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Nabokov Was Wrong About Dickens
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Oct 13, 2023 05:00
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| # ? Jun 6, 2024 23:40 |
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I actually read the entirety of The Goldfinch and ha ha ha ha I'm not sure why lol
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Oct 13, 2023 08:14
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I've been reading the posts about The Goldfinch and conflating it with The Gadfly everty time  Gonna read Bleak House this Winter because, well, I have it. Great Expectations wasn't great, yeah. e: I wonder if at the publisher of The Gadfly they ever called it the Voynich manuscript?
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Oct 13, 2023 08:23
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did you read solenoid, is that why youre thinking about the gadfly
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Oct 13, 2023 15:58
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I also hate The Goldfinch. I've never gotten into Dickens but maybe I just haven't read the right Dickens. Speaking of popular recentish novels and Booker winners, I also read Wolf Hall recently and just did not get the hype for that at all. But for some reason I got it into my head that it would be a fun challenge to read all the Booker winners (I know this is a waste of time, everyone has told me this is a waste of time) so eventually I will definitively be able to tell everyone The Worst Booker Winner. Actual good favourites so far have been Lincoln in the Bardo, Milkman and The Siege of Krishnapur but I have 40 more to read and I'm sure there'll be a lot of tedious poo poo to get through.
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Oct 13, 2023 17:46
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Milkman was fantastic but it was so well written I kept absorbing a lot of the narrator’s anxiety.
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Oct 13, 2023 18:26
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I did not realize The Goldfinch carried such ire
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Oct 13, 2023 18:31
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Wolf Hall is extremely good. Lincoln in the Bardo too obvs. I didn’t really get the hype for Shuggie Bain. I think that’s the most recent winner I’ve read.
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Oct 13, 2023 19:09
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So are any of Tartt's novels worth reading? I've never heard about the middle novel, Goldfinch seems very negatively received and Secret History seems to have attracted a very cringecore crowd.
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Oct 13, 2023 19:15
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Gaius Marius posted:So are any of Tartt's novels worth reading? I've never heard about the middle novel, Goldfinch seems very negatively received and Secret History seems to have attracted a very cringecore crowd. People ITT love to hate on anything written in English since 1980. Her books are good Edit: by this I really mean that Secret History is phenomenal, I didn’t read the middle book, and Goldfinch is pretty good but also forgettable blue squares fucked around with this message at 20:45 on Oct 13, 2023 |
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Oct 13, 2023 20:00
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The Secret History rules. I wish thrillers as absorbing and intelligently done were a dime a dozen, but they definitely are not. The middle book doesn’t really work, alas. I never read the Goldfinch cos I never met anyone who liked it.
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Oct 13, 2023 20:28
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Prix Goncourt and Premio Strega have much better track records than the Bookers, maybe read those instead
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Oct 13, 2023 20:44
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I enjoyed The Secret History but think it could have been improved with a few minor changes: One: Judy Poovey needs to be louder, angrier and have access to a time machine. Two: Whenever Poovey's not on screen, all the other characters should be asking, "Where's Poovey?" Seriously, the side characters steal the show.
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Oct 13, 2023 21:41
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The Empire podcast had Rosamund Bartlett on, and noted she has an excellent translation of Anna Karenina so on a whim I grabbed it from the library. This is gonna be a new experience for sure.
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Oct 14, 2023 15:21
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derp posted:did you read solenoid, is that why youre thinking about the gadfly Sadly no. I think it was just that both comprise two words, beginning with g and f, respectively, naming a species of fauna as well as a well-known book.
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Oct 14, 2023 19:42
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It might be too early to say but I'm enjoying Doctor Faustus quite a bit. Germans seem to have a penchant for blending their literature with natural sciences and I'm here for that. The second chapter with Adrian's father showing the kids experiments was fascinating. I wonder if that's a cromulent criticism of more modern work, literature to me at least seems to be becoming more divorced from science, religion, and philosophy and more and more strictly only commentating on social issues or literature itself. Goethe was a scientist as well as a writer and his writing reflects that, if we keep churning out writers whose only life experience is writing what are they supposed to be able to write about other than writing? Didn't Cormac McCarthy start thinking the same before he died?
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Oct 15, 2023 03:09
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All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren marks the first time I've read a piece of serious fiction longer than 500 pages in years. It did well to ease me into the literary groove, rich with allusion and contemplation. Warren seems both critical and affectionate towards the South, depicting it both as having deep wells of history, beauty and tradition and as being full of corrupt backwardness. It's described as a book about Huey Long's fictional counterpoint, but the protagonist Jack Burden is the heart of the story, far more so than Nick is in The Great Gatsby. The lengthy digression telling of the life of his 19th century ancestor on its own would make a tremendous short story. I was quite entertained in the end by the editor's note to the new edition, which is quite critical of Warren's original editor for being totally insensitive to theme and subtext.
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Oct 15, 2023 10:14
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Gaius Marius posted:It might be too early to say but I'm enjoying Doctor Faustus quite a bit. Germans seem to have a penchant for blending their literature with natural sciences and I'm here for that. The second chapter with Adrian's father showing the kids experiments was fascinating. I wonder if that's a cromulent criticism of more modern work, literature to me at least seems to be becoming more divorced from science, religion, and philosophy and more and more strictly only commentating on social issues or literature itself. George Saunders has a background in geophysical engineering. When you listen to him in interviews, his descriptions of his ideas about writing sound somewhat informed by his engineering background, but his books themselves aren't really "the writings of a former geophysicist." Yiyun Li was an immunologist and served a compulsory year in the Chinese military, but Dear Friend, from My Life I Write to You in Your Life doesn't contain a trace of immunology--it's about communion with authors long past. Ishiguro and Murakami definitely let their experience with music influence their writing. David Foster Wallace studied modal logic, and his awesome weirdo philosophy sensibilities are definitely evident on the page and in the structures of his work. I don't know if it's really fair to compare contemporary writers to Goethe. He was born to a well-off family in the late 1700s. That was a time when a generalist could make meaningful contributions to the sciences. These days, one would have to have an advanced degree to even be allowed to engage with the peer review process. As far as contemporary fiction I can think of that has interests in other fields of inquiry... I guess there's The Overstory by Richard Powers, for ecological fiction. A lot of Ursula K. Le Guin's books are clearly informed by anthropology. Ruth Ozeki is an ordained Buddhist priest, and her novel A Tale for the Time Being is in conversation with an 800-year-old Buddhist religious treatise. Saunders' Lincoln in the Bardo is also definitely a Buddhist piece of writing. Anyway, I have a copy of Guerney's translation of Dead Souls coming in the mail, and I'm extremely stoked for it.
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Oct 15, 2023 19:18
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Pynchon's mathematics background is plainly influential in GR
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Oct 16, 2023 04:17
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I kinda want to read The Fall by Camus after hearing it discussed by a podcast but I’m fighting my way page by page through the Idiot. Is the Fall also a slog? Can someone recommend a lighter course to cleanse my palate perhaps.
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Oct 17, 2023 00:17
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It's only 150 pages. I haven't read it but if it's like camus' other books, the stranger, the plague, it won't be a slog at all
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Oct 17, 2023 00:21
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It's only like 100 pages
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Oct 17, 2023 00:21
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Proust Malone posted:I kinda want to read The Fall by Camus after hearing it discussed by a podcast but I’m fighting my way page by page through the Idiot. Is the Fall also a slog? Can someone recommend a lighter course to cleanse my palate perhaps. Blood Meridian
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Oct 17, 2023 01:38
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The Fall is a bit weird because it's written in second person
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Oct 17, 2023 01:44
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FPyat posted:All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren marks the first time I've read a piece of serious fiction longer than 500 pages in years. It did well to ease me into the literary groove, rich with allusion and contemplation. Warren seems both critical and affectionate towards the South, depicting it both as having deep wells of history, beauty and tradition and as being full of corrupt backwardness. It's described as a book about Huey Long's fictional counterpoint, but the protagonist Jack Burden is the heart of the story, far more so than Nick is in The Great Gatsby. The lengthy digression telling of the life of his 19th century ancestor on its own would make a tremendous short story. I was quite entertained in the end by the editor's note to the new edition, which is quite critical of Warren's original editor for being totally insensitive to theme and subtext. I absolutely loved this book when I was like 20. I hope it holds up to a reread. Just the opening pages are so beautifully evocative of the South (and its casual racism). Phrasings like "aching for the tongue and ready to bleed gold" still stick with me. It's as close as you can get really to Southern Political Gothic.
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Oct 17, 2023 02:10
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read a good book ya dingus
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Oct 17, 2023 02:25
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Proust Malone posted:I kinda want to read The Fall by Camus after hearing it discussed by a podcast but I’m fighting my way page by page through the Idiot. Is the Fall also a slog? Can someone recommend a lighter course to cleanse my palate perhaps. I think they're by different authors, OP.
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Oct 17, 2023 02:42
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Don't read Camus unless you already did. In which case you probably have got the gist. He plays one note better than anyone.
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Oct 17, 2023 02:49
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The stranger was one of my favorite books for a long time. I ought to reread it at some point to see if that's still true
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Oct 17, 2023 03:00
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derp posted:The stranger was one of my favorite books for a long time. I ought to reread it at some point to see if that's still true It holds up. You gotta pretend that it is like, an actual book written by a real guy. You know what I mean. Don't make the mistake of thinking he is a "protagonist" and therefore worthy of emulation. Edit: to be clear he is just a guy. Maybe some of the reader is reflected in him. That's fine.
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Oct 17, 2023 03:10
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mdemone posted:He is a "protagonist" and therefore worthy of emulation. What the everloving gently caress is this? I'd love to hear what book IS like this. (He lied.)
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Oct 17, 2023 04:25
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I don't think anyone in the thread is going to emulate or idolize characters in the novels they read just for them being in the spotlight. 3D Megadoodoo posted:What the everloving gently caress is this? I'd love to hear what book IS like this. (He lied.) Bartleby the Scrivner
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Oct 17, 2023 04:36
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3D Megadoodoo posted:What the everloving gently caress is this? I'd love to hear what book IS like this. (He lied.) a side effect of genre brain
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Oct 17, 2023 04:52
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Gaius Marius posted:I don't think anyone in the thread is going to emulate or idolize characters in the novels they read just for them being in the spotlight. That's a documentary.
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Oct 17, 2023 05:54
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Proust Malone posted:I’m fighting my way page by page through the Idiot. I had this same problem.
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Oct 17, 2023 10:36
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mdemone posted:It holds up. You gotta pretend that it is like, an actual book written by a real guy. protagonist doesn’t mean anything else than the person a book (primarily) is about. it doesn’t imply identification, or the need for emulation or anything like that
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Oct 17, 2023 11:04
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anyway, you want to know another book in the second person? the moscoviad it’s fun, cold and brutal, and you should all read it just like 180 pages or something too
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Oct 17, 2023 11:05
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Heath posted:The Fall is a bit weird because it's written in second person It’s a dramatic monologue…. That makes it sound like it’s a Choose-your-own-adventure.
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Oct 17, 2023 14:02
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I mean, it's not wrong, is it? He addresses You directly. It's been a while since I read it
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Oct 17, 2023 14:20
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| # ? Jun 6, 2024 23:40 |
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It's written in the first person, and he talks to you. https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/albert-camus-the-fall
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Oct 17, 2023 15:07
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