, The Childhood of Jesus
Next Up: Boyhood

1983 - William Golding - "The Spire"

I've only read two by Golding, but I have thoroughly enjoyed both of them. This despite the fact that many consider Golding's Nobel as one of the great misfires of the prize - no Borges, Calvino, or Greene? Really?! I don't know if he is one of the greats of this great prize, but he was a very talented writer, unflinchingly earthy and human. I have selected The Spire because I think it plays with many themes which are of particular importance to those who wish to become something of themselves - pride and shame, disillusionment, and ambition. And I think it plays with them wonderfully. It may be that Golding's greatest talent was playing with physical threats which were the central symbols of the story, and here he does this masterfully. A wonderful little book, with some great writing and descriptions. I would be thrilled to ever be able to write about dust falling like this man.

Also Read: The Lord of the Flies
Next Up: Rites of Passage

1957 - Albert Camus - "The Stranger"

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This is perhaps the most controversial selection I'll make to this thread. Quite simply, The Stranger is fantastic, but it isn't as good as The Plague. I love them both deeply, but, until I reread The Stranger I can't argue that it has the same weight or heft as The Plague. I can't argue that it engages with society quite as much - I can't argue that it is anything more than a little experiment. But what a good experiment. Read at any time in one's life I suspect The Stranger is illuminating to the ways in which we can and cannot relate to the society we find ourselves trapped in, and just what we can expect of one another. Was Camus important? You're damned right he was. Was this book important? You're damned right it was. And it still is. One of the great laureates as far as I'm concerned, with more than a couple masterpieces under his belt.

Also Read: The Plague, The Myth of Sisyphus
Next Up: The Fall

 

[redhead]

Kenzaburo Oe- A Personal Matter
It's pretty much Oe's flagship book, at least in the US. Upon rereading, the ending is not as ill-fitting as some might suggest, but Oe definitely could have handled that better than he did. Still, the writing, the plot...it's one of my favorites, surpassed in Oe's oeuvre by only The Silent Cry, a much denser, less exciting, but ultimately more rewarding read.

Mo Yan- The Garlic Ballads
I know some posters on here hate this book, but it's what made me fall in love with Mo Yan's writing. Like Oe, his language hits me just right. And although the plot is a little predictable, the way the nonlinear plot unfolds struck me as having the gripping pacing of a thriller. Seeing Chinese poverty first hand also opened my eyes to the sort of things described in this book. Life and Death Are Wearing Me Out may be better, but this one still holds a special place in my bookshelves.

Patrick Modiano- Missing Person/The Cafe of Lost Youth
Yes, I'm cheating. But I can't pick just one. One is an intriguing detective story, the other is about cafe-goers recalling a young woman who went around in their circles some years prior. Neither is better than Dora Bruder, though.

John Steinbeck- Cannery Row
I have weird tastes for when it comes to Steinbeck. His most famous pieces never really resonated with me; I can see why they're so popular, but The Grapes of Wrath, East of Eden, etc, seemed like over-written, under-edited, black and white books. Cannery Row, a more subtle, more humorous book, is more my speed. It's about a group of bums and a scientist on the US's west coast and their day to day life. No life or death matters, no biblical allegories, just derelicts trying to throw Doc, the scientist, a party. His best, in my opinion, is his travelogue Travels with Charlie (the titular character is Steinbeck's dog).

Saul Bellow- Henderson the Rain King?
The reason for the question mark is that 6 or 7 years ago I read Augie March and was blown away. It quickly became one of my favorites but I'm not quite sure what I'd think of it if I read it again. But enough about that, Henderson the Rain King is a great comic novel. Here's a short synopsis: an American millionaire goes to Africa to try and find fulfillment, hijinks ensue. Eugene Henderson is a complete asshole, but Bellow makes sure he never becomes completely unlikable. He's not someone I'd want to interact with too much in person, but as a character, Henderson's dickish attitude is more amusing than annoying, much like Ignatius Reilly in A Confederacy of Dunces. The character is a typical Bellovian hero, but it's interesting to see Bellow getting out of his comfort zone, making the plot be something few people had ever experienced.

 

[Ben Jackson]

Wole Soyinka--- A Dance of the Forest
Also read: Madmen and the Specialists, The Interpreters, Death and the King's Horseman, Ake, You Must set forth at Dawn, Idanre and Other Poems

Albert Camus--- The Fall
Also read: The Stranger, Exile and the Kingdom, Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays, The First Man

Ernest Hemingway--- For Whom the Bell Tolls
Also read: The Old Man and the Sea, A Farewell to Arms, The Sun Also Rises

J M Coetzee--- Scenes of Provicial Life
Also read: Disgrace, Life and Times of Michael K, Elizabeth Costello

William Golding--- Pincher Martin
Also read: Lord of the Flies, Paper Men

Heinrich Boll--- The Clown
Also read: Group Portrait of a Lady, Billards at Half-past Nine

Saul Bellow---- Herzog
Also read: Seize the Day, Adventures of Augie March

Odysseas Elytis--- The Monogram
Also read: To Axion Esti, Orientations, Maria Nephele

Pablo Neruda--- 100 Love Sonnets
Also read: Twenty Love Poems, The Canto General

Samuel Beckett--- Krapp's Last Tape
Also read: Waiting for Godot, Short Prose

Boris Pasternak--- My Sister-- Life
Dr Zhivago, Selected Poems

T S Eliot---- The Hollow Men
Also read: The Wasteland, Prufrock and Other Observations, Selected Essays

Hermann Hesse---- Steppenwolf
Also read: Siddhartha, Peter Camenzind, Demian, Poems

 

[Leseratte]

Wole Soyinka--- A Dance of the Forest
Also read: Madmen and the Specialists, The Interpreters, Death and the King's Horseman, Ake, You Must set forth at Dawn, Idanre and Other Poems,

Albert Camus--- The Fall
Also read: The Stranger, Exile and the Kingdom, Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays, The First Man

Ernest Hemingway--- For Whom the Bell Tolls
Also read: The Old Man and the Sea, A Farewell to Arms, The Sun Also Rises

J M Coetzee--- Scenes of Provicial Life
Also read: Disgrace, Life and Times of Michael K, Elizabeth Costello

William Golding--- Pincher Martin
Also read: Lord of the Flies, Paper Men

Heinrich Boll--- The Clown
Also read: Group Portrait of a Lady, Billards at Half-past Nine

Saul Bellow---- Herzog
Also read: Seize the Day, Adventures of Augie March

Odysseas Elytis--- The Monogram
Also read: To Axion Esti, Orientations, Maria Nephele

Pablo Neruda--- 100 Love Sonnets
Also read: Twenty Love Poems, The Canto General

Samuel Beckett--- Krapp's Last Tape
Also read: Waiting for Godot, Short Prose

Boris Pasternak--- My Sister-- Life
Dr Zhivago, Selected Poems

T S Eliot---- The Hollow Men
Also read: The Wasteland, Prufrock and Other Observations, Selected Essays

Hermann Hesse---- Steppenwolf
Also read: Siddhartha, Peter Camenzind, Demian, Poems

Several favorites here. You seem to be a systematic reader.

 

[Ben Jackson]

Several favorites here. You seem to be a systematic reader.

Thanks for the comment. Yes, I'm a very systematic reader. I try to get ideas and style of a writer by first reading a biography of the writer before reading two or three books of him/her( the books that's available online, most Nobel lauretes books aren't easy to find in bookstores in my country except Soyinka and Coetzee and Gordimer and maybe British or American Lauretes like Bernard Shaw, Hemingway and Toni Morrison) and then provide judgement about the author's works.

Actually, I've several favourite Nobel Lauretes that I didn't mention here including:
Octavio Paz
Vincente Aleixandre
Eugenio Montale
Juan Ramon Jimenez
George Seferis
Joseph Brodsky
Jean Paul Sartre
Naguib Mahfouz
Tomas Transtromer
Patrick Modiano
Knut Hamsun
Thomas Mann
W B Yeats
George Bernard Shaw
Jose Saramago
Derek Walcott
Yasunari Kawabata

 

[wordeater]

There are only five winners by whom I've read three or more complete books, and liked at least two. I'll mention the number 1 between brackets. I'll rank them by how much I like their second best book.

1. Gabriel García Márquez - Chronicle of a Death Foretold (One Hundred Years of Solitude)

This short novel has a very tight structure. An outsider reconstructs the events before a murder. You know what has happened from the beginning, but each chapter gives a deeper insight into how and why. It leaves an image of a primitive macho society.

2. Hermann Hesse - Steppenwolf (Siddhartha)

In this case the most famous novel is my second favourite. Hesse wrote about someone who feels alienated from society and its bourgeois morality. He feels like a wild animal that can go nowhere with its energy. Modern psychiatrists would call him schizotypical. It involves some surrealist elements, an attempt at escape from reality.

3. John Steinbeck - The Grapes of Wrath (Of Mice and Men)

The topic of the economic migration east is interesting, but I prefer his shorter work. I see him as the American version of naturalism. It has dialogue in dialect, descriptions of nature, travel and work, and robust characters fighting against the odds.

4. Ernest Hemingway - A Farewell to Arms (The Old Man and the Sea)

It gives a personal account of the First World War, involving desertion, travel and a love story. This might even be his best, but I need to reread it. It moves from Italy to Switzerland.

5. Thomas Mann - Doctor Faustus (Death in Venice)

Mann was an intellectual with strong views on politics, philosophy and art. This book interested me, because it's about music theory and modernism. It has a description of a magic square with sixteen numbers.

 

[redhead]

Kenzaburo Oe- A Personal Matter
It's pretty much Oe's flagship book, at least in the US. Upon rereading, the ending is not as ill-fitting as some might suggest, but Oe definitely could have handled that better than he did. Still, the writing, the plot...it's one of my favorites, surpassed in Oe's oeuvre by only The Silent Cry, a much denser, less exciting, but ultimately more rewarding read.

Mo Yan- The Garlic Ballads
I know some posters on here hate this book, but it's what made me fall in love with Mo Yan's writing. Like Oe, his language hits me just right. And although the plot is a little predictable, the way the nonlinear plot unfolds struck me as having the gripping pacing of a thriller. Seeing Chinese poverty first hand also opened my eyes to the sort of things described in this book. Life and Death Are Wearing Me Out may be better, but this one still holds a special place in my bookshelves.

Patrick Modiano- Missing Person/The Cafe of Lost Youth
Yes, I'm cheating. But I can't pick just one. One is an intriguing detective story, the other is about cafe-goers recalling a young woman who went around in their circles some years prior. Neither is better than Dora Bruder, though.

John Steinbeck- Cannery Row
I have weird tastes for when it comes to Steinbeck. His most famous pieces never really resonated with me; I can see why they're so popular, but The Grapes of Wrath, East of Eden, etc, seemed like over-written, under-edited, black and white books. Cannery Row, a more subtle, more humorous book, is more my speed. It's about a group of bums and a scientist on the US's west coast and their day to day life. No life or death matters, no biblical allegories, just derelicts trying to throw Doc, the scientist, a party. His best, in my opinion, is his travelogue Travels with Charlie (the titular character is Steinbeck's dog).

Saul Bellow- Henderson the Rain King?
The reason for the question mark is that 6 or 7 years ago I read Augie March and was blown away. It quickly became one of my favorites but I'm not quite sure what I'd think of it if I read it again. But enough about that, Henderson the Rain King is a great comic novel. Here's a short synopsis: an American millionaire goes to Africa to try and find fulfillment, hijinks ensue. Eugene Henderson is a complete asshole, but Bellow makes sure he never becomes completely unlikable. He's not someone I'd want to interact with too much in person, but as a character, Henderson's dickish attitude is more amusing than annoying, much like Ignatius Reilly in A Confederacy of Dunces. The character is a typical Bellovian hero, but it's interesting to see Bellow getting out of his comfort zone, making the plot be something few people had ever experienced.

It’s interesting to revisit this thread and see how my thoughts have changed. For example, I now hold A Personal Matter in higher regard than The Silent Cry and view both Saul Bellow and Mo Yan as utter mediocrities. Though my thoughts on Steinbeck are still the same.

Back on topic: I think Dylan’s best album is Highway 61 Revisited, his second best Blood on the Tracks (and “Love and Theft” is third, Blonde on Blonde fourth).