Grossly underrated writers

[Mozzer]

Flann O'Brien

The Third Policeman is in my top 5 favourite books. By the way I pm'd you in April.

 

[Mozzer]

Something that's always bothered me.
I am a huge fan of J.G. Ballard. I think he's an endlessly provocative and inventive writer. He was also something of a seer. He mainly writes about dystopian futures that are not very far away, i.e. The Drowned World, or that are already on us. But he also wrote interesting novels such as Cocaine Nights and Supercannes about the right-here, right-now: closed communities that live according to their own social laws, more or less. He was a brilliant short story writer, and some of his best work is to be found there: try “Thirteen to Centaurus”, or “The Garden of Time”. It'll only take you about fifteen minutes. In those fifteen minutes he'll manage to say more than most full-scale novels. They are marvels of the art.
He tends to be dismissed because he is pigeonholed as a “science fiction” writer. I'm not a big fan of science fiction as such, any more than I'm a fan of “fantasy” literature, but the best “science fiction” writers are of course using the future to write a critique of the present. As in Orwell's 1984.
Ballard was one of the treasures of post-war British writing — there haven't been that many — but he has been dismissed as somehow not serious. It's the kind of snobbery that gets up my nose.
Anybody else got writers like that?

I read a lot and am open to any author. The only Ballard book I've read is Crash. Got to be honest and say I thought it was very poor. Friends rave about him, perhaps I should read Empire of the Sun.

 

[JRockBlues]

I read a lot and am open to any author. The only Ballard book I've read is Crash. Got to be honest and say I thought it was very poor. Friends rave about him, perhaps I should read Empire of the Sun.

I've only ever read one of his too (Millennium People) and thought that was pretty good. Have another 3 waiting on the tbr shelves to get to at some point.

 

[Lovebitesandeveryfing]

I read a lot and am open to any author. The only Ballard book I've read is Crash. Got to be honest and say I thought it was very poor. Friends rave about him, perhaps I should read Empire of the Sun.

Crash is kind of weird, not to say perverse, and probably not the right choice to get into him right from the outset. Try the short stories. Low Flying Aircraft has a good collection. Try also the two short stories I mentioned in my OP.

 

[Saddleworth2]

I read a lot and am open to any author. The only Ballard book I've read is Crash. Got to be honest and say I thought it was very poor. Friends rave about him, perhaps I should read Empire of the Sun.

Empire of the Sun is good imo.

 

[Saddleworth2]

I like Muriel Spark.
Varied and intelligent. Beautifully written, never too long.
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (obvs)
Loitering with Intent
The Ballad of Pekham Rye

If you like those three then plenty more to go at (she wrote more than 20 novels)

 

[Lovebitesandeveryfing]

I like Muriel Spark.
Varied and intelligent. Beautifully written, never too long.
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (obvs)
Loitering with Intent
The Ballad of Pekham Rye

If you like those three then plenty more to go at (she wrote more than 20 novels)

A fine writer. Is she underrated, though? I wouldn't have thought so. She's certainly received her due for Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.

 

[Saddleworth2]

A fine writer. Is she underrated, though? I wouldn't have thought so. She's certainly received her due for Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.

I think if Ballard is, she is. :-)

 

[Tuearts right boot]

I once knew of a grossly overrated underwriter that worked for The Independance Insurance Co.

 

[Blue and true]

Don't know the consensus on his work so subsequently wouldn't be able to say if he's underrated, but Anthony Horowitz is the best crime writer of his generation