Books: What are you reading tonight? - Page 505 - The Lounge Discussion and Review on Literature, Arts, Culture

cant edit. Considering their attitude the morning after, I would've dumped the girl, fought the dude, and quit my job because I wouldn't be able to look at them every morning.

and if I found out the only reason they had the party was to get my gf loose, and everyone was on it including the boss, i'd go work for the other side.

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09-03-2014 , 11:54 AM

#12603

Gioco

veteran

Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 2,410

Quote:

Originally Posted by bob_124

I'd be interested to hear you elaborate, if you're willing, since many of your other book reviews have been critical (in the most positive sense of that word).

Okay, I'll work on that. I happen to be very busy working on a project that is due 10/1 so it may take a while.

In short, Musil does all things excellently. A Man Without Qualities foreshadows the themes and style (not just the writing style but the structural style of idea introduction) of White Noise; outdoes Pynchon in every way and better and has the wry humor of Heller or Vonnegut.

Apparently the two English translations have very different feels and, according to some comments, substance. If I get to read the second one before I write more I'll comment on that.

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09-03-2014 , 01:25 PM

#12604

agapeagape

journeyman

Join Date: May 2012 Posts: 379

This is the "top" review of Underworld on goodreads.com: https://www.goodreads.com/review/sho...on=true&page=1

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09-03-2014 , 06:28 PM

#12605

RussellinToronto

veteran

Join Date: Oct 2007 Posts: 2,198

Quote:

Originally Posted by agapeagape

This is the "top" review of Underworld on goodreads.com: https://www.goodreads.com/review/sho...on=true&page=1

I've read a fair sampling of DeLillo but not (or at least not yet) Underworld (except for the Pafko section), so I can't speak to it. But I was stuck by this response to the review linked above:

Quote:

Look. Underworld should not be anyone's first DeLillo experience. If you could major in DeLillo Studies, Underworld would be the capstone seminar at the end of your senior year. I think a lot of people pick it up without any foreknowledge of DeLillo's work because they've heard the hype, or they saw it in that NYT "Best Books of the Past 25 Years" thing, and they understandably walk away thinking WTF. But that's not how it should be.

Start with White Noise. If you don't love it, DeLillo isn't for you. If you recognize its awesomeness, then move on to stuff like Libra and Running Dog and The Names, or the recent Falling Man. All wonderful, accessible, and relatively slim novels. Once you've got a fairly thorough understanding of DeLillo's signature obsessions and stylistic tics, and assuming you're eating all that **** up like the delicious and healthy literary dessert that it is, then and only then should you pick up Underworld. It's not his best book--all the ones I just named are better, in my opinion--and it only really makes sense in the context of DeLillo's larger body of work. If you still think it sucks at that point, well, you've got more than a leg to stand on. I've got some pretty major reservations about it myself. But it is absolutely not for n00bs.

Oh, and it's amusing to look at what I've just pasted in and see that language that can be used on Goodreads (not to mention Facebook), still can't be used on 2+2!

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09-03-2014 , 09:04 PM

#12606

kioshk

Nixonian

Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 92,827

Quote:

Start with White Noise. If you don't love it, DeLillo isn't for you.

This was exactly my experience, read WN when it first came out. I've been thinking I may try it again one of these days. I haven't read Pynchon either.

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09-03-2014 , 10:53 PM

#12607

agapeagape

journeyman

Join Date: May 2012 Posts: 379

I thought White Noise was excellent, one of the best I've read. I remember the beginning being less interesting than the latter half though that may have been my fault as a reader, or rememberer. Probably most valuable to a teenager, in my opinion, and I wish I had read it at that age.

Unlike these books, Mao II, Ratner's Star, and The Body Artist (the other DeLillo books that I've read), Underworld and White Noise are very readable and compelling like a "real novel" or story. And these books are all brilliant.

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09-04-2014 , 05:07 AM

#12608

biceps

old hand

Join Date: Apr 2012 Posts: 1,478

This is amazing. ****ing amazing.

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09-04-2014 , 08:22 PM

#12609

BigPoppa

Carpal \'Tunnel

Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 22,216

So, what is the first Murakami book I should read?

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09-05-2014 , 07:32 AM

#12610

All in the Game

enthusiast

Join Date: Jan 2010 Posts: 69

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigPoppa

So, what is the first Murakami book I should read?

Norwegian Wood or Wild Sheep Chase. Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is the best I've read but I still haven't read IQ84.

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09-05-2014 , 07:40 AM

#12611

SL__72

Carpal \'Tunnel

Join Date: May 2004 Posts: 16,497

1Q84 is the only one I've read and it certainly wouldn't be a poor choice.

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09-05-2014 , 07:51 AM

#12612

kioshk

Nixonian

Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 92,827

I would eschew this Murakami character and stick with American writers.

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09-05-2014 , 10:37 AM

#12613

amplify

Eternal Unknowable Mesmerizing

Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 78,255

Quote:

Originally Posted by kioshk

I would eschew this Murakami character and stick with American writers.

You've bit off more than you can eschew. My vote would be Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. Murakami is ultimately a minor writer but that may prove to be his most enduring work.

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09-05-2014 , 11:19 AM

#12614

Robin Agrees

veteran

Join Date: Jul 2012 Posts: 2,310

I'm looking to read a novel about crazy people/psychology like the Dice Man. Does anyone have suggestion for books like that? Like a book that describes how a crazy person is living in a world with what is assumed to be rational sane people but turns out that everyone else is crazy and he is the only sane person alive!

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09-06-2014 , 02:17 AM

#12615

JudgeHoldem1848

banned

Join Date: Jun 2012 Posts: 2,474

Quote:

Originally Posted by DiggertheDog

The underlined paragraph is an example of outstanding writing. A pleasure to read. Perhaps I should read the book you just reviewed.

I'm no literary critic but chapter one is the most brilliant thing I've read. It's the amygdala talking.

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09-06-2014 , 04:15 AM

#12616

DiggertheDog

Pan Troglodytes

Join Date: Mar 2008 Posts: 57,791

Quote:

Originally Posted by RussellinToronto

I've read a fair sampling of DeLillo but not (or at least not yet) Underworld (except for the Pafko section), so I can't speak to it. But I was stuck by this response to the review linked above:

Oh, and it's amusing to look at what I've just pasted in and see that language that can be used on Goodreads (not to mention Facebook), still can't be used on 2+2!

No offense intended toward bicep's avatar but they have a fascist word filter yet a permissive visual image policy.

Contradictions abound.

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09-07-2014 , 02:49 PM

#12617

agapeagape

journeyman

Join Date: May 2012 Posts: 379

Finished Underworld. I'm not good at reviewing books. I thought it was too long, but excellent.

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09-07-2014 , 08:30 PM

#12618

microbet

Solar Powered

Join Date: Jan 2005 Posts: 56,485

My recollection of Paradise Lost from reading, well skimming it, for class in college is that it was no page turner.

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09-07-2014 , 09:12 PM

#12619

kioshk

Nixonian

Join Date: Oct 2006 Posts: 92,827

I took a survey course in English Lit in college. Paradise Lost was pure torture, as was Spenser's Faerie Queene. I somehow survived with a B and ran for my life away from college liberal arts classes forever.

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09-07-2014 , 09:43 PM

#12620

I_AM_EVIL

Carpal \'Tunnel

Join Date: Dec 2006 Posts: 13,267

Paradise Lost is one of those books that I'm glad I read but was one of the toughest things ever to get through. I wouldn't ever do it again.

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09-07-2014 , 10:11 PM

#12621

amplify

Eternal Unknowable Mesmerizing

Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 78,255

I love the language in Paradise Lost. It's one of the best things English can do. My location for some time now is a phrase from when God hurls Satan from heaven.

I fully recognize that studying it in a undergraduate situation would probably be terrible but reading it should be pure joy.

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09-07-2014 , 10:20 PM

#12622

amplify

Eternal Unknowable Mesmerizing

Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 78,255

I am listening to Ulysses on audiobook. I've read this and that in it here and there but never the bulk of it straight through.

It's well-written

I'm enjoying hearing the English language in that as well. Hearing it helps avoid getting bogged down in details and riding the great wave of the thing.

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09-07-2014 , 11:25 PM

#12623

DiggertheDog

Pan Troglodytes

Join Date: Mar 2008 Posts: 57,791

I am applying for a Master Research (Eng Lit) and was thinking of my thesis proposal being focussed on Hamlet (perhaps more broadly Shakespearean tragedies) and the Homeric Heroic/Epic Cycle.
Good idea or well trodden path or omg are you mad?
Opinions welcome..

Milton's Satan is one of the great literary characters. Apparently, Milton's Satan was uncontroversial at the time of publication yet the readers could not get over the fact that the poem was unrhymed.

Having to read the stageplay Away By Michael Gow (Aussie) + Vertigo by Amanda Lohrey for my student who I tutor.
Currently in the middle of Tale of Two Cities and reading some Coleridge.

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09-07-2014 , 11:28 PM

#12624

DiggertheDog

Pan Troglodytes

Join Date: Mar 2008 Posts: 57,791

Quote:

Originally Posted by kioshk

That suprises me, somehow I pictured you liking the subject matter of Paradise Lost. No offense, but I would have thought Milton's assertive mix of Protestant republicanism was your 'cup of tea'.

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09-07-2014 , 11:34 PM

#12625

Gioco

veteran

Join Date: Feb 2008 Posts: 2,410

Started the newest translation of The Man Without Qualities by Robert Musil, translated by Sophie Wilkins and Burton Pike.
1700+ pages from now, I'll be back.

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