Introduce yourself

**goliardine** · 09-Jul-2009, 18:42

Liam,

Thank you so much for the recommendations. I actually ordered a dual-language book of Lynge poems last week because it was the only thing I could find (with my meager research skills, anyway) that was a translation from Greenlandic. So I am waiting for that to arrive.

Long historical novels make me go "ooooo." I love them like sunsets. I will definitely check The Greenlanders out. And Jane Smiley is one of those authors who seem to be everywhere but about whom I know next to nothing. Now I will know something.

And the movie is on order from Netflix as we speak! I had to shove aside quite a few episodes of Bablyon 5 to push it to the front of the line.

Exciting!

**goliardine** · 09-Jul-2009, 18:47

Originally Posted by Stewart

It's translated from the French and written by a Togolese author but An African In Greenland, his account of growing up in Togo, making the trip across Europe, and living in Greenland, may be of interest. It's by Tete-Michel Kpomassie.

Stewart, that sounds potentially amazing. I will have to check it out.

And in response to Liam's question, I am from Michigan but currently living in Las Vegas for grad-school purposes.

**john h** · 10-Jul-2009, 02:28

I'm still making my way around this site. There is so much here it takes a while to getting around to scoping it all out. I just finished the Zweig book yesterday, promptbr, and couldn't agree more--he's a vastly underappreciated writer. I visited your windswept site and can see that you're a connoiseur of neglected writers and books. It's a kick I've been on for a long time too. I assume you know about the neglected books site. I've made a lot of gret discoveries from that site.

**Noumenon** · 12-Jul-2009, 12:49

Originally Posted by The Artist Formerly Known As Critch22

Hello all,

I'm an Englishman living in Madrid, in dire need of a second language under my belt, plus a second book not written in English as well (that's an exaggeration. Slightly). I'm occasionally struggling under the weight of Don Quixote at the moment - I like it, it's just a bit of a marathon and there are so many shorter, easier diversions to be enjoyed on all sides...

The most recent translated work i've read was Q by the Italian group mind "Luther Blissett" and very good it was too.

Finally, apologies for the avatar. I joined a sci-fi forum with it, but since two months later I don't go anywhere near it I thought i'd put it to use here. I'll replace it with something a little more Spanish when i get the time!

Hello again,

Grateful thanks to Stewart for allowing me to bring my identity here under the comforting umbrella of my usual label. A new avatar as well. Contrary to my stated intention it has wound up being a touch more Dutch, but since the Spanish didn't banish me (at least not yet) if I find something more local to wrap around my face I will.

Have I developed as a person during the many years I've been contributing so little to this forum? Well, I've still not finished Don Quixote, I think it's one for my death bed. Y ahora, hablo muy poco castellano - pero no intiendo nada. So it looks like the answer's "no"...

**promtbr** · 12-Jul-2009, 15:48

Originally Posted by john h

. I just finished the Zweig book yesterday, promtbr, and couldn't agree more--he's a vastly underappreciated writer. I visited your windswept site and can see that you're a connoiseur of neglected writers and books. It's a kick I've been on for a long time too. I assume you know about the neglected books site. I've made a lot of gret discoveries from that site.

Zweig was one of my best discoveries of last year. I will be reading (and reviewing) his Chess Story soon.

The Neglected Book site is awesome, (I have a link to it on my site...)

This site here has been the best hidden gem 'miner's headlamp' tho...

Welcome Richard, I will check out the Roth site ( I am under read in him)

I live in the small town that Marilynne Robinson lived in for a time when she was growing up and set Housekeeping in (her place descriptions in it are accurate except for taking artistic liberties with the lake's water depth at the railroad trestle

)

Welcome Back (?) noumemon. Checked out your site. Looks good!

Howdy Andy and Gollardine

don't just dabble the toe, jump in, the water's fine..we promise.

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**Clarissa** · 12-Jul-2009, 15:51

Hi everybody,

I came across this site quite by accident. This afternoon, I was listening to a dramatised radio version of the Ingeborg Bachmann-Paul Celan correspondence, two writers whose work I admire. I googled their names together and came across a thread here on World Literature Forum by Mirabell, a member who lives in Germany.

Browsing through the various threads, I found a lot to interest me and so I joined.

At first, I thought the site was no longer active (despite receiving the customary e-mail to finalise my registration) so I clicked on 'latest posts' and found that July 2009 is as active as when Stewart got this going in the Spring of last year.

If I may recommend one author whose work I discovered last year, it would be Sandor Marai. I recently finished reading Das Wunder des San Gennaro (The Miracle of San Gennaro) published posthumously, but I do not know if it has been translated from the Hungarian into English. I read it in German. One of those rare books that I shall take pleasure in rereading.

This being my first posting here, I am not sure if it's in the right place. If it isn't, please bear with me as I'm the new kid on the block.

**promtbr** · 12-Jul-2009, 16:32

Originally Posted by Clarissa

If I may recommend one author whose work I discovered last year, it would be Sandor Marai. I recently finished reading Das Wunder des San Gennaro (The Miracle of San Gennaro) published posthumously, but I do not know if it has been translated from the Hungarian into English. I read it in German. One of those rare books that I shall take pleasure in rereading.

This being my first posting here, I am not sure if it's in the right place. If it isn't, please bear with me as I'm the new kid on the block.

Cool, Austria. Being a monolinguist *whines to self* I envy your being able to read all your country's amazing writers in the original langauge...

Sandor Marai...Right On! (old hippie expression). Just read Embers and its one of the best Novels I have read. I have not heard of the one you mention in translation...

Welcome!

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**Clarissa** · 12-Jul-2009, 22:07

Thanks for the welcome promptbr. Bought Gilead after reading Marylinne Robinson's Pulitzer Prize winning Home which I enjoyed enough to want to read more of her work. Gilead is next on my list of books to read. When I finish John le Carr?s A Perfect Spy, another good read.
Philip Roth - one of my favourite US writers.
Stefan Zweig - not only a good novelist. His historical biographies are also worth reading but, for me, his most outstanding book is his autobiography Die Welt von gestern (The World of Yesterday)

**marafeeney** · 15-Jul-2009, 18:55

HI--just joining in. I love literature, especially cross-cultural and world literature. Undergraduate degree in Anthropology, graduate degree in Community and Regional Planning. Canadian now living in San Francisco (it's the weather and the wine!). I was an Eskimo Housing Officer in a past life, and just wrote my first novel about that era: "Rankin Inlet." The protagonist is a British nurse-midwife who takes a post in a tiny Inuit community on the west coast of Hudson Bay. Look forward to following some threads here...

**andrewmoquin** · 16-Jul-2009, 04:46

Hi there, I'm new here and quite excited about being amongst people who are interested in literature and writing.

love reading and watching Shakespeare, my favourite play being Hamlet with King Lear, Romeo and Juliet, Henry IV part I, and Henry V coming in close behind.

The classics make up most of my reading. The Brontes, Hardy, Keats, Shelley and Byron are just a few of the writers I love passionately.

I'm looking for more modern stuff to read, as of yet, I've not really found anything I've enjoyed that much (apart from Cold Mountain). So any recommendations are welcomed.

I'm also looking to learn more about the myths of Ancient Greece and Rome.

Aside from literature, I love writing, playing piano, and tennis ...

Cheers!
-Andy

“What is wonderful about great literature is that it transforms the man who reads it towards the condition of the man who wrote.”
“Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled, thought and speculation at a standstill.”

**Liam** · 16-Jul-2009, 05:06

Welcome, Clarissa, Mara and Andrew, and yes, you're in the right place!