Thursday, April 19, 2007

Sam Taylor's top 10 books about forgetting

Sam Taylor is the former pop culture correspondent for the Observer. His first book, The Republic of Trees, was published in 2005. His second novel, The Amnesiac, tells the story of James Purdew, a man obsessed with uncovering the events of three years of his life about which he remembers nothing.

He named his top 10 books about forgetting for the Guardian.

Number One on his list:
The Trial by Franz Kafka

As far as I can remember, Kafka never once mentions the idea that his protagonist, Josef K, has forgotten anything of importance, but the possibility haunts every sentence in the novel. Why is he being persecuted for a crime he did not commit? Quite rightly one of the most influential novels of the 20th century.
Read the entire list.

--Marshal Zeringue