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  • Why Read

  • Selected Writings 2001-2021
  • By: Will Self
  • Narrated by: Will Self
  • Length: 9 hrs and 51 mins
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars (2 ratings)

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Why Read

By: Will Self
Narrated by: Will Self
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Publisher's Summary

From one of the most unusual and distinctive writers working today, dubbed 'the most daring and delightful novelist of his generation' by the Guardian, Will Self's Why Read is a cornucopia of thoughtful and brilliantly witty essays on writing and literature.

Self takes us with him: from the foibles of his typewriter repairman to the irradiated exclusion zone of Chernobyl, to the Australian outback and to literary forms past and future. With his characteristic intellectual brio, Self aims his inimitable eye at titans of literature like Woolf, Kafka, Orwell and Conrad. He writes movingly on W.G. Sebald's childhood in Germany and provocatively describes the elevation of William S. Burroughs's Junky from shocking pulp novel to beloved cult classic. Self also expands on his regular column in Literary Hub to ask how, what and ultimately why we should read in an ever-changing world. Whether he is writing on the rise of the bookshelf as an item of furniture in the nineteenth century or on the impossibility of Googling his own name in a world lived online, Self's trademark intoxicating prose and mordant, energetic humour infuse every piece.
©2022 Will Self (P)2022 W. F. Howes Ltd
History Social Sciences
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Profile Image for NEIL MCCARTHY

thank you

Thanks for the book Will Self - I now have a greater understanding of the writing process and it’s accompanying pain . As a fellow bibliophile,failed surfer and grumpy old man I’m going to be more comfortable buying the books I want and lying down and reading when I choose , knowing there is at least one other person who has been more self indulgent .

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In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.