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Cloks posted:Mel makes some pretty good recommendations but his frank nature is easy to take as trolling. I really really love Carry the One, glad I finally got someone else to read it. It was my book of the year in 2012. It has one of my favorite depictions of addictions and the toll it takes on the family of the addict. I also like any fiction that wrestles with characters dealing with impossibly tragic moments. I am reading I Saw a Man by Owen Sheers right now and it is sort of similar but its almost too tragic. Like, it goes beyond pushing a character to limits of his psychological strength and is just deliberately piling on impossible tragedies now. Music Theory posted:These look good; thanks. (Although I still want to hear Mel's recommendations) Honestly not a huge fan of Calvino (one of my trolling moments I guess?) but yeah if you want to read more from him Invisible Cities is his other big one. Beyond that, Pale Fire is a good choice. House of Leaves works too. Cloud Atlas like someone else said is also good. I recently read Valeria Luiselli and Enrique Vila-Matas and they are also pretty similar in style and themes I think. There is another one on the tip of my tongue and its driving me nuts trying to remember. Mel Mudkiper fucked around with this message at 00:41 on Sep 29, 2015 |
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Sep 29, 2015 00:37
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A friend's brother-in-law is an addict and the portrayal seems very true to what he's told me.
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Sep 29, 2015 01:26
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I just finished Aquarium and that was a hell of a book, thanks whoever in here was talking about it.
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Sep 29, 2015 05:45
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The Nonexistent Knight
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Sep 29, 2015 07:28
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Don't read Cloud Atlas it's terrible
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Sep 29, 2015 10:54
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Swagger Dagger posted:I just finished Aquarium and that was a hell of a book, thanks whoever in here was talking about it. Glad you liked it Seriously, wasn't that part in the middle where the mom wanted her daughter "to know what it was like" some of the most intense writing you've ever read? I was practically sweating.
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Sep 29, 2015 12:23
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corn in the bible posted:The Nonexistent Knight This is my favorite Calvino I also should have mentioned it
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Sep 29, 2015 15:49
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Mel Mudkiper posted:Glad you liked it Yeah, once I hit that bit I couldn't put the book down until I finished it. I was just completely compelled to see it through to the end.
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Sep 29, 2015 16:43
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corn in the bible posted:The Nonexistent Knight I've already read that, and yeah it is great.
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Sep 29, 2015 17:47
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Ta-Nehisi Coates got a MacArthur grant  So did Ben Lerner 
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Sep 29, 2015 18:53
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I don't know much about Lerner but 10:04 was so incredibly pretentious that I had to put the book down a couple of times from constantly rolling my eyes.
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Sep 29, 2015 21:44
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Mira posted:I don't know much about Lerner but 10:04 was so incredibly pretentious that I had to put the book down a couple of times from constantly rolling my eyes. 10:04 is incredibly depressing because chapters 2 and 3 are actually really powerful and brilliant but holy poo poo if the rest of the book isn't unforgivable navel gasing white make bullshit. Chapters 1, 4, and 5 are what people who say they hate modern literature think modern literature is. I mean Jesus Christ there is a scene where he is volunteering to bag groceries for his vegan co-op and thinking unironically about how he is not as cliche as these other Brooklyn hipsters. Mel Mudkiper fucked around with this message at 22:21 on Sep 29, 2015 |
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Sep 29, 2015 22:17
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Guys I read Doris Lessing's The Fifth Child and it was not good. It was, in fact, bad. Going to go for JR next!
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Sep 30, 2015 02:43
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I just started reading Moby Dick and tbh I didn't know writing could be this good. Holy poo poo.
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Oct 3, 2015 20:18
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NienNunb posted:I just started reading Moby Dick and tbh I didn't know writing could be this good. Holy poo poo. That about sums up my initial experience with it too.
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Oct 4, 2015 01:04
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ulvir posted:not that much left of 2015 now, and I'm noticing that my reading list is hella male-centric to boot. Apart from Sylvia Plath, any other female authors I should bump up in my reading queue? Evelyn Waugh
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Oct 4, 2015 04:48
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oops I was two pages too late to make that joke
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Oct 4, 2015 04:49
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I'm slowley making my way through maldoror at a crawl but I'm thinking a lot about zeno's conscious and the moments where he goes to the shrill voiced singer and in his first attempt to truly make her his mistress her akward mother is there as well and he just sits and reads from a singing theory book hoping she would leave but she is to petrified to move and lmao
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Oct 4, 2015 04:54
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There's a second hand bookshop near me which has taken the odd decision to sort authors based on gender and Evelyn Waugh and George Eliot threw them.
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Oct 4, 2015 09:07
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Guys, there is a literary mystery afoot and maybe you can help solve it for me. When I was in college, I read a 1947 edition of Henry Miller's The Wisdom of the Heart, which included a bizarre, stream-of-consciousness prose-poem-type thing called "Finale". Screengrab of a page from Henry Miller; an informal bibliography, 1924-1960 by Esta Lou Riley:  "Finale" does not appear in any later editions of this work -- Table of Contents from 1960 edition and all later editions. Now, fortunately, I discovered this mysterious absence from later editions while I was an undergrad, so in the interest of being able to read it again later in life, I copied out "Finale" in one of my notebooks, which I found today.  Here's the first page or so -- quote:Eye to eye, fire to fire, blood-red ice and black perfume, moon goddess and moon fire, the smoke of vanished kisses, harp bleeding its green music, poppies floating in a cold sea. The roundness of the beginning, the end like a navel; craters flowing with blood-red ice, hemispheres of warm milk, swan’s down and meat of olives. [I've transcribed the whole thing, but I don't know if it's still under copyright. I can quote more of it if anyone's interested.] I'm dying to know: A) why it was excised from later editions, and 2) what...what it's all about? What does it mean, what inspired Miller to write it, what is it alluding to, etc.? But what's even weirder than "Finale" is, is the fact that I can't find any reference to "Finale"'s existence anywhere other than the bibliography above. I've searched using Google and Google Scholar, and I've searched in all the academic research databases my university subscribes to -- no dice. I can't find any mention of it anywhere -- no criticism or commentary on it, no citations, nothing.  Have any of you ever read it? Is there another SA thread I should post this in for a better chance of getting some clues?
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Oct 4, 2015 21:50
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Aw, did I kill the thread?
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Oct 7, 2015 14:30
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Rabbit Hill posted:Aw, did I kill the thread? No but I have no idea how to approach finding anything about it. I looked and found poo poo, emailed an old professor and he found poo poo. If I had to guess I honestly still wouldn't know where to start. I don't even like Miller but your question is interesting.
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Oct 7, 2015 14:50
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Wow, thank you for doing that much! I'll create a thread here to catch any stray Miller fans.
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Oct 7, 2015 17:22
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this year's nobel prize in literature being announced tomorrow! my money's on some old white bloke hardly anyone's heard about and who has never had any of his works being published comedy option: murakami lol
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Oct 7, 2015 20:39
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it's gonna be the sad puppies guy
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Oct 7, 2015 20:43
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GRR Martin is apparently 50/1 odds so one person who can nominate writers is clearly an impossible goon
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Oct 7, 2015 20:47
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Mel Mudkiper posted:GRR Martin is apparently 50/1 odds so one person who can nominate writers is clearly an impossible goon It's me.
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Oct 7, 2015 20:48
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I pray to God its anyone but Phillip Roth or Joyce Carol Oates Alexievich would be a really interesting win. Not many have one for journalistic non-fiction and oral history.
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Oct 7, 2015 20:50
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Mel Mudkiper posted:GRR Martin is apparently 50/1 odds so one person who can nominate writers is clearly an impossible goon has someone seriously nominated him?
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Oct 7, 2015 20:54
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ulvir posted:has someone seriously nominated him? The only reason I could imagine he would be in the betting pool at all is if there was some leak from one of the eligible nominators that he was listed
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Oct 7, 2015 20:56
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ulvir posted:has someone seriously nominated him? Also Bob Dylan and Neil Gaiman: https://sports.ladbrokes.com/en-gb/betting/awards/nobel-prize-in-literature/2015-nobel-prize-for-literature/220019571/
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Oct 7, 2015 20:57
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Mel Mudkiper posted:The only reason I could imagine he would be in the betting pool at all is if there was some leak from one of the eligible nominators that he was listed Or to collect money from people who would bet on him
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Oct 7, 2015 20:57
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Bob Dylan shows up every year and I want to find the fucker who keeps bringing him up.
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Oct 7, 2015 20:58
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anybody can call the betting office and ask to place a bet on whomever, so it's not a given he was nominated. then again, there have been 200 ppl nominated this year, so i wouldn't be too surprised if CestMoi's bid got in. the bookies were gamed a couple of years ago, because apparently the betting activity is so low that one 20 euro bet done from sweden made the odds (for Alexievitch, I think) drop heavily. anyway, over the last month i read a few of the authors that are often mentioned in the nobel discussion but I hadn't read before (Oz, ben Jelloun, Magris, Aira, Fosse, Krasznahorkai) and my prize would go to Amos Oz. the only reason he hasn't received it yet is probably because he already has all the prizes. but I have a feeling that this year it should be a non-westerner, so he has a good chance, I think. then again, I remember reading that the new head of the committee has said something about women not being represented enough, so eh
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Oct 7, 2015 21:11
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I haven't read any of those authors except for Aira, and therefore he should win.
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Oct 7, 2015 21:20
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I'm rooting for Kjell Askildsen and Knausgård, but I'm biased because "we" haven't won one since the 1920s
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Oct 7, 2015 21:24
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ulvir posted:I'm rooting for Kjell Askildsen and Knausgård, but I'm biased because "we" haven't won one since the 1920s if you broaden that "we" just a little bit to Scandinavians then "you've" won most of them
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Oct 7, 2015 21:26
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ulvir posted:I'm rooting for Kjell Askildsen and Knausgård, but I'm biased because "we" haven't won one since the 1920s Knausgård is the popular name but as far as Norwegian writers go people seem to talk about Dag Solstad as the biggest candidate. altho it seems solstad has relatively few but very vocal fans. haven't read him or askildsen tho by the way, you might know: what is it with Fosse and 'yes' repeated at every sentence? is it supposed to be actual 'ja' or whatever it is in Danish or more like 'mhm' agreement sound? or is it just his tick and nobody actually talks like that?
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Oct 7, 2015 21:31
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CestMoi posted:I haven't read any of those authors except for Aira, and therefore he should win. Aira is v. good, too, i'll def read more of his stuff. i read the landscape painter one, but i already got a couple more.
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Oct 7, 2015 21:36
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Burning Rain posted:Aira is v. good, too, i'll def read more of his stuff. i read the landscape painter one, but i already got a couple more. That one's good, Literary Conference is really great and features Cesar Aira watching Carlos Fuentes watch a play he's made and he's like "man Fuentes probably thinks this is dumb poo poo what the hell was I thinking this play is rear end" and then some other things happen.
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Oct 7, 2015 21:39
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