XFX: Read These Authors

The internet site, Modern World,  is a valuable place to explore many of the important modern authors who exhibit quality writing which extends the boundaries of fiction, often venturing into the realm of experimentation. Here is what they say:

WELCOME TO THE MODERN WORD, the Web’s largest site devoted to exploring twentieth-century experimental literature! My name is Allen Ruch – though I generally go by my nickname of the Quail – and I have the pleasure to be the site’s Editorial Director, but for this section you can think of me as your tour guide.
The Modern Word is a large site, and one that’s been through many changes since its inception. It began in 1995 as The Libyrinth, a portmanteau word coined to represent the two common themes I felt ran through much modern literature – the Library and the Labyrinth. The Library, symbolic of a multitudinous cross-referencing of resources; and the Labyrinth, symbolic of a prose style that employs many winding paths through a shifting veil of reality. Allusive and Elusive: The Libyrinth. (I hope you like the word – the stress is on the first “LIE,” like any good Irishman will tell you – because we reJoyce in that typo worldplay ’round hearasay.)
After five years of growing as the Libyrinth, the site was re-dedicated in May 2000 as The Modern Word, its borders greatly expanded but dedicated to the same goal – to celebrate and explore the works of these amazing authors, from the past metamorphoses of Kafka to the Ecos of the future.

In the section of Modern World called The Scriptorium there is a list of amazing authors and if you look around, even more suggestions that will extend the list. Here is a list of authors that should open anyone to the world of modern fiction. How many have you read?

• Abé, Kobo
• Ballard, J.G.
• Banville, John
• Barth, John
• Barthelme, Donald
• Beckett, Samuel
• Borges, Jorge Luis
• Burgess, Anthony
• Carter, Angela
• Coover, Robert
• Dick, Philip K.
• Eco, Umberto
• Gaddis, William
• García Márquez, Gabriel
• Hawkes, John
• Joyce, James
• Kafka, Franz
• Lem, Stanislaw
• Levi, Primo
• Lovecraft, H.P.
• Noon, Jeff
• O’Brien, Flann
• Ondaatje, Michael
• Peake, Mervyn
• Perec, Georges
• Pynchon, Thomas
• Queneau, Raymond
• Robbe-Grillet, Alain
• Winterson, Jeanette

I’m sure you might have a few authors you would add to this list … I certainly do. The Scriptorium also indicates authors who will be added to the list in the future. Check it out.