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I'm reading Hopscotch. It's good but I do prefer Bolaño when it comes it to the genre of failed Latin American poets drinking, smoking and destroying the lives, because he wasn't a raging misogynist
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Sep 16, 2022 20:37
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| # ? Apr 24, 2024 06:06 |
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3D Megadoodoo posted:It was fine. I'm going to read 2666 at some point but it's frankly too big to read on the bus or in bed. coward
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Sep 16, 2022 21:39
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E: nvm
3D Megadoodoo fucked around with this message at 14:26 on Sep 17, 2022 |
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Sep 16, 2022 23:30
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Ras Het posted:I'm reading Hopscotch. It's good but I do prefer Bolaño when it comes it to the genre of failed Latin American poets drinking, smoking and destroying the lives, because he wasn't a raging misogynist i tried to read 62: a model kit once because a bunch of people with reasonably good taste had talked it up but i found it completely interminable. the stories about people in spanish speaking countries stopping him in the street and asking for autographs like a rock star are cool though
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Sep 17, 2022 10:29
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A human heart posted:i tried to read 62: a model kit once because a bunch of people with reasonably good taste had talked it up but i found it completely interminable. the stories about people in spanish speaking countries stopping him in the street and asking for autographs like a rock star are cool though Tbf Cortazar is really good at the Bolaño style (well other way around) combination of creeping dread combined with pseudo-artistic monologues. Like there's a bit in Hopscotch where this woman's kid suddenly dies and there's like 20 pages of the dudes sitting around in a room waffling about Tibetan Buddhism and occasionally going "should we mention to her that the kid is stone cold?" and another where the protagonist starts hanging out with an old homeless woman and once it gets to the point where she starts sucking him off you know for certain that this is going somewhere intense (both of these bits are also examples of the weird cruelty towards all female characters that really bothers me)
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Sep 17, 2022 10:48
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I've been wanting to read some Cormac McCarthy, I've only read The Road which is apparently his worst book. Quick question, some of All The Pretty Horses is just straight up written in Spanish, right? I mostly listen to audiobooks while I'm measuring stuff at work and the language part of my brain is completely unoccupied, so I'm thinking that a book with a lot of Spanish in it might not work out too good for me.
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Sep 17, 2022 14:15
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E: whoops
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Sep 17, 2022 14:26
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Solitair posted:Are there any good podcasts about literature? Michael S Judge’s Pynchon episodes are amazing. (His podcast is Death is Just Around the Corner)
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Sep 17, 2022 14:31
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JustPosting aside, Blood Meridian and 2666 sit in a similar place in my head, even if only for similar subject matter. Bolaño is absolutely Lit, and the length helps show off his prose and storytelling prowess. He’a also always riffing on other books or poets. Dracula makes an appearance, for instance. I didn’t want to lug around Faust on a trip so I’m reading Tokarczuk’s Drive Your Plow…. It rules. Really wonderful to spend time in the mind of an elderly vegetarian teacher who loves discovering the world and tries to beat up poachers. I want to send her my birthday to find out whats what.
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Sep 17, 2022 21:37
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I'm halfway through Privati abbisi by Gianfranco Calligarich and it rules. So far it's basically a dandy soap opera, but it's dripping in cryptic irony and the style is unlike anything I've read before. Definitely requires willingness to look past the pomp and circumstance, much like his first novel, for the first half of which I hadn't found that patience yet (e: but which was also very good and has actually been translated into English in the meantime). This is funnier, which probably helps in that regard. Would recommend, though I think it's only available in Italian and Dutch for now
Lex Neville fucked around with this message at 12:53 on Sep 18, 2022 |
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Sep 18, 2022 08:23
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Borosilicate posted:I've been wanting to read some Cormac McCarthy, I've only read The Road which is apparently his worst book. Quick question, some of All The Pretty Horses is just straight up written in Spanish, right? I mostly listen to audiobooks while I'm measuring stuff at work and the language part of my brain is completely unoccupied, so I'm thinking that a book with a lot of Spanish in it might not work out too good for me. On a tangentially related note, I'm at the point in The Magic Mountain where Hans and Claudia have their conversation in French during Carnival, which my edition left untranslated. I know a little French, but not enough to get through it in a reasonable amount of time. Are there any good editions that have this section in English?
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Sep 18, 2022 13:47
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Solitair posted:Are there any good podcasts about literature? Edit: I take it all back, I aggressively hate this show now and am no longer having a good time. Vienna Circlejerk fucked around with this message at 18:00 on Sep 27, 2022 |
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Sep 19, 2022 21:49
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Vienna Circlejerk posted:I don't know if it's good or not and I don't know anything about literature but I've been having fun listening to Our Struggle which is supposed to be entirely dedicated to Knausgård but usually winds up being about almost anything other than him, usually mentioning a bunch of the authors that get talked about in this thread (e.g. Tokarczuk just a few replies up, and they like to poo poo on Pynchon a lot). The guests have been mostly a bunch of literary types though occasionally you get some online person. Maybe it's actually bad and I'm dumb but I'm having a good time. It's appropriate because My Struggle is itself about anything and everything in addition to occasionally being about Karl Ove's life.
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Sep 19, 2022 22:18
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Borosilicate posted:I've been wanting to read some Cormac McCarthy, I've only read The Road which is apparently his worst book. Quick question, some of All The Pretty Horses is just straight up written in Spanish, right? I mostly listen to audiobooks while I'm measuring stuff at work and the language part of my brain is completely unoccupied, so I'm thinking that a book with a lot of Spanish in it might not work out too good for me. There's some dialogue in Spanish, but it's on the order of lines, not entire paragraphs or pages. Translations are pretty readily available online. Don't let them scare you off--the Border trilogy is absolutely worth your time. 
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Sep 19, 2022 22:41
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ThePopeOfFun posted:JustPosting aside, Blood Meridian and 2666 sit in a similar place in my head, even if only for similar subject matter. Bolaño is absolutely Lit, and the length helps show off his prose and storytelling prowess. He’a also always riffing on other books or poets. Dracula makes an appearance, for instance. You know, I really agree with this post. When I was reading 2666 I was really feeling weird, like I had read the author before, or the story, or the vibe, but yes, blood meridian makes a lot of sense. I agree that 2666 is lit though. Tangentially, I'm reading Lincoln in the Bardo right now and wondering if Saunders counts as lit. I personally have a real hard time with "fiction"- is any well written fiction that can't be neatly counted among the many genres out there count instead as serious lit?
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Sep 20, 2022 03:06
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gonna decide that the very question "does author [x] count as lit" inherently places you in a relationship with the author and their work that presupposes its own answer
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Sep 20, 2022 04:28
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like the presupposition that "lit" should be devoid of any potential alternate characterization or taint of genre or it loses it's "litness" should at least strike you as weird, right? like doesn't it, in your best high school english teacher voice, make you want to "unpack that assertion" a little?
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Sep 20, 2022 04:32
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Tree Goat posted:like the presupposition that "lit" should be devoid of any potential alternate characterization or taint of genre or it loses it's "litness" should at least strike you as weird, right? Oh yeah it strikes me as very weird, and anyway it's a cool book and it's making me think and feel things- I just have no idea what is or isn't appropriate for this thread if I haven't seen it discussed already
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Sep 20, 2022 05:46
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LitB is a thread favourite
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Sep 20, 2022 07:28
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HaitianDivorce posted:There's some dialogue in Spanish, but it's on the order of lines, not entire paragraphs or pages. Translations are pretty readily available online. Don't let them scare you off--the Border trilogy is absolutely worth your time. Seconding this. Borosilicate, you can usually pick up the general gist of the Spanish dialog from context.
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Sep 20, 2022 15:24
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sephiRoth IRA posted:You know, I really agree with this post. When I was reading 2666 I was really feeling weird, like I had read the author before, or the story, or the vibe, but yes, blood meridian makes a lot of sense. I agree that 2666 is lit though. saunders is great. highly recommend the audiobooks of his short stories, which he reads himself. they're my go-to for long road trip listening
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Sep 20, 2022 22:28
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Borosilicate posted:I've been wanting to read some Cormac McCarthy, I've only read The Road which is apparently his worst book. Quick question, some of All The Pretty Horses is just straight up written in Spanish, right? I mostly listen to audiobooks while I'm measuring stuff at work and the language part of my brain is completely unoccupied, so I'm thinking that a book with a lot of Spanish in it might not work out too good for me. There's some stuff in McCarthy novels you'll definitely want to translate, like the Mexican tarot reader in Blood Meridian, but huge chunks of the untranslated Spanish are immediately answered in English (whether dialogue or in the prose). Like, somebody will ask "Where are you coming from?" in Spanish and the next sentence is "The boy said he was coming from New Mexico." So it's not a huge hurdle. Also, you can just google "Cormac McCarthy [novel] Spanish translations," keep the resulting .pdfs open and handy. e: also, I haven't read his first two or Cities of the Plain yet (coming up next, I just reread AtPH and am roughly halfway through The Crossing) but no way is The Road his worst. I like everything I've read but it's either Child of God or No Country for Old Men for me.
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Sep 25, 2022 23:31
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Criminal Minded posted:No Country for Old Men for me.  He doesn’t have a bad book, the McCarthyisms per page vary quite a bit though. No Country or the Road probably have the fewest.
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Sep 26, 2022 00:46
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The Crossing is not only my favorite McCarthy but probably my favorite book period
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Sep 26, 2022 15:54
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Kindles are great for when you’ve got a small passage you need to translate. I know everyone loves the smell of paper but tech does have its benefits.
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Sep 27, 2022 00:16
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Kull the Conqueror posted:The Crossing is not only my favorite McCarthy but probably my favorite book period Suttree is my favorite (McCarthy and novel, period, or tied with Gravity's Rainbow anyway) but The Crossing is way up there and I've been relishing the reread.
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Sep 27, 2022 04:14
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Meaty Ore posted:On a tangentially related note, I'm at the point in The Magic Mountain where Hans and Claudia have their conversation in French during Carnival, which my edition left untranslated. I know a little French, but not enough to get through it in a reasonable amount of time. Are there any good editions that have this section in English? My book has it in Swedish in footnote, so I can’t help you with where to find it. Be sure to look it up though, it’s pretty impactful as I remember.
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Sep 27, 2022 17:15
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Which English translation of The Master and Margarita is gonna serve me the best as a non Russian speaker?
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Sep 29, 2022 00:20
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Gaius Marius posted:Which English translation of The Master and Margarita is gonna serve me the best as a non Russian speaker? Wait I had one that I liked... Ginsburg. Haven't read any of her other translations but it very much caught the Russian tempo and humor Source: me, also not a speaker of Russian. So what do I know?
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Sep 29, 2022 00:22
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ThePopeOfFun posted:JustPosting aside, Blood Meridian and 2666 sit in a similar place in my head, even if only for similar subject matter. Bolaño is absolutely Lit, and the length helps show off his prose and storytelling prowess. He’a also always riffing on other books or poets. Dracula makes an appearance, for instance. I was recently revisiting 2666 and even before I remembered that the novel features a cafe named Fire Walk With Me, I was developing the idea that Bolaño was consciously influenced by David Lynch (what is "The Part About the Crimes" if not 300+ pages of Laura Palmers?). He has the same inscrutable sense of creepy, foreboding humor.
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Sep 29, 2022 04:32
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Not sure if i'm really enjoying mumbo jumbo by ishmael reed or finding it really annoying
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Sep 29, 2022 14:03
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Criminal Minded posted:a cafe named Fire Walk With Me, I was developing the idea that Bolaño was consciously influenced by David Lynch (what is "The Part About the Crimes" if not 300+ pages of Laura Palmers?). He has the same inscrutable sense of creepy, foreboding humor. Totally missed this. Agreed on the foreboding. He injects fear beneath the surface with little bits of prose. Something as innocuous as a broken hotel toilet makes you wonder what the hell is going to happen.
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Sep 29, 2022 14:45
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Gaius Marius posted:Which English translation of The Master and Margarita is gonna serve me the best as a non Russian speaker? I read and really enjoyed the Burgin and O'Connor translation (a dark red cover with a cat in silhouette)
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Sep 29, 2022 15:12
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Heath posted:I read and really enjoyed the Burgin and O'Connor translation (a dark red cover with a cat in silhouette) Oh, cool -- I bought this translation last weekend (at an estate sale, so I wasn't spoiled for choice) and was meaning to ask if it was any good.
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Sep 29, 2022 23:30
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Heath posted:I read and really enjoyed the Burgin and O'Connor translation (a dark red cover with a cat in silhouette) I have nothing to compare it to as I've never read the original Russian or any other translation, but I also very much enjoyed this one.
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Sep 30, 2022 01:10
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Went with the O'Conner version purely off actually being able to find it for sale digitally. Hoping it's good, I don't think I've read any actual Soviet literature but if it's to the level their films are it should be good. Besides I love Faust, if I'd known it was inspired by it I woulda jumped on it way sooner
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Sep 30, 2022 03:11
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Criminal Minded posted:I was recently revisiting 2666 and even before I remembered that the novel features a cafe named Fire Walk With Me, I was developing the idea that Bolaño was consciously influenced by David Lynch (what is "The Part About the Crimes" if not 300+ pages of Laura Palmers?). He has the same inscrutable sense of creepy, foreboding humor. the part about the crimes is actually about how the violence of the so called 'drug cartels' in mexico is really state backed violence, as detailed in this book: https://www.vanderbiltuniversitypress.com/9780826504661/drug-cartels-do-not-exist/
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Sep 30, 2022 08:55
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Criminal Minded posted:Suttree is my favorite (McCarthy and novel, period, or tied with Gravity's Rainbow anyway) but The Crossing is way up there and I've been relishing the reread. Yeah, that's right up in my pantheon, probably just a smidge behind BM and Suttree, a shade ahead of The Road among what I've read. Just cracked Cities of the Plain for the first time today.
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Oct 3, 2022 03:46
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oh god
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Oct 12, 2022 19:24
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I haven't followed this thread in years so I dunno if the David Vann Stan guy still posts here but I got a Vann book from the library last time I went and started reading it last night, so I wanted to give him a shout out because for some reason I remember the fights about contemporary literature happening here. If the book isn't good I will be insanely pissed off because I trusted a goon, also.
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Oct 16, 2022 11:15
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