"Quiet" Writers

[Sand]

When I was younger, I liked nothing better than a highly vivid style and subject matter in a book - with, eg, tentacles and cloven hooves to the fore. Now I also like to read what, for want of a better term, I'll call "quiet" writers, who achieve their effects more softly and subtly. Note, I don't say these are "better" or my reading has "progressed": they're just different (and I still like to indulge in the swashbucklers of literature too).

I am enjoying the sort of story where, as my wife put it, "something may or may not have happened". Examples of authors who succeed in this are de la Mare and Kawabata. The term 'quiet' doesn't imply "cosy" - very often these may be as insidiously unsettling as more rattling work. But the stories smoulder rather than leap up in bright flames.

Does anyone else like this sort of story and have other writers to recommend?

And are there any films in this form? I've only seen two - Into Great Silence, and After Life.

[RaleC]

Woot - my favorite kind of art, and fiction. So of course I'll start with two non-fiction books that meet this request better than any book I know.

Non-fiction:

The Peregrine By J.A.Baker - Probably one of the finest books ever written. Baker seeks to shed human "filth" and ghost the bird until he no longer registers as fear in it's spaniel-like eyes - is reborn as landscape beneath this bird that is more than a bird to him - and forgiven for his sin of being human.

“Approach him across open ground with a steady unfaltering movement. Let your shape grow in size but do not alter its outline. Never hide yourself unless concealment is complete. Be alone. Shun the furtive oddity of man, cringe from the hostile eyes of farms. Learn to fear. To share fear is the greatest bond of all. The hunter must become the thing he hunts.”

Wisonsin Death Trip. By Michael Lesy (Also an excellent documentary)- Newspaper clippings. Thesis essays bracketing the text. The Victorians lost their minds and did very strange things when the winter months brought them into inescapable contact with their families, God's and selves.

"La Crosse was somewhat agitated last week by an alleged ghost manifesting itself by the usual symptoms."

"Admitted January 20th 1896 Town of Garfield. Age 52. Norwegian. Married. Two children. Youngest 19 yrs. old. Farmer. Poor. Illness began 10 months ago. Cause said to be his unfortunate pecuniary condition. Deluded on the subject of religion. Is afraid of injury being done to him. Relations say he has tried to hang himself... Sept. 29, 1896: Discharged... improved ... Readmitted May 4, 1898: Delusions that he and his family are to be hanged or destroyed."

Fiction:

Pan by Knut Hamsun. An ideal for living.

The Road and Child Of God by Cormac McCarthy. Both horrfic.

The Painted Bird by Jerzy Kosiński (Literary twin to the film Come And See - also fitting)

Movies:

Everything by directors Andrei Tarkovsky, Andrei Sokurov and Bela Tarr. (Start with Stalker, Werckmeister Harmonies, and Mother and Son.)

Ingmar Bergman's Silence trilogy - Winter Light, A Glass Darkly and The Silence.

The Forest (Las) - Piotr Dumala.

Spirit of the Beehive (El espíritu de la colmena) - Victor Erice

Music:

Arvo Part - Fur Alina onwards.
Aphex Twin - Selected Ambient Works 2
Eno - Discreet Music

[MadsPLP]

I suppose he's fairly well known by the thread-starter, but W.G. Sebald springs to mind as an almost perfect example (without there being any hints of supernaturalisms) on the type of fiction you're looking for.

The Rings pf Saturn (and, for that instance, his other novels, especially Austerlitz) is a true masterpiece and of the finest books I've ever read.

[Draugen]

Quote Originally Posted by MadsPLP

I suppose he's fairly well known by the thread-starter, but W.G. Sebald springs to mind as an almost perfect example (without there being any hints of supernaturalisms) on the type of fiction you're looking for. The Rings pf Saturn (and, for that instance, his other novels, especially Austerlitz) is a true masterpiece and of the finest books I've ever read.

I just looked up the blurb for Rings of Saturn and it looks fascinating, thanks.

Malone, regarding the Beckett Trilogy.. I agree, great book there. But, although there's no tentacles, I'd possibly say the horror isn't 'quiet' - it bludgeoned me over the head with existential horror! And it's also a very funny book.

[Nemonymous]

In Search of Lost Time - Marcel Proust
The Glastonbury Romance - John Cowper Powys
Man Without Qualties - Robert Musil
The Avignon Quincunx - Lawrence Durrell
Elizabeth Bowen, Frances Oliver, Phyllis Paul...

I am currently re-reading the John Cowper Powys book and collecting my favourite quotes from it here: Quotations from by John Cowper Powys | WEIRDTONGUE:

I agree with the WG Sebald suggestion.

[RaleC]

Quote Originally Posted by Nemonymous

I am currently re-reading the John Cowper Powys book and collecting my favourite quotes from it here: Quotations from by John Cowper Powys | WEIRDTONGUE:

Wolf Solvent seems to fit the list. Which seems to be about books set in worlds of crisp existential loneliness viewed through the lens of poetic souls. So, this one. And most of the folks here.

I'll throw The Diary Of Opal Whitely out there, and if you haven't read it you're in for a real treat.

Also Robert Cormier's work. Particularly Fade.

[tartarusrussell]

Quote Originally Posted by Nemonymous

Phyllis Paul...

Agreed!

[Malone]

And don't forget Pessoa's Book of Disquiet. If there's a volume where less happens than in that, I'd be mighty surprised.

Beckett's Malone Dies is also a beuatifully lyrical hymn to silence and the void.

On a more popular note, I found the George Clooney thriller The American from a couple of years back to be a beautiful movie. Set in a remote Italian hillside village with very little dialogue and a gorgeous soundtrack. Well worth a look.

[MagnusTC]

I'd like to recommend Michel Butor's Passing Time.

[MadsPLP]

Quote Originally Posted by Malone

And don't forget Pessoa's Book of Disquiet. If there's a volume where less happens than in that, I'd be mighty surprised. Beckett's Malone Dies is also a beuatifully lyrical hymn to silence and the void. On a more popular note, I found the George Clooney thriller The American from a couple of years back to be a beautiful movie. Set in a remote Italian hillside village with very little dialogue and a gorgeous soundtrack. Well worth a look.

I thoroughly agree with your first two recommendations.

The American, however, is one of the films that I have hated the most in recent times, and managed to epitomize a lot of the things I dislike about movies in general.

A happy prostitute with a heart of gold. Strings telling me exactly what to feel and when to feel it. A camera lens smothered in vaseline. An extremely predictable plot twists. Looooong helicopter of George Clooney driving a very nice car of the brand "Product Placement Car". Product placement car always clean, despite being driven on dirt roads. George Clooney going undercover in small Italian village - undercover including driving big, nice product placement car, striking up a friendship with local priest, etc.. The whole thing feels like watching an overlong, extremely sanctimonious car commercial.

Please don't take it personally. I just really, really hated that movie.