/lit/ - Literature

L. Ron Hubbard is the greatest writer, followed by Orson Scott Card. Distant third: Stephenie Meyer. Fourth: Robert Jordan. Fifth: Shakespeare, Sixth: Chaucer, Seventh: Homer.

People who know more than one language recognize that Racine and Molière are at least as good as Shakespeare for theatre.

When it comes to all-around literature, Victor Hugo excelled at Theatre, poetry and novels.

Picking Shakespeare because he is the most publicized is kind of retarded.

Francis Bacon actually wrote Shakespeare's plays.

>who you would pick instead?

No one because that sort of thinking is moronic.

>>1504977
No.
>>1504972
Moliere was spectacular at play-writing, but I respectfully disagree when one states his skills match that of Shakespeare, or any other writer. Shakespeare's themes are universal, written in such an elegant form of beauty and can be translated into any language without losing the context of the dialogue.

>>1504972
Racine is fucking terrible. Moliere is awesome and a contenda.

Hugo is about as notable as Ayn Rand. Jesus Christ. I hope you were just poking fun at idiots or something with that post.

>>1504977
He actually did. The evidence is indisputable.

>>1504960

Who could ever respect any works by that Barbarian?

>>1504995
Kinda have to agree.

>>1504977

Shakespeare actually devised Bacon's Scientific method

>>1504995

Mad english fag unable to read French, or literature for that matter.

Victor Hugo is acknowledged as one of France's greatest writers, try not to insult him, please.

Your ignorance is quite baffling. Please die of cancer.

>>1505006

Victor Hugo is a great writer, but not amongst the greatest ever.

>>1505013

People who read translations have about 1% legitimacy when criticizing a foreign author.

Hugo was a genius, recognized as such by all writers of his time.

>>1505019
I already said he was a great writer, and if I was making a list of the best 100 writers he would be on it.. but he is not a contender for the greatest writer ever.

>>1505030

Mine is Théophile Gautier.

And he'd probably never been in your top 500.
English speaking world has no love for god tier French authors :-(

>>1505039
>Gautier

I laughed pretty hard. You honestly think Gautier's the world's greatest writer? REALLY?

God damned Francophiles. Fuck, I love the French too but you're going way overboard with your otaku shit.

>>1505048

Ever read him?

For now he is my greatest ever.

Mind you, I might change my opinion when I learn German and Russian and read their greatests.

Capitaine Fracasse is so beautiful <3

>>1505053
How long does it take you to learn a language fluently enough to appreciate its greatest literary works? You speak of learning languages the same way I would speak of watching movies.

Shakespeare was a master of his time. A very original writer and his themes have been applied to MILLIONS of books, movies, T.V. shows, etc.

there is no replacement

just because he didn't write for a modern audience doesn't mean he isn't a god among writers

>>1505059

Absolute fluency, of course.

I only am fluent in 4 atm (French, Brazilian Portuguese, English and Spanish).

I am a relative "genius" when it comes to languages (I got tested years ago). So it might be easier for me.

Honestly, I consider Racine and Molière as having a prettier style than Shakespeare. It might make a lot of people mad, sorry :-(

>>1505053
Yeah bro. I also adore Camus, Fante, Lautreamont, Baudelaire, Artaud, Rimbaud etc but I wouldn't rank them among the greatest regardless of personal bias.

>>1505061

"themes have been applied to MILLIONS of books, movies, T.V. shows, etc."

> means he's any good.

Wow, you're everything wrong with literature today.

You know Bieber sold more records than Mozart, right ?

>>1505065
I would like to fight you.

>>1505072

Fight, why ?

Why the fuck is /lit/ obsessed with superfluous oversimplifications?

>>1505068

If you remotely imply Baudelaire and Rimbaud aren't amongt the greatest poets EVER, it will make me rage quite hard.

>>1505079

How else do you draw people in a thread in such a dead board ?

I understand how Shakespeare's important and all, but I'd be lying to you if I said I actually enjoyed reading or watching his plays.

Am I uncultured swine?

>>1505086
Interesting /lit/ discussion that doesn't involve namedropping?

>>1505094

You have personal preferences and aren't influenced by meaningless hype.

gratz'

>>1505094
You don't have to enjoy his plays, you just have to recognize his genius and influence.

>>1505094
Nah. The best thing about him is is wordplay. The plots aren't all that great. Hamlet, Othello, and Julius Caesar are the only ones I've enjoyed. His use of language really is incredible though. I read his plays just for the wonderful rhyming couplets that are sprinkled throughout.

>ctrl f
>cervantes
>no results

/LIT/ IM DISSAPOINT

>>1505111

I don't like his style dude, sorry. Plot is great though.

>>1505111
>i am a spic

>>1505111
Cervantes is great, but by no means THE greatEST.

I agree with Shakespeare being the greatest writer to have ever picked up a pen, period.

The greatest novelist, however, goes to Flaubert, ALMOST easily if it wasn't for Tolstoy and Dostoevsky.

If you read Flaubert in french (because I have, because I'm a pseud), you'd realize he isn't all that great.
Jus' sayian.

>>1505192
I respectfully disagree.

So basically /lit/ can't think of a better writer than Shakespeare?

I am satisfied with the outcome of this thread.

I don't think Shakespeare is the world's greatest writer. I would instead pick my penis, because it would illustrate how silly of a question "world's greatest writer" is.

>>1505172
>>The greatest novelist, however, goes to Flaubert, ALMOST easily if it wasn't for Tolstoy and Dostoevsky.

Can't let you do that, starfox

>>1505243
Can't let you do that, starfox

>>1505229
can't let you do that, starfox

>>1505254
>>1505267
>>1505269
i like how illiterate /lit/ is becoming

i pick my nose

>>1504971
Can't let you do that, starfox

>>1505276
Can't let you do that, starfox

>>1504960
Can't let you do that, starfox

We all done here?

>>1504996
>the evidence is indisputable
>provide no evidence
>0/10

>>1505351
>>1505300
>>1505291
>>1505284
>>1505254
superior writer of Ireland

>>1505384
YOURE FULL OF SO MUCH BULLSHIT HES NOT EVEN FAT IN THAT PIC

>>1505254
Suck my dick, you pompous, untalented, incoherent Irish fuck.

>>1505394
>Wilde
>fat
Tybrax is going to have to find a new tripcode, this one has been cracked and whoever did it is fucking terrible at ruining someone's reputation

>>1505407
say what you want piece of shit.

cant believe this place has mods know whats the point. how depressing what will happe n to me jus want a hug but lill prob get sent to a nother different pscyhodtheapry when this one gets bored of me no one likes me ever i have error in brain and it didnt even break it ist still going

>ITT /lit/ have no taste

>>1505470
>I found out how to feel superior with as little time as possible
>>1505458
you're kind of a depressing thing

>>1505473
im not a thiong im a perso that s whars depressing i might even forget it if i had things to do but i dont im sick asnnd no one likes sick people i wish i could ignore thsem but it makes me tired when i do so i just look patheitc instead and i never change i stay the same ill be here for moinths or longer until and it wont even helpo she probably hates me thats why the first one abandoned me they wouldnt helpo if it wasnt theyre job its sad. i hate pople so much i wish i wasnt a people

>>1505406
u jelly bro?

>>1505482
>ill be here for moinths
where are you?

and don't be specific

lol why u mad though

>>1505486
uk u dumb cunt, you such a newfag yet think youre the shit here/

>>1505254
James Joyce wrote like 3 novels and one of them was gibberish. Best novelist my ass.

>>1505172
Flaubert is no even close to the greatest novelist. His best novel is Madame Bovary which is completely overrated. He is not even in the top 100 of novelists.

>>1505502
>>1505502
I'm sorry i haven't payed attention to your every comment and meditation

forget i ever said anything

When you ignore the fact that he put conversations in sonnets and shit, his characters pretty much just walk around saying "You make me very cross" and "I'd like to see you naked" all the time, until someone gets stabbed.

>>1505508
you're fucking retarded, please stop coming to 4chan /lit/

and i don't mean that in a mean way

i'm really just beggin you to not come back here, please

>>1505510
>>1505510
penis brain have u ever been outside america?

>>1505514
you're just bluthering on about absolutely nothing at this point

>>1505515
>too embarassed to answer question xD
oscar wilde fucking sucks you only like cos he teh gheys

>>1505518
okay since we haven't actually discussed literature in about a day i'll go ahead and say what i would like

do you even understand Wilde?
that sounds stale in pronunciation but i'd generally like to know

>>1505518

Actually, he's only gay because he likes Wilde.

ok im going to sleep now if youre all still slutsfuckers

>>1505526
this might be true

I just wanted to let this sink in for everyone...
in OP's picture...
Shakespeare bears a resemblance to Sid Haig...

>>1505513
You can fuck off tripfag. I'm right so deal with it. Also, I actually contribute to /lit/, I have made two of the recommendation charts and often give recommendations.

>>1505482
>my face when this reads like Finnegan's Wake
inb4 Starfox

Shakespeare is certainly up there. Kafka and Dante shade it for me. I think there's greater potential in epic and prose than in plays

I never understood the hype behind Kafka

i read a few of his stories, it's kinda cool how he explores some modern themes, but the writing isn't anything spectacular neither are his characters or worlds

dunno wtf ppl think hes so good

AnYWAY: "world's greatest writer" is too vague, writer of what? fiction, poetry, fantasy, philosophy, science? what politics? when? what's your criteria...

most popular? most influential? most absurd? what

>>1505969
>the writing isn't anything spectacular

Unless you read the original German, I suggest you shut the mouth.

>>1505980

i guess it's all a matter of taste

not everyone likes oranges

i tasted a lot of kafka, nothing really to him...maybe it's because i have a big philosophical background and find his themes pretty superficial

i think a lot of simple people who haven't read philosophy get blown away by guys like kafka for that reason

>>1505985
Listen, you lobotomised chimp.

Kafka is renowned for his unique contortions with the German language. I don't give a nun's hymen what you think about his books--if you haven't read the original German, shut. the. mouth. about the prose.

>>1505985
What are Kafka's themes? His work is absolutely rammed full of potential meaning but almost completely ambiguous. The focus and skill it takes to write like that and remain coherent is phemonenal, well it takes a top genius.

Knoiw what you're saying about his prose in a way. In some respects he seems like an anti-writer or an anti-stylist, but he I think that was because he was taking on the historical burden of literature. So much action and romanticism in literature till Kafka, and the modern world doesn't let people act or live truly, so he kept true and wrote about characters who couldn't and yet still kept the work full of life.

>>1505991

I speak 3 languages quite well: english, hungarian, german, and my japanese is passable

there are too many strong german writers that make kafka seem like an ant....

maybe you can enlighten me, what is about his prose that is worth talking about? im confused.

>>1506003

it's not even ambiguous, it's just dull

making a vague metaphor that can be interpreted in various ways isn't a sign of genius, it just means he wasn't really sure what to say and had no real intention in mind

human art is marked by intention, his worked lacked focus and direction...he went one way, and then just kind of wandered around

he had nothing to say, his voice was muffled by his insecurities and couldn't really express himself

im not sure this deserves hype or praise...it deserves maybe therapy and criticism...he wasn't much of a writer, he just appears that way to very simple minded people for some reason

>>1506007
Kafka an insect? Who could even think such a thing.

Which writers btw?

>>1506016

Hesse, Kant, Fichte, Goethe

hell Nietzsche is a better writer than kafka, and a much smarter writer as well

>>1506013
Human art WAS marked by intention. Art changes as circumstances change. Kafka diagnosed the modern world better than almost anyone and produced art in repsonse to that. Exponentially superior to say, a Hemmingway and his fake intentions.

"Very simple minded people"

Speaking of exponentially superior...

personally, i think Brecht is way better than Shakespeare.

He changed the game, certainly, but he's not the best writer ever. I haven't read enough different authors to call the best ever, but Joyce is the best I've read.

usula le guin. I savour all her books, I love the way she creates worlds that are so different to ours yet still hold the feeling of longing.

how about you /lit/? who's the world's greatest writer?

>>1506026

no he didn't diagnose anything, he had no theories, he had no coherent ideas...

he simply wrote some vague short stories that have multiple interpretations, it isn't a feat...it's quite easy to do

and they weren't even written that well, and the stories themselves weren't even that engaging

the greatness you see in Kafka is something you are projecting onto his dull work, it's just a fiction your mind has created for some reason--it's quite common though

Twilight fans talk about twilight the same way, they can't really explain it's greatness or make specific claims...

>>1506032

herp derp kafka's good cuz we dunno wtf hes talkin about

must be super genius lols

>>1506032

This.

>>1506036
>>1506032

let's all samefag, and write in a shitty style

also kafka totally suck, I could have done what he did. trust me it's true because I just said.

>>1506032
Of course he didn't have theories - he's a story writer, a poet, not a philosopher or critic. He looked at the world and produced art in step with his time, completely - like a Homer, a Dante or Shakespeare. That's why his work will be timeless.

And it's not "quite easy" to write a story that myriad people can project greatness into. It's unimaginably difficult. Kafka took Shakespeare's negative capability and desubjectified it. There's nothing in literature like his work that predates it. I'd say Rabelais and Gogol touched on it, Kafka realised it.

One of my professors told me that Maya Angelou was better than Shakespeare. We read one Angelou book for every piece of Shakespeare we read in her class.

>>1506041

Gogol > Kafka

in every way possible

>>1506041

"Kafka took Shakespeare's negative capability and desubjectified it."

Pretentious? Moi?

>>1506053
No I'm not very pretentious. That's the simplest way I could think of expressing the thought.

James Joyce is the best writer if only for the dirty love letter he gave to his beloeved.

the dirtiness of it all always get's my spine tingling.

>>1506056

in that case you are just a sad person. foreveralone.jpg

>>1506111
Jesus. Go easy man. Have a heart.

>>1506053
>calls someone else pretentious
>uses quotation marks on 4chan instead of green text
o_o

ITT : english speaking fags pretend to be able to judge foreign writers based on translations.

I especially laughed at people judging Flaubert, when he himself said the perfect novel had no plot, and he focused 100% of his attention on writing style, which cannot be perceived in a translation.

And this is supposed to be a literary forum T_T

This is the excellent foppery of the world, that,
when we are sick in fortune,--often the surfeit
of our own behavior,--we make guilty of our
disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as
if we were villains by necessity; fools by
heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and
treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards,
liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of
planetary influence; and all that we are evil in,
by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion
of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish
disposition to the charge of a star! My
father compounded with my mother under the
dragon's tail; and my nativity was under Ursa
major; so that it follows, I am rough and
lecherous. Tut, I should have been that I am,
had the maidenliest star in the firmament
twinkled on my bastardizing.

>>1506228
Kafka is awesome in German. Dem rules of three, dat revealing the verb at the end, dat vagueness. It's awesome.

>>1506228
No, this is /lit/ - Literature on 4chan. Big difference.

>>1506260

Not all boards are /b/tarded, come on T_T

>>1506267
stop being a bitch most people here aren't even 20 yet.

>>1506269

Doesn't mean they should all be so retarded.

>>1506274
since most are in HS or just out of it and reading foreign stuff for first time how can you blame them?

>>1506279
Looking down on people has nothing to do with blaming them.

>>1506279

I am just a sadfrog, not blaming anybody.

>>1506287
well stop being a bitch then.

>>1506288
unrealistic expectations.

>>1506290
Moar liek you already are my bitch.

>>1506292
no im not im not wanted not even a slave to anyone :(

>>1506007
i came back from my night's slumber to find this thread contorted and retarded

i beleive somewhere down the line someone said "art is marked by intention", that's how retarded

you should all be very dissapointed with yourselves

also, if you ever try to argue about kafka's themes, you don't understand what he was writing

>>1507621

unintentional art is for nature

humans make intentional art, they try to express some sort of meaning, otherwise it's just random nonsense

Why is Shakespeare considered the greatest writer in the English language? I mean, I've read his stuff, and it's very good, but why is it considered the top?

Franz Kafka.

It was even great before I learned German and could only read translations.

>>1507641
>>1507641
the problem with you is that you're romantic, and romantics can't be realists

>>1507650
Your problem is that you're a homosexual and homosexuality is a form of mental illness.

If you don't think this man is the greatest writer of all time, then you're all a bunch of fucking plebs.

>>1507654
not anymore, there are so many of us infected that it has become politically incorrect to call it such a thing

but you're fucking retarded

ITT:

State opinions. Pretend that they are provable facts.

>ITT: Lit being lit.

Fixed that for you.

>>1507665

>implying I'm not always right

>>1507663
Admitting mental illness is the first step to recovery.

Aristophanes.

>>1507669
but why would i want to be cured?

haven't you heard? male-on-male love is the highest form of love in the world

or that's what the greeks beleived, and it's not as if they were the first real civilization on earth or anything

I'd call you pedantic, but using the word "pedantic" is pedantic.

OP said "writer," not "fiction writer." I can't believe nobody has mentioned Plato or Kant yet. My personal vote would go to Plato.

I do not, but only because I prescribe to the notion that Shakespeare was not real.

>>1505061
>a very original writer
>he stole everything from others except for the tempest

Nooo...

Maybe in the English language. Its hard to judge literature in other languages. Translations of Kafka rarely do justice.

> mfw this thread
Y'all can try and deny it, but you're just making your anxiety that more apparent.

>>1507680

i mentioned kant

no other writer in the history of the english language has made as big of an impact, and i would say that no other writer has conquered the stories of so many human virtues and vices as eloquently and cleverly. suck it.