/lit/ - Literature

>>11791342
>Obligatory where do I start with him post.
Seriously I am a fan of William James's work in psychology, but I was only very recently made aware of his brother's work.

>>11791342
So who did like him?

>>11791370
Pretty sure Joyce liked him

>>11791342
>Mark Twain said he would rather "be damned to John Bunyan's heaven" than read Henry James's novel The Bostonians.
Holy shit that's so good.

>>11791370
Borges, I think.

>>11791403
not really. he praised his ability for "situations" but he thought that there wasn't enough life in his books.

>>11791342
Oscar Wilde is completely right tbqh
If you know anything about Eliot's critical work you'd know that he was actually complimenting James
McCarthy is a giant pseud who happens to write amazing prose

>>11791422
You're a pseud too if you think Corncob tortillas YeCarthy is good.

>>11791411
That quote about life should not be taken too seriously since the same is true of his own work. He wrote about James frequently and although he always took an ambivalent tone when doing so, the fact remains that he wrote about James a lot. And he included a few of his works in his 'personal library' that he was asked to curate http://www.openculture.com/2015/03/jorge-luis-borges-personal-library.html

>>11791370
Ezra Pound.

>>11791438
T. Discord dick rider

>>11791577
I've never even been on the discord, roody poo.

>>11791438
I mean you can mock the man but that doesn't dimish his work.

>>11791342
I loved Portrait of a Lady although I feel a bit less manly for admitting it. I can see why people criticize him. You really have to have patience and be in the mood for a dawdling melodramatic literary soap-opera. But if you want to read tip-top dawdling melodramatic literary soap operas, James is your man.

>>11791937
As a boy I grew up watching Desperate Housewives, which I loved. Now that you say this, my love of James is exactly the kind of logical progression that may have been expected.

>>11791342
>He's even revealed seemingly brilliant people t
This reads like terrible Britprose and James was a mere melodrama boi
>>11791386
but joyce had shit taste tbqh

>>11791342
I plan to read the Golden Bowl before the end of this year.

>>11791583
There's nothing to diminish because it's shit to begin with.

>>11792002
I hope you're not starting there

>>11791342
>The ultimate pleb filter
Yep. The novel doesn't reach 'high art' more than it does with James.

How everyone describes his works as eerie and lifeless sparksy interest in him desu

>>11791937
>>11791979
Soap opera is a phrase plebs use to mean 'concerns women and relationships'

>>11791342
Nabokov is an intolerable critic. On no reasonable grounds, can "What Maisie Knew" be described as terrible. Although the "style" was not entirely appropriate to the "matter." Compare this to the first chapter of A Portrait by Joyce. I think if it had been made more "child-like," it should have been a superior production. I hate "critics" who throw off "clever" provocative opinions that are just plain wrong.

As for Frazen, the criticism is ridiculous. Repetition and variation are necessary to build literary impressions. Joyce does this as well. A Portrait of a Lady is too early to be of much use to me, and it is certainly inferior to his later works for various reasons. But to focus on the "repetition" as though this were a fault is just stupid. If a reader is to be left with any impression at all, there must be a well developed system of repetition and variation. If there is any problem at all with the first paragraph it's that it's elements wasn't sufficiently "mixed." The entire paragraph is devoted to "setting the scene." He might have done this better (in my view) if he approached the way he did in this later works: throw the reader into the action, and interweave (slowly and deliberately) the elements of setting, history, and character.

>>11791370
Joyce, Pound, and other modernists loved him and were influenced by him.

>>11791370
H. P. Lovecraft was a big fan of The Turn of the Screw and his other ghost stories.

>>11793455
I mostly “agree” but can you please “stop” doing “that”

>>11792582
>t. chick

>>11793539
lol yeah looking back that is an excessive and unnecessary amount of quotes

Jonathan Franzen is probably a bigger plebeian than most of /lit.

>>11793639

>>11792582
No, it’s used to describe novels of which the main interest has more to do with petty intrigue and social victories

>>11793979
That's what I said