Chris Ringrose is
Principal Lecturer
in English at the
University of Northampton,
where he is Head of
Learning and Teaching
in the School of the Arts.
Chris is involved in
the Subject Centre’s
E-Learning Advocate Project,
has published recently
on children’s literature,
contemporary fiction
and life writing, and
is Contemporary Literature
Editor for The Annotated
Bibliography of English
Studies.
Chris Ringrose presents his Desert Island Texts:
Richmal Crompton: William the Showman
One of the funniest books ever written. Richmal Crompton is a great ironist. I remember reading this with our son Matthew when he was small, and we laughed till we cried. Literally.
One of the funniest books ever written. Richmal Crompton is a great ironist. I remember reading this with our son Matthew when he was small, and we laughed till we cried. Literally.
Henry David Thoreau: Walden
Prophetic, inspiring and profound. Also, I love Thoreau’s sense of humour (though some say that’s an oxymoron). In 1995, when visiting Concord, I walked around Walden Pond; that was a moving experience, despite the sunbathers. There is little plaque on the shore, marking the site of the cabin that Thoreau built with his own hands in 1845.
Prophetic, inspiring and profound. Also, I love Thoreau’s sense of humour (though some say that’s an oxymoron). In 1995, when visiting Concord, I walked around Walden Pond; that was a moving experience, despite the sunbathers. There is little plaque on the shore, marking the site of the cabin that Thoreau built with his own hands in 1845.
William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge: Lyrical Ballads
I was sold on Wordsworth from the day I read a few lines from The Prelude: “Nor was this fellowship vouchsafed to me/With stinted kindness” and of his going homeward “by the margin of the trembling lake”. Visiting the bookseller in 1798 to buy Lyrical Ballads would have been a treat. Excellent value: you get The Rime of the Ancient Mariner as well.
I was sold on Wordsworth from the day I read a few lines from The Prelude: “Nor was this fellowship vouchsafed to me/With stinted kindness” and of his going homeward “by the margin of the trembling lake”. Visiting the bookseller in 1798 to buy Lyrical Ballads would have been a treat. Excellent value: you get The Rime of the Ancient Mariner as well.
Charles Dickens: Little Dorrit
As graduate students in the 1969–1970 Dickens seminar at the University of Alberta, we read the complete works at the rate of one book per week – a great reading and discussion experience. I can recall every student in the seminar, as well as Tony Ward’s inspiring commentaries. What a revelation Little Dorrit was when its turn came round.
As graduate students in the 1969–1970 Dickens seminar at the University of Alberta, we read the complete works at the rate of one book per week – a great reading and discussion experience. I can recall every student in the seminar, as well as Tony Ward’s inspiring commentaries. What a revelation Little Dorrit was when its turn came round.
Vladimir Nabokov: Pnin
Well, anything by Nabokov, really. Pnin is a great comic novel, but also a melancholy and touching account of exile and the brutalities of history.
Well, anything by Nabokov, really. Pnin is a great comic novel, but also a melancholy and touching account of exile and the brutalities of history.
Yvor Winters: Collected Poems
Majestic and underrated. The early free verse is haunting, too, as is the recording of Winters reading ‘A Summer Commentary’– a luscious meditation on living and learning intoned in his characteristically dour, steady tones.
Majestic and underrated. The early free verse is haunting, too, as is the recording of Winters reading ‘A Summer Commentary’– a luscious meditation on living and learning intoned in his characteristically dour, steady tones.
Brian Glanville: Book of Footballers
Originally published in 1978, then revised and reissued for the World Cup of 1982. Each of these portraits is a prose poem; Brian Glanville really can write. The 300-word evocations of Puskas, Di Stefano and Ruud Krol are terrific.
Originally published in 1978, then revised and reissued for the World Cup of 1982. Each of these portraits is a prose poem; Brian Glanville really can write. The 300-word evocations of Puskas, Di Stefano and Ruud Krol are terrific.
Jack Kerouac: The Dharma Bums
Rolling odyssey that is a curious mixture of the carnal, the spiritual and haphazard poetry (if poetry can be haphazard). When I was 18 I wanted to be Japhy Ryder. I don’t think I ever really wanted to be Jack Kerouac – he was too wounded and vulnerable, heading for an early ending.
Rolling odyssey that is a curious mixture of the carnal, the spiritual and haphazard poetry (if poetry can be haphazard). When I was 18 I wanted to be Japhy Ryder. I don’t think I ever really wanted to be Jack Kerouac – he was too wounded and vulnerable, heading for an early ending.
Gary Snyder: The Back Country
Inimitable eloquent simplicity in poetry. Has climbing the Sierras, sharpening axes, chopping wood, making a campfire and cooking a stew ever been so stirringly written about? Gary Snyder had impeccably ‘green’ credentials even back in 1965.
Inimitable eloquent simplicity in poetry. Has climbing the Sierras, sharpening axes, chopping wood, making a campfire and cooking a stew ever been so stirringly written about? Gary Snyder had impeccably ‘green’ credentials even back in 1965.
Dorothy Livesay: The Two Seasons: Collected Poems
A great woman and a great radical Canadian poet. I’d like to think I would recognise her qualities as a writer even if I did not owe her so much as a person.
A great woman and a great radical Canadian poet. I’d like to think I would recognise her qualities as a writer even if I did not owe her so much as a person.
