what are you reading?
Re: what are you reading?
haven't been doing as much reading recently, but managed to find a copy of tolstoy's essays from tula, which includes "the slavery of our times" among others, and it's really very nice and engaging. his novels are obviously good but also not too exciting for me, but the essays really give a good sense of his thought and might lead me to read the novels again at some point.
"Most esteemed biographer of Peter Barrington Hutton"
haven't really mentioned what i've been reading because it was all rather dull (apart from gert jonke's geometric regional novel) but just hoovered up césar aira's varamo and want to angrily wonder again why he hasn't had the nobel yet. he's got to be our best living novelist? and he just churns them out. amazing man.
after a long slump, where i did read a few things, i've gotten closer to my old self. reading gil scott-heron's the vulture. didn't know he wrote a couple of novels until a week or so ago.
"Most esteemed biographer of Peter Barrington Hutton"
I've also been slumping, reading only 13 books in the past 4 months, and am trying to pick the pace up a bit. Currently I'm reading "La cavalière Elsa" (1921) by Pierre Mac Orlan as well as "Winesburg, Ohio" (1919) by Sherwood Anderson - both are excellent, so far - and right now I'm also on the way to the library to pick up "Storia di domani" (1949) by Curzio Malaparte.
"I too am a child burned by future experiences, fallen back on myself and already suspecting the certainty that in the end only those will prove benevolent who believe in nothing." – Marran Gosov
reading (loving) very slowly (due to mild ecstatic faints) pascal quignard's hatred of music. i too fucking hate music (noise) right now. this guy has a 100% hit rate of making me delirious (have read one other book by him)
i'm reading antonio lobo antunes atm -
but i'm thinking i'd like to read homer before i head to the med next year
what is the best translation of homer please
but i'm thinking i'd like to read homer before i head to the med next year
what is the best translation of homer please
Wanted to read Homer for a long time, but also haven't yet decided on a translation (at least I know which translations I won't read ^^).
Currently I'm in the middle of another Thomas Hardy, TESS OF THE D'URBERVILLES, and the love interest of the titular heroine is such an asshole (luring her into a marriage under false pretences being the least of his faults...), that I just hope he'll die as soon as possible, and that Tess will meet someone worthy of her feelings. But as I've learned from RETURN OF THE NATIVE, Hardy seems to hate women, and she'll probably simply continue to suffer. The writing is not as good as the first 30 pages of RETURN OF THE NATIVE, but much better than most of the rest in NATIVE. Hardy seems to have greatly improved as a writer when it comes to other stuff besides the observance of nature (which he still does admiringly!
), but the moralizing seems to have gotten even worse. Not sure yet, if this will be on the whole better than RETURN OF THE NATIVE, though. But after the mediocre THE WOMAN IN WHITE (which is way more misogynist - something I could have forgiven in a Victorian novel, but it hasn't got anything interesting to tell and is often badly written) I reeaaally wanted a step up in serialised English fiction of the 19th century. But I guess I'll take a break after this one and try SISTER CARRIE by Theodore Dreiser as an in-between, before I move on to LITTLE DORRIT by Dickens.
Are there any popular British novels from the 19th century that don't throw terrible male characters in the way of the female protagonist? Or a book where someone like Tess or Eustacia (thr female protagonist in RETURN OF THE NATIVE) can simply make their choices and enjoy their lives without being reprimanded by the writer? Maybe I should read some Jane Austen?
Currently I'm in the middle of another Thomas Hardy, TESS OF THE D'URBERVILLES, and the love interest of the titular heroine is such an asshole (luring her into a marriage under false pretences being the least of his faults...), that I just hope he'll die as soon as possible, and that Tess will meet someone worthy of her feelings. But as I've learned from RETURN OF THE NATIVE, Hardy seems to hate women, and she'll probably simply continue to suffer. The writing is not as good as the first 30 pages of RETURN OF THE NATIVE, but much better than most of the rest in NATIVE. Hardy seems to have greatly improved as a writer when it comes to other stuff besides the observance of nature (which he still does admiringly!
), but the moralizing seems to have gotten even worse. Not sure yet, if this will be on the whole better than RETURN OF THE NATIVE, though. But after the mediocre THE WOMAN IN WHITE (which is way more misogynist - something I could have forgiven in a Victorian novel, but it hasn't got anything interesting to tell and is often badly written) I reeaaally wanted a step up in serialised English fiction of the 19th century. But I guess I'll take a break after this one and try SISTER CARRIE by Theodore Dreiser as an in-between, before I move on to LITTLE DORRIT by Dickens. Are there any popular British novels from the 19th century that don't throw terrible male characters in the way of the female protagonist? Or a book where someone like Tess or Eustacia (thr female protagonist in RETURN OF THE NATIVE) can simply make their choices and enjoy their lives without being reprimanded by the writer? Maybe I should read some Jane Austen?
"I too am a child burned by future experiences, fallen back on myself and already suspecting the certainty that in the end only those will prove benevolent who believe in nothing." – Marran Gosov
lombardo's translations are very readable. i've heard some classicists complain that they're not as accurate and recommend fagles instead, but i tried that once and it was a struggle. emily wilson has a translation of them that's recent, and they might be good for a different perspective, but i don't know them. so i'd go with lombardo or wilson.
"Most esteemed biographer of Peter Barrington Hutton"
george eliot! adam bede is a good option, and maybe daniel deronda (daniel is almost unrealistically good and the other dude is an ass, but at least eliot cares about the female protagonist as a woman and as a character). any of hers would be good, though.wba wrote: ↑Tue May 28, 2024 4:49 pm Are there any popular British novels from the 19th century that don't throw terrible male characters in the way of the female protagonist? Or a book where someone like Tess or Eustacia (thr female protagonist in RETURN OF THE NATIVE) can simply make their choices and enjoy their lives without being reprimanded by the writer? Maybe I should read some Jane Austen?
Last edited by brian d on Tue May 28, 2024 6:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
"Most esteemed biographer of Peter Barrington Hutton"
thanks brian!! i'll give wilson a shotbrian d wrote: ↑Tue May 28, 2024 5:28 pmlombardo's translations are very readable. i've heard some classicists complain that they're not as accurate and recommend fagles instead, but i tried that once and it was a struggle. emily wilson has a translation of them that's recent, and they might be good for a different perspective, but i don't know them. so i'd go with lombardo or wilson.
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Lencho of the Apes
- Posts: 1900
- Joined: Tue Dec 11, 2018 4:38 am
Have you tried Mary Elizabeth Braddon? I remember her books as being female-agency crime novels; she was criticized at the time for the unladylikeness of her characters, doing all kinds of terrible girlboss things to attain power-money-prestige. I think Lady Audrey's Secret is the go-to book in her catalogue.
The opposite of 'reify' is... ?
THANKS!
Eliot and Braddon will be my next purchases.
Eliot and Braddon will be my next purchases.
"I too am a child burned by future experiences, fallen back on myself and already suspecting the certainty that in the end only those will prove benevolent who believe in nothing." – Marran Gosov
I'm currently reading my first novel by Margaret Kennedy, and it's so good, that if the quality of the writing and storytelling stays the same till the end, I'll definitely want to read all of her other books!
It's really delightful, and I haven't had this much fun reading a British novel since reading Vita Sackville-West last September.
Goodbye, Collins and Hardy, and thank god for Kennedy and Sackville-West.
PS: I also haven't forgotten about the recs regarding Eliot and Braddon. And I also desperately need to read more by H.C. Bailey!
It's really delightful, and I haven't had this much fun reading a British novel since reading Vita Sackville-West last September.
Goodbye, Collins and Hardy, and thank god for Kennedy and Sackville-West.
PS: I also haven't forgotten about the recs regarding Eliot and Braddon. And I also desperately need to read more by H.C. Bailey!
"I too am a child burned by future experiences, fallen back on myself and already suspecting the certainty that in the end only those will prove benevolent who believe in nothing." – Marran Gosov
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Lencho of the Apes
- Posts: 1900
- Joined: Tue Dec 11, 2018 4:38 am
Oooh, my recommendation of Braddon was largely triggered by your apparent tolerance for Collins...
The opposite of 'reify' is... ?
Chekhov's letters and a re-read of Kawabata's Sound of the Mountain.
Have a look at all the picnics of the intellect: These conceptions! These discoveries! Perspectives! Subtleties! Publications! Congresses! Discussions! Institutes! Universities! Yet: one senses nothing but stupidity. - Gombrowicz, Diary
Yes, the Collins was totally ok, just nothing special. Simply one of those "classics", where one wonders why people seem to love it, when your personal reaction is "just another decent, but pretty trivial and by-the numbers novel". I loved the initial idea, and some themes (doppelganger, asylum, being declared legally dead even when obviously alive, etc.), but Collins isn't great with words compared to someone like Hardy.Lencho of the Apes wrote: ↑Tue Jul 09, 2024 10:19 pm Oooh, my recommendation of Braddon was largely triggered by your apparent tolerance for Collins...
"I too am a child burned by future experiences, fallen back on myself and already suspecting the certainty that in the end only those will prove benevolent who believe in nothing." – Marran Gosov
I just read my first "novel" by Nathanael West today (more of a short story, really) while taking a looong bath (immeditely afterwards I read my first novel by Lou Andreas-Salomé - who was among many other things the great love of Friedrich Nietzsche as well as Rainer Maria Rilke, both of whom got on her nerves after a while ^^), and it was truly fantastic.
Incredibly relaxed and joyful and very funny and life-affirming, it's about the travels of an idiot protagonist (who also happens to be a middllebrow poet) inside the intestine of the Trojan horse, where he meets some funny writers and gets to read their stuff, as well as listening to some of the reasoning behind them writing it. I'd classify this as a magical realist novel in the style of mad magazine. Or if Don Quijote had been written by a teenager (don't get me wrong, it's nowhere near as great as Don Quijote, but you know what I mean...). It probably reminded me most of the cartoons and some of the novels of Walter Moers. Couldn't recommend this more!
PS: It also read a bit like a short episode that could've been included in Gombrowicz' Ferdydurke. Definitely my kind of humor.
It's only 50 pages. Check it out you guys!
Incredibly relaxed and joyful and very funny and life-affirming, it's about the travels of an idiot protagonist (who also happens to be a middllebrow poet) inside the intestine of the Trojan horse, where he meets some funny writers and gets to read their stuff, as well as listening to some of the reasoning behind them writing it. I'd classify this as a magical realist novel in the style of mad magazine. Or if Don Quijote had been written by a teenager (don't get me wrong, it's nowhere near as great as Don Quijote, but you know what I mean...). It probably reminded me most of the cartoons and some of the novels of Walter Moers. Couldn't recommend this more!
PS: It also read a bit like a short episode that could've been included in Gombrowicz' Ferdydurke. Definitely my kind of humor.
It's only 50 pages. Check it out you guys!
"I too am a child burned by future experiences, fallen back on myself and already suspecting the certainty that in the end only those will prove benevolent who believe in nothing." – Marran Gosov
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Monsieur Arkadin
- Posts: 423
- Joined: Mon May 27, 2019 5:56 pm
For those with interests in giant, exhausting, postmodern tomes...
I recently started reading La Medusa by Vanessa Place.
Place is an interesting character in and of herself, with a biography that seems like too many lives lived for a single person (much like Pynchon). She is a criminal defense attorney, mostly focused on sex crimes. As a result she sometimes moonlights working on episodes of Law & Order: SVU but she's probably best known as a conceptual artist. (She did a very Pierre Menardstyle piece in which she tweeted Gone With The Wind line by line for years, calling into question the values of American media (copyright vs. grappling with our racist media depictions.)
The book is interesting. I had it described to me as a Ulysses of Los Angeles. And as someone who is greatly nostalgic for my time in LA, that's a lot of fun.
It's maybe a bit too cutesy with its tour-de-force gimmickry, but it does land a lot of interesting moments in a free-jazz sort of way.
All desriptions of the book sound vaguely insufferable:
Digging it enough so far.
I recently started reading La Medusa by Vanessa Place.
Place is an interesting character in and of herself, with a biography that seems like too many lives lived for a single person (much like Pynchon). She is a criminal defense attorney, mostly focused on sex crimes. As a result she sometimes moonlights working on episodes of Law & Order: SVU but she's probably best known as a conceptual artist. (She did a very Pierre Menardstyle piece in which she tweeted Gone With The Wind line by line for years, calling into question the values of American media (copyright vs. grappling with our racist media depictions.)
The book is interesting. I had it described to me as a Ulysses of Los Angeles. And as someone who is greatly nostalgic for my time in LA, that's a lot of fun.
It's maybe a bit too cutesy with its tour-de-force gimmickry, but it does land a lot of interesting moments in a free-jazz sort of way.
All desriptions of the book sound vaguely insufferable:
While I guess that's accurate, the book is much less dry and MFA thesis-presentationy than that description makes it seem.La Medusa is a polyphonic novel of post-conceptual consciousness. At the heart of the whole floats Medusa, an androgynous central awareness that anchors the novel throughout.
Digging it enough so far.
i finished lavinia ♥ loved it and now i've got the lathe of heaven too
i'm reading the emily wilson odyssey and it's wonderful - she didn't lose the wine dark sea or rosy fingered dawn
also this ♥ it's going much too quickly
also this ♥ it's going much too quickly