A random book from the collection looks interesting: Correction by Thomas Bernhard.
Described as “a mesmerising, claustrophobic novel about obsession, genius and the impossibility of perfection. Structured in two enormous, uninterrupted blocks of prose, it follows an unnamed narrator reconstructing the life of his dead friend Roithamer, before becoming absorbed in his manuscripts. Sentences spiral, repeat and contradict themselves, creating the sensation of being trapped inside an endlessly turning mind. Roithamer is modelled partly on Ludwig Wittgenstein, particularly his intellectual austerity and obsessive pursuit of perfection, reflected in his design of an extraordinary house for his sister. A darkly comic, exhilarating and exhausting masterpiece.”
Bernhard is fantastic. Woodcutters might be a gentler introduction to his style. It's shorter, funnier, and less oppressive than Correction, which is his magnum opus. Apparently he was at least somewhat as unhinged in real life as in his writing. He was notorious for insulting the Austrian intelligentsia and either refusing literary awards or showing up at the ceremony just to rant and insult the audience, which he wrote about in a memoir titled My Prizes. He was a big influence on W.G. Sebald, another great German language writer (my personal favorite) who makes an appearance in McCarthy's library.
McCarthy made his famous dismissal of Proust and Henry James in the NYT in 1992 and in the Oprah interview, on the grounds those writers didn't deal with deep issues of life and death. But from all that has been revealed about his personal library, including this Bernhard book, one wonders if that was a put-on.
Surely he meant their work. Dealing with deep issues of life and death in his work didn’t require him to be serious all the time about every topic in his own life.
You'll love Correction if you have a taste for experimental literature. I've have all of Bernhard's novels. They are (mostly) uninterrupted walls of text. They can also be quite depressing. You'll likely either love them or hate them. Correction is probably the most exemplary instance of his style and experimentation, and maybe his best novel, but Concrete and Extinction fall into this category as well. Wittgenstein's Nephew, Frost, and Woodcutters are more approachable if you want to ease into it. Starting with Correction might be a bit off-putting and intense depending on how often you read more experimental/stylistic literature.
I like Bernhard. I also recommend The Lime Works and wittgenstein’s nephew if you like correction. I found Bernhard through Thomas Ligotti. For Ligotti I recommend teatro grottesco and if you want to dive off the deep end the conspiracy against the human race.
Something I didn't expect -- quite a lot of banal stuff in there in there (in addition to the many known and I'm sure underappreciated greats). You hear about these impressive libraries all the time; good to know at least some of it might be '1001 golf courses to play' and similar pre-internet listicles.
Side question: how grim is the the Road? I've been meaning to pick it up because I love No Country but I've heard that the Road is just bleaker than bleak.
It's a very grim book, but it's also fundamentally about the goodness of people. The setting and the plot are bleak, but its outlook is, in a way, hopeful.
At least that's my takeaway. If someone else found it purely depressing I would understand, but I feel differently.
You nailed it. I have a full sleeve tattoo with elements nodding to The Road. For me “carrying the flame” is the lasting message of the book and it’s one of hope and courage.
Not all that grim, at least compared to some of his others. Grimmer than No Country for Old Men, less so than Blood Meridian or Outer Dark. There is at least one very grim scene, though, and maybe some others I'm not thinking of at the moment. Been a pretty long time since I read it.
Grimness aside, I'd rank it simpler, at the level of reading difficulty, than some of his others.
It's a good book but personally, I don't think it's among his best.
Our son was about 3yo when I read it, and I couldn't put it down. To me, it is a story of the father standing by his son no matter what. A really immersive reading experience. A father-son exchange that touched me:
What is it?
Nothing. I had a bad dream.
What did you dream about?
Nothing.
Are you okay?
No.
He put his arms around him and held him. It's okay, he said.
I was crying. But you didnt wake up.
I'm sorry. I was just so tired.
I meant in the dream.
I do think McCarthy's own family life felt, well, "controversial" in the light of all this. But, at least he didn't seem to justify himself about it. IIRC, on not paying child support after divorce, he has said "with what?" in one of his rare interviews.
I'm not a native English speaker, and I've had writerly ambitions myself, and his style feels like magic to me (hey, an accidental cormac-y polysyndeton here!). But... yeah. Thinking about the way many poets "manage" to put art before family life (obviously, they can't help it) is a good reflection of me myself being just a layperson.
But he is a true master, obviously. Could be that I liked "All The Pretty Horses" even more than "The Road". Unfortunately "Suttree" isn't translated to my language yet.
> Could be that I liked "All The Pretty Horses" even more than "The Road".
Have you read the others in the Border Trilogy, The Crossing and Cities of the Plain? If you liked Pretty Horses, you'll probably like them, too. Pretty sure I've read all three twice.
I just finished it last week - as a father to young children, I have to admit I felt like crying by the end. It was a great book nonetheless, especially for someone who doesnt usually enjoy fiction.
It is bleaker than bleak but incredibly rewarding. Unlike, say, Child of God where you are wallowing in filth, in The Road there is humanity and warmth and love it’s just the environment that is hostile.
Grim enough to make you cry before sleeping (possibly a lot if you have a kid), but surprisingly not as grim as Blood Meridian. That one you really need to brace yourself for.
Depends on your circumstances. I read it as a single male in university and loved it. Recently, I re-read it as an adult with two young sons. Absolutely devastating.
Bleaker than bleak is an accurate description but it actually ends on what I would consider to be a hopeful note, a moment of true kindness. Worth the read.
A random book from the collection looks interesting: Correction by Thomas Bernhard.
Described as “a mesmerising, claustrophobic novel about obsession, genius and the impossibility of perfection. Structured in two enormous, uninterrupted blocks of prose, it follows an unnamed narrator reconstructing the life of his dead friend Roithamer, before becoming absorbed in his manuscripts. Sentences spiral, repeat and contradict themselves, creating the sensation of being trapped inside an endlessly turning mind. Roithamer is modelled partly on Ludwig Wittgenstein, particularly his intellectual austerity and obsessive pursuit of perfection, reflected in his design of an extraordinary house for his sister. A darkly comic, exhilarating and exhausting masterpiece.”
Adding to my ‘want to read’ list now …
A review: https://proletarianpolyglot.substack.com/p/correction-by-tho...
Bernhard is fantastic. Woodcutters might be a gentler introduction to his style. It's shorter, funnier, and less oppressive than Correction, which is his magnum opus. Apparently he was at least somewhat as unhinged in real life as in his writing. He was notorious for insulting the Austrian intelligentsia and either refusing literary awards or showing up at the ceremony just to rant and insult the audience, which he wrote about in a memoir titled My Prizes. He was a big influence on W.G. Sebald, another great German language writer (my personal favorite) who makes an appearance in McCarthy's library.
McCarthy made his famous dismissal of Proust and Henry James in the NYT in 1992 and in the Oprah interview, on the grounds those writers didn't deal with deep issues of life and death. But from all that has been revealed about his personal library, including this Bernhard book, one wonders if that was a put-on.
Surely he meant their work. Dealing with deep issues of life and death in his work didn’t require him to be serious all the time about every topic in his own life.
You'll love Correction if you have a taste for experimental literature. I've have all of Bernhard's novels. They are (mostly) uninterrupted walls of text. They can also be quite depressing. You'll likely either love them or hate them. Correction is probably the most exemplary instance of his style and experimentation, and maybe his best novel, but Concrete and Extinction fall into this category as well. Wittgenstein's Nephew, Frost, and Woodcutters are more approachable if you want to ease into it. Starting with Correction might be a bit off-putting and intense depending on how often you read more experimental/stylistic literature.
He also wrote poetry.
I like Bernhard. I also recommend The Lime Works and wittgenstein’s nephew if you like correction. I found Bernhard through Thomas Ligotti. For Ligotti I recommend teatro grottesco and if you want to dive off the deep end the conspiracy against the human race.
Both Bernhard and Ligotti seem to have been heavily influenced by Schopenhauer, the granddaddy of pessimism.
From Amazon:
Customers say
Customers have mixed reactions to the book's content, with one finding it mesmerizing while another describes it as excruciatingly tedious.
!
Related:
Cormac McCarthy's personal library - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45444694 - Oct 2025 (138 comments)
Something I didn't expect -- quite a lot of banal stuff in there in there (in addition to the many known and I'm sure underappreciated greats). You hear about these impressive libraries all the time; good to know at least some of it might be '1001 golf courses to play' and similar pre-internet listicles.
Don’t sleep on “Slow Cooker Magic: A Seasonal Selection of Family Favorite Recipes”
No mention of Augusta Britt on the about page?
https://archive.is/7pFnc
I think it's interesting that he kept multiple copies of a lot of the great writers, he apparently had over 100 books on Shakespeare alone.
One has to wonder how much of this he actually read, if he was reclusive it must have been because he spent most of his time reading.
- i have been collecting programming related books since the last 20 yrs
- i have 50000 books as of now but obviously its all high seas material
- should i even bother sharing it? if yes how
Side question: how grim is the the Road? I've been meaning to pick it up because I love No Country but I've heard that the Road is just bleaker than bleak.
It's a very grim book, but it's also fundamentally about the goodness of people. The setting and the plot are bleak, but its outlook is, in a way, hopeful.
At least that's my takeaway. If someone else found it purely depressing I would understand, but I feel differently.
You nailed it. I have a full sleeve tattoo with elements nodding to The Road. For me “carrying the flame” is the lasting message of the book and it’s one of hope and courage.
> how grim is the the Road?
Not all that grim, at least compared to some of his others. Grimmer than No Country for Old Men, less so than Blood Meridian or Outer Dark. There is at least one very grim scene, though, and maybe some others I'm not thinking of at the moment. Been a pretty long time since I read it.
Grimness aside, I'd rank it simpler, at the level of reading difficulty, than some of his others.
It's a good book but personally, I don't think it's among his best.
I read it when it came out in a day or two.
Then I tried to read it again a few years later but my boy was about that age and I could not put myself through what reading it was taking out of me.
Our son was about 3yo when I read it, and I couldn't put it down. To me, it is a story of the father standing by his son no matter what. A really immersive reading experience. A father-son exchange that touched me:
I do think McCarthy's own family life felt, well, "controversial" in the light of all this. But, at least he didn't seem to justify himself about it. IIRC, on not paying child support after divorce, he has said "with what?" in one of his rare interviews.I'm not a native English speaker, and I've had writerly ambitions myself, and his style feels like magic to me (hey, an accidental cormac-y polysyndeton here!). But... yeah. Thinking about the way many poets "manage" to put art before family life (obviously, they can't help it) is a good reflection of me myself being just a layperson.
But he is a true master, obviously. Could be that I liked "All The Pretty Horses" even more than "The Road". Unfortunately "Suttree" isn't translated to my language yet.
> Could be that I liked "All The Pretty Horses" even more than "The Road".
Have you read the others in the Border Trilogy, The Crossing and Cities of the Plain? If you liked Pretty Horses, you'll probably like them, too. Pretty sure I've read all three twice.
Grim. If you have a kid it might be too much. I couldn't finish it; too much.
(an I'm completely unfazed by anything else. I loved Blood Meridian for example. The Road just takes me out)
I just finished it last week - as a father to young children, I have to admit I felt like crying by the end. It was a great book nonetheless, especially for someone who doesnt usually enjoy fiction.
It is bleaker than bleak but incredibly rewarding. Unlike, say, Child of God where you are wallowing in filth, in The Road there is humanity and warmth and love it’s just the environment that is hostile.
Grim enough to make you cry before sleeping (possibly a lot if you have a kid), but surprisingly not as grim as Blood Meridian. That one you really need to brace yourself for.
Depends on your circumstances. I read it as a single male in university and loved it. Recently, I re-read it as an adult with two young sons. Absolutely devastating.
Not that grim. As a dad it brought me to tears. It’s so good.
Bleaker than bleak is an accurate description but it actually ends on what I would consider to be a hopeful note, a moment of true kindness. Worth the read.
Very bleak, but nonetheless a must read. Wouldn't recommend reading it during a depressive episode or existential crisis though.
Personally, the opposite: suddenly my own world looks bright and inviting by comparison.
It depends, you could also view it as: in all the bad there’s still some good.
It’s been a decade but from what I remember, it is very dark. It was my first McCarthy book and have been hooked since.
I didn't like No Country for old men. It started off great but lost me toward the middle.
The Road, however, is a classic.
Grim sometimes brutal but not gratuitous
As grim as it gets, with rare glimpses of light.
> 10 Days to Faster Reading
He's got so many books, did it work?
Happy to see how many titles by Gore Vidal he owned - and annotated.
bunch of buzzfeed-style books