Friday, October 13, 2006

Another Day, Another Book Sale

My primary goal in attending this week’s big book sale was to round out my Virginia Woolf collection in anticipation of the reading project that I mentioned the other day. I did rather well on that count, picking up four of the novels and one of the essay collections that I didn’t yet own. But of course I didn’t stop there. I found a raft of books to feed my current obsession with the novel as a literary form. Then I came across a few bargain editions of books I’ve read multiple times but inexplicably didn’t have copies of in my collection. Plus a selection of memoirs, essays, and letters that I’ve been after for a while. Plus a few short story collections by authors whose work I’ve become increasingly interested in of late thanks to discussions at A Curious Singularity. And finally, a couple of fiction titles that I’ve been meaning to buy for ages. You can see why I didn’t restrain myself.

Here’s the grand list:

Miriam Allott, Novelists on the Novel;
The Personal Papers of Anton Chekhov: his notebook diary
     and letters on writing
(translated by S.S. Koteliansky,
     Leonard Woolf, and Constance Garnett);
Robertson Davies, World of Wonders;
Robert Murray Davis, ed., The Novel: Modern Essays in Criticism;
John Halperin, ed., The Theory of the Novel: New Essays;
John Lent, So It Won’t Go Away;
Katherine Mansfield, Bliss;
Mary McCarthy, Memories of a Catholic Girlhood;
Mary McCarthy, The Writing on the Wall and Other Literary Essays;
Lorrie Moore, Birds of America;
Christopher Morley, The Haunted Bookshop;
Cynthia Ozick, Metaphor & Memory;
Grace Paley, Enormous Changes at the last minute;
Editor to Author: The Letters of Maxwell E. Perkins
     (John Hall Wheelock, ed.);
Robert Scholes, ed., Approaches to the Novel: Materials for a Poetics;
Wallace Stevens, The Necessary Angel: Essays on Reality and the
     Imagination
;
Philip Stevick, ed., The Theory of the Novel;
Guy Vanderhaeghe, Man Descending;
Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel;
Virginia Woolf, Jacob’s Room;
Virginia Woolf, The Voyage Out;
Virginia Woolf, The Waves;
Virginia Woolf, The Years; and,
Virginia Woolf, The Common Reader.

There’s yet another such book sale next week. At the rate I’m going, perhaps I ought to sit that one out…

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh, I wish I could go to that sale. I cannot believe the wonderful things you picked up. Lucky, lucky you Kate.

litlove said...

What a wonderful selection of books! I'd love to get hold of the Christopher Morley, but no chance in this country. I look forward to hearing you blog about them!

dovegreyreader said...

Gasp! Did you have shopping trolley to hand? I'm planning a foray into Cynthia Ozick's writing. I started Bear Boy and didn't do too well (time and place thing) but there is a new edition of all her short stories out which looks very "must have". Congrats on the Woolf haul.

Rebecca H. said...

I absolutely adore McCarthy's Memories of a Catholic Girlhood and I'm curious to hear what you think. And I like Ian Watt's book about the 18C novel -- it's been challenged and "rewritten" so many times by scholars, but it's still very useful and scholars keep returning to it -- a sign of its usefulness.

Kailana said...

Wow, awesome list!

Lotus Reads said...

You did really well - that is a wonderful selection of books! You've got me wanting to go to the Trinity College sale now!

j-love said...

Great haul! Have you read "Birds of America" before? Your mention reminded me that I'm due for a re-read of that. I just bought a massive second-hand solid oak custom-made-for-someone-else bookshelf for almost nothing, and I can't wait to unpack my books and survey them all again!

What and where is this sale? I must go!

j-love said...

oops I got too excited about the sale - your link answers my question - near my new job! Hurray!

Anonymous said...

Such a gratifying lack of self-control! What a great haul...