Mel Mudkiper posted:Well yeah it was the defining book of its era but it was a lovely vapid era And Great Gatsby does a magnificent job of holding a mirror up to that nature A book can be a great book and still not be something I'm going to read more than once.
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# ? Jun 10, 2024 19:20 |
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:And Great Gatsby does a magnificent job of holding a mirror up to that nature Well yeah but its still written terribly ![]() the first few pages are barely readable
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Went googling for Fitzgerald and found this:quote:Everybody my age knows about Hemingway's story about measuring F. Scott Fitzgerald's penis in A Moveable Feast, but maybe it's a good way to introduce a younger generation to Big Papa's work. I've always wanted to write a poem about it, but nothing I ever came up with came close to matching Hemingway's account. The story is this. F. Scott Fitzgerald asked Hemingway to advise him about an important problem that had come up between Scott and Zelda. (So to speak.) So Scott and Papa go to Michaud's ("on the corner of the rue Jacob and the rue des Saints-Peres") for lunch and consultation. Fitzgerald swore Hemingway to tell "the absolute truth" when answering. Hemingway says, "He drank wine at the lunch but it did not affect him and he had not prepared for the lunch by drinking before it." (This doesn't have a lot to do with the story, but the sentence knocks me out; I think it's the "did not" and "had not" constructions.) Anyway, Zelda had told Scott his penis was too small. Here's the Hemingway: http://thebestamericanpoetry.typepad.com/the_best_american_poetry/2009/03/hemingway-reassures-fitzgerald-about-his-penis.html
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I like the implication that Papa looked at Fitzgerald's wang but not vice versa.
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Dictionary of the Khazars is like Infinite Jest if it were good and written by an intelligent person who isnt a hack
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Went googling for Fitzgerald and found this: Hemingway was a true friend
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corn in the bible posted:Dictionary of the Khazars is like Infinite Jest if it were good and written by an intelligent person who isnt a hack It's zalso nothing like Infinite Jest.
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What is this Dictionary of the Khazars it sounds like discount Borges
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Smoking Crow posted:What is this Dictionary of the Khazars it sounds like discount Borges It's Borges if Borges was Serbian and collected his short stories into an encyclopedia about the conversion of a nomadic country to one of three abrahamic religions.
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CestMoi posted:It's Borges if Borges was Serbian and collected his short stories into an encyclopedia about the conversion of a nomadic country to one of three abrahamic religions. So Eastern European bootlegger Borges
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Smoking Crow posted:What is this Dictionary of the Khazars it sounds like discount Borges It's like a more mystical & folkloristic Borges. It's pretty good poo poo, but Borges is king
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My local library has both versions of Dictionary of the Khazars at hand. I think I'm going to borrow the feminine version.
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Smoking Crow posted:So Eastern European bootlegger Borges Not exactly. More like Borges would write a short story describing a book like Dictionary of the Khazars, but Dictionary of the Khazars attempts to be the object itself. IMO it's very good.
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It is very good and is delightfully fairytalely in a way that Borges usually isn't.
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I don't really understand Borges. But I do understand Bolaņo who's basically a Borges who didn't go to Eton but has had sex.ulvir posted:My local library has both versions of Dictionary of the Khazars at hand. I think I'm going to borrow the feminine version. the different versions are like the one stupid gimmicky thing that I don't like about that stupid wonderful gimmicky book. It's like one sentence.
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Ras Het posted:I don't really understand Borges. But I do understand Bolaņo who's basically a Borges who didn't go to Eton but has had sex. I dunno, my issue with Borges is that he always seemed to see human beings in his stories as little more than flat objects to sit around and look at or talk about strange things. Bolano is massively more skilled at characterization.
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That's exactly what people in Borges stories are for so that seems like a weird problem to have.
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His later stuff is more directly concerned with human emotion and suffers for it IMO.
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I like the sappy later Borges stuff too.
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Mel Mudkiper posted:I dunno, my issue with Borges is that he always seemed to see human beings in his stories as little more than flat objects to sit around and look at or talk about strange things. Bolano is massively more skilled at characterization. Bolano also has, like, 600 more pages to work with????
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I hated 2666. That's the most overrated book I"ve ever read
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blue squares posted:I hated 2666. That's the most overrated book I"ve ever read Get Out
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blue squares posted:I hated 2666. That's the most overrated book I"ve ever read Why do you feel this way? That's like a top 5 for me.
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I really enjoyed the first section and thought the characterization was done quite well. Everything after that just bored the poo poo out of me. This review says everything I think but much better. http://www.openlettersmonthly.com/december-2008-the-evidence-of-absence/ Honestly, the critical acclaim for this book just baffles me. I don't understand it at all.
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blue squares posted:I really enjoyed the first section and thought the characterization was done quite well. Everything after that just bored the poo poo out of me. This review says everything I think but much better. http://www.openlettersmonthly.com/december-2008-the-evidence-of-absence/ Also taking what you said into account, the review seems a bit lost in its own argument, since the first part blatantly isn't about death, and if the last part isn't either, then... I mean, I like death, so I don't really have to disagree here.
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Ras Het posted:I don't really understand Borges. But I do understand Bolaņo who's basically a Borges who didn't go to Eton but has had sex. It's silly, but the rest of the book is real good. I tried to read landscape painted in tea though and thought it was too gimmicky. loving crosswords, gently caress off with those.
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Smoking Crow posted:
Do you have any recs on some modern Russian poets (who have translations in English because I can't read Russian :languagefail:)
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Ras Het posted:Also taking what you said into account, the review seems a bit lost in its own argument, since the first part blatantly isn't about death, and if the last part isn't either, then... I mean, I like death, so I don't really have to disagree here. It's been a while since I read the review, but I found everything after The Part About the Critics to be dull and poorly written. The book as a whole seemed like a first draft, which from what I read it was
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Stravinsky posted:I can't read Russian :languagefail:) Bro do you even lit I can't read Russian either, such bad mod
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Stravinsky posted:Do you have any recs on some modern Russian poets (who have translations in English because I can't read Russian :languagefail:) I'm sorry to do this to you STravinsky, but you can't post in this thread any more.
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CestMoi posted:I'm sorry to do this to you STravinsky, but you can't post in this thread any more. .......ffffffffffffffffffffffff
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I had a choice between the languages of warmongering genocidal savages and a peaceful civilised people. I chose the former so I could study chinese
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I learned Spanish because 20th boom literature is the best literature Magical Realism 4 Lyfe Also bluesquares you take back what you said about 2666 or I am coming for you
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its a bad book
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Yo dawg maybe you best try something like the Hunger Games instead
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If you don't speak at least two languages you should probably stop posting, and go outside, and then go learn a second language and start posting again.
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I don't speak any languages
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i communicate primarily via pheromonesNanomashoes posted:If you don't speak at least two languages you should probably stop posting, and go outside, and then go learn a second language and start posting again. hey man some of us have disabilities, like being born in America
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Stravinsky posted:Do you have any recs on some modern Russian poets (who have translations in English because I can't read Russian :languagefail:) Nobody's translating modern russian poetry nowadays. Most of the stuff from the soviet period isn't translated yet either. The number 1 new sincere poet is Dmitry Vodennikov but nobody's translating him sorry anglophones Smoking Crow fucked around with this message at 04:40 on Mar 19, 2015 |
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# ? Jun 10, 2024 19:20 |
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Here are some Russian Futurist poets to soothe your pain http://hlebnikov.com/works Fun fact: the guy that wrote this thought that Dostoyevsky's writings would have to be destroyed in order to progress to the great fascist future
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