The 10 Best Sentences in Literature?!

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Jason Parham

07/16/14 11:04AM

Or: What Do 7 White Men, 2 White Women, and 1 Black Woman Have in Common?

Abigail Hamilton Jason Parham 07/16/14 12:31PM

Many, many of the sentences in AL Kennedy's All the Rage: Stories stand up better as discrete bits than these, possibly because they are powerful without being oversweeping and complex. Which is to say, this list idea bites by its very nature.

Jason Parham Abigail Hamilton 07/16/14 02:28PM

I'll have to check out All the Rage, I'm not familiar with Kennedy's work.

Abigail Hamilton Jason Parham 07/16/14 04:38PM

I wasn't either; it was a New Yorker Briefly Noted pick, so I found it. I just bought one of her novels as a follow up.

Abigail Hamilton Jason Parham 07/16/14 04:39PM

Some of the sentences are startlingly perfect.

Max Read Jason Parham 07/16/14 11:33AM

Honestly I don't even think I have favorite sentences. They do so many different things it seems weird to compare them head-to-head.

Jason Parham Max Read 07/16/14 11:58AM

But this is the way we live now, Max. Everything must be ranked and compared and thinkpiece'd. For better or worse (but mostly for worse), this is the world we built.

Max Read Jason Parham 07/16/14 12:01PM

What's your favorite sentence? Obviously one of mine, but which one?

Jason Parham Max Read 07/16/14 12:22PM

I'd have to really go through some of my favorite books — Song of Solomon, Linden Hills, We The Animals, etc — but here are some sentences/ excerpts I've collected on my Tumblr.

Gabo
Toni Cade Bambara
Joel Lovell
DFW *this one would be in my top 10
JSF
McCarthy
Max Read

Jason Parham Jason Parham 07/16/14 11:05AM

How did James Baldwin and Gabriel Garcia Marquez not make this list?!!!