/lit/ - Literature

I'm quite interested in Baudrillard's notion of hyperreality and simulacra en Debord's notion of spectacle.

Which works would you recommend by them, and more importantly, which works would you consider mandatory before engaging with them? I'm reasonably familiar with anything up to the 20th century, but from the 1900 mark onwards I'm lost.

>>4628360

>>4523757
Will VR complete it or ruin it?

>>4436599
The simulacrum is never that which conceals the truth—it is the truth which conceals that there is none. The simulacrum is true

>>4356131
It's due to the higher amount of mature and/or intelligent people.

>>4215569
>platonist
>implying the representation refers to the real
>implying there is anything but representation

>>4037160
This is why our politicians are chatters instead of grand orators in the Roman style - if they tried to be grand orators in the Roman style they would seem pathetic, it would seem as though they were straining their voice. This is why it is difficult to speak romantically to your loved one without seeming like your an imposter dressed up as an 18th century poet.

Why has this happened? This is a large question that needs a large explanation, but I'm going to give you a small explanation anyway because it's more amusing to do that than to simply omit explanation. The reason why we have no voice is that we have abandoned "objective" truth and morality. I'm not trying to be "reactionary" here. The reason that I can't speak to my pet properly is because I have no objective sense of truth or objective sense of good and evil. If I had those things then I would know the RIGHT way to speak to my pet, but in the total absence of right and wrong I have no idea what the right way is to speak to my pet, so I speak it to him in a borrowed, simulated voice that is not my own. This is also why we are clumsy in greeting each and showing each other admiration and respect - there is total obfuscation as to what is the RIGHT way to do things is, so we have to talk, act, and make gestures purely from hints. We have to look out into the big emptiness of the crowd and by observing their actions try and piece together what the "right" way to do things is.

Reading Baudrillard feels like such a chore. I picked up Simulacra and Simulation because a TA was telling me about Baudrillard's ideas, and I was interested. Reading him is a completely different issue though.

I'd hate to not finish the book, but I think I've gotten a pretty good grasp on his big ideas, and reading his wanky prose seems like more trouble than it's worth.

Which is a better starting point for Baudrillard: The Gulf War Did Not Take Place, or Simulacra and Simulation?

small time