As usual, the bulk of my reading this year followed my world literature meta-list.  I began this particular project with The Epic of Gilgamesh (c. 2000 BCE) in 2012 and have progressed chronologically ever since.  This year I turned the corner into the 20th Century, an exciting milestone.  Highlights included a wonderful multi-generational novel from Portugal that deserves to be better known (The Maias, written by Eça de Queirós in 1888), a somber modernist tale from Norway (Hunger, by Knut Hamsun) and the thought-provoking, darkly ironic plays of George Bernard Shaw.  A large chunk of my reading time this year was devoted to the works of Sigmund Freud. I read a compendium of six of his works (Interpretation of Dreams, Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex, Psychopathology of Everyday Life, Wit and the Unconscious, Totem and Taboo, and History of the Psychoanalytic Movement).  (The book was left over from a college philosophy class in the early 1980s; I didn’t get around to reading it back then!) To obtain some perspective on how Freud’s theories are perceived now, I read the recent biography by Frank Tallis, Mortal Secrets.  My views on Freud are complicated, but right now I believe he was a revolutionary thinker and psychologist whose ideas influenced the development of psychology and psychotherapy, mostly for the good, although also in negative ways.  He was no scientist, but recent science has found support for some of his theories.

My continuing studies of art led me to read a number of art books, including a riveting biography of one of my art heroes, Marcel Duchamp, by Calvin Tomkins.  I also read a very funny memoir by one of my favorite comedians, Maria Bamford (Sure, I’ll Join Your Cult).  I was fascinated by my friend Andy LeCompte’s account of his experiences in an actual cult (Finding Miracles.)

Here are the books I read this year, with Goodreads rating.

5 Stars

1. The Maias – Eça de Queirós (Portugal, 1888)
2. Hunger – Knut Hamsun (Norway, 1890)
3. Plays – George Bernard Shaw (UK, 1893-1912)
4. Duchamp: A Biography – Calvin Tomkins (US, 1996)
5. Finding Miracles: Escape from a Cult – Andrew LeCompte (US, 2024)

4 Stars

6. The Essential Tales of Chekhov – Anton Chekhov (Russia, 1880-1903)
7. Thus Spoke Zarathustra – Friedrich Nietzsche (Germany, 1885)
8. Plays – Anton Chekhov (Russia, 1887-1904)
9. The Picture of Dorian Gray and Other Short Stories – Oscar Wilde (Ireland/UK, 1888-1891)
10. Diary of a Nobody – George Grossmith (UK, 1892)
11. A Shropshire Lad – A.E. Housman (UK, 1896)
12. Cyrano de Bergerac – Edmond Rostand (France, 1897)
13. The Basic Writings of Sigmund Freud – Sigmund Freud (A.A. Brill, ed.) (Austria, 1899-1914)
14. The Immoralist – André Gide (France, 1902)
15. The Varieties of Religious Experience – William James (US, 1902)
16. The Souls of Black Folk – W.E.B. Du Bois (US, 1903)
17. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism – Max Weber (Germany, 1905)
18. The Confusions of Young Törless – Robert Musil (Austria, 1906)
19. The Playboy of the Western World and Other Plays – John Millington Synge (Ireland, 1902-1907)
20. Mythologies – Roland Barthes (France, 1957)
21. Greek Art – John Boardman (UK, 1964)
22. History of Modern Art – H. Harvard Arnason (US, 1968)
23. After Modern Art: 1945-2000 – David Hopkins (UK, 2000)
24. Outlive: The Science and Art of Longevity – Peter Attia (US, 2023)
25. Sure, I’ll Join Your Cult: A Memoir of Mental Illness and the Quest to Belong Anywhere – Maria Bamford (US, 2023)
26. Mortal Secrets: Freud, Vienna, and the Discovery of the Modern Mind – Frank Tallis (UK, 2024)

3 Stars

27. Art: A Brief History – Marilyn Stokstad (US, 1999)