Favorite Authors Thread

[BassDude726]

Now, I think we can all consider ourselves intelligent and well-read individuals without stroking our egos too much, so I thought I'd start this to see what other people are reading. I'm only including a few categories, but if anyone thinks of some other ones that should be included, knock yourself out.

Fiction: Hemingway (The Sun Also Rises)
Science Fiction: Frank Herbert (Dune)
Fantasy: Tolkien (Silmarilion)
Literature: Joyce (Dubliners)
Pop fiction: Tom Clancy (No distinguishing novels, they're all pretty good)
Philosophy: Plato (The Republic)

I'm sure I've left out a few categories but I'm kind of rushed at the moment, sorry!

 

[IglooDame]

Fiction: James Michener (Hawaii, Alaska, The Caribbean)

Sci-Fi: Robert Heinlein (Stranger in a Strange Land, Starship Troopers), Isaac Asimov (the Foundation trilogy).

Pop fiction: Clive Cussler (several)

Philosophy: Ayn Rand (Atlas Shrugged), various religions' holy books

 

[Ramius75]

Fiction: George Orwell (1984, animal farm) John Steinback (Grape of wrath)
Science Fiction: Arthur c clarke (Rama series, 2001 series) Frank Herbert (Dune) Kim stanley robinson (red mars series)
Fantasy: Tolkien (LOTR)
Literature: Joyce (portrait of an artist as a young man)
Pop fiction: Nil
Philosophy: Confucius ( Lu Yu-Analects of Confucius) Nietzsche (Beyond good and evil)

Ramius

 

[JtheJackal]

I don't really read enough, ut these people always stick out in my mind
Science Fiction: HG Wells (the War of the Worlds), Kurt Vonnegut (Sirens of Titan)
Fantasy: JK Rowling (Harry Potter)
Horror: HP Lovecraft (various)

 

[BassDude726]

I'd have to go with Space and Tales of the South Pacific for my favorite Michener novels... and on second thought, he's way better than Tom Clancy.

 

[test_specimen]

Fiction: Dalton Trumbo (Johnny Got His Gun), Karl May, Graham Greene
Science Fiction: Jules Verne, Frank Herbert, Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke
Fantasy: JRR Tolkien, HP Lovecraft
Literature: Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, Kafka, Hesse
Pop fiction: Robert Menasse, Douglas Coupland
Philosophy: Karl Popper, Bertrand Russel, Ludwig Wittgenstein
Drama: Henrik Ibsen, Thomas Bernhard, Tennessee Williams, Arthur Miller

Hard to put everything in the right category, I have especially problems with "pop fiction" and the distinction between "fiction" and "literature".

 

[luiz]

Historic Fiction: Maurice Druon(The Damned Kings); Bernard Cornwell(Warlord Chronicles)

Literature: Dostoyevsky(Brothers Karamozov)

Philosophy: Karl Popper, FA Hayek(more of an economist, but with some solid philosophical works)

I don't really like Sci-Fi or Pop Fiction(whatever that is)

 

[BassDude726]

I felt the need to differentiate between Literature and Fiction and pop-fiction because they seem to be distinctive categories to me. I don't know what the defining characteristics are, but it seems blasphemous to include Hemingway in the same category as Tom Clancy.

 

[The Last Conformist]

My usual inability to pick absolute favourites rears its ugly head again; consider the below names as authors I much like, but not necessarily the numbers one in the categories.

Fiction: (This would seem to be a superset of several of the below)
Science Fiction: Frank Herbert
Fantasy: Tolkien, Pratchett
Literature: Dostoevsky
Pop fiction: Don't read this kind of books.
Philosophy: Don't read much philosophy either.

I read alot of non-philosophy non-fiction, too. Paul Davis, John Keegan and Peter Nilsson are just some names that deserve being mentioned. The last also wrote decent SF (he claimed they contained too much science to be Science Fiction, but being dead, he can no longer contradict me!)

 

[WickedSmurf]

Terry Pratchett, Clive Barker, Herman Lindqvist, Douglas Adams... Tolkien, Stephen King. Did read some Koontz as well until I got bored of him. Stories are surprisingly non-surprising after one have read some of his books.

 

[nonconformist]

Fiction: Alistair MacLean(HMS Ulysses, Guns of Navarone), Brian Callisson(A Flock of Ships), Robert Westall(The Machine Gunners).
Non-fiction: Stephen E. Ambrose (Band of Brothers, Citizen Soldiers), various I can't remember names
Sci-Fi:nothing really
Fantasy: not much
Literature: Can't remember
Pop fiction: Tom Clancy
Philosophy: Michael Moore (Dons FlaK jacket), Karl Marx (reinforces FlaK jacket with riot shield)

Seriously, my book collection is so large (well over a hundred), and most of the books I read are reference books (WWII), so I can't really remember.

 

[Plotinus]

By far the best philosopher to read, in my opinion, is Leibniz, followed by Plato - both for sheer readability and breadth of ideas.

 

[BassDude726]

I felt pretty conventional listing Plato as my philosophy choice, but if you read some of his stuff, it's really just completely breathtaking in its genius.

 

[Plotinus]

I felt pretty conventional listing Plato as my philosophy choice, but if you read some of his stuff, it's really just completely breathtaking in its genius.

It was Whitehead who said that all Western philosophy is just footnotes to Plato, and I think he was quite right. Not because Plato was right, but simply because his works identify most of the issues and problems in the various subjects he discusses. Plato makes you think, which is exactly what he wanted - often, his characters reach no conclusion, and sometimes he even has Socrates use obviously false arguments, because he wants you to think about them. That's why they're all conversations, not treatises.

Aristotle was said to write brilliant dialogues, and I often wish they had survived. We only have about a fifth of Aristotle's works, and they are basically his lecture notes, which is why they are horrible to read.

 

[Syterion]

For fiction-hmm, I read alot of diff. stuff. I'm not sure, I'll edit this If I come up with a specific name.

Sci Fi-So as not to repeat everyone else, I choose Douglas Adams(Hitchhiker's guide books).

Fantasy: Don't read it.

Literature: What does this mean? Aren't all books literature?

Pop Fiction: Dan Brown, John Grisham

Philosophy: Only real Philososphy book I've read is Atlas Shrugged, so I guess I don't have an opinion.

 

[CivCube]

I felt the need to differentiate between Literature and Fiction and pop-fiction because they seem to be distinctive categories to me. I don't know what the defining characteristics are, but it seems blasphemous to include Hemingway in the same category as Tom Clancy.

As far as I'm concerned, fiction is fiction. If one places genres at different levels solely because of current work, that is unfair to other writers who may have better works.

 

[BassDude726]

It has nothing to do with current work... Tom Clancy or Clive Cussler or any of those fiction writers just can't hold a candle to Hemingway or Dickens and such.

 

[phil87]

Jeffery Archer (Boo Hiss) and Frederick Forsyth must surely be two of the best authors ever. Occasionally Patricia Cornwall and Ken Follet

 

[jzsf]

Karl May and Gárdonyi Géza

 

[CivCube]

It has nothing to do with current work... Tom Clancy or Clive Cussler or any of those fiction writers just can't hold a candle to Hemingway or Dickens and such.

Very true; however, does the taste of the intellectual defeat the taste of another? However the "popular" choice for an author may be, whether it be Shakespeare by the learned or the Da Vinci Code by the base, it's still all subjective. You can't separate fantasy or science fiction from "normal" fiction because it's popular.

What does it hurt to have two books on the same shelf? They're not changing the plots of each other, are they? To each his own.