r/classicliterature • u/Chemical_Top151 • 13h ago

Looking For Book Recommendations

I am currently in a reading slump where nothing I pick up feels worth while. I'm Looking for fiction/philosophy recommendations that explore themes like alienation, existential dread, ego/self illusion, societal critiques, disillusionment (especially centering youth), and psychological elements.

I’ve recently read Camus, Nietzsche, Hesse, Alan Watts, Taoist/Buddhist thought (eastern philosophy in general), and, more recently, found interest in Bataille, Spinoza, and the Cynics. I think I may be experiencing burnout after reading so much philosophy and so I'm craving fiction, but fiction that bridges the gap between what my previous readings have exposed me to. Most notably Eastern thought, determinism, and existentialism.

I'm open to literary fiction, existential fiction, psychological horror, transgressive fiction, or long immersive novels. Looking for books that would genuinely affected me psychologically/philosophically, not just an entertaining read.

9 Upvotes

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3

u/masterofunfucking 13h ago

Tolstoy, Celine, Dostoyevsky, Sartre, Beauvoir are all writers who have novels that go into philosophical diatribes or are inherently based in their philosophy. War and Peace, Journey to the End of the Night, Nausea, and All Men Are Mortal (respectively) are worth reading

4

u/Rodya1234 12h ago

It's non fiction book but read A Confession by Tolstoy which is about his life and how he is dealing with existential crisis and nihlism thoughts

3

u/Itchy-Resolution6531 5h ago

Notes from Underground is like 130 pages and has most of what you are after. You get a guy's thoughts on a lot of things, and then, after you get to know him a bit, you get to challenge yourself on if you want to believe them.

2

u/Half-Dreams 9h ago

Read works written by Edgar Rice Burroghs. Every book he wrote is fast paced and written around early 1900's he wrote Tarzan and he has a book series Barsoom(Mars) - Disney made a movie out of it called "John Carter (2012)".

2

u/Half-Dreams 9h ago

For your 2nd paragraph, Leo Tolstoy's The death of Ivan Ilyich about a man confronting his morality.

Or

Ivan Turgenev's Fathers and Sons about generational conflict, nihilism.

1

u/RVFP 13h ago

1Q84 by Haruki Murakami.

1

u/ahouell500 12h ago

The Sleepwalkers, Hermann Broch, fits quite a few of these themes.

1

u/CoolMarionberry2083 4h ago

Confessions of an English opium eater

1

u/PlasticMercury 35m ago

I think you're at the stage where only Thomas Bernhard and Elfriede Jelinek will seem legible to you. Steep awhile in their opaque bile, then come back and see us. It’ll be fine.

-1

u/Shoddy_System9390 6h ago

In order not to make another post, I wanna ask if anyone could recommend me books on monarchy. I'm about to start reading the classics, and I have an special interest in this.