/lit/ - Literature

Wait until you hear Hitler was vegetarian.

>>10259685
It's more a concern of the poet being the representative of the philosopher – or in this case, the novelist being a representative of the psychologist.

It's a great tome, and I hate starting something without finishing it as these lose threads tends to float around in my head, so I'd like to weight the merits of diving in.

>>10259675
Gaddis was not a Jung scholar nor was his work derivative of Jung's work. A lot of artists and philosophers were heavily influenced by Jung, that doesn't make them Jung disciples. The Recognitions isn't a 1,000+ page postmodernist tome of Jungian ideology. That's a stupid thing to think. You're a stupid person. If there was anything of value in The Recognitions you'd be too stupid to pick it up. Read something else.

>>10259675
>Jung's pseudo-mystical lmao-everything-is-psychological reductionist worldview
You're humiliating yourself.

>>10259739
Please, spare me the sentimental banter, you hopeless fanboy.

I tend to do some preliminary research on the books that picque my interest and found an excerpt from Steven Moore's analysis of the works of William Gaddis.

http://www.williamgaddis.org/mooregaddisbk/ch2.pdf

>The Recognitions does have its supernatural moments, but its immense network of references to myth, religion, and the occult is deployed chiefly for psychological purposes. Carl Jung found in such spiritual traditions the validation needed for his theories of the process of individuation, and Gaddis's documented reliance on Jung's "Integration of the Personality" - a psychological commentary on alchemical symbolism - allows the reader to interpret Wyatt's "wild conflict" (247) in terms of the quest for psychic wholeness that Jung insists is at the heart of all mystical traditions. With Jung supplying the Ariadne's thread, readers can make their way through Gaddis's labyrinth of magic and myth with results that are as surprising as they are enlightening [...]

>>10259787
Between Jung and Plotinus, I prefer the latter. Jung clearly jacked much of his shit from the Platonists and distortedly watered it down to fit his idiosyncratic worldview.

He is pseudo-mystical in the sense that he approached the divine from a sterilized, clinical viewpoint. Pathetic, really.

>>10259675
Jungian psychology is THE antithesis to reductionism. It's impossible to be this retarded for fucks sake. Damn.

it's a good book just read it my dude

do you read books for their philosophical content or some shit? The ideas in novels don't really matter. Authors create beautiful things and the medium is complex enough to contain meaningful ideas, but it's still an artistic medium and not one that you should expect to have correct/good idealogical or philosophical viewpoints. Even moreso should you not be extrapolating things about the work based on biographical details about the author. If a critic you read referenced Jung when talking about the Recognitions it says more about the critic's interested in analyzing it as Jungian.

I'm gonna reread it just seeing this.

>>10259834
If you don't see the reductionist element of Jung, the straight up bastardization of the classical worldview, you really haven't studied enough philosophy and theology to call anyone a retard.

I'll take Steven Moore for his well formulated word and brush The Recognitions aside as a maze of Jungian bullshit. Thanks for another fine discussion /lit/

>>10259859
I'm not the dude you replied to or anything but there's the fucking problem with /lit/. It seems like every fuckin' discussion here is just two bigheaded dorks saying some variation of "you're not intelligent enough to even be commenting". It's really childish.

>brush The Recognitions aside as a maze of Jungian bullshit

This is pretty stupid but whatever.

In some ways this is probably the "smartest" board, but nowhere else is the pointless ad-hominem so fuckin pronounced.

>>10259859
>>10259870
The fucking problem is ignorants spouting insanely retarded shit. I replied with hostility because there is NO WAY someone knowledgable about Jung will discard his works as 'reductionist'. The only possible way is if you only read his wiki entry. Which is exactly what happened since OP doesn't like Jung, so he probably never read his works. I don't feel like I have to explain why as much as you won't try to change the mind of someone who calls Marx a capitalist or Jesus an atheist.

All of this is possible because of anonymity. I never encounter such philistines in real life because then they'd have to stand for their ignorance or swallow their unfounded pride.

>>10259739
This exact post, but worded more politely/.

you're missing out on a really good book, OP. that's all i have to say about this matter.

Well, shit. OP here. I seem to have let my sentimentality get the best of me, so I'll try to correct my behaviour. My apologies.

>>10259739
I get this, of course a 1,000+ page novel isn't going to exclusively center around Jung, however slight or overwhelming his influence might have been. This was also why I made this thread to begin with, asking for original insights in regards to the value of the book, countering this caricature I had drawn of William Gaddis.

I've seen Cliff's review and it prompted me to buy it, and reading excerpts made me quite excited – I particularly enjoyed how Gwyon had a bottle of booze in a cavity of The Dark Night of the Soul. Just wanted to hear what readers found enjoyable, getting more motivation to read it in the process.

>>10259870
Yes, brushing off The Recognitions as a maze of "Jungian bullshit" was rash and irrational. There is a culture of banter centered around intellectual superiority on /lit/, as >>10259872 also points out with the ad hominem attacks. I like /lit/, even with it's many flaws, and shouldn't have contributed with such a base mentality.

>>10259787
>>10259834
>>10259914
Now for an explanation proper. Growing up as a child, I dreamed of becoming a priest. I had "strange" experiences throughout my life, and my late excistential teens prompted me to understand religion more. I became entagled with the New Age movement, Western occultism and Eastern mysticism – I became heavily dismayed later in life when I found out, upon consulting secondhand academic sources and reliable translations of primary works, that much of it was the personal fancies of the authors, nowhere near reflecting the scriptural tradition. At this point, I became vary of historical discrepancies and ideological distortions.

It is not that I find Jung to be completely full shit – but when reading classical works of Neoplatonism, Christian Theology, both Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant, Hermeticism, German Idealism, Classical Chinese cosmology and such, I find that Jung falls short. Yes, in contrast to atheistic materialism, Jung is defintely not a reductionst, but in contrast to, say, Maximos the Confessor, William Blake and Schelling, Jung does seem to fall short in his psychological paradigm. I can understand why people appreciate Jung, but for me personally, I find greater solace in the worldview of the oldtimers.

And finally
>>10259856
Yes, I do read works primary for their philosophical insight. I get where you're coming from, but personally, I benefit from the intellectual meat on the bone of aesthetics. To be sure, aesthetics can be excellent in and of themselfes, but I appreciate it much more when there is a depth added to it – in this case, philosophy. It's how I'm wired, and while I understand not everyone had these preferences, it works pretty good for myself.

>>10260019
>It's how I'm wired
So are you asking about the quality of the book or are you asking about how much you'll enjoy it? I'm confused about your expectations.

>>10260033
I doubt anyone could tell me to what extent I'd enjoy it.

I'm looking to hear what readers of the book found enjoyable, what stood out, what impacted them etc.

>>10259914
t. idiot who doesn't know what reductionism is

>>10260044
But your questions in the OP make it seem like you care about its philosophical content

Recognitions is too good for this board

The greatest debut novel of all time

>>10260044
it's a good book
gaddis write conversations good
characters are dark
teach me bout art

>>10260062
By "anything of value", I don't mean philosophy per se, but whatever the readers themselfes found valuable. When I'd be reading through it myself, you bet I'd look to extract the philosophical implications of the work.

>>10260057
See >>10260019

Out of curiosity, considering this hostility in regards to my critique of Jung – you wouldn't happpen to be influenced by Jordan Peterson? Knowing his presence on /lit/, I suspect much of this admiration I see in this thread is mediated by him.

>>10260093
So what are you asking us? I'm still confused. Just read the fucking book.

>>10260107
>is there anything of value to be gained from reading The Recognitions?
>I'm looking to hear what readers of the book found enjoyable, what stood out, what impacted them etc.

>>10260117
Why the verbose anti-psychological posting? Are you just a pretentious bag of shit who wants to know what others like himself thought about a book so that he can show off when he sees them IRL?

Your statement leads me to believe that reading this book will blow you the fuck out. I highly recommend you do so.

>>10260129
I like to read books to subsume their content and make it my own in order to build character, rather than entertaining escapism or bulking up on patrician credits.

Due to past experiences, I'm vary of ideological distortions lurking in the background. I'm not anti-psychological. The word itself comes the Greek psuche, meaning soul – I prefer the theological treatment of it, the clearest being found in Plotinus, rather than that of Jung, as I've explained in several posts now.

I know this is a meme, but doesn't /lit/ read? It was funny the first couple of times, but the lack of any original insights, the spiteful banter without any intellectual arguments behind the, and the blatant skipping of posts in this thread makes me a bit concerned. Isn't this board full of English majors anyway? You mean to tell me that a plebian factory worker like myself reads more than someone who fashioning for himself a living off literature?

Genuinely curious about my Jordan Peterson theory as well.

>>10260171
>Genuinely curious about my Jordan Peterson theory as well.
I'm not a Jordan Peterson fan and I've read some Plotinus.
>I'm not anti-psychological
You don't come off that way.
>Isn't this board full of English majors?
I studied philosophy and history, actually. Literature is pure diversion.

>>10260160
Fuck it, this thread doesn't seem to go anywhere. It's creeping around in my mind anyhow, so I'll give it a shot. Looking forward to being blown the fuck out.

>>10260171
i'm not versed in psychology, theology or philosophy but i really like it because it discusses the concept of being a phony a lot which i really like. stop debating with this guy who's just trying to have an argument.

gaddis writes high tempo which is really fun to read, things keep happening, people stumble into eachother, talk, move along after a couple of exchanges but it's never messy if you keep focused. it's one of my favorite books ever

>>10260171
your jordan peterson theory is retarded

you are no genius for knowing about jung before watching peterson

>>10260019
Sorry for insulting you OP, my stomach was empty and I'm a bit too passionate about stuff in general. Realized I should expand on my criticism. Kinda funny how we both retracted our harsh claims.. It's a miracle on the internet.

Jung is important because he is the first person to break free of the enlightenment/newtonian paradigm and realized it was both deleterious to human life and comprehension. I understand your penchant for classical works, I am also highly influenced by some of them (Monotheistic theology, hermeticism to name a few). But classics were written in a time where the conscious attitude was less influential in everyday life and there wasn't a clear distinction between the conscious and the unconscious. Jung being contemporary makes him infinitely more interesting to study because he is just like us in terms of cultural development, therefore more comprehensible for contemporary man. Good on you for being able to decipher with greater ease the classics than Jung's work, but keep in mind the opposite might be more plausible to the average reader.

To those summoning the name of Jordan Peterson: I feel it is important to note that I am not familiar with his works at all. I don't know whether or not he distorted Jung's ideas. From the few threads I've read on /lit/, it doesn't seem like so, but being politicaly vocal isn't really Jungian. I'll look into what he's all about.

>>10260294
he isn't really politically vocal, it's more about being philosophically vocal in context of philosophers going political (he hates whom he calls "neo-marxists", which is basically all the corrupt 20th century french jews who were used to promote current academic insanity).

>>10260357
So Jordan Peterson is an anti-Semite? I thought he was more milk-toast than that. Alt Lite rather than Alt Right.

>>10260364
not an anti-semite. he criticizes the absurd postmodernist ideologies that were originally mostly pumped out by Derrida and the rest of the jewish crew, but not only them.

and about alt right, when asked about it by someone, he stated that he doesn't stand with it at all, and from listening to most of his interviews, he's way more Alt Lite, new sincerity and regular conservative than Alt Right.

>>10260074
>The greatest debut novel of all time
That’s not Proust.

Is this book as hard to read as, say, Ulysses ?

>>10259675
Pearls before swine faggot. Jung was pretty much the greatest philosophical (in a wider sense) mind of the twentieth century. Certainly better than obscurantist garbage like Heidegger or Deleuze

>>10260422
around the same

>>10259675
I know how you feel. Whenever I hear that a writer was influenced by Jung I immediately dismiss him. The worst offenders are those whose careers revolve around his work, like that Peterson guy /lit/ likes.

>>10260447
Hard... for the same reasons ? Language first ?

>>10260422
no. some parts are hard to understand. the fate of anselm is the first thing that springs to mind, the clues to what actually happened are ridiculously obscure but you can just read notes on williamgaddis.org if you feel like you have no idea what's going on.

>>10260438
>philosophical (in a wider sense)
what do you mean by this? if anything philosophy has a much more narrow definition in the 20th century.

>>10260438
Nobody on /lit/ takes Deleuze seriously anyway.

Jung? more like dung.

Jung? more like old.

>>10259870
Why do you think this place gathers such aggressive insecure individuals? Honest question

>>10259914
>you have to extensively study someone in order to form an opinion lmao

>>10261894
t. jordan peterson jr

>>10259739
Tpbp

I honestly love /lit/ for when it's harshly honest to people

>>10261896
I hate this guy though. Try again

>>10261882
I think the average /lit/ user is someone that's very intelligent and has very low self-esteem. 4chan in general is kind of for losers, or for the lower points in your life when you're not leaving the house as much or feeling motivated to do things that interest you more (like reading books).

>>10260373
Jordan Peterson the man is a bog standard boring conservative.

Jordan Peterson the meme, symbol, and celebrity is pretty fashy.

>>10260734
speak for yourself

If you've read a thousand plateaus I'm surprised you don't at least respect him for his creativity.

>>10259675
>As someone who despises Jung's pseudo-mystical lmao-everything-is-psychological reductionist worldview, is there anything of value to be gained from reading The Recognitions?

Probably a lot of value to be gained in you blowing your arrogant brains out.

>>10259675
Currently at page like 670 in this. Will probably become my favorite (ahead of Infinite Jest and JR)