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Can anyone recommend something good and interesting to read, but that is also fun? My last few Lit books have all been depressing and Russian and Id like to buck the trend.
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Jan 19, 2021 13:05
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at swim-two-birds
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Jan 19, 2021 13:11
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CestMoi posted:at swim-two-birds Thank you. The wikipedia article makes it look like it'll be a bit to complex for me to get my head around, being all meta and everything, but I'll certainly give it a try.
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Jan 19, 2021 13:26
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OscarDiggs posted:Can anyone recommend something good and interesting to read, but that is also fun? My last few Lit books have all been depressing and Russian and Id like to buck the trend. Jrbg posted:Reading Olga Tokarczuk's Drive your plow... it's good
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Jan 19, 2021 13:30
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OscarDiggs posted:Thank you. The wikipedia article makes it look like it'll be a bit to complex for me to get my head around, being all meta and everything, but I'll certainly give it a try. the meta aspect eases you in pretty well, all the levels of it are distinct enough that you're not going to be lost at who's where in which story and plus it's really funny so you won't care
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Jan 19, 2021 14:17
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OscarDiggs posted:Thank you. The wikipedia article makes it look like it'll be a bit to complex for me to get my head around, being all meta and everything, but I'll certainly give it a try. You should try to read the funny book before deciding that it's too smart for you.
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Jan 20, 2021 10:01
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Also you should not base any decision on anything you read on Wikipedia.
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Jan 20, 2021 16:08
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reading a book in public and laughing loudly at the pages
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Jan 20, 2021 16:31
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I just finished Inherent Vice and it's my first Pynchon novel and I really dug it. Writing a noir detective novel in the close of the 60s feels inspired (maybe it's not? I don't know) and I'm surprised how accessible Pynchon is after only associating him with Gravity's Rainbow. What's a good next novel while I work up the courage for GR or Against the Day? Or should I just dive in?
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Jan 27, 2021 03:59
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HaitianDivorce posted:I just finished Inherent Vice and it's my first Pynchon novel and I really dug it. Writing a noir detective novel in the close of the 60s feels inspired (maybe it's not? I don't know) and I'm surprised how accessible Pynchon is after only associating him with Gravity's Rainbow. What's a good next novel while I work up the courage for GR or Against the Day? Or should I just dive in? just read gr. maybe v if it is a length rather than depth issue that is putting you off
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Jan 27, 2021 04:15
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Against the Day is really long, but I found it to be one of his more accessible novels on the level of prose/structure. It felt a lot easier to follow what was going on than his other work.
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Jan 27, 2021 04:51
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Tree Goat posted:just read gr. maybe v if it is a length rather than depth issue that is putting you off V. is incredible and is the perfect entry point to Gravity's Rainbow.
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Jan 27, 2021 07:12
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Mason & Dixon is real good too.
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Jan 27, 2021 08:13
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Wole Soyinka's first novel in 48 years is getting published later this year, good time to read The Interpreters if you haven't because it's really good.
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Jan 27, 2021 08:46
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Bilirubin posted:V. is incredible and is the perfect entry point to Gravity's Rainbow. V. is the best one i didn't care for inherent vice, maybe because i don't have much of a connection to the period and location, i liked that V. was set in europe as imagined by an american sailor
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Jan 27, 2021 10:38
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OscarDiggs posted:Can anyone recommend something good and interesting to read, but that is also fun? My last few Lit books have all been depressing and Russian and Id like to buck the trend. The Good Soldier Švejk by Jaroslav Hašek
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Jan 27, 2021 11:08
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A human heart posted:Wole Soyinka's first novel in 48 years is getting published later this year, good time to read The Interpreters if you haven't because it's really good. im not holding out a huge amount of hope that itll be cool, but wole soyinka is insanely good so if anyone can be good at novels 5 decades apart its him
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Jan 27, 2021 13:04
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What's some good Russian literature from the 20th century? I haven't read anything newer than Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky.
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Jan 28, 2021 11:00
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cebrail posted:What's some good Russian literature from the 20th century? I haven't read anything newer than Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. Solzhenitsyn is an obvious pick.
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Jan 28, 2021 11:29
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What kind of stuff are you into? And does it have to be Russian or can it be Russian-language literature from other Soviet states (e.g., Chingiz Aytmatov)?
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Jan 28, 2021 12:08
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cebrail posted:What's some good Russian literature from the 20th century? I haven't read anything newer than Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. I would suggest checking out some of the post-Soviet stuff. Pelevin owns, especially Generation P. Blue Lard by Sorokin is very good If you can get it. Svetlana Alexievich is from Belarus, but her writings are essential for the post-Soviet era and her Nobel is well deserved. Everything she wrote is excellent.
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Jan 28, 2021 12:23
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Bulgakov is great, early 20th c though I think he's Ukranian technically, but still a russian-language author
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Jan 28, 2021 12:25
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Platonov is a really cool.
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Jan 28, 2021 13:34
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yeah platonov is really good
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Jan 28, 2021 13:36
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3D Megadoodoo posted:Solzhenitsyn is an obvious pick. please only read nazis if they are good at writing like limonov ty
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Jan 28, 2021 14:45
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cebrail posted:What's some good Russian literature from the 20th century? I haven't read anything newer than Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. To counterbalance the Solzhenitsyn rec, I'll say that Isaac Babel is excellent, especially Red Cavalry.
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Jan 28, 2021 15:25
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strugatsky bros are really fun
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Jan 28, 2021 15:32
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Shibawanko posted:strugatsky bros are really fun Yeah, Hard to Be a God is a personal favorite of mine, highly recommended if you’re a fantasy reader
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Jan 28, 2021 15:33
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In no particular order, in addition to all previously recommended: Yuri Olesha – Envy (Berczynski translation) Vassily Aksyonov – The Burn Venedikt Erofeev – Moscow to the End of the Line Vladimir Nabokov – Invitation to a Beheading Andrey Bely – The Silver Dove Ilya Ilf and Yevgeny Petrov – The Twelve Chairs (Fisher translation, although the sequel is better translated by Gurevich and Anderson) Yevgeny Zamyatin – We (Ginsburg translation) Vladimir Voinovich – The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of Private Ivan Chonkin Edit: Make sure to read the Burgin and O'Connor translation of The Master and Margarita. Sham bam bamina! fucked around with this message at 17:52 on Jan 28, 2021 |
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Jan 28, 2021 15:41
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Just remembered; Kuprin, Popov (Jevgeni), and Ilf & Petrov. e: Oh I'm slow.
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Jan 28, 2021 15:59
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ulvir posted:Bulgakov is great, early 20th c Seconding this The Master and Margarita is a must read.
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Jan 28, 2021 16:55
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What’s the horniest, most lurid early-19th century American lit? Does anyone know of a place online with scans of old dime novels/penny dreadfuls?
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Jan 28, 2021 17:21
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Do you mean the late 19th century or the early 20th century?
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Jan 28, 2021 17:46
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Carly Gay Dead Son posted:What’s the horniest, most lurid early-19th century American lit? Does anyone know of a place online with scans of old dime novels/penny dreadfuls? iirc American dime novels mostly became a thing in the second half of the 19th century, I guess because the literacy rate was too low beforehand for mass-market popular literature to really take off. I've read a couple of the early Nick Carter novels that I found on Gutenberg and they're fairly tame (bordering on naive), very much a precursor to something like Doc Savage.
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Jan 28, 2021 17:49
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PeterWeller posted:Seconding this The Master and Margarita is a must read. Seconding this. Can't remember the last time a novel made me ugly-cry.
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Jan 28, 2021 17:56
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Sham bam bamina! posted:Do you mean the late 19th century or the early 20th century? Early 19th. Whatever type of thing Pynchon was spoofing with The Ghastly Fop from Mason & Dixon (which is mid-18th c., I know).
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Jan 28, 2021 18:22
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Ah, that would be early Gothic fiction. A really lurid one that's been on my to-read list for a while is Horrid Mysteries. If you want a specifically American recommendation, there's also Charles Brockden Brown.
Sham bam bamina! fucked around with this message at 18:34 on Jan 28, 2021 |
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Jan 28, 2021 18:27
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It's been a while since I read Mason & Dixon but there's also a fair bit of Sade in there as I recall.
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Jan 28, 2021 18:35
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lost in postation posted:It's been a while since I read Mason & Dixon but there's also a fair bit of Sade in there as I recall. Lurid, not smooth.
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Jan 28, 2021 19:02
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CestMoi posted:im not holding out a huge amount of hope that itll be cool, but wole soyinka is insanely good so if anyone can be good at novels 5 decades apart its him his prison memoir is really sick, there's a bit where he's on hunger strike and in solitary confinement and looks through a hole in the wall and sees Hitler staring back at him
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Jan 28, 2021 19:15
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