/lit/ - Literature

What the hell was this list's argument against Don Delillo? All my professors love him, that part is true. But he's also a favourite of students. He's a Vonnegut tier postmodernist. Very accessible

It's a fun read. Nothing more.
I laughed out loud a lot, which is rare for me, so that kept me reading. It was never boring, if that's what you're worried about. No effort involved.

People who assume Franzen is in the same league as DFW just because they were buds will be sorely disappointed.

>>3208959
Right. Of course. Recursion is an established linguistic device is all I meant. You know, it has the Wikipedia paragraph and everything to make it official.

I seem to remember it was the interviewer that brought up fractals. It wasn't necessarily a term DFW himself used.

One thing I learnt from a postmodernism course I took, is that fractals occur a lot in postmodern architecture. Applying those same ideas and shapes to literature makes sense, I guess. But I doubt it's an established literary device. It's just a nice way of describing dense and digressive writing where ideas are broken down into smaller, branching ideas.

A similar concept that I definitely have heard DFW refer to is "recursion."

>>3191473
I honestly hope you're right. As I said, I've heard testimony like yours so often that it almost seems too good to be true. Considering how much I adore Brief Interviews, the notion that something/anything could be "fucking leagues above" it is quite daunting to me.

If I run out of things to read in the next few months, I may consider picking it up. We'll see.

>>3191433
Oh, that's embarrassing for me then. Carry on, sir.

>>3191455
Haven't read it. Don't care to either. Not at this point in my life. It's been built up too much and it can only disappoint me.

I hated The Broom of the System with a passion, but loved his essays and short stories. I have a sneaking suspicion that I might end up preferring his short form work.

>>3191286
>>3191177
Holy shit. Reading both these excerpts from Finnegans Wake makes me really want to read it. Maybe they've just chosen stand-out passages, but it looks great. Certainly not worthy of its reputation as incomprehensible. I guess I'll find out for myself.

English Major and proud of it... Well, not really.

The Crying of Lot 49
The Sound and the Fury
Brief Interviews with Hideous Men
Pale Fire
Lolita
To the Lighthouse
Dubliners
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Blood Meridian
The Great Gatsby

>>3191423
>>3191424
>not getting obvious satire

>>3191365
I don't even read comics and even I couldn't resist the Absolute Sandman hardcovers. Even bought the Death one, despite it being a total rip-off.

Nope, not hard. Though the prose does get progressively more difficult to read as the main character grows older and wiser. I know they're ugly, but the Penguin Modern Classics edition has useful notes in it. you'll probably use them sparingly, I used them for some historical context mostly. I didn't need to know where every landmark or street was situated in order to enjoy the book.


And yes, it's a great intro. Dubliners is even more accessible, though.

"We’re not here to assess your character, and you, especially, should not have to defend it. I’m sure you’re a scrupulous individual; you don’t strike me as a cad or a weasel. Honesty is welcomed and even appreciated, but it is not exonerating."

>>3165581
>*nor* can we experience it vicariously

>>3165428
Jeez, OP. I just completed an exam on Heidegger and Sartre the other day. So glad to be done with it. Come on to /lit/ and have thrown back in my face. Is this a sign?

Bad faith has been explained pretty well already. It's the tendency of people to deny their freedom of choice for fear of the consequences that come with making a choice, it's an act of self-deception.

Authenticity is a little more complicated. All people (Dasein) are at one time or another inauthentic in their way of Being. The inauthentic person engages in everyday discourse without bringing critical faculties to bear. You don't engage with the world around you, you just sort of let it flow over you.

The part that a lot of people forget is that Heidegger says you have to be ever-conscious of your impending death in order to be authentic. But we can't phenomenologically experience death not can we experience it vicariously in any meaningful way, so it's tough. Basically there are two distinct ways of Being-towards-death or thinking about death on a daily basis. The inauthentic, everyday approach is to evade consideration of death entirely. Conversely, an authentic Being-towards-death finds us both accepting death and anticipating it. This does not mean we have to live in constant fear of death, that would be pretty lame and make life suck. According to old Heidegger, death represents our “ownmost” experience. It is the purest act of individuality we can experience. If we comprehend and apply all this bullshit that Heidegger wants, we supposedly achieve a sense of perspective, allowing us to focus on our Being as a whole and recognise the extent of our own possibilities. Achievement Unlocked: 'Authentic Dasein.'

>>3164740
>really contrived
It's a perfectly straight forward quote. What are you on about?

Christy Wampole is/was in a 'cerebral rock' band according to wikipedia.

>Christy Wampole, a Ph.D candidate in French and Italian at Stanford, worked primarily with French musicians before joining Glass Wave as lead vocalist. She began to perform French cabaret and chanson in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex as a duet act called The French Jazz Project with saxophonist, keyboardist, and vocalist Pascal Valcasara.

Love the interview with Bloom from the Paris Review.
Fascinating read. I wish I had his memory.

http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/2225/the-art-of-criticism-no-1-harold-bloom

The Book Thief
Twilight
Harry Potter


Whenever I'm suckered into reading one of the popular "Young Adult" novels I'm always deeply disappointed.

Where the hell do all these photos come from?! Who is taking them? For what purpose?

This thread has given me much to think about.

>"I give you the mausoleum of all hope and desire...I give it to you not that you may remember time, but that you might forget it now and then for a moment and not spend all of your breath trying to conquer it. Because no battle is ever won he said. They are not even fought. The field only reveals to man his own folly and despair, and victory is an illusion of philosophers and fools.”

So this is a subgenre of creepy photography, I take it?

I like it. There's something horribly sad about a woman alone in a bookstore. I don't know why.

>>3131801
Well, as of right now, I don't have a great handle on what separates "analytic" from everything else. So I'm going to be at the mercy of whatever bias I encounter early on in my reading. I appreciate the heads-up though. I'll do my best to stay critical.

>>3131777
Interesting perspective, anon. I'll keep it in mind. I did actually read some Sam Harris as a teenager. I recall that he was a neuroscientist of some sort, I wouldn't expect him to be a great philosopher. It was pretty accessible, though, as you suggest.

>They are not "obfuscated" (well, maybe Derrida is), they simply have to be read attentively and carefully.

My professor told us that Heidegger utilized the full expressive potential of German... and that it doesn't translate that clearly into English. So there's still something of a roadblock there it seems. If only I had the time to learn any new languages.