Why Lists?

I am seeking a response to question that interests me. The members of this group represent a rather different constituency than the other forums where I have posted this question. I hope some of you reply.

I am not a fan of lists. I am, however, interested in the phenomena of book lists. Listing the best books is by no means a phenomena specific to the late 20th/early 21st century; however, lately it seems as if I cannot enter a bookstore without finding yet another book listing the best books of a given period, x books we should read before we die, etc. My experience with newspapers and magazines is similar. Moreover, a casual perusal of LT groups indicates that a regular Schwärmerei for book lists exists among LT members. Two questions interest me: what is the agenda (ideologically, culturally, economically, etc., - you choose) for the choices that appear on these lists? Apart from some outliers, certain titles appear with great regularity - and I would like to see a more nuanced explanation than the usual "well they're classic and influential." Classic to whom? Influential? How? Why? To whom? The second question that interests me: Why do people feel the need to buy books of lists, check off the books they've read, and so on? What does the act of having read all the books on certain lists represent to people?

I have several books of lists of books everyone must read. My first was Anthony Burgess's and he seems to have set the standard, because the same books now turn up with monotonous regularity on all Best of lists. Given that this includes some real obscurities and, indeed, some truly awful novels I can only conclude that Burgess drank with/slept with most of the authors. Certainly many of his picks were by Anglo-Catholic converts like himself so perhaps he just went to church with them. Suffice it to say I was not impressed by his choices, but dutifully slogged my way through a good 30 or so.

I was more impressed by Carmen Callil's choices in The Modern Library. I found that book really useful as far as women's novels went.

Why do I buy these books of lists? Because I have read so much I really don't know where else to turn. Do they work for me? Not all the time. I find I've read huge numbers of the recommended books already, or have already discovered the authors through other works. But between the stinkers - in just these two books - I discovered The Sword of Honor trilogy, The Balkan Trilogy, The Spire, The Mandelbaum Gate, The Flint Anchor and The Siege of Krishnapur, all of which were perfect tens, or damned close to it.

Why do I check off books I've read on lists? Because I don't have a life?

I don't purchase nor read books of lists of books but I do like to make lists of books that I wish to purchase, get from the library, etc. I also like to plan & list out, to a certain degree, the books I will be reading in the year to come. I do not stick to it completely but it does help me to get where I want to be at the end of the year as far as reads go.
I hope you get more answers to the actual question Mary.

There will, no doubt, be someone far more edu-meh-cated than me who can respond to this properly however I'll give it a shot - so standby for some half-baked, amateur, pot boiled theory.

Lists - my mother had lists by the dozen - lists for today - for tomorrow - for next week - written in copperplate. A sign to me of enormous competence. My husband in contrast was brought up believing that having a list was a sign of weakness. If you were told to go to the shop and get something a la Milly Molly Mandy it was a sign of great intelligence if you brought everything on the memorized list home. So the list was still important - even if he protests how much he despises them - it just has to be written in invisible ink on your brain. He's the kind of guy that relishes remembering mathematical formuli and chemical tables - I on the other hand failed science.

Hunters and collectors....whether or not we fit that somewhat hackneyed stereotypical description, I do think there is something connected to a gathering, ordering instinct. Lists are a form of indexing...we want to find or remember where something is...now I'll get deeply philosophical over my mixed berry wholegrain wheeties....may be we want to be "found" or "remembered" by our lists - subconsciously like.....(she pulls at hairs on chins...oops that was a typo - the chins that is..but maybe it's my body subconsciously begging to be relieved of the eating of the wheeties)

Now, I was given a$20 gift voucher for Xmas one year by my daughter's boyfriend. I raced down to my nearest bookshop and what did I buy? A book of lists about books....I think its called the Little Black Book of Books or something....only its not little...its quite heavy and made very good Xmas reading - browsing really....lots of pictures - I do like pictures....it told me about books I'd never heard of....it was and still is deeply satisfying...comforting - knowing that there is still much more reading I have yet to do...that I will never be bereft of a suggestion...

But lists do sometimes leave me feel wanting...every year I think I will read the Booker longlist - then I revise my goal and make it the Booker shortlist...I've yet to ever read all the books on the shortlist - hopeless it is I am....

I often use lists to make me get on with crap I am studiously avoiding or procrastinating about doing...I then feel a small flush of self-congratulation as I cross it off my list - "There that's done." Tick. Another stone rolled up the hill of life.

So in summary - I guess I'm looking for order, direction, for identification, for inspiration, for reflection and consolation. How about that?

All thoughtful replies. Please continue to let the answers pour in.

Ad; U R crackin' me up!~!

In response to the second question (well, not an answer, just an observation): It's not just books that people want to list and check off; think of twitchers who live to "collect" bird sightings, or train spotters, for example. It seems to me that the instinct to create or seek out a list and then try to complete the items on it must be some part of human nature.

As for referring to lists, I am as guilty as anyone in some respects as I do own 1001 books to read . . . and some similar books. But I while I enjoy seeing how many I have read, I also get great pleasure in questioning and disagreeing with the selections too. Perhaps for me, looking at these lists is one way of thinking about and debating books when there is no person around with whom I can have a conversation on the subject. I love books about books, especially those that focus on a genre or subject in which I am interested, and some of the lists out there tap into that for me.

Thanks. Please keep the responses coming in.

I don't buy the books that list other books to read - it seems like too many of them are of the "96 dead white guys plus Jane Austen, Emily Bronte, George Eliot, and Virginia Woolf" variety. No thanks.

off topic: I am finding through the 'Austen-a-Thon' that I much prefer books about Jane, her books & her characters, than her books. Don't know why, but I just don't particularly care for Jane Austen. Perhaps if I read them multiple times I could come to care for them but.........................don't see it happening.

You don't like Jane Austen?!!! Belva, I am shocked, SHOCKED, I tell you - clutches the pearls - oh, wait, I don't wear pearls. Anyway, the Angela Carter thing I get, but Jane? I am baffled.

>9 Leseratte2:, 11: these made me laugh!

The 96 dead white guys sums it up Andrew. I have been so disappointed by things like Sister Carrie and The Old Man and the Sea (although I love most other Hemingway). Burgess is cleverer than that though. He got me to read such stinkers as Pavane, The Fox in the Attic and Goldfinger for God's sake. But in between these were some real gems, which I might not have discovered by myself.

Personally, Belva, I love Austen but I support your right not to. That's what makes the world go round, right? And of course I have a really quirky taste of my own that I'm always having to defend.

And dear Barbara, The Old Man and the Sea is one of my favorite standards that I simply must read every few years. Yup, different strokes for different folks.

I did rate Sense and Sensibility a 5 star read when I read that one but did not like Emma and I have been trying to get into Pride and Prejudice for several months now and just can't seem to do it. I have never attempted Jane Austen until Stasia began the Austen-a-Thon and I thought this would be a good time, but perhaps not. Am thinking of substituting The Friendly Persuasion for Persuasion when I come to that one as I do (at this point) intend to forge through these by years end so I can complete the challenge. Yes, I am just that stubborn.

Andrew mine svweete; I do so hope that you do not keep your pearls in the safe deposit box as they are delicate and like opals they need air to breathe to remain lovely.

And now we return this thread to Mary's 'Why Lists'.

I seem to remember that pearls need to be on skin - is it the oil ? - to remain beautiful....how did we get on to pearls??????

Great questions! The reason readers gravitate to lists of books or books of lists about books has I think to do with why we're here on The Library Thing in the first place. It's a visceral need to be in the Who's Read What? Who doesn't want to be on the list that marks you as a serious reader? Having read books from the list is seeking recognition for who you are. Mind you, I don't think anyone who looks at a list will not think, I've got a better one!

Your other question, is there an agenda? Absolutely!
Reading is a judgment. These lists try to judge you. Whom you read says a lot about you. Whom you read is the company you keep.

Be your own reader!

16 - Nicely said! I agree with everything you said.

I have another reason--to-read lists are fun. My personal list includes over 600 books that I have unread in my house, and over 900 on my wish list. Compiling those two lists has been a great hobby for me.

@ 16; not afraid to put yourself on the block, are you?!?
I quite like it and also agree to a degree.......

@18 Psychologists ought to study readers and writers for revelations.

Hmm, I think there are several ideas of lists at work here.

In academia and even in high school I encountered lists of must reads (whether for exams or to express some sort of canonical preference). I am often curious how my reading matches up with these various lists but I am never slavish about completing this lists. In fact, I find I have a terrible stubborn streak which means that often when I have seen a book on a list (Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children for example), I don't choose the famous work but choose something else by the same author so I read a less preferred book first. I read The Moor's Last Sigh and Haroun and the Sea of Stories before making it to Midnight's Children and The Satanic Verses The Moor's last sigh is not as good as the others and sort of rehashes ideas so it probably undercut Midnight's Children for me but I prefered getting to thos books in my own way.

I too wonder who the creators of these "canonical" lists are. Oh and incidentally, if you want a good mystery about a bookstore that employs a secret panel to choose only good books for their store and then members of this panel start getting murdered I recommend A Novel Bookstore (or if it just appeals to your desire to kill off list makers).

I am much more interested in the personal lists of favorite books of friends whose choices I have found interesting in the past. I am an inveterate book voyeur, by which I mean there is nothing I like better in visiting a friend at home than looking at their book cases both for points where we intersect and books I might want to read. LT appeals to this tendency because you can look at other people's shelves virtually.

Another list idea at play seems to be about either personally tracking what one has read. I am by no means complete in tracking all the books I have read but I see the appeal because it is sort of interesting to see what you were reading at a certain point in time, or seeing if there were trends in what you were reading (last winter was all about cozy mysteries for me).

Finally, there is the completing a list of books you want to collect whether those are Viragos or books in a series or something else. With certain publishers like Virgao, Persephone or New York Review of Books I feel like their editorial choices are much like the lists of a good friend they introduce me to books I find interesting and I have come to trust their choices. With all three of these publishers I feel like that their mission is to find interesting work that I haven't heard of or books that have been neglected by someone else's list so maybe they appeal to that stubborn streak in me.

Almost 20 years ago I started asking people to tell me their favorite book of all time, so that I could read it for myself. I had some interesting replies. Billy Budd was one, and I hated that. Someone else said A Month in the Country which I thought was a lovely book but not a 'favorite of all time' book. A feminist woman told me that her favorite was HMS Ulysses by Alistair MacLean. I was not only deeply surprised, I was extremely skeptical. However, it proved to be MacLean's first book, and not only worth reading but really really good. I stopped asking when I found myself committed to reading (and then discussing) Kaleidoscope by Danielle Steel.

Of all the forums on which I have posted this question, the Viragoes are offering the most thoughtful responses. Now what does that say about us?

That we are quietly brilliant readers.

Mother Urania did you see this?????

http://www.librarything.com/work/9102209/reviews/74341364

Yes.

I am finding this fascinating. Mary, as per usual, stirs things up! alexdaw, your response in #4 was delightful. And all of it has got me thinking...

I gather you are asking about lists in public forums, Mary? 1000 books to read before you die kind of thing? I don't follow those nor do I feel compelled to read all the Booker's, Orange prizes, etc. It seems that my lists are all of a personal or idiosyncratic nature.