21 books for a godson, pt. 2

This post is the second half of a list of 21 books that a man might give to his godson on the occasion of his twenty-first birthday.That is novels done. The bespoke bookcase is more than half loaded; 12 slots are full, nine remain. I conceive the selection of other titles as a complement to the novels we have already chosen – an acknowledgement too, if you like, that the novel is the highest of all art, let alone book, forms and other texts should therefore pay homage to it. Having ended prose fiction with a novel that pretended to be a long poem we will now begin the best of the rest with a long poem that pretends to be a novel. Byron’s Don Juan (1819 onwards) is lengthy, unfinished, sprawling and utterly hilarious. It’s couplets – the sting in the tail of the Italianate ottava rima verse form – include ‘Society is now one polish’d horde, Form’d of two mighty tribes, the Bores and Bored’ and the much-quoted ‘A little still she strove, and much repented, and whispering, “I will ne’er consent” – consented.’