/lit/ - Literature

Pseud/5

>>15637943
As a non-buyer, allow me to participate

>>15637943
oioi Rabelais friends

>>15638083

The set by Gibbon is so god damn long.

It is worth it?

>>15638726
vol 1-3 is worth it, 4-6 was his publisher telling him to do byzantium for money. the everyman box set also is highly aesthetic

>>15638726
well if you're like me and you forget most of the stuff in the previous volume before you've even started the next one then probably no. The prose is good tho. I'll probably re-read it all in a couple years or so and like actually take notes and that

Jealous?

>>15638770
is that true? Bit of a shame if it is because I definitely liked the earlier parts where Rome was the main place of everything, and apart from maybe the very early Byzantine stuff, like Constantine moving to Constantinople, was, at least I felt it was, pretty fuckin boring if I'm honest. Only really starting picking up interest again when the Goths and Huns starting fucking everything up for the Romans.

>>15638796
Different anon, but I would say it depends on what you're reading the later volumes for. If you're prizing historical accuracy, there are defintely better and more recent books to get. That being said, if you enjoy Gibbon as a writer and a 'philosopher of history', they are defintely worth reading, as they do a very good job of showcasing Gibbon's beliefs and have played an extremely important role in shaping how we conceptualise Empires (ie, thinking about them in terms of rise/decline, virtue/corruption, ascetism/decadence and so on.)

>>15638804
Give me german recs please.

>>15638887
What are you looking for.

The last ones from a couple days. Currently on Eileen.

>>15639028
* The Ego and Its Own by Stirner
* Speedboat by Renata Adler
* Treatise on sacrifices by Joseph de Maistre
* Ramayana by Valmiki
* Eileen by Ottesa Moshfegh

Except for the last one all of them are in Spanish.

>>15637943
>The Power Broker
How based and red pilled anon

>>15637967
Here is your (You), now scurry back to r/books

>>15639133
based

>>15637943
Tropic of Cancer and End Zone are both really great

>>15637943
Lmao Caro and DeLillo on the same stack.

Don't read the Power Broker if you're sucking down garbage like Don. You'll be wasting your time.

>>15639795

I'll focus on the good, by post.

>>15637943
The Confidence Man is bizarre and seems to come out of nowhere in Melville's canon. I haven't made my mind up on it but it's certainly not a waste of time. Rabelias likely has plenty of value, if only via influence, but I've never perused. The Power Broker is absolutely permanently mind bending if you can read with a critical eye willing to pick out places where Caro is wrong or naive.

>>15638083
Which translator for Gogol? I highly recommend investing in the Penguin paperback translated by Robert Maguire, ace English scholar of Gogol. Grab Nabokov's Gogol biography as well, it's cheap.

>>15638804
I'm not qualified to comment on any of this but Camus, so I'll abstain.

>>15639133
That book on the bottom is not long for this world, make sure you hang onto it.

>>15639771
Dune the only worthwhile thing on this stack. The more time stretches between my Pynchon days and now, the more I decide that he's 'two people', and that the Vineland - present day (present time) author is an imitation of the one who wrote V. and Gravity's Rainbow.

>>15637943
Smol books mostly

>>15637943

>>15639871
I've got the Rayfield translation for Gogol, I did make a post a while back asking about the translation and it generally seemed like people thought this one was the best, or at least one of the best. I have actually read some of it, about, 125pgs, and there is definitely quite a lot of humour, especially when Chichikov starts getting angry at people for not wanting to sell him the souls, but overall I can't really say I enjoyed it too much. Definitely my fault though as I barely looked into the book at all, I didn't even fucking know all the people he visits were meant to be satires of the kinds of people who were knocking about in Russia at the time, all that I did know was that it was influential on early Dostoevsky and that he threw most of the second part up a chimney, and also because I had like three books that I'd wanted to read for ages come in just after I started Dead Souls, so I think just like subconsciously I saw it more as something in the way of better stuff, rather than really getting into it and actually looking at it for what it was. I mean like yeh I will most definitely give it another go in like a couple months or so and hopefully like it more without the distractions and now that I know more about what the book actually is.

>>15639981

I don't know how much I recommend leaning on cariactures to derive enjoyment. Gogol is distinctly Russian, with less of the universalism that has made Dostoevsky a cornerstone in the English speaking west. If you didn't immediately enjoy it [Dead Souls], you may be better served exploring other pastures. Otherwise, consider trying The Government Inspector or The Overcoat. Both are far shorter and retain the features that make Gogol Gogol. But one could spend a lifetime on Dostoevksy alone, so if he speaks to you more directly, pursue that instead.

On the flip side, your stack is fairly diverse. Not everyone has to be the Russian literati. Ignore what others tell you to like, chase what sparks your brain ruthlessly.

>>15640075
Yeh, like I said I'll definitely try reading it again in the near future, every book deserves a second chance and that, especially one this important and influential. Also, I'm thinking that going forward with Gogol, and probably just Russian lit in general, that instead of the English I might read the Polish translations, as I've recently started to get my Polish back reading Reymont's Chłopi, which is pretty decent and very comfy, but also very pretty fuckin slow plot wise; because apparently Polish, and I think just generally Slavic translations of Russian, are meant to be a lot more accurate and close to the original than the English ones are. Obviously being more accurate doesn't automatically mean the better, but it'd be good to see how differently Russian is translated between the two languages.

>>15639871
>present day (present time)
hahahahahaha

>>15639871
Mien Kampf question - what do you mean?

Finished the republic, it was good. Liking the forest so far

>>15638900
Good German works from the end of ww2 up to the present day.

>>15637943
How's that Hubbard?

Getting to the middle of Stoner
Feeling so bad about what's going on with his wife and daughter

>>15639871
Nobody asked you.

I haven't bought books in months lads, I feel so incomplete

>>15638788
I don't see Invisible Man

>>15639871
interesting, i thought Dune was the one id catch shit for. with Pynchon ive read Mason & Dixon, V., and Crying of Lot 49 but Bleeding Edge has turned out to be one of the most enjoyable reads for me so far.

>>15640311
nice

>>15640610
have you read all the books you own yet? if not this is the perfect time to make a dent in your backlog

>>15640653
I've read about 2/3rds of the few hundred I own, but my reading has ground to a screeching halt during quarantine.

>>15640458
It's a controversial book written by the bad man - it's being pulled from shelves and censored as we speak. I don't think it should be taboo to read the works of anyone. Don't we have adages about "know your enemies", etc? But that's the world we're in now.

>>15640603
They did.

>>15640639
Dune has great stuff in it, Herbert did his homework and had legitimate ideas to explore. The later novels turning into utter garbage doesn't undo the first (or second, or even third) novels.

I thought Mason and Dixon had its moments. I didn't find much memorable in Bleeding Edge, just more of the same #mysteryteam he's been on with smaller novels since Lot 49 (which I also find dull). De Gustibus, though.

>>15640662
you can always turn that around

Red pill me on the power broker

>>15640681
Citation for removal of books like Mein Kampf? Sounds dubious

>>15640836
Search around. The cries to get rid of such books have been around for a long time, but the historical slant has always been enough to stop it. The Fabian strategy works slowly!

But this was before June 2020 in America. Reading the double-speak of "approved editions", "critical editions", etc, is important. The filter of what qualifies as, and who chooses, an "approved edition" is a narrow and specific bottleneck.

I don't have a copy myself.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/mar/16/amazon-bans-sale-of-most-editions-of-adolf-hitlers-mein-kampf

>>15640721
you can redpill yourself by reading it

>>15640593
As a person with a bad mother, traped in my house, The Bell Jar hit me hard, one of my favorites, I loved it. I've never felt so akin to he protagonist.

>>15639028
Eileen was quite good for contemporary lit

>>15641505
I was going to read that first but Stoner came in the mail ahead of it. I might have to wait a bit before reading The Bell Jar because I'm not doing well and just getting through Stoner is rough.

>>15639871
I forget where I read it, but I came across a note from a guy who hung out with Pynchon back in the day after V. but before GR. apparently Pynchon was working on three books about America at once, and said that which ever one he finished first he'd probably be remembered for.

My theory is that he was writing GR, Mason&Dixon, and Against the Day, which would explain why everyone says they feel like "Old Pynchon"

This is old but I found it while looking through old photos and I think it looks good

>>15642623
small, basic stack. comfy nonetheless

Starting to get into English poetry.

>>15642648
what did you think of mary liver? I recently read her poetry collection 'dog songs' and liked it.

>>15640629
cuz its invisible stupid

>>15642672
*oliver

just got these yesterday

>>15642672
I haven't got too far into it yet, but it's been pretty good so far. I got it as sort of a companion piece to The Ode Less Traveled to help me better understand meter and form. And for that purpose, it's been great.

Rate my stack /lit/

>>15642829
I take Ready Player One of my shelf when I'm sharing pictures

>>15638804
Heine is great. Not a native German speaker here, but I've been speaking and reading for about 6 years. Heine's Bucher der Lieder was the first thing I read.

>>15642829
Who's your favorite Japanese author? I've only read Schoolgirl and No Longer Human by Dazai.

>>15642648
>>15642772
I read reviews saying the Oliver books were very mechanical and schematic, but damn if I don't need something just like that. I read Nabokov's Notes on Prosody in high school to try to make an objective system of evaluating poems.

>>15642747
Watt is still considered early Beckett though it is very enjoyable but kind of a dive if one isn't familiar with his pre-WW2 style. Molloy is a really great read, especially the catalogue/list sections that are a clear carryover from the early novels, even more enjoyable than in Watt. Make sure to read his short stories from this era too.

>>15642866
Gotta be Hayao Miyazaki to be honest man. The Nausicaa series is amazing.

>>15640593
oof, bell jar. my heart fucking broke the more i read it.

>>15642829
that Ogawa novel whips. also what's up with that Dune edition?

>>15639967
boring. try cultivating your own interests instead of just buying every book on a /lit/ chart

>>15642931
...but isnt that how cultivating your own interests work though? you have to start from somewhere

This all came on the mail, the stuff in the foreground

>>15643041
>secondary sources

>>15643076
if you applied that to ancient history you'd soon find very little to work with, most of what we have is secondary

>>15643076
A lot of ancient philosophy only exists as secondary accounts. Same for most ancient literature I think. But yeah secondary sources on philosophy are not so concerned with the philosophy itself but instead the progression in history of philosophy and usually mean there’s some personal interpretation involved which can take away from the philosophers original concepts.
I’m not reading these by themselves, but they are interesting to me anyway because of the Christian interpretation

>>15643041
In the background, what's the book above Siddhartha?

>>15641689
I'm loving it, it reminds me of The Bell Jar, the new one, year of rest and relaxation, is it good?

>>15641784
I would take into consideration that, but, keep in mind some people, like me, felt less traped and got a sense of empathy, some folks say is good, others bad for depression, it varies. Which literary is good.

>>15642929
Same :-/ -> >>15641505

>>15642829
You seem like someone who reads books so he doesn't look like an anime fan

>>15642747
kind of jealous you have The Castle coming up

I've only read The Trial and The Castle... not sure where to go next? Amerika? Short Stories? Metamorphosis?

>>15644061
I have a confession, its my first kafka

>>15643849
downloaded Hunger by Hamsun the other day. Are his other works any good?

>>15644114
Yes I'd particularly recommend Mysteries, Growth of the Soil and Wayfarers, but basically all the others too, except this one seemingly; i'm only half way through but it's not doing it for me.

>>15642747
Best here but I don't stan Eagles
>>15643041
Pretty good. I love Loebs.
>>15643849
Not sure about this one.

>>15640494
not that german anon, but i highly recommend Ernst Jüngers later works, especially Eumeswil and Heliopolis. His short stories are good too.

>>15640469
How's that Aitmatov book? Is the style post-modern or more like sci-fi?

Bought today

>>15638788
>no dr. Little
>no dr. Beck

>>15639881
Gotta give you credit for having something other than classics.
>>15642829
>Ready Player One
>Murakami
>Stephen King
>Basketball
>Dune
Is this picture from reddit?
>>15639967
You really swallowed the meme, didn't you?
>>15643041
Copleston is great.

>>15643849
God tier stack

>>15644061

Definitely read Amerika very underrated Kafka

>>15638788
Is this the stroke dad black anon?
How’s your pop doing?

>>15638083
Hyperion is amazung

>>15639871
>pick out places where Caro is wrong or naive
Like what? I'm about to read Power Broker and know nothing else on the Topic, Caro would be only source

>>15637943
are you talking about the one near penn?

>>15638788
Based James Baldwin reader.>>15638788

>>15646668
yeh, I mean I did read the prologue a good few months ago, problem was that there were so many made up sci-fi words, that were literal gobbledegook, that I just lost interest completely. Maybe you can sell me on it tho and I'll come back to it sooner than I would on my own.

>>15645245
Pretty good. Not far into it though. I guess the style is more in line with sci-fi but I’m not an expert on either style to be honest

>>15643849
Don’t recognize these books. How are they?

>>15637969
based and calibrepilled

Rate, call me a fag, etc. The brown book is a Douay-Rheims Bible that I bought used a while ago, it said "The Holy Bible" on it but it long since faded away.
>>15637943
>>15638804
>>15640593
>>15642623
Respectable
>>15638083
>>15642747
Very respectable
>>15638788
A little too fixated on race
>>15639028
>Ramayana
Based and epicpilled
>>15639133
Captain Underpants was my jam back in the day
>>15639771
Luv Dune
Simple as
>>15639881
...huh
>>15639967
Boring /lit/ pseud
>>15640469
Those look really comfy
>>15642648
Mere Christianity is a good read
>>15643041
>Loeb editions of Aristotle
PAINFULLY BASED
>>15643849
Don't know any of these but the bottom one has a nice spine
>>15645422
Nice. How old are these?

>>15646876
>The Women At The Pump
Honestly the weakest of Hamsun's works I've read yet (i've read nearly all of his work). Half way in, it's his well trod themes of the earnest, lonely romantic, struggling in changing world, but done better elsewhere and without much new.

>The Loser
Not read more than a few pages yet but looks set to be another entertaining, exaggeratedly cynical rant, this time about piano virtuosos. Have read Woodcutters and Extinction and would recommend both, but not sure I could reliably advise where to start with Bernhard yet. I'll confess that Bernhard's characters are often too well versed in high-culture for me to fully appreciate, and I anticipate this one being 'worse' than some of his other works in that regard.

>The Hotel Years
Untouched. This is a series of observational newspaper pieces from Germany in the years leading up to WW2. have read other work in a similar vein (The White Cities, What I Saw) which have been astute, charming and lyrical. Would highly recommend Roth's most famous work, The Radetzky March, a military coming-of-age novel in Austria-Hungary pre-WW1.

>The Tanners
untouched. Have only read one other Walser novel (Jakob Von Gunten) which was a lot of fun but also very emotive in a hard-to-describe way. Author has an enthralling, tragic life story.

>Diary of a Man in Despair
Untouched. from what I understand it's the (non-fictional) diary of a aristocratic, conservative German during Hitler's ascendancy, distraught at what is happening to his country.

>Seeing Like a State
Yale prof somewhat known for his anti-state position. Intensely interesting case studies about some of man's disastrous attempts to centralise/regulate/normalise complex spheres of life i.e. rural communities, agriculture, forestry, planned cities.

>>15647287
Thanks for going into so much detail man. I really appreciate it.

>>15646955
>Based and epicpilled
Thanks fren.

>>15646692
Also interested - without an encyclopedic knowledge of 20th century NYC history and laws/regulations etc. I'd find it difficult to dispute Caro's positions.

I read about half of the power broker, but put it down for a week or two's break and never picked it up again (despite enjoying it).

Wondering if I have a chance at picking it up again as opposed to starting afresh.

Anyone has read Tao Te Ching?

I’m honestly wondering if I should buy it. Lately I’ve been interested in spiritual stuff.

>>15647467
I just picked it up again. It's a weighty book, it feels powerful.

>>15646249
What do you have against basketball?

>>15646955
>those look really comfy
They are

>>15647475
It's definitely worth a read. I'm a little biased though, I like aphorism-based philosophy. Addiss' version is a good translation. I picked it up for a freshman philosophy gen-ed and I've kept it ever since.

Spic stack

>>15649098
Spic stack pt. deux
I got a really sweet deal on the complete works of Kafka

>>15649098
Best non 2666 Bolano books?

>>15649118
for me it's:
Amuleto
Estrella distante
La literatura nazi en America
(I don't really know the translated titles, srry bb)
collected short stories

>>15649098
>>15649109
más que basado

>>15649109
Sospechosamente parecen stacks de Colombia

Moving onto some classics right now

>>15649620
Those are free
https://standardebooks.org/ebooks?query=austen

>>15649671
Why go for an online version when you can hold it in your hands?

>>15649593
Lo son.
Hay uno que otro negro en /lit/.

>>15638083
10/10 stack
no grizzle
all quality choices, fren

>>15649818
Yo casi siempre estoy aqui, onions de Mexico, no nací aqui pero no llamaría casa al otro país donde nací. Hay dos o tres mexicanos mas. Mi stack es el otro en español.

>>15642829
Murakami is a shit writer for midwits.

>>15650025
Onions de México...como diablos lo corrigió a onions.

>>15649847
cheers mate

>>15639967
Thanks for the laugh, anon