/lit/ - Literature

>You cannot judge this book now. You will not even be able to judge it rightly when you have read its last chapter. Ten (or twenty) years from now you will know it was a good book if you remember any of it.

>>13837725

There's only so much time in a lifetime. Why stretch yourself thin? Depth over breadth--every time.

Some of the older volumes are worth owning BECAUSE of their dubious translation decisions. Case in point:

>In 1931 Loeb translation of Plutarch's 'Moralia' whenever Babbitt found a Greek dialect he translated it as Scots: so Agesilaus laments deaths in intra-Greek warfare: "Hech, sirs, for Greece, wha her ane sel' had killed sae mony men — as mony as micht pit doon a' the barbarians."

Based

Any of you guys want to know what ancient Greek sounds like?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7FIlh-eY2Q

>>11362591
>What’s she’s pointing out is that a lot of the popular idea of Roman History is based on shoddy 19th century scholarship that no one has bothered to challenge.
>Her books aren’t really Roman histories but metahistories of Roman scholarship.

The crazy thing about this is that her work comes across as dated because so much of it is about the same old figures, same old monuments, same old regions, same old period, same old myths, etc.

Other better scholars are exploring all sort of things that were once discounted out of hand. Whole new centuries and peoples are being given a fair account for the first time. These people make the Classics feel fresh and exciting. Beard, on the other hand, makes everything feel staid. One can't help but smell the formaldehyde when she's around.

She's something of a hypocrite too in that she projects a certain joyous insouciance despite being driven mainly by by historical grudges. Her smiles conceals much ugliness.

>>11007054

The McLuhanite approach basically begs for extrapolation. This gives it lasting power. The insights are applicable to new media, and the reader is implicitly invited to apply them.

As for the book in question, I find it a little 'lite'. I'm not sure it stands up to repeated readings. That said, well worth reading once, and makes for a good introduction to some of McLuhan's ideas. I'd recommend it especially for the younger reader.

Avoid buzzwords.
Avoid unnecessary padding.
Avoid name-dropping.
Avoid cliches and overused tropes.
Avoid writing about things that are currently popular.
>Don't use joke titles or funny footnotes.
>Don't use endnotes.
>Don't double-space your text.
>When quoting passages in other languages, do not translate them.