The Name of the Rose
The year is 1327. Franciscans in a wealthy Italian abbey are suspected of heresy, and Brother William of Baskerville arrives to investigate. His delicate mission is suddenly overshadowed by seven bizarre deaths that take place in seven days and nights of apocalyptic terror. The body of one monk is found in a cask of pigs' blood, another is floating in a bathhouse, still another is crushed at the foot of a cliff.
Stats for nerds
57recommend
149mentions
115people
2008–2026years
45% recommend52% neutral3% critical
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- I read multiple books together.
- My Name is Asher Lev, by Chaim Potok
Upbringing of a painter and the beginning of his journey in 1950s New York in a Hasidic Jewish family. Existentialism, art, passion.
- The Art of Doing Science and Engineerig, by Hamming
Surprisingly fresh and piercing, even today.
- Miracle of Love, Ram Dass
Stories about Neeb Karori Baba, as mentioned in Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs.
- The Name of The Rose, Umberto Ecori
Murder mystery in a famous library-monastery in medieval Europe. Amazing portrayal of that time.
I have a books site: https://ritoghosh.com/books
It's a few months outdated.
- It’s hard to know what anyone considers the “usual greats”. Doris Lessing won the Nobel Prize for literature, but she doesn’t seem to make it into the “average” person’s greats list, possibly because her use of language is very much not grade 5. Try The Golden Notebook, The Summer Before the Dark, The Grass Is Singing, The Good Terrorist, The Fifth Child, or the series that starts with Shikasta.
E.L. Doctorow is another such example. Try The Book of Daniel, Ragtime, Billy Bathgate, Loon Lake.
In the scifi genre (aside from the Shikasta series already mentioned), M. John Harrison is worth a look. He’s got a long bibliography but Light might be a good starting point.
Umberto Eco: The Name of the Rose, Foucault’s Pendulum.
Some of Ursula Le Guin’s more serious books might fit the bill, like The Dispossessed or The Left Hand of Darkness.
Someone already mentioned Mervyn Peake, he definitely fits this category.
- The Name of the Rose by Eco is essential. Don't be fooled if you've only seen the movie, which was not good. The book itself is phenomenal.
- > One always wonders which incredible books we lost, from amazing mysterious old philosophers.
You might be interested in The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco, a historical novel about such a lost work.
- John Le Carre’s “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”and Umberto Eco’s “The Name of the Rose” were constant companions for me on road trips (sadly no English unabridged “Foucault’s Pendulum” exists)
- Fiction: The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco.
Non-fiction: Pilates Anatomy by Rael Isacowitz - it changed me and changed my body.
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God bless you, Mr. Rosewater
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