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Nicholas Sparks recommended Pretty Woman (1990) in Movies (curated)

Pretty Woman (1990)

1990 | Comedy, Romance

7.8

(34 Ratings)

Movie Favorite

"My number one top love story would be Pretty Woman. This film wins because unlike so many films, this wasn’t a romantic comedy, it was a romantic drama, and yet there’s humor, the performances were unbelievable, the chemistry between Richard Gere and Julia Roberts was palpable onscreen. It hearkens to fantasy, like “I can be struggling but someone’s gonna see my true me inside.” And it captures all of that in a way that, at the time, felt utterly fresh and original, and you throw in the ending, wonderful. Of these movies, truly, this one is really the only happy one. Patrick Swayze was gone, Leo, sorry, he didn’t make it. Rick doesn’t get the girl. And Baby goes home with her parents at the end of the summer."

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Kudos

John Berendt recommended Complete Stories in Books (curated)

Complete Stories

Flannery O'Connor | 2016 | Fiction & Poetry

(0 Ratings)

Book Favorite

"O’Connor enshrines in each of her characters an unforgettable rendition of a basic human flaw: venality, bigotry, pent-up anger, stupidity, jealousy, greed, even innocence. Her dark humor is funniest when she is laying bare some horrible piece of human nastiness. And the writing! She can evoke more from the particulars of a person’s face than any other writer I know. For example: “His face behind the windshield was sour and froglike; it looked like it had a shout closed up in it, it looked like one of those closet doors in gangster pictures where there is somebody tied to a chair behind it with a towel in his mouth.” (“The Heart of the Park”) “She jumped back and looked as if she were going to swallow her face.” (“The Peeler”)"

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Kudos

Zadie Smith recommended Pnin in Books (curated)

Pnin

Vladimir Nabokov | 2000 | Contemporary, Fiction & Poetry

(0 Ratings)

Book Favorite

"This novella is explicitly a book about ridicule and caricature—Professor Pnin is a joke of a man on a college campus. He’s an awkward Russian émigré with bad English, false teeth, a clumsy sense of humor, a tendency to burst into tears or take offense at small slights. Everybody on campus can do an impression of him. He’s a clown. But at the core of the book is the idea that there is a Pnin who is as real as the people who ridicule him. You are invited to laugh at him, and then you are humbled and shamed by your own laughter. It’s a gorgeous, hilarious, humane book that uncovers the reality of a man’s life in sly, piecemeal fashion. I think it’s my favorite novel."

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