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yeah but i don't understand why the humour invalidates any of that. i think the humour forms a crucial part of the pathos that makes the book so good. just like ~~~ulysses~~~ or ~~~gravity's rainbow~~~
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Mar 15, 2018 16:49
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Mel Mudkiper posted:well sure, but at the same time its about a family with an estranged father who commits to a pilgrimage in the belief that grief has finally redeemed him. Taking Addie's body is as much a tribute to Addie as it is an expression of faith that Anse might be changed by the weight of his loss. Due to their own ignorance, each character by the end is destroyed except for Anse, who reveals to his new ruined family that he still remained the selfish person he always was. I don't think that it has to be one or the other. I think it's possible to acknowledge a character's tragic flaws and empathizing with their plight, while also being able to laugh with them and at them. I agree with your distinction that it shouldn't be considered a "comedy", like say Confederacy of Dunces, but to say that it can't have darkly comic moments because it explores dark/heavy themes seems to limit the entire experience and ignores how subjective humor is, especially to a modern audience, and to an extent the writer's abilities. Foul Fowl posted:yeah but i don't understand why the humour invalidates any of that. i think the humour forms a crucial part of the pathos that makes the book so good. just like ~~~ulysses~~~ or ~~~gravity's rainbow~~~ These also came to mind.
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Mar 15, 2018 16:49
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Foul Fowl posted:yeah but i don't understand why the humour invalidates any of that. i think the humour forms a crucial part of the pathos that makes the book so good. just like ~~~ulysses~~~ or ~~~gravity's rainbow~~~ Well yeah, but there is a fundamental difference between approaching a book while acknowledging moments of humor and declaring the optimal reading of the book is one in which humor is primary outcome Franchescanado posted:I agree with your distinction that it shouldn't be considered a "comedy", like say Confederacy of Dunces, but to say that it can't have darkly comic moments because it explores dark/heavy themes I never said that though
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Mar 15, 2018 16:50
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I don't understand, the difference between a comedy and a tragedy isn't laughs, it's whether or not everyone is dead at the end Also tragic protagonists are usually royalty, that's a rule
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Mar 15, 2018 16:57
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:I don't understand, the difference between a comedy and a tragedy isn't laughs, it's whether or not everyone is dead at the end don't you have a 6th century folk tale to be pedantic about somewhere else fucker
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Mar 15, 2018 17:03
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I got a copy of The Recognitions and im gonna read it
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Mar 15, 2018 17:21
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Mel Mudkiper posted:don't you have a 6th century folk tale to be pedantic about somewhere else fucker Harsh, but fair Still, trollin' my way towards a larger point there: it's somewhat pedantic to say any modern complex work "is" a tragedy or "is" a comedy; those kinds of strict genre distinctions arent' really coherent when applied to authors like Faulkner (or Kafka), they only make sense for works that actually fit within such strictures (Aristotelian plays; episodes of Frasier; whatever). If you read Faulkner and ignore either the tragic or comic elements you're missing a huge chunk of the work.
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Mar 15, 2018 17:45
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What brought this up is a teacher saying that As I Lay Dying should be read as a dark comedy. Probably not the best perspective to try and convey to a new reader. However, at least the students are now aware that the book has comedic moments and can get more out of it than if they were to think everything is dreadfully serious and they shouldn't laugh or feel anything beyond sadness or the meditations of grief or whatever.
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Mar 15, 2018 18:16
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i dont think hes saying that there arent comedic elements to AILD but just that reducing the whole pathos of it to "this whole thing is supposed to be funny" is an oversimplification
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Mar 15, 2018 18:17
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books are just words man
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Mar 15, 2018 18:18
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chernobyl kinsman posted:i dont think hes saying that there arent comedic elements to AILD but just that reducing the whole pathos of it to "this whole thing is supposed to be funny" is an oversimplification Yeah. I agree, it's a weird oversimplification. I guess my point is, that, despite the oversimplification, it still conveys an aspect of the book that a student may just not get. There's a lot of people that don't think literature can be funny, and act like it's weird to say stories like Pride & Prejudice or some other classic is quite humorous. This also reminded me of my teacher who said Moby Dick was a comedy and a satire. Franchescanado fucked around with this message at 18:23 on Mar 15, 2018 |
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Mar 15, 2018 18:21
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Some people think they look smarter if they claim to find complex literary works simply "funny."
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Mar 15, 2018 18:31
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Franchescanado posted:Yeah. I agree, it's a weird oversimplification. I guess my point is, that, despite the oversimplification, it still conveys an aspect of the book that a student may just not get. There's a lot of people that don't think literature can be funny, and act like it's weird to say stories like Pride & Prejudice or some other classic is quite humorous. The humor in Moby-Dick is mostly situational. I personally found the idea of Ishmael sitting around musing about things humorous simply because for as long as the book is, 90% of the time he's generally sitting around staring at nothing in the hopes of seeing a whale, so the gravity with which he discusses the prospect of whaling being formulated against a backdrop of being stuck on a loving boat has an air of being at least amusing. Plus I actually laughed out loud at the incredibly grave scene of Queequeg dying of a fever and having his custom coffin built and then at the very last second he remembers he had some business to attend to and just instantly recovers.
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Mar 15, 2018 20:58
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Now I'm picturing a man reading a book and all of a sudden laughing loudly at the book, in a public place
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Mar 15, 2018 20:59
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Heath posted:The humor in Moby-Dick is mostly situational. I personally found the idea of Ishmael sitting around musing about things humorous simply because for as long as the book is, 90% of the time he's generally sitting around staring at nothing in the hopes of seeing a whale, so the gravity with which he discusses the prospect of whaling being formulated against a backdrop of being stuck on a loving boat has an air of being at least amusing. Plus I actually laughed out loud at the incredibly grave scene of Queequeg dying of a fever and having his custom coffin built and then at the very last second he remembers he had some business to attend to and just instantly recovers. Yeah, Moby Dick has humor, it was just another example of oversimplifying a book, like Moby Dick, a book with comedy, as just a comedy. Shibawanko posted:Now I'm picturing a man reading a book and all of a sudden laughing loudly at the book, in a public place It's me. I'm that man.
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Mar 15, 2018 21:06
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Shibawanko posted:Now I'm picturing a man reading a book and all of a sudden laughing loudly at the book, in a public place if you have never done this: lol, just lol
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Mar 15, 2018 21:08
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:if you have never done this: lol, just lol
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Mar 15, 2018 21:10
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Shibawanko posted:Now I'm picturing a man reading a book and all of a sudden laughing loudly at the book, in a public place I was in my bedroom
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Mar 15, 2018 21:19
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Heath posted:I got a copy of The Recognitions and im gonna read it Yeah but you won't finish it
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Mar 15, 2018 22:11
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Heath posted:I got a copy of The Recognitions and im gonna read it blue squares posted:Yeah but you won't finish it I've splattered off it so many times I'm thinking about just giving it up.
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Mar 16, 2018 05:05
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read all of the recognitions it's very good.
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Mar 16, 2018 05:09
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Speaking of funny books, Recognitions is very funny. And if you don't finish it I hope your copy falls off its shelf and breaks your toe.
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Mar 16, 2018 09:14
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About half of the Recognitions went over my head and the other half was amazing and darkly hysterical
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Mar 16, 2018 15:51
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i admit i hadnt heard of it so i looked it up and lol whoever wrote this on the wikipedia: "Like James Joyce, he uses an em-dash to mark the beginning of speech, not standard quotation marks. He leaves it up to the reader to deduce who is talking by the speaking style, other behavior or attributes of the speaker, or the context." im pretty sure most books ive read are written like that, wtf
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Mar 16, 2018 17:46
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looks interesting but im not reading any more books over 400 pages long this year. havent posted a dumb opinion in a while so here you go friends: books should just not be that long. its kind of hard not to find it arrogant to write a book that long imo. how many words do you really need to say what you're trying to say, and how much is self indulgence?
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Mar 16, 2018 17:53
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honestly I'm getting real tired of long books too. Whatever happened to book lengths like The Stranger, or The Bridge of San Luis Rey? Those are real good imo. I guess part of it is perceived value for money. not a lot of people want to pay 15 bucks for 120 pages... Luckily I have a bunch of short story collections i bought for virtually nothing used (lots of glimmer train, some randoms) so I use them to buffer the bricks
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Mar 16, 2018 18:07
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There are plenty of short contemporary novels so perhaps your issue is a lack of diversity
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Mar 16, 2018 18:14
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tbf I just passed up on a Saunders collection at my local bookstore the other day because it was super thin (maybe approx 100 pages?) but still $15 which seemed excessive. I still bought Lincoln in the Bardo for the BotM and then found The Face of Another by Abe in their sale section.
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Mar 16, 2018 18:21
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I was looking through the library's shelf of books removed from the collection. Nothing grabbed my eye until I spotted a translation of Sophocles's Antigone. I grabbed at it so fast that it was embarrassing. It wasn't like there was anyone else there who was going to take it.
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Mar 16, 2018 18:28
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BravestOfTheLamps posted:I was looking through the library's shelf of books removed from the collection. Nothing grabbed my eye until I spotted a translation of Sophocles's Antigone. There was a used book store that converted to a record store in town, and they just dumped all their old stock on the street in boxes labelled free I got some loving good poo poo from those boxes Guy A. Person posted:tbf I just passed up on a Saunders collection at my local bookstore the other day because it was super thin (maybe approx 100 pages?) but still $15 which seemed excessive. I still bought Lincoln in the Bardo for the BotM and then found The Face of Another by Abe in their sale section. Extrapolating the value of a novel by how long it takes to read it is the definition of pervasive capitalism
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Mar 16, 2018 18:29
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Mel Mudkiper posted:There are plenty of short contemporary novels so perhaps your issue is a lack of diversity recommend some then, ya 
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Mar 16, 2018 18:36
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Mel Mudkiper posted:Extrapolating the value of a novel by how long it takes to read it is the definition of pervasive capitalism Yeah no duh, I'm not saying I ain't pervaded by capitalism
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Mar 16, 2018 18:51
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Krankenstyle posted:im pretty sure most books ive read are written like that, wtf I would say quotation marks are common. I believe emdashing is a French thing. Also derf can gently caress off, as usual.
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Mar 16, 2018 19:42
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Krankenstyle posted:recommend some then, ya Solar Bones What Belongs to You Grief is the Thing with Feathers Signs Preceding the End of the World The Last Wolf The Story of my Teeth A Brief History of Portable Literature Train Dreams Every Day is for the Thief Mel Mudkiper fucked around with this message at 19:54 on Mar 16, 2018 |
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Mar 16, 2018 19:50
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Guy A. Person posted:Yeah no duh, I'm not saying I ain't pervaded by capitalism 
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Mar 16, 2018 20:35
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Mel Mudkiper posted:Solar Bones nice! thx 
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Mar 16, 2018 21:40
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Speaking of overly long books, I just finished a re-read of 2666. There’s an off-handed moment in the final part, where Archimboldi describes the punishment of Sisyphus as being a distraction from which his ingenuity will allow him to escape. Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but I feel like there’s a lot going on in that moment. Bolaño is so good at conveying moods. Before this I hadn’t really thought about him since 2010 or so, so it’s crazy to see he still has “new” books coming out. I picked up The Third Reich, hoping to get around to reading it soon.
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Mar 16, 2018 22:23
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How does someone have "new" stuff when he's been dead fifteen years?
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Mar 16, 2018 22:48
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Mr. Squishy posted:How does someone have "new" stuff when he's been dead fifteen years? He was crazy obscure until Savage Detectives so people are still translating his backlog Just like Laszlo K just had a hard back release of a book from the 80s
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Mar 16, 2018 22:51
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What, you mean you don't all read in the Spanish?
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Mar 16, 2018 22:54
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