For me, The Unbearable Lightness of Being-Milan Kundera; On Earth we are Briefly Gorgeous-Ocean Vuong; Love in the Time of Cholera-Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The most tragic, painful, human suffering can be presented and these writers present it in the most excruciatingly beautiful prose.
On Earth we are Briefly Gorgeous-“A woman stands on the shoulder of a dirt road begging, in a tongue made obsolete by gunfire, to enter the village where her house sits, has sat for decades. It is a human story. Anyone can tell it. Can you tell? Can you tell the rain has grown heavy, its keystrokes peppering the blue shawl black?”
What is the beauty for you?
I was too frightened by its reputation to read Moby Dick until my early 40s, and when I finally did I was sucked right in and would talk about it to anyone who’d listen. There’s so much wonderful writing in it - the shared bed scene where Ishmael first meets Queequeg, or where he meets the shipowners in Nantucket. It’s an incredible book.