There are a million suggested reading lists out there, especially now that it’s the end of the year/decade/life as we know it. So how’s an aspiring literary hipster to know which books are most important in terms of street cred and general knowing-it-all-ness? We decided to go straight to the source, and to that end, we’ve collected a few of our favorite and most knowledgeable lit-hipsters’ own hit lists for your cred-building convenience.
Most of the books and stories suggested here are completely awesome, and we’re pretty confident that these people know what they’re talking about (most of them create some not-too-shabby literature themselves), so we suggest that the anti-hipsters among you might do well to read on too. After all, we mean hipster in the good way (this time).
Blake Butler (author of Scorch Atlas, editor of HTMLGiant):
(Our favorite selections from his list of 25 Important Books of the ’00s – for the full article click here)
Oblivion, David Foster Wallace
Rising Up and Rising Down, William Vollmann
American Genius, A Comedy, Lynne Tillman
Pastoralia, George Saunders
Magic For Beginners, Kelly Link
Why Did I Ever, Mary Robison
The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis, Lydia Davis
Dear Everybody, Michael Kimball
The Collected Stories, Amy Hempel
Notable American Women, Ben Marcus
Miranda July (performance artist, filmmaker, author of No One Belongs Here More Than You):
Teased out from ‘Reading List’, in Vice‘s new Fiction Issue. Read the full and very adorable piece here.
milk containers
to-do lists
In the Aeroplane Over the Sea by Kim Cooper
addresses on packages
emails you receive
emails you send
Varieties of Disturbance by Lydia Davis
text messages
marquees
Marlon Brando, Pocahontas, and Me by Jeremy Deller
titles of Antony and the Johnsons songs while listening to Antony and the Johnsons
Mark Borthwick’s handwriting
billboards
Rilke
Nick Flynn (poet, playwright, author of Another Bullshit Night in Suck City):
Read his explication at The Millions.
Eula Biss’s Notes on No Man’s Land
Rachel Zucker’sThe Museum of Accidents
Stephen Elliott’s The Adderall Diaries
Stephen Elliott (editor of one of our favorite blogs, The Rumpus, author of The Adderall Diaries):
Responding to HTMLGiant’s prompt to pick his three top books of the year.
I only read three books that were released this year. I loved two of them. But the best two out of three is an awfully small pool so you might want to ignore these recommendations:
We Did Porn by Zak Smith
Zeitoun by Dave Eggers
Keith Gessen (editor at n+1, author of All the Sad Young Literary Men):
Also responding to HTMLGiant’s prompt to pick three top books of the year.
The Ask by Sam Lipsyte
The Possessed by Elif Batuman
Perfect Rigor by Masha Gessen
Tao Lin (publisher of Muumuu House, author of Shoplifting From American Apparel):
Also also responding to HTMLGiant’s prompt to pick three top books of the year.
Sometimes My Heart Pushes My Ribs by Ellen Kennedy – I liked this and published it on Muumuu House.
During My Nervous Breakdown I Want to Have a Biographer Present by Brandon Scott Gorrell – I liked this and published it on Muumuu House.
Waveland by Frederick Barthelme – His 10th novel.
David J. Gutowski (editor of largeheartedboy):
See his reviews for each recommended book here.
All the Living by C.E. Morgan
The World in Half by Cristina Henriquez
The Manual of Detection by Jedediah Berry
Lowboy by John Wray
This Is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper
Beat the Reaper by Josh Bazell
The New Valley by Josh Weil
Going Bovine by Libba Bray
Everything Matters! by Ron Currie, Jr.
A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick
Big Machine by Victor LaValle
The editors at Vice Magazine:
Vice published four long-form comics in their Fiction Issue. We like them too.
The Haunted High School by Dash Shaw
Shopping with She-Moose by Lisa Hanawalt
The New Yorker Story by Sammy Harkham
The Miracle by Johnny Ryan
Tell us, what’s first on your list?
Comments (39)
ugh…this reminds me of early twentieth-century high modernists propagating semi-interesting art…
jean rhys
Miranda July and Tao Lin annoy the shit out of me.
None of those people are hip.
[...] “Literary hipsters” Blake Butler, Tao Lin, Stephen Elliott, and Miranda July’s favorite books of the year. [...]
[...] The Ultimate Hipster Reading List…and “we mean hipster in the good way (this time).” [...]
Hmmm a list with a few gems. Mostly more self-referential post modernism, meaning sensitive half assed existentialism.
A slow and overly reflective movement of ideas. I hope we’re done with that decade now.
To sink your teeth into a work from the last year informed by the history of western philosophy and some cutting edge mathematical & physics theories
then read Neal Stephenson’s ANATHEM.
A beautiful execution of narrative presenting a new horizon for theory.
One that gets us looking at the source of information rather than wondering around in personal impressions.
This is the whitest article I’ve ever read.
You use two images of sexy women to illustrate the piece but ask only one woman for recommendations. We do read, you know.
From a socio-anthropological angle I am surprised by the omission of Murakami, since every other pretentious asshole you see on the L train seems to be reading THE WIND-UP BIRD CHRONICLE.
Um, one woman, who obviously doesn’t read books, and a bunch of white dudes talking about other white dude’s books? Apparently women are only good for decoration.
It’s quite obvious most of these people – who aren’t even interesting anyhow – didn’t speak to Flavorpill about this list, either because they weren’t asked or weren’t interested in responding (e.g., Miranda July’s picks were “[t]eased out from ‘Reading List’ . . .”). I can’t say that surprises me, given how lost this publication seems to be these days. The larger question is why would anyone who so obviously doesn’t know anything about books and doesn’t appear to have any genuine interest in them (apart from posing with them) would bother writing about them.
What someone upthread said about Anathem–fantastic book, makes you think, go read it.
Also yes to the “white guys who nobody gives a shit about talking about stuff written by other white guys that nobody gives a shit about.” The only work here that I’d read is “Rising up Rising down” in its full, not condensed version.
Otherwise, I’m a lot more interested in the stuff coming out of New China these days (especially the stuff written by women, who would NOT pose with their ass hanging out on the cover of VICE), the resurgance of the graphic novel (I can’t believe that nobody mentioned the amazing Wednesday Comix 12-part series), and the growth of meaningful content-driven blogs.
I’m also all for re-visiting the classics (some of them). I’d still burn every Bronte book ever written given my druthers but I just re-read “Dorian Grey” and the travel writigns of Herodotus and they were both worth more than their used-book cover prices.
Um, a lot of the recommended books are by women. Like half of the first guy’s list. So…
As most posts go, people are quick to complain. Please add a few recommendations in addition to your posting slams. This reader would be interested in a few non white or female authored suggestions. Personally I enjoyed “Lost and Found: Stories from New York” (Vol. 2) (Mr. Beller’s Neighborhood) (Paperback)
This list reads like a conformists dossier… ugh.
I guess Miranda July is the only woman hip enough to recommend books for Flavorwire.
Love all the comments much better than the books or the people recommending them…seriously flavorpill no wonder tea baggers get all the media attention if you can only come up with some boring pretentious white men. Look at a book I have a three page spread in: “Paper Politics:Socially Engaged Printmaking Today” edited by Josh McPhee- get it from PMPress.org
I do love books even though I don’t know these people or the books they recommend (which for me is the point of reading) so I can’t comment about the comments but I can’t sit idly by and let someone diss Miranda July! Nice work considering they didn’t talk to you, that’s what I say.
LOL @ douchetards here. We get it, you are too painfully cool and alt for this painfully pedantic list. We know.
It is so hard to find a book list that of good books that don’t require you to be:
A)A slave to Oprah and/or NYT
B)a pretentious poser who reads like they are adding notches to their belt
C)A girl who likes to read about shopping and marriage or a guy who likes books ’bout killin a-rabs.
What’s the deal? What if I just want to read some well written stories from people who share my Gen Y worldview?
Not to diss this booklist – Miranda July is on deck in my bookshelf –
+ The Stranger – albert camus
+ Lolita – Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov
+ anything by Kurt Vonnegut
Evan – based on your bookshelf, we could be soul mates.
First off, ‘literary hipster’ is a hilarious oxymoron. I consider it an honor that my favorite authors are on none of these lists. Good grief.
Someone asked for recommendations by women: Amy Gerstler’s “Dearest Creatures,” Mary Jo Bang’s “The Bride of E,” Jill McDonough’s “Habeas Corpus,” Dara Wier’s “Selected Poems.” Oh, yes, these are all books of poetry.
“LOL @ douchetards here. We get it, you are too painfully cool and alt for this painfully pedantic list. We know.”
^^ this.
get over yourselves, you awful bunch of poseurs.
“His Dark Materials” – Philip Pullman
A retelling of Paradise Lost “with the moral poles reversed”. For 12-year-olds. Really.
The Patrick O’Bryan Aubrey-Maturin series. For older hipsters. The words are big but don’t worry, it’s cool. The problem is these books are so well-written that I can’t read most fiction now; bad prose hurts.
Miranda July’s radio pieces are head-spinningly good. If you can handle that there’s nothing to look at.
A small part of me is psyched I have no idea about any of the books on any of the lists above. A bigger part of me wishes I didn’t need to go to Flavorpill (or pitchfork or Brooklyn vegan or Seth godin or bob lefsetz or cocktail parties in silverlake) to validate my existence.
I’ve just started What the Dog Saw by Malcom Gladwell, and it makes me think, which is enough for me
Apparently, hip = American? No Moya? Bolano? Littell? Petrushevskaya? Not saying the titles on these lists aren’t good. Just, really?
(Seriously, no Moya? Senselessness? Dances with Snakes? The She-Devil in the Mirror? Anyone?)
Who cares. Go to a second-hand cook shop pick up some books and read them. Who on earth is pretentious enough to read ‘the right books.’ If you are studying literature, maybe. Otherwise read whatever you enjoy and whatever expands your mind. And yes, I’m a non-conformist douchetard in case you were wondering.
If “hipster” means ignoring the literature of every other continent in the world besides North America, I don’t think I want to be one.
Thank you Stephen Browne. You took the words right out of my mouth!
Bizarre this publish is totaly unrelated to what I used to be searching google for, however it used to be indexed at the first page. I guess your doing one thing right if Google likes you sufficient to position you at the first page of a non related search.
I love the valuable information you be offering in your articles. I can bookmark your weblog and feature my children test up right here generally. I am quite certain they’re going to be told quite a lot of new stuff right here than anybody else!
Hm. OK, I’m a woman and I don’t have a problem with Miranda July – I enjoyed her short stories and gave them away as a gift to someone…and I’m not bothered by the word hipster, which is probably good for publicity for someone (maybe?) so I’m going to add to the list, since this is first and foremost a valuable reading list, regardless of what category of people it involves/prefers/perpetuates/provides a platform to for commenting and/or literary masturbation:
Jean Phillipe Toussaint – Running Away (Dalkey Archive, 2009 or something?) Yes, to whoever mentioned Roberto Bolano – I’m an unashamed reader and amateur critic of his work – “2666″, “Savage Detectives”, “By Night In Chile”, etc. etc.
Also, I’m enjoying the other English-translated (poor me, mono-linguist) ‘new (ish)’ Latin Americans – Alejandro Zambra – “Bonsai”, Carlos Yushimoto, and Lucia Puenzo (thanks to Granta’s collection)
and also an older experimenter – Cesar Aira …while I’ve read more than just this one, “An epsiode in the life of a Landscape Painter” (C 2000) really stood out to me.
I also enjoyed “Herzog on Herzog” for its rich stories about movie making.
And since I’m crossing genres – THANK YOU Ariana Reynes for writing “Coeur de Lion” (c 2007) – it is such a pleasure.
AND Ostashevsky for writing “Iterature” (c 2005).
Here’s the most dense concentration of “hipster lit” pretty much: http://www.themorningnews.org/article/much-ado-about-whatever
Miranda july’s article was stupid
[...] of this important cultural movement. Again, written without tongue in cheek. There are links to other lists of essential Hipster Lit. Again, I’m batting .000. Even on Amazon’s list, bound to be the most commercial and [...]
[...] July, e in generale non ci sono donne. E Fitzgerald? Nemmeno. Grazie al cielo è arrivato Flavorwire e ha stilato la sua ultimate hipster reading list. E se volete fare i secchioni e saperne di [...]
97% of those posting in the comments section are complete tools.
Post a new comment