One Country/One Book (in progress; inspired by Slothrop33)
- Trying to read a book from an author in every country of the world:
- Algeria- Yasmina Khadra (Mohammed Moulessehoul)- Morituri
- Argentina- Jorge Luis Borges- Ficciones
- Australia- Peter Carey - Jack Maggs
- Austria- Sigmund Freud - Civilization and Its Discontents
- Belgium- Maurice Maeterlinck - The Blue Bird
- Canada- Robertson Davies - Fifth Business
- Chile- Isabel Allende - The House of the Spirits
- Colombia- Gabriel Garcia Marquez- One Hundred Years of Solitude
- Czech Repblic- Franz Kafka - The Trial
- Denmark- Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen) - Seven Gothic Tales
- Dominica (Commonwealth)- Phyllis Shand Allfrey - The Orchid House
- Egypt- Naguib Mahfouz - Palace Walk
- Estonia- Tõnu Õnnepalu - Border State
- France- Mme. Riccoboni - Histoire du marquis de Cressy
- Germany- Goethe - The Sorrows of Young Werther
- Great Britain- Too easy
- Greece- Nikos Kazantzakis - The Last Temptation
- Guatemala- Rodrigo Rey Rosa - The Good Cripple
- Hungary- Imre Kertész - Fatelessness
- Iceland- Halldór Laxness - Independent People
- India- Kalidasa - Shakuntala
- Iran- Farid al-Din Attar - Conference of the Birds
- Ireland- James Joyce- A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
- Israel- Batya Gur - Literary Murder
- Italy- Italo Calvino - If on a winter's night a traveller
- Japan- Yasunari Kawabata - Snow Country
- Jordan- Fadia Faqir - Nisanit
- Mexico- Carlos Fuentes - La muerte de Artemio Cruz
- Netherlands- Janwillem van de Wetering- The Blond Baboon
- New Zealand - Ngaio Marsh- Artists in Crime
- Nicaragua- Ernesto Cardenal- Canto nacional, various poems
- Nigeria- Wole Soyinka- Aké: The Years of Childhood
- Norway- Jostein Gaarder - Sophie's World
- Peru- Mario Vargas Llosa- The War at the End of the World
- Portugal- Jose Saramago - Baltasar and Blimunda
- Russia- Fyodor Dostoyevsky- Crime and Punishment
- Senegal- Ousmane Sembène - Xala
- Serbia- Milorad Pavic- Dictionary of the Khazars
- Slovak Republic- Timrava (Božena Slancíková-Timrava)- That Alluring Land: Slovak Stories
- Somalia- Nuruddin Farah- Sweet and Sour Milk
- South Africa- J.M.Coetzee- Disgrace
- Spain- Ana Maria Matute- Primera memoria
- Sweden- August Strindberg- Miss Julie
- Switzerland- Johanna Spyri - Heidi (heh)
- Turkey- Orhan Pamuk - My Name is Red
- Uganda- Otok p'Bitek - Song of Lawino & Song of Ocol
- Ukraine- Vasily Grossman - Life and Fate
- United States- too easy
Slothrop33 has inspired me to take a stab at this; I've read more books than the average 33-year-old, but when I thought about the countries / regions represented in my reading, I realized that I'm remarkably narrow...probably more so than most avid readers out there! As you'll see with some that I named, I'm also short on contemporary authors (or at least those writing in 1950 or later). I'm starting to list the easy ones first, and I should be able to add some countries pretty quickly over the next week, going over my shelves, and remembering names. After that, it's up to me to hunt down many other nationalities... At least I have a head-start on Algeria. :-) If you have recommendations for specific countries (or updates for my older entries), I'll be happy to add them to my "to-find" list!
Update 9/17/07: added Ukraine, working on Uganda (unintentionally following one "U" country with another!)
Me too I have been inspired and I create two lists:
One Country/One Book
One State/One Book (USA) (like you say, this is easy, but for the fifty states, it's harder)
In those lists, I put my favorite books I've read for each country/state.
But for most of them, I didn't really had the choice and put the only one I've read. (^-^ ¤)
My ten next adds would probably be (I never for sure in advance):
Colombia: Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Gabriel García Márquez
Norway: Sophie's World, Jostein Gaarder
Russia: Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
Scotland: Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
Spain: The Club Dumas, Arturo Pérez-Reverte
USA, Missouri: Naked Lunch, William S. Burroughs
USA, New Jersey: I Am Legend, Richard Matheson
USA, North Carolina: Tom Robbins, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues
USA, Texas: Strangers on a Train, Patricia Highsmith
USA, Virginia: The Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe
The obstacle with the country list is the authors with multiple nationalities.
I rely on Wikipedia most of the time, but this is not always easy.
For the USA, it was interesting to look the map (look my list) and see where exactly the author is born in the US.
I'm 24 years old and for most of the authors, I had just a vague idea where they came from.
For some, it was a surprise.
Yay, glad more people are doing the one country one book list. You'll find that most books will give you the country of origin in the artist bio. How many official countries are there? I think Sierre Leone will be my next conquest. First one to conquer the world wins; of course george bush could beat us to it :(
On the plus side I have noticed that whenever we invade a country, more literature is translated from that culture. I think we need to invade central asia as I have had a hard time finding novelists from places like Uzbekistan. What will I do when Iraq breaks up? When there is Kurdistan? Soon we will have to read from Kosovo and already just added Montenegro to the list....
~194 official countries!
Wikipedia - List of countries
Capitals of Every Country