While browsing the author interview section on Powell’s website, I came across a Q and A with Michael Chabon (The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay). When asked to recommend five books on a single subject, he chose the “unrecognized subcanon” known as the Great Works of Parrot Fiction to inspire his newish short novel The Final Solution.
And, here is the list.
A Simple Heart by Gustave Flaubert
Flaubert’s Parrot by Julian Barnes
Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia-Marquez
The Parrot by Guy de Maupassant
How Love Came to Professor Gildea by Robert Hichens
(or read this story online in “Tongues of Conscience” (1900))
