Schadenfreude--pleasure derived by someone from another person's misfortune. Nabokov, I am coming to find, is the master of this. The key to it, is to not identify too much with the person experiencing the misfortune, otherwise it becomes uncomfortable, cringy, awkward... but this, is not. You find yourself laughing with the most perfect satisfaction. And …
Mystery on the side
I'm listening to another Nabokov novel, and no surprise, it's great. This one is about a struggling businessman who also seems a bit mentally unstable, running across a vagrant who happens to look exactly like him. The instant he sees this face, a plan sparks in his mind. You can tell, but, you don't know …
Pale Fire, by Vladimir Nabokov
This is the epitome of genius. Nabokov must have some kind of freak literary gene that makes him so good with words. This is one of the few books I've wanted to start reading again the moment I reached the end. (I think Lolita was another...) On the surface, Pale fire is a 999 line …
Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Kafka has some way with words that makes everything seem like a slow, surreal nightmare. This story, in simple, straightforward language, manages that feeling while still being somewhat comical. Gregor Samsa wakes one morning to find he's transformed into a giant insect-like creature who's smell and appearance so horrify his family that they can't bear …
Starting at the action
I'm listening to Kafka's Metamorphosis, and the first sentence is him waking up as a giant insect. This is how stories should be told. So many other writers, amateur or not, would write however many thousands of words about the day before it happened--but why waste time getting there? Since the story is about him …
Jonas David 