My Favorite Books

Several weeks ago -- well over a month -- I went to the Strand Bookstore to fail to find a copy Zoë Heller's Everything You Know; I entered a ballot to vote for my 5 favorite books of all time. Of course, like any election, your vote's more likely to count if other people agree with you, so they're really kind of asking you what the book you like most of those to which large swaths of people have been exposed. The pornographic novel my father wrote, which I think about (especially the phrase 'they had used each other is many ways as people can be used', which is roughly how pater's purple prose went) probably as often as any other book, wouldn't be a great choice.

They sent me a confirmation of my ballot today. So, I thought I'd share with you what I felt were my five favorite books on that day.

1. Arrowsmith; Sinclair Lewis
2. Wind-up Bird Chronicle; Haruki Murakami
3. Idiot; Fyodor M. Dostoyevsky (Strand's only got the Constance Garnett)
   
4. Titus Andronicus; William Shakespeare
5. Keep the Aspidistra Flying; George Orwell

I am exceptionally fond of a large number of other books, and at any point my top five might be different*, but that's where I was then.

* -- you'll recall how unstable my favorites are