The legend who was David Bowie passed away early in 2016, but as with all legends, Bowie’s influence never really died. The latest in a long line of inspired tributes, revelations, and final releases from the artist and his estate involves Bowie’s son, movie director Duncan Jones, and one of Bowie’s favorite hobbies: reading.Duncan has kicked off an online, social media-based book club to honor Bowie, “a beast of a reader”:
Back in 2013, the list of Bowie’s Top 100 Must Read Books was released by the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto as part of their “David Bowie is…” exhibit. According toPitchfork, the exhibit featured “handwritten setlists, lyrics, diary entries, instruments, sketches, costumes, music videos, set designs, photographs, and excerpts from films and live performances.” The list has been circulating around the Internet ever since, but there has not been a dedicated, organized Bowie book club like this before.
Bowie’s taste in literature is as eclectic as the star himself, with books ranging from 1945 right to 2008 and spanning a variety of genres. The list includes all-time classics like the Iliad by Homer, George Orwell’s 1984, Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, and The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin as well as more recent titles like The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz and several comics and magazines. According to Duncan, one of Bowie’s “true loves” was Hawksmoor by Peter Ackroyd and its “sojourns into the history of Britain and its cities.”
Alright gang! Anyone who wants to join along, we are reading Peter Ackroyd’s “Hawksmoor,” as an amuse cerveau before we get into the heavy stuff. You have until Feb 1. ❤️
And so the award-winning 1985 book is Duncan’s pick to launch the club. He called it an “amuse cerveau,” which is a very fancy French way of saying it’s a kind of appetizer intended to fire up the brain and get the whole club thing started. Those interested in joining have until Feb. 1 to get through the novel. Although Duncan did not share many more details about how the club will work exactly, there seems to be enough interest to keep the Bowie book club going for as long as it takes to get through the 100 books Ziggy Stardust loved the most.
