/lit/ - Literature

>NIGGER, NIGGER, NIGGER, NIGGER, NIGGER, NIGGER, NIGGER, NIGGER

Was he truly a great author or just the Tarantinoboy of his generation?

>>17162161
>All men have heard of the Mormon Bible, but few except the "elect" have seen it, or, at least, taken the trouble to read it. I brought away a copy from Salt Lake. The book is a curiosity to me, it is such a pretentious affair, and yet so "slow," so sleepy; such an insipid mess of inspiration. It is chloroform in print. If Joseph Smith composed this book, the act was a miracle — keeping awake while he did it was, at any rate.

Which American authors should every European read?

I got told my writing was like Mark Twain, but I've never read an entire book by the guy. What do you reccommend?

Did he write anything good other than novels about children?
He is such a good writer, makes you wonder why he didn't tackle heavier stuff

Did he write anything good other than novels about children?
He is such a good writer, makes you wonder why he hasn't tackled heavier stuff

did this guy write anything good other than kid novels?

“Strange! that you should not have suspected years ago—centuries, ages, eons, ago!—for you have existed, companionless, through all the eternities. Strange, indeed, that you should not have suspected that your universe and its contents were only dreams, visions, fiction! Strange, because they are so frankly and hysterically insane—like all dreams: a God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave his angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice and invented hell—mouths mercy and invented hell—mouths Golden Rules, and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites this poor, abused slave to worship him!...

“You perceive, now, that these things are all impossible except in a dream. You perceive that they are pure and puerile insanities, the silly creations of an imagination that is not conscious of its freaks—in a word, that they are a dream, and you the maker of it. The dream-marks are all present; you should have recognized them earlier.

“It is true, that which I have revealed to you; there is no God, no universe, no human race, no earthly life, no heaven, no hell. It is all a dream—a grotesque and foolish dream. Nothing exists but you. And you are but a thought—a vagrant thought, a useless thought, a homeless thought, wandering forlorn among the empty eternities!”

He vanished, and left me appalled; for I knew, and realized, that all he had said was true.

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3186/3186-h/3186-h.htm

>says he will die when halley's comet appears
>dies when halley's comet appears

>born on the same day halley's comet appeared
>said that he would "go out with it" when it appeared again
>halley's comet appears again and he dies the next day
what the fuck is this

Reminder that "great American novel" translates to "unreadable schlock only mutts can appreciate" in every other country. Not a single European academic institution thinks Melville, Hemingway, Steinbeck, Twain, etc. had anything worth saying.

>>10564497

Why are American writers and philosophers so terrible in comparison to their European counterparts? Even their most sacred cow Mark Twain is pretty mediocre in comparison to most European authors at his time. Is it the fact that their country has never had a culture that leads to their work being so soulless and pointless?

http://www.twainquotes.com/Austen_Jane.html

is he worth a look? does he raise any philosophical questions or lasting themes? or are his works very plot-driven? i have a copy of huck finn next to me.