/lit/ - Literature

>>10966267
Ey, that book is really good.

>>10966262
>1984 and Animal Farm
>Guns, Germs and Steel
>Bill Bryson
>Tao Lin (technically bourgeois hipsters, but there's a lot of overlap)
>No Fear Shakespeare
>Jonathans Lethem and Franzen
>Those books about the history of one item, like salt or cadavers or whatever
>Deepak bloody Chopra
>blank verse

>>10966427
Paradise Lost is pesud-tier?

>>10966427
1984 is perhaps pseud-tier now, but only because it has seeped so much into our culture that many of its tropes have become cliche.

I wouldn't say it was written for pseuds, even if it has occupied that cultural level nowadays. It was a rather well written portrayal of the possibilities of a looming totalitarianism of the time.

>>10966262
12 Rules for Life desu :)

>>10966647
Usually no one tries to push obvious falsehoods like "trains are small" as facts, though. Propaganda is more subtle, with a grain of truth somewhere at the center to latch onto. Like "Mao was a great leader because he industrialized China really fast" or something on those lines. 1984 just looks amateur in comparison to other dystopias like Zamyatin's We, The Iron Heel, Darkness at Noon, etc. Not to mention Orwell's journalism and essays far outweigh his fiction.

>>10966920
That's not a real quote from 1984. it's parody. The Guardian got fooled too, though, so don't feel too bad.

You're not entirely wrong though. The book exaggerates quite a bit the tendencies in totalitarian societies, but it did provide useful concepts like 'double-think' and that sort of thing that did apply to some extent to totalitarian societies. It also portrays the sort of distrust in your neighbor that such a society facilitated.

You're right it was more subtle in actual existing societies, but an extreme fictional depiction can still shed light on and expose existing societies with these tendencies.

Every North American book since radios got made.

>>10966920
I actually think 1984 brings some interesting concepts to the fore, like the eternal war or the two minutes hate. The book is subtle by no means but it creates an effective and coherent picture of a totalitarian world that sticks with you long after you've read it.

>>10966262
Franzen

>>10966262
Is he crying?

>>10967318
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvBm0ZUfe7I

>>10966262
anything by Steven Pinker

>>10966920
"The Iron Heel" may be a more complete political thesis, but, as far as literature goes, it's almost unbearable actually to read.

>>10966262
Anything that enables the reader (or viewer, whatever) to feel like the only aware person int he midst of a sea of sheeple may qualify. This doesn't make the book bad, though.

>>10966920
>1984 is not as good as [terribly written books]
wew lad

>>10966920
"Fake News" is naturally a perfect example of this. Not the articles that people claim to be 'fake news', but the very idea that there is some obvious way of determining and classifying certain news as 'fake', and hence that otherwise, the normal system of news is perfectly natural, fine, real and 'unbiased' (because bias is a bad thing you want to eliminate of course, and not an inherent condition of selecting specific things to report on in the first place).

>>10966262
12 Rules for Life is an immediate bestseller. It's ranked #4 in Amazon Books. JBP never has to work another day in his life.

Meme magic is real boys.

>>10969412
Nice mental gymnastics

>>10970432
modern news corporations are similar to state enterprises of the ussr, dingus

>>10966920
we had 2 minutes of hate when the gun control kids shouted at rubio just the other week. we have doublespeak and perpetual war ongoing right now. how much more does a book have to get right before you just accept it as fundamental to the cannon.

>>10969995
Rick Warren has wrote several immediate bestsellers, too, doesn't make him any less a pseud.

>>10969995
good job tards, you provided this nimbly calculating happy self-help book merchant with a pile of shekels by making him a celebrity.

>>10969995
>JBP never has to work another day in his life.
He never worked in the first place, he's a clinical psychologist.

>>10966427
I’ve always heard people trash Guns, Germs, and Steel but I never got a specific reason why. Why is it considered such a joke?

>>10970833
Only complaint I ever heard leveled against it is that it is somehow racist.

>>10970860
I’ve never understood how it’s exactly racist. One of his big beliefs is that geography greatly affected how societies developed and that’s how he explains why some societies conquered while others got conquered. I feel like a lot of the criticizism he receives is really generic.

>>10970833

It's historically inaccurate.

>>10970877
Do you have an example? I’m just curious because when I ask most people don’t have one.

>"We've abandoned the religious values from before the 20th century. You need Jesus!"
>" Do you actually believe in Christianity. Do you even worship God?"
>"w-well no but I like the idea of Christianity."

Fuck that. I have a lot more respect for genuine Christians than this tool. It's funny that Peterson is a Dostoyevsky fan but Dostoyevsky would have contempt for Peterson's view of Christianity.

>>10966267
/lit's favorite book.

>>10970931
>It's funny that Peterson is a Dostoyevsky fan but Dostoyevsky would have contempt for Peterson's view of Christianity.
ah yes, the good old "in order to be a fan of someone or appreciate his creations you have to agree with everything he says all the time"
dumbass

>>10970432
retard

>>10971141
You can't just take Christ out of the Western Zeitgeist and expect to revive it with any success. It's like taking the engine out of a car and expecting it to work. And just going "well, no I don't go to church or pray, but Jesus had some good ideas" is fucking lame, it's dishonest and deluded.

>>10970931
nothing wrong with that. always thought peterson was a christian, but if he's merely pretending then i have a bit more respect for him. religion is a useful corralling tool for retards who need to worship SOMETHING.

>>10970860
That's golden because the main complain I've heard of it in /pol is that it is not racist enough (no kidding).

>>10971164
>but if he's merely pretending then i have a bit more respect for him. religion is a useful corralling tool for retards who need to worship SOMETHING.
I might agree with this point of view at least a little but one of his 12 rules is "tell the truth".

No respect for hypocrites.

>>10971161
>You can't just take Christ out of the Western Zeitgeist and expect to revive it with any success.
What we believe undergoes metamorphoses all the time, I don't see why this is different. Not that agree with Memerson.

>>10971193
that I

>>10970931
>He doesn't accept the cybernetic theological model
brainlet

>>10970833
he claims papua new guineans are the strongest race in the world

>>10966381
lmao

>>10966427
What's wrong with Bill Bryson?

>>10970931

he's just another /pol/cuck who is using Christianity because he values it's aesthetic appeal

>>10966262
zizek

>>10970833
People are generally upset by materialist analysis of history since it generally will run contrary to whatever national myths they prefer