/lit/ - Literature

that spine's not gonna hold out

>>19190406
I just ordered this the other day, can't wait to read it after finishing my other books
Why read an abridged version when I can just read a synopsis of a book?
I either read unabridged or I don't read the book at all

>>19190406
It’s usually worth it. I’m going through Les Miserables now and while Proust is better at digressions, I wouldn’t want to miss Hugo’s brilliant moments, even one or two lines. Pic related: 800 page BOMBER.

>>19190406
Ngmi

>>19190406
Never. My favorite book is as long as/longer than (depending on formatting it seems) W&P and I've read it twice, plan to read it again soon, and hope to read it at least 10 times in my life. Is it too much work for you, to engage in a your hobby? Maybe it's not your hobby. Maybe you're only cut for binging entire series' of poorly produced TV dramas.

>>19190406
When they were originally serialized since they tend to have been padded out to maximize $

i read this edition

one of the best reading experiences of my life

truly one of the works that makes you marvel at humanity

tolstoy is next level

>>19190417
>>19190431
>>19190454
>just read the whole thing, bro

>>19190406
I want to read the war and peace but I just finished the Count of Monte Cristo and I don't feel like reading a long book after a long book.

>>19190499
If you only read long books then it doesn't make a difference. Anything <600 pages is like a novella to me now.

Never
I refused to be filtered

>>19190513
filtered

>>19190406
Obviously never.
Just read plot summary if you can't be bothered.

>>19190406
I would only read an abridged version if I thought the book wasn't going to be very good. And if I thought the book wasn't going to be good I wouldn't read it. Unabridged only, my friend. I read War & Peace about five years ago and it's the only book from that time I still think about. Incredible novel.

>>19190406
I read the Signet Classic version. One of the best reading experiences I have had.

>>19190495
When I was a young child, I used to think that judaism was a simpler and smaller language because they only had part of the bible.

>>19190586
*religion

The Talmud is the oldest version of 'the left can't meme' and 'wall of text'.

>>19190406
I don't read.

>>19190495
it's fucking astonishing just how much schizo rambling is in there. Theres also a lot of mundane law debates and then the rabbis tell a story about the other rabbi being so assblasted that he burns everything he sees with his laser eyes. Its hilarious

>>19190619
Law doesn't count, the US Legal Code has 53 volumes (still not that large compared to some countries) and if you'd include all schizo ramblings about it it would fill libraries.

Novels this big should be sliced in 2 or 3 tomes.

>>19190495
you probably don't think I'm human, but I can seriously respect the aesthetic of this. Are these antiquarian or do you have tribesmen commission them?

>>19190495
Oy Vey!

>>19190406
war and peace is not worth that much reading

>>19190732
>sliced
Someone bought me Cormac's Border Trilogy in one volume and I was forced to get out the Stanley knife.

>>19190744
>you probably don't think I'm human
i-i don't think you're subhuman, goy-kun.

>>19190406
>abridged version

JOKE:
"Complete and unabridged, with an introductory essay by Literally Who."

BROKE:
Reader's Digest Condensed Books Are Proud To Present

WOKE:
Wikipedia: "This plot summary is excessively detailed."

BESPOKE:
youtube dot com forward slash movie trailer

>>19190411
But those butt cheeks though! oooh mama...

The only time I read abridgements is for massive 3 volume biographies of figures I am interested in but not enough to read thousands of pages about. It was a common trend at the time to release a one volume abridgement and quite often the abridgement is done well enough that it works just as well as most one volume biographies today. Reading an abridged novel is dumb, either read the whole thing or don't read it at all. I'm glad the ridiculous trend of abridging novels (often without even stating it is abridged in the book!) has almost completely died out.

Specifically I can't imagine an abridgement of War & Peace done well. The Bondarchuk film version really suffered from cutting out the "less important" plotlines and characters

>>19190813
There are heretics that listen to abridged audiobooks.

>>19190854
at 2.7x speed while doing other mentally demanding tasks

>>19190856
Then say that they "read" Moby Dick.

>>19190406
I read the Anthony Briggs translation a couple years back. Took me about a month and some concerted effort, but it was a good read. There's no point in reading an abridged version for this book, it's not necessarily the story, but the atmosphere the whole thing breathes. Reading an abridged version would detract from the charm of the novel (if one even exists, I'm not concerned enough to see if it's a troll post or not). While reading it I vividly remember a weird dream where I was carrying the book with me everywhere and I dropped it in a diarrhoea filled toilet when I was up to the last few pages, and I was trying desperately to salvage it but each time I kept fumbling with the book and it would drop into the poo filled loo more and more severely until people were prying me away from the toilet and telling me to leave it and that it's disgusting. I woke up terribly panicked that this had actually taken place and I'd need to get another copy, until I saw the book on my bedside table. All was right.

>>19190411
Can confirm, the spine for this version will get fucked even if you try be careful. Doesn't matter, anyone who has books for the aesth*tics of having a book is a woman-brain

>>19190423
I preferred les mis over Proust, I've only read Swann's way but Chr*st that was painful to get through
>600 pages of some guy simping over a 5/10
>Lesbian scene?
>Guy writes a piano song???
>No one dies in the whole thing (author was a sheltered faggot?)

>>19190576
What is it like to be forced to read translations of everything you want to read lol

>>19190411
It'll hold anon, it'll hold

>>19191007
>spine is only broken in a third of the way through
are you sure though?

>>19190461
The Netflix of their day.

>>19190406
You fugged up, not the authors fault

>>19190406
never. I read the whole thing, or not at all

>>19190406
I really enjoy russian literature but I have been reluctant in reading Tolstoy because of his retarded views on Christianity. Does his ideological retardation leak in the books? If I'm in the middle of one these enormous books and read something about Jesus' miracles not being real or anything about anarchy I'll just throw the thing out of the window.

>>19191111
>blue
>light up keyboard
>watch
>shitty pelican books
Lame

>>19191231
Dont be a precious little snowflake and read bitch

>>you know i'd really like to expand my horizons and get a basic understanding of indian mythology
>here's the starter kit, bro

>>19191039
It may not last two more reads but I slogged that book around in my bag and would flatten it out at the beginning like a caveman when I first started reading it.

Around the Christmas scene is when I treated it as I should.

>>19191231
I mean Jesus wasn't real period so maybe you need to read more.

>>19190406
The Penguin spanish edition is actually abridged I think, lel

>>19191678
All the leading scholars of theology, regardless of their affiliation, agree that Jesus existed.

>>19191255
>Talking to other people is lame
>Backlit keyboard at night is lame
>Owning a watch is lame
>Books are lame
I bet people are glad when they meet you

>>19191003
Fine?

>>19190406
In reading one volume of 3 about Stalin that’s about that long(although the last 300 pages are all notes and references).

To whoever sold me on reading the unabridged version of The Count of Monte Cristo, claiming that it's way better, I just want to say, you were wrong and that book is like half filler

>>19190586
Rabbinic “Judaism” has almost nothing to do with the religion practiced by Jews in the Bible.

should I read w&p or anna karenina first bros
keep in mind i'm a miserably depressed person with zero confidence

>>19190619
>tfw you realize Jews invented the entire industry of psychology because they couldn’t keep up with the demand for people willing to sit and listen to their schizo ramblings

>>19190732
That’s what Tolkien did with LoTR

>>19191678
You’re not real

>>19191007
>reading translations

>>19191534
Indians don’t even read all that shit. I’m pretty convinced that all of “Eastern Spirituality” was concocted by American Jews in the 1950’s

>>19193080
>learning a new language to read a novel

>>19193094
>He doesn't speak Russian, English, German, French, Danish, Dutch, Swedish, Spanish, Italian, Latin and Hebrew at a native speaker level

>>19193094
>learning a new language to read a novel

>>19193099
I speak Russian English and Hebrew and a native speaker level

>>19191534
I'm currently reading the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita. Is this worth reading after? Or should I move on the Buddhist /lit/ instead?

Also, at this point should I just read the abridged versions of the mahabarata and ramayana if I do read them at all?

Like this shit always happens. I'm like halfway through Eknath's translation of the Upanishads, and I was recently gifted the Oxford Classics by Olivelle. And it's like shit, I'm don't feel like re-reading the Oxford version from the beginning, but at the same time, I heard it's much better. Would it be worth it to drop the Eknath version and to re-read Olivelle from scratch?

>>19193100

>>19191007
>unfinished

>>19193044
Anna Karenina

>>19191111
jesus christ how horrifying

>>19190406
In Russia, part of the school curriculum in literature. So all Russian school graduates should theoretically read. I don't know how many percent actually read from cover to cover. I read.
The book is quite diverse in topics (girls flip through chapters about the war and read about balls and salons, boys vice versa) so I don’t remember that it seemed to me very difficult reading.
But it is too early for schoolards (it's about 15-16 years old) to read this.

never? why would you want to read something at all if youre going to skip so much of it? are you reading just to tell people youve read it or something?

>>19193083
it came from the ancient Aryans who founded the eastern civilisations in prehistory.

>>19190495
Is this Ben Shapiro's shelf?

>>19192784
I don't know where this habit of criticizing people like this comes from but it's swept over 4chan in the past couple years really badly. Even after 2016 people would only comment if they saw a bunch of /d/ tabs open in your browser or a bottle of lube on your desk, or creepy anime coomer figures. Now you get shit talk for your brand of shoes or the rim of your glasses and other retarded irrelevant shit. I see it often and it's fucking weird. It is feminized zoomers who do this?

>>19190495
based steinschmetz poster

>>19193099
>speak
>at a native level
Speaking in a language and reading in a language are two different skills. Consider the average burger or bong who gets filtered by 19th ce Victorian English.

>>19190495
what's gayer, talmud or catholarp ramblings and decrees? both are absolute schizotard garbage. and these niggas have the audacity to diss the book of mormon lol.

>>19193676
catholicism is better becaause its less jewish

>>19193617
all sorts of psyops going on, even among the general population. most people are fucked in the head in some way

>>19193111
>>19193119
Nobody here as read them to answer your question.

>>19193009
Dude that second volume of that is so fucking gooooood. Super interesting stuff.

>>19193588
Ben can't read. So it's likely.

>>19193737
Indeed, it's actually 0% Jewish because they turned away from the God of Abraham for the sake of idolizing a prophet.

>>19190840
>found an old used copy of Three Musketeers for $3 at a tiny bookstore in fuckall nowhere when a friend and I took a wrong turn off the highway
>read it, it's alright, don't see the hype
>looking it up online, there are lots of characters and famous plot beats that didn't appear in my copy at all
>realise after extensive googling that I found a really obscure abridged version
Fucking gay. I should have known one of literature's most famous and influential stories would be more than 200 pages long.

Just get a hardcover

>Shakespeare: "brevity is the soul of wit"
Meanwhile, in Germany...

>>19190406
There's a lot of books I'm interested in but am too intimidated to start, pic related

>>19190411
I just put clear packing tape over the big books to keep their spines together.

>>19195005
> Thinks Jesus was a prophet

Oy Vey! How much for a night with your shiksa?

>>19193009
> Waiting for Hitler

Cummie cope. If only that faggot hadn't been a stupid, naive little bitch who let Nazis get the drop on him. Russia could have ruled the whole continent

>>19190495
I get you guys all hate Jews and everything but put that aside for a second to recognize this is actually kinda Based

>>19190749
>>19193588
Is this funny or just the rhum?

Is War and Peace usually sold in just one volume in English? Here in Finland, it's traditionally sold in four separate volumes. Much easier and more pleasant to read

>>19190406
Why would anyone read an abridged version of War and Peace of all novels? The entire point in reading W&P is savouring its length, and as an achievement. An abridged version is fucking chickenshit. Go read Tolstoy's short stories if you don't want to read something big.

>>19195103
this
If I see another Don Quixote paperback im gonna fucking strangle someone

>>19195437
I think at some point in time american publishers decided to almost never divide books into volumes. I have a 2 volume War and Peace from the 60s, but whenever I'm in Barnes and Noble they are always single-volume.

>>19195732
>NOOOO BOOKERINOS ARE LIKE FUNKOPOPS
>NOT A HECKIN PAPERBACK! THEY'RE NOT COLLECTIBLE!!!
Stop being a whiny faggot

>>19195753
Strange, I'd guess those huge books would be a pain to read. Pic related are my four-volume War and Peace and two-volume Anna Karenina.

Forgot pic

>>19195788
>I'd guess those huge books would be a pain to read

It's easy enough to get around. What I find strange is that publishers could make more money by splitting it into many volumes, and yet they don't.

>>19195765
This ain't Fight Club. Some people like their stuff.

>>19195840
I haven't read or watched fight club so that reference is entirely lost on me. Explain what you mean in words that don't assume knowledge of quote unquote popular culture, since it's surprisingly not as popular as you think.

>>19191111
Check out this guy's cum collection on his desk.

>>19195847
no u

>>19195765
It just makes sense to buy a hardcover for larger books retardo
The more you read a paperback, the more dirty and bent the spine gets. A 1000+ page paperback would be fucked on the second read through.

Not even a long book considering it's fiction op, you could read that within two weeks easily

I plan on getting pic related when I get round to reading War and Peace.

>>19195115
You think that book is trying to be witty?

>>19195235
>We are fifty or a hundred years behind the advanced countries. We must make good this distance in ten years. Either we do it, or we shall be crushed.

>>19195984
I already own two copies of W&P but that edition tempts me every time I see it

I accidentally read abridged Count of Monte Cristo when I was younger
it was fine, but reading the real version later was amazing

>>19193009
The notes and bibliography in those books are absolutely terrifying, triple columned and they go on for longer than most novels. Kotkin certainly did his homework.

>>19193561
I wish Aryans were still here, man.

>>19196105
As long as some of the blood remains in Europe and in the americas they canberecreated later through eugenics programs.

>>19196175
Israel will keep everyone's blood. they're a bunch of fuggin weirdos.

>>19196175
>Europe
Nah, they're semitic in spirit and now by blood too pretty much.

>>19196013
How autistic are you?

>>19195765
They are collectible, and you can pass them down to your kids.

>>19195103
Is that a tome 1? Edition I was looking to buy has two tomes of abotu that size
>>19195765
My gluebound hardcover Don Quixote is doing alright
My papeback Count of Monte Cristo and Les Miserables not so much