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lol nobody wants to come anywhere near this thread. i wonder how many are silently bookmarking like i did.
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Mar 15, 2019 23:35
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| # ¿ May 22, 2024 13:44 |
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feel free to effortpost, man. personally i have a headache from all the you-know-who drama, so i think people are distancing (at least judging by the post/views ratio here so far)
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Mar 15, 2019 23:39
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ho. lee. poo poo. i think i'm far more forgiving of "quirky" narrators than most, but this is downright painful to read. and i loved what i read of his historical novels. it's disappointing because the plot seems genuinely fun. wacky conspiracy fiction is always a good time. then again, we already have the Illuminatus trilogy, which does what D.O.D.O seems to be attempting, except is actually fun to read. (as a side note: i havent finished it yet but i believe it has the potential to be my favorite piece of satire)
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Mar 16, 2019 01:12
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suggestion: add a rule to the OP that this is not a thread for talking about you-know-who.
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Mar 16, 2019 02:43
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just gas the old thread tbh
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Mar 16, 2019 02:52
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Because this thread is for being specific with critiques, lets go over everything I hate about the D.O.D.O excerpted text. (I have absolutely no desire to read more)quote:sooo quote:Julie Lee: Professional 聪明的驴子•双簧管 You're not allowed to put non-Roman characters in your story unless your initials are MZD. quote:a complicated something-latte-something with lots of buzzwords I picked out at random from the menu I know you know how to be funny, Neal. Why are you resorting to a bottom-of-the-barrel "coffee is too confusing" joke? Also, the use of the word "buzzwords" here just makes me shake my head and sigh. quote:...to pursue his offer. (Also he was rather handsome, which made me jittery a bit, so I decided to hide behind an affected eccentricity.) I hate to be pedantic about this, but the parenthesis punctuation is extremely wrong here. quote:We have a bunch of very old documents—cuneiform, in one case—and we need them translated, at least roughly, by the same person. The word "roughly" in this sentence, contrary to Mr. Stephenson's intentions (probably), very much wants to be attributed to "by the same person" and is barely, barely hanging on to "translated". It still confuses the heck out of me and I've read it over like 5 times. Somehow I feel this case is kind of weak, so to defend against people who might attack me for not knowing how appositives work, think about how you'd interpret the sentence "We need them translated, at least for the time being, by the same person." And this isn't even taking into account how "We need them translated by the same person" is a confusing sentence on its own, because "same" is not usually used as a solo adjective like that with no context to compare to. Even adding a simple "We need them all translated" would make it much clearer by emphasizing the plurality of the documents. quote:But I can't tell you ... And you cannot ever tell anyone about this. You can’t even say to your friends ... you can't take ownership ... you can't share it ... Why is there a single "cannot" when he says "can't" four times in the same dialogue? quote:You’d have to agree to that before I say another word. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure this either has to be "You'll have to agree to that before I say another word" or "You'd have to agree to that before I said another word." Tense agreement still applies in conditionals. Compare these example sentences from the guidetogrammar.org page on conditionals (yes I'm obnoxious enough to do research about this): "If I become president, I will change the social security system." (Said by a presidential candidate) "If I became president, I would change the social security system." (Said by a schoolboy) Now if we reword Stephenson's line slightly (and awkwardly), we can illustrate the tense problem: "If I am to say another word, you will have to agree to that." compared to... "If I were to say another word, you would have to agree to that." Personally, I think the first is closer to what he was going for, so my change would be to switch the you'd to you'll. Neal, hire me as your editor. quote:Dear reader, give me credit for not ... quote:I felt doltish while this elegant creature held us all entranced. Entranced is not the right word, though—that conjures a sense of a doe-eyed fairy-tale princess, and Erszebet was not that. She was fierce. I have a huge problem with the logical flow of these sentences. The MC and Tristan (and others, but idk the context) are described with the adjective "entranced," right? Presumably what Stephenson was going for with this hyphen-paranthetical is that the concept of being entranced by someone makes you think that the cause of the entrancement is something akin to a "fairy-tale princess". But as written, it's the group of main characters being compared to the fairy-tale princess, and the following clause makes absolutely no sense. quote:Not deliberately, not like the Alpha Girl in a high school clique . . . it was effortless on her part, elemental. 1) An ellipsis is not a semicolon. 2) Yes, you can stick adjectives on the end of sentences like that. No it does not always sound good. Here is exhibit A. quote:...she continued to Tristan, in a so-there tone. That is not a thing for hyphens, it is a thing for quotes. I get that it's in a dialogue attribution so that would be confusing, but here's an idea: write normally for one loving sentence. (the last paragraph is too abysmal for me to even comment on. refer to my comment on the previous strike-through, but with extra silence at the horniness) WOW, that was a pretty dense loving slog. Are you sure you didn't just cherrypick the worst bits? I'm sure I had an annoyance with every single loving sentence you quoted. And I super regret doing this. So thanks. gently caress.
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Mar 16, 2019 04:57
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Doctor Faustine posted:I prefer the term “pulp” to mean “thing bad” and “literary” to mean “thing good,” where either can be applied to any genre. So within fantasy you’d have pulp fantasy (Sanderson, Gurm, Rothfuss, honestly most fantasy because most fantasy sucks rear end) and literary fantasy (LeGuin, Peake). And naturally some poo poo that’s kind of in the middle. This comes with its own huge slew of problems too, mainly that pulp stuff can be really entertaining, and entertainment is one of the largest measures of success imo, for this medium of entertainment that is books. For example, I'd personaly classify all of Stephen King's books as "pulp horror" even though I think many of them (okay, some of them) are great novels. To be honest, I think the term "pulp" describes more of an "ease of reading" than general quality. In that case I'd definitely agree that Stormlight Archive be classified as pulp fantasy (I love the series, sue me). Whereas stuff like Peake which is objecively more difficult to read, deserves to be called literary fantasy or whatever, which speaks nothing to the quality (I love Gormenghast too though).
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Mar 17, 2019 00:27
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FactsAreUseless posted:This doesn't seem like a great basis for critical thought about writing. I knew somebody would call me out for this! My argument is this: Treating entertainment as a metric of value is not mutually exclusive with thinking critically about writing. Critical discourse about writing should absolutely take into account the factor of entertainment value, not as some wishy-washy shield from all criticism, but as a valid metric that may be supported by textual evidence, just like the equally vague concept of "good characterization". So there.
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Mar 17, 2019 00:43
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Doctor Faustine posted:How difficult something is to read isn’t really a measure of literary quality. I mentioned LeGuin as an author I would consider to have written literary fantasy, and there’s nothing particularly challenging about her prose. It’s clean and tidy and very easy to read, while still having an aesthetic quality that is elevated. Prose quality is the main issue, not difficulty or ease of reading. You can have challenging prose that’s good and challenging prose that’s bad. Ditto easy to read prose. I agree with you on the LeGuin point. And by extension, pretty much the entire point. To be honest, I prefer when libraries just put every fiction book in the same section all together sorted alphabetically, because genre distinctions are largely... well, fake. But the metric of thematic weight is, I feel, a bit broader than you intend it to be. Like, I definitely get it if we're comparing, like, any of the 50 cyberpunk tiger-anthro thrillers to basically anything else. But for example there's this children's book I am very fond of, "The Phantom Tollbooth" that I could absolutely write several term papers about. It's very rich in themes. Actually, much like other fables, it priorities theme over many other aspects of plot. But I wouldn't call it high literature or anything. To bring up a particularly divisive example just to showcase my point, I could also write papers about the themes and literary merits of Homestuck, since there is definitely a cohesive message to be found there. But that's almost as far away from "literature" as you can get. FactsAreUseless posted:Entertainment isn't a metric of anything. What people find entertaining is shaped by culture and familiarity. It is neither quantifiable nor qualifiable. It is less measurable than anything else you could possibly talk about regarding writing. That's pretty true, but I have to wonder... are things like good characterization, poignant themes, and excellent prose inherently entertaining? For me, I know good prose can carry me pretty far in an otherwise boring book, but I don't think these things alone are what make something a "page-turner" or whatever. I'm pretty sure we all have books that we acknowledge have great literary weight, but we nonetheless can't get into them. I'm wondering, what is it exactly that makes a difference there? I think examining that area is also a part of serious criticism.
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Mar 17, 2019 01:24
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The one criteria by which every novel should be judged... is it a "smasheroo"?
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Mar 17, 2019 01:42
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Pacho posted:Somewhere in the old thread someone mentioned that making high school kids in the US do thematic analysis kinda burns them on good books because it makes them think that reading *real* literature is homework this is 100% true
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Mar 17, 2019 07:28
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Mel Mudkiper posted:taking art and rendering it Pepsi. this is a nonsensical analogy but it would be a really good thread subtitle
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Mar 17, 2019 21:04
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Take the plunge! Okay! posted:This analogy is nonsensical. Are you trying to say we evolved to seek out trashy genre fic? both of them got kind of weird with their metaphors, but what thranguy said in his first paragraph is very smart and good
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Mar 17, 2019 21:19
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Take the plunge! Okay! posted:I think that’s getting uncomfortably close to the old “well, Dickens was very popular in his time, so (current genre author) will be considered a classic one day”, which is just plain wrong. There is nothing wrong with having a Marxist or feminist critical reading of a literary work. They are often extremely good at describing why certain popular yet worthless works capture wide audiences. The said audiences wouldn’t like to hear what they have to say about their favorite works, though. Trying to hand wave some of the major approaches to literary criticism away by describing them as hipsterish is both snide and ignorant. i won't speak for thranguy, but my interpretation of his post was not that the factor of "entertainment" is in any way superior or more essential than any of the other factors focused on in literary critisism. just that it should be considered as well. and that dismissing it out of hand is to ignore a large part of how the literary world functions
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Mar 17, 2019 21:36
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Mel Mudkiper posted:The issue is that "high sales" doesn't equal "more entertaining." The problem with using sales to measure "entertainment" is that it is trying to use the market to assert a subjective value. i completely agree with you there.
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Mar 17, 2019 22:07
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Mel Mudkiper posted:You could have saved a lot of time by understanding my criticism instead of going off on a rant that has nothing to do with it Can you explain your argument better then? I'm really struggling to understand what you mean if Copernic's excellent post didn't address it.
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Mar 18, 2019 23:31
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Mel Mudkiper posted:My evoking of capitalism is because capitalism has turned art into a "product" or "commodity" in which its value is determined by profitability and sales. The idea of art as a product is an extremely contemporary one. I mean, Walter Benjamin was the first one really talking about it and that was in the mid-1930s. I am not saying people's preferences or behaviors are solely controlled by capitalism, as his reply seems to suggest. Instead, I am saying the fundamental premise of art as product, which implies the value of the art can be determined by its effectiveness as a product, is a capitalist premise. Because it is. I think you are largely misunderstanding what we, or at least I, intended to say with the "entertainment" argument. Even you admitted earlier that "sales" does not equal "entertainment" yet you've been arguing as if by espousing the value of entertainment we are preaching that sales = quality. I know that's in no way what I believe. My favorite movie genre, for example, is one that I find extremely entertaining, and it also famously panned critically: horror. edit: granted, horror sells well. but i'm referring to niche horror that goes largely ignored by the general public
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Mar 18, 2019 23:59
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Mel Mudkiper posted:Indeed. I am not arguing that point with you. I am arguing it with Thranguy. I agree with Thranguy that financial success can be an indicator of entertainment value. It certainly isn't meaningless. I don't think Thran was saying that sales is a categorical marker of quality. Sure, I could list endlessly all the high-grossing/award-winning things I think are pieces of poo poo, but it's also ignorant to claim that the only possible factor that goes into financial success is everyone being sheep and blindly following advertising or whatever. That's also ignoring the fact that critical success won't always equate to financial success.
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Mar 19, 2019 00:13
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Mel Mudkiper posted:Your vanity is obstructing your intellectual growth Yours is inhibiting your ability to make convincing arguments. Right now it seems the conversation has hit a standstill, and opinions aren't going to be swayed by analogies and put-downs.
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Mar 19, 2019 00:55
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Mel Mudkiper posted:Yes but they have funded Piers Anthony and that's probably worse Lol I can agree with you there. @sham bam: Its true that perception of what's entertaining varies from person to person, but so does perception of what is high quality (ie good). When we're critically examining works, I assume we're working towards a conclusion relating to the quality of the work, in an attempt to do that as objectively as possible. My opinion is not that "entertainment value" be used abstractly as a means to that end, but that it may be a valid conclusion to draw, and that drawing conclusions relating to the entertainment value of a work can be a valid aim of literary critisism. Ideally in conjunction with exploring the "objective" quality of the work.
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Mar 19, 2019 01:43
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Sham bam bamina! posted:Nope. What do you mean?
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Mar 19, 2019 02:03
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Sham bam bamina! posted:Perhaps I'd be more appreciative of this "toolset" if you gave me examples of its tools and how they can be meaningfully put to use. I can't make head or tail of what you're arguing for here. "Entertainment value" is something that you say is inherent to a work, but as far as you've been discussing it, it seems functionally indistinguishable from commercial performance; assessing it is simply market analysis. My one hangup with this is that I find things thoroughly entertaining (maybe even engaging) that are far from critically acclaimed or massively popular. For me the examples that come to mind are mainly films since I find genuine value in B-movies (eg Creep 2, Jason Lives,), but it applies to lit as well.
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Mar 19, 2019 02:56
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Sham bam bamina! posted:So? What do critical acclaim or popular appeal have to do with your own judgement? You say yourself that you find "genuine value" in these films. I'm distancing my interpretation of what constitutes "good entertainment" from both of those things.
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Mar 19, 2019 03:02
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Milkfred E. Moore posted:At the same time, genuine "so bad it's good" is a complex thing. The Room is genuine in that sense. Something like Sharknado 12: Time Sharks is not. ugh (i know this is a slight derail but) i HATE movies like sharknado that try to artificially emulate what makes b-movies so charming. in the end they fail as both comedies and as enjoyable films. edit: i also think the room is bad and do not want it to be conflated with my beloved low budget horror films.
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Mar 19, 2019 04:13
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Mel, I support you challanging people on this and having these nuanced discussions, and you certainly, on a surface level, come across very learned. But your style of discourse is affecting that impression negatively for me. And before you post about how much you don't care what people think of your arguments, you can say that all you want but I'm prettysure you do care. And using "I'm not actually trying to convince you so it doesn't matter" as a deflection won't get you very far because it ultimately leads to "why are we even talking about this?" It's all well and good to cite whatever texts on critical analysis you've read, but it's no fault of your listener for not having read them. It's still your responsibility to get your point across clearly. And if you're going to respond with how that's not your goal, then stop posting. Also, responding solely to the weakest part of a person's post is transparently a cop-out (example: thranguy's post just now)
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Mar 19, 2019 16:19
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Ccs posted:I started reading Martha Wells Element of Fire because the sci fi thread loves her Murderbot stories. Second page and I’ve run into the sentence “Thomas personally couldn’t think of a good time to forcibly invade a foreign sorcerers house.” the "forcibly" should have been forcibly removed by an editor. the "personally" was probably supposed to have some function of comedic understatement, but was placed in the worst spot imaginable. for example, something like "Personally, Thomas couldn't think of a good time to invade a foreign sorcerer's house" would be a lot better already. (also was the lack of apostrophe present in the original or is that your mistake?)
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Apr 6, 2019 20:17
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what the hell is happening to this thread?
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Apr 7, 2019 00:12
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Bilirubin posted:17776 i have read this. it is amazing
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Apr 7, 2019 01:28
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my bony fealty posted:Hyperion must be had by this thread in light of it coming up in the SFF thread i'd like to see you try. that book is phenominal
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Apr 9, 2019 04:05
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chernobyl kinsman posted:hyperion, like all of dan simmons' work, blows like the winds to the east lol if you really think this
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Apr 10, 2019 19:26
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Sham bam bamina! posted:I don't know what pronouns are, but I won't let that stop me from telling other people what to think about them. he meant proper nouns, but even then he's wrong
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Apr 10, 2019 19:28
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it's true. oil doesn't have seams
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Apr 10, 2019 22:04
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The DPRK posted:Is there any difference between a human that can turn into a dragon and a dragon that can turn into a man? sure. the human could be a woman
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Apr 14, 2019 05:24
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chernobyl kinsman posted:gene wolfe has died and is now ablaze, in hell this post may be in bad taste
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Apr 17, 2019 22:57
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A human heart posted:writing your own epitaph in advance i see 
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Apr 18, 2019 05:05
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Mel Mudkiper posted:I may have walked into a death of the author fight accidentally that's a weird way of saying you started a discussion about death of the author. i agree with you though. that thread's reaction to it was weird.
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Apr 30, 2019 20:09
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pile of brown posted:Asking as someone who is not super well versed in Marx's writings, what is a contemporary example of art (preferably literature) that satisfy these expectations for what art should be? Does it change when the revolution is accomplished and "channeling energy into revolutionary activity" is redundant? Off the cuff, examples I can think of for art that is utilitarian: 1) propaganda 2) product advertisements 3) graphic design 4) novels written quickly to capitalize on a trend I have no idea why cherno thought he was making a good point by citing Marx here. And while we're on the subject, citing Plato's "poetry is bad" beliefs in defense of good art is a bizarre debate tactic, to say the least. I'm frankly confused why cherno is interested in this thread, considering his posts so far reflects an understanding of literature that's limited to its political value. With a point of view like that, which is in direct opposition to the idea that art is a creative endeavor, I'm surprised he claims to dislike capitalism, since capitalism discourages (artistic) creativity just as much as cherno does.
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May 6, 2019 10:19
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chernobyl kinsman posted:you are, and i mean this respectfully, very stupid lmaooo
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May 6, 2019 20:27
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Milkfred E. Moore posted:gas this thread please
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May 15, 2019 13:35
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fairy tales are fantasy lol
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May 19, 2019 15:25
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