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Solvency posted:Ulysses- I tried to read it, I really did, but I either would fall asleep (which I never do when reading), or get a huge headache when I would attempt to read it. It was just such a difficult read, and made no sense to me, that I couldn't justify spending the time trying to wrap my head around what was going on. I know it's supposed to be one of the pinnacle novels, but I can't say a book is a masterpiece when many people can't even read it because of it's difficulty. If you want to give it another shot, I'd suggest reading Harry Blamires' _New Bloomsday Book_ as a guide. It's basically a plot summary for each chapter, explaining what's going on formally. It gives you a good literal foundation of just what the hell is going on. Pretty essential, I think, especially your first time through.
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May 8, 2008 20:58
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Totally TWISTED posted:The Poisonwood Bible. Oh god I DESPISE that book. One of the few books I've actually thrown away. The whole thing just reeks of the author's smug self-satisfaction, even though the different narrators are the broadest caricature imaginable. And that mute girl! Her "wordplay!" Gah!
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May 8, 2008 22:24
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Buck Lodestar posted:To sum up, it's a book that's worth taking the time to properly frame and understand the first time through. Totally. Which is why I'd suggest the Blamires book over _Ulysses Annotated_ for a first attempt. I took a Joyce class, too, and I found myself returning to _Ulysses Annotated_ less and less as I progressed the book. There are some helpful references and such, but overall I found that it was too much trees, not enough forest. Not even trees -- the bumps on each mushroom of each individual tree. Which, sure, is interesting once you've gotten your bearings, but my first time through I just wanted somebody to throw me a bone and tell me what was fricking happening.
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May 10, 2008 06:27
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ZeeBoi posted:I was unable to get through The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. I'm not really sure why but something about the writing style and content just turned me right off. I gave up halfway through. Yeah, I had a similar experience with this one. I got a few pages in and was turned off by style. I mean, I like thick, lyrical writing, but there was something smug and self-congratulatory about it. I don't know, it was a while ago for me too. If you decide to give it another shot, let us know what you think...
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May 10, 2008 18:23
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Elderling posted:The first page of the thread contains a similar comment about The Poisonwood Bible, which I haven't read, and honestly from the plot descriptions I've heard it doesn't sound like the kind of thing I'm into. But comments about how smug and falsely clever the author is just make me think that maybe the author really is clever--Danielewski, regardless of whether or not you think his work has literary merit (or to put it differently, whether or not you think he's worth reading), is certainly one of the cleverest writers I've found in a long time. Do you think Nabokov was born writing Lolita? I'm sure he must have written his fair share of artsy bullshit before he took up English, of which I imagine few things are translated or well-known. Well, I haven't read House of Leaves, so I can't really speak to that. As far as Poisonwood Bible goes, though, I just didn't feel like the narration that was devoted to wordplay was anything special. In the novel, there's friction set up between one daughter who's a "typical teenager," superficial and ill-at-east away from her suburban comforts, and the mute daughter, who uses her chapters for word games and puns and cynical observations about the rest of the family. It's been a few years since I've read it, so I may be forgetting something. But I don't think we were supposed to take the mute daughter to be very unreliable; even the more clearly limited points of view from the other daughters are reliable to the extent that they're presenting true information. So is the mute daughter supposed to be a parody of literary wankery? Don't know, but I don't think so. The other characters seemed pretty broadly drawn to me, so I wasn't willing to extend that readerly goodwill toward Kingsolver. How much of my ill-will toward the book was projection? Some, definitely; probably more than I'd care to admit. I read it my first year in my MA program, when I felt like I was really coming into my own as a reader, but still dealing with lots of insecurity and uncertainty as a writer. I haven't looked at the book since, and maybe I should. Still, I find myself put off by books where stylistic flourishes and wordplay and experimentation are used seemingly for their own sake, where the intended effect is basically for the reader to set the book down and go, "Wow, [x] can write," without feeling like s/he knows that much more about the characters or the story. This is subjective, sure, and I'm not at all averse to writing some people find meandering and self-indulgent. (You'll notice I started a thread on Virginia Woolf...) As for me, I didn't care for the book. Oh well. I can see your points, though, and I think it's good to examine why we respond to art the ways we do. galumphing lummox fucked around with this message at 00:04 on May 12, 2008 |
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May 11, 2008 23:58
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JesusSinfulHands posted:The Sound and the Fury. I inexplicably chose this book off of a reading list that included Catch 22, Slaughterhouse Five, and East of Eden for a critical review assignment, and ended up completely bullshitting my essay based on Sparknotes. I got a 95%, but I must have spent nearly a day trying to read it and failing miserably. How is anyone supposed to figure out what is going on without any help when the story is told in events that are out of order and the events themselves are out of order Dang, dogg, a whole DAY on Sound and the Fury? (Ahem) That's a tough read, even with study guides and stuff to help you sort out what's going on. Once you've gotten that down, though, it's a pretty great read. Definitely worth the time and effort it demands of you. If you're interested.
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May 19, 2008 07:00
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andrew smash posted:I have a minor derail question regarding this thread and other discussions similar to it here: is 'throwing it across the room' or otherwise treating a book you don't like violently some sort of running joke? I only ask because there are a few books that I've not been able to finish but I never had the urge to do anything other than put them down. Yeah, I think it mostly is. Though now that I think about it, there've been a few books that have infuriated me so much that I did literally want to throw them at the wall. Gordon Lish's My Romance comes to mind. It's just so up-its-own-rear end and self-satisfied that I felt like it was purposely designed to waste my time. It was just so pointless that my primary thought was, "gently caress you, book!" But that's an outlier. For the most part if I'm not feeling something, I will, in fact, just put it down. 
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May 27, 2008 17:22
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Naked Singularity posted:I have tried on three separate occasions to read Herman Melville's "Moby Dick" yet have failed no more than 200 pages in each time. It's not like I don't care for the writing of the period, but I just can't stomach the stupid book. There's something about the writing style that makes me go off track and lose interest. Is that about the point when he decides to write absolutely everything he can think of about whaling? Because, yeah, that's when I started skimming myself...
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Jun 8, 2008 03:20
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