various and sundry

Emily emailed me and asked what some of my favorite books/authors were, seeing as you all told me yours. It was a surprisingly hard question. As I get older, I find that I like different authors, different movies, different music, different books, for various purposes, for various ways in which they inform me, so it's harder to call any one "favorite" any more. That said, here, somewhat edited/expanded, is what I pulled out of my hat in response to Emily:

I love Haruki Murakami (Japanese, contemporary). I do like Raymond
Chandler quite a bit. Just read a book by David Mitchell called 'Cloud Atlas'
that was pretty darn great. I must admit that I'm both a a George Saunders and Lydia Davis fan. Raymond Carver is one of the great short story writers ever. I don't read much scifi but I've loved a couple of Phillip K. Dick novels. There's a slim little book by the actor/playwright Wallace Shawn (see photo - you may know him from "The Princess Bride" or as a Ferengi, but he's also one of our greatest living playwrights) called 'The Fever' that's a great political monologue. Charles Bukowski is not the greatest writer and he's arguably a pig but I've read and really got a lot from his stuff. That first Dave Eggers book, 'A Heartbreaking Work . . . " I love and hate and love and hate. I've read two Ursula Le Guin books that I thought were terrific, but it's been a while, The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed. Didn't mention this in my email to Emily, but Flannery O'Connoor is another incredible story writer, sez me. I could go on all day, but there's a start. Oh, there's also poetry. If you think you hate poetry, read Frank O'Hara or a Bukowski poem or two. Robert Lax is also a strange and wonderful poet.

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As for me, in terms of introduction, well, you can go here (jamiebergerwords.com).

You'll find a cute little book about my dog, some journalism, and some fiction and nonfiction that's, well, a bit "adult" to be sharing with my college students, but I'm guessing some of you have already looked and it's in the public domain so there you go. Please, though, let's leave my work out of the class and the blog, okay? If you really want to respond or ask a question about something of mine, drop me an email. I'll bring that dog book into class sometime.