a reading list for Lana fans

[Trash Magic 28,467]

Thanks to whoever suggested Junky. Just finished it and really enjoyed it. Going to order some other burroughs books now. The influence this thread holds...

[longtimeman 9,011]

Thanks to whoever suggested Junky. Just finished it and really enjoyed it. Going to order some other burroughs books now. The influence this thread holds...

Just be aware that he had a long run of books which are almost literally unreadable, where he would cut up his writing with scissors and glue, and retype the resulting gibberish. I'd recommend 'Queer' if you liked Junky, and Naked Lunch, which starts to be experimental, but is at least sort of readable. After that, you can jump to the trilogy he did in the 80s with Cities of the Red Night, Place of Dead Roads (my favourite of them) and Western Lands.

 

I even more strongly recommend tracking down his records and audiobooks - a lot of them are on youtube, and the stories make much better sense when read by him, than if you're just trying to work through all the accents and affectations.

[Trash Magic 28,467]

Just be aware that he had a long run of books which are almost literally unreadable, where he would cut up his writing with scissors and glue, and retype the resulting gibberish. I'd recommend 'Queer' if you liked Junky, and Naked Lunch, which starts to be experimental, but is at least sort of readable. After that, you can jump to the trilogy he did in the 80s with Cities of the Red Night, Place of Dead Roads (my favourite of them) and Western Lands.

 

I even more strongly recommend tracking down his records and audiobooks - a lot of them are on youtube, and the stories make much better sense when read by him, than if you're just trying to work through all the accents and affectations.

yeah I just read this when researching him further. Thanks for saving me some time reading garbage it doesn't sound worth the time.

 

Has anyone read anything good about america in the 60s / particularly the summer of love? I trust people heres recommendations more than the reviews on goodreads because we must have similar tastes already 

[bummersummer 2,219]

You can see two books in her latest Instagram post

 

 

 

 

thanks! added these + the one from her latest ig post with sean lennon,

 

Has anyone read anything good about america in the 60s / particularly the summer of love? I trust people heres recommendations more than the reviews on goodreads because we must have similar tastes already 

 

there's 2 i really love that immediately came to mind.

 

the 1st is called The Invisible Circus by Jennifer Egan (who later went to win a Pulizter for another book); it's set in the early to mid 70s, so immediately after the summer of love, but it's about a girl coming to terms with the death of her sister (not a spoiler, this is a known fact from the beginning) who was a quintessential San Francisco hippie, so there's a lot of flashbacks to that era. it's a really good coming of age story that deals with loss, complicated family dynamics & traveling as self-discovery. there's even a movie adaptation that's pretty terrible considering the source material but kind of a guilty pleasure for me lol

 

the 2nd was released this year, it's called America Was Hard To Find and it's by one of my fave young writers, Kathleen Alcott. it's kind of a family saga: it follows a woman, Fay, a hippie who joins a violent leftist group in the 60s; a man, Vincent, who's an alt history version of the 1st man on the moon & with whom she had an affair; and their son Wright up until his young adulthood, dealing with both his parents' legacies and his own identity. it goes from 60s counterculture to 80s gay AIDS-era San Francisco. it's incredible, stayed with me for a really long time.

[cherryblossoms 10,432]

On the Road is like the bible of Lana’s lyrical themes

So many things and references you’ll immediately recognize if you’re familiar with Lana’s work

[AnarKissed 281]

Apparently, back in 2011 L.D.R. told The Fader that she likes a book called Forbidden Gates: How Genetics, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Synthetic Biology, Nanotechnology, and Human Enhancement Herald The Dawn Of TechnoDimensional Spiritual Warfare by Tom and Nita Horn. This is what Lana said about it: "An easy way to become familiar with some of the major advances we're making each year. It's 2011, and we should all be aware of exactly how fast technology is developing—from understanding cybernetics, to learning that living organisms are now being created synthetically. In my world, life has always been more than music and art; it's about science and understanding where we come from." https://www.thefader.com/2011/10/21/what-were-reading-lana-del-rey/

[bummersummer 2,219]

@@AnarKissed thanks so much, added! and thanks in general for all y'all's contributions, i'm happy that i made this thread bc we're creating a pretty decent listing of Lana related literature.

 

i added another rec myself: Lithium For Medea, by Kate Braverman. no idea if Lana ever read this book or any of her other work, but it has so many elements that relate to her/her music's themes - addiction, toxic/dysfunctional romances, complicated mother/daughter relationships, Los Angeles (specifically Venice) - that i wouldn't be surprised if she did. anyway, Kate Braverman died like 2 days ago which is why i remembered this now.

[genghis khan 5,110]

The Lana related books I have read, and my brief thoughts:

Lolita. Was definitely worth the read, it's a really interesting experience. It's way different from the 90's movie, which frames Humbert as some kind of innocent victim of the throes of passion, when in the book he was very clearly a villain 

A Clockwork Orange.  Similar to Lolita. It's worth the experience 

The Bible . It took me a fucking year to read the whole thing, front to back. I don't regret it but it gets repetetive. I happen to be personally very interested in religions and religious symbolism but i doubt its worth reading it for most people

I just recently came across a copy of Think and Grow Rich and i'm excited to read it, i'm also super interested in reading Henry Miller too and have been for a long time, it's just really hard to come across physical copies. I'm wondering what it has to do with Lana though? 
 

[Jaeden xx 7,138]

in this image

 

she is reading the misfits by Arthur Miller I believe its the 1961 penguin books edition not sure if the book was listed on here but (also I don't think it is printed anymore)

[Jaeden xx 7,138]

Making the Shift: How to Live Your True Divine Purity by Wayne Dyer

 

(mentioned on her latest instagram post)

 

[Alison by Slowdive 26,154]

The Gin Closet by Leslie Jamison - I get AKA trailer vibes (and so much more)

Jean Rhys' works (would rec starting with Good Morning, Midnight) 

Lit by Mary Karr

[Alison by Slowdive 26,154]

Being Lolita by Alisson Wood

My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell

My Year Of Rest And Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh

[RiverColaLight 94]

Esther & Jerry Hicks - Ask and it is given

[Alison by Slowdive 26,154]

i was just thinking about how how to murder your life might actually parallel a lot of lana's early experiences or at least give insight to how her experiences might have been... it's my favourite trashy drug addiction memoir of all time by former conde nast beauty editor cat marnell <3 it's incredibly readable! she went to boarding school in MA and went to college in NYC in the early 2000s (like lana), and i feel like it was such a singular time - i loveeee reading about the club culture and nightlife in new york in the early 2000s - it's so fun lol

[bluechemtrails 27,316]

maybe all works from Sylvia Plath, because she inspired her for hope is a dangerous thing

[Fanny 29]

Anything by Eve Babitz

[sympathyisaknife 16,158]

Suprised that The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald isnt there. I'd also recommend A Separate Peace by John Knowles. Also The 7 1/2 deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton is pretty good.

[Alison by Slowdive 26,154]

the end of the affair  - graham greene

dirty blonde: the diaries of courtney love

bluets - maggie nelson

just kids - patti smith

play it as it lays - joan didion

white oleander - janet fitch

 

but the most lana book i've ever read is still the gin closet by leslie jamison, it's SO aka :(( 

[ultravyvanse 873]

why men love bitches by sherry argov

last days at hot slit by dworkin

art of seduction by robert greene

scum manifesto by valerie solanas 

the scarlet letter by nathaniel hawthorne 

dream story by arthur schnitzler

the contortionist handbook by craig clevenger 

the yellow wallpaper by charlotte perkins gilman

 

[LOVE 4,465]

If you all enjoyed Kerouac I'll do you two better from a couple dangerous, sentimental American poets:

Burning in Water, Drowning in Flames: Selected Poems by Los Angeles poet Charles Bukowski. He embodies the ultimate rugged scumbag romanticized in an early LDR track.

A Coney Island of the Mind by Beat poet Lawrence Ferlenghetti. Imo, a better Kerouac without all the weird origins. San Francisco legend, I could imagine Lana has read some Ferlenghetti.

 

A more feminine literary figure for LDR fans would be Anaïs Nin, a French-born eroticist and essayist, raised in Cuba and Spain who spent her later life in Los Angeles. Read her first published diary– it's startingly stunning prose for a diary work. Nin is a bit of a tragic, self-flagellating, hopeless romantic figure herself with a lot of erotic swagger (and quite a bit of homoeroticism). I feel like Nin's 1931-1934 diary reflects Lana's tender, glamorous sonic universe.