Is there a type of novel that is centered around the setting,

>>9709888
mann's Doctor Faustus is narrated by someone other than the protagonist, iirc

>>9709888
The Bible

Blood Meridian, Moby Dick

>>9709888
Isherwood's Berlin Stories. Doctor Zhivago.

thomas bernhard - woodcutters
>observing a cocktail party

thomas bernhard - old masters
>sitting in a museum ranting about middlebrows

>>9709888
Ernst Jünger's "In Stahlgewittern" or "Storms of Steel" for you burgers. He made observation his passion and life goal. Wether it be in the pursuit of woman, war or beetles. Do it nigger. read him

>>9710405
soldier's diary is quite a stretch from op

>>9710426
Not really if you think about it. The plot in this case would be the war obviously and it indeed is the setting of his diary. Just read some of his stuff and you'll see what I mean.

>>9710440
already did and he leads offensives, trench raids etc. if anything his ww2 diary is more passive. by your standards every novel fits op's request as long as the author describes exterior events that aren't under his full control.

>>9709888
The Great Gatsby

>>9709888
The Beetle Leg is more about the place it's set in than anyone there or any of the events. There's no real main character either.

>>9710358
Pretty much all of Bernhard's books involve a narrator who's an observer listening to other people say things or recalling things that were said to them. The Lime Works is probably the most extreme example where the narrator is some random small town insurance salesman talking about events that he's only heard about through rumors and gossip.

James Salter's "A Sport and a Pastime" is like this. It's about the tempestuous relationship between an American in France and the French girl about 10 years his junior that he falls in love with. The catch is that the narrator is a third party to this relationship, and spends most of the book alone, imagining the great sex the other two are having.