/lit/ - Literature

Call of the Crocodile, by far

>>20544408

>>20544387
in the miso soup and the wasp factory, probably

>>20544387
Watt by Samuel Beckett

Die deutsche Gelehrtenrepublik (1774) by Klopstock. It's the equivalent of sci-fi but for art and culture.

>>20544387
Probably House of Dead Leaves, or that book of short stories by Michael Ende (Mirror in the Mirror I believe it's called )

>>20544387
this really old one, it's all told in flash back, like this guy is returning from a festival or something but because he's so famous these guys immediately kidnap him to steal his wisdom, they go to this guy's house where they ask this old man about whether he still has sex despite being old, and they ask the famous guy all about self-control and he goes on this long rant about how if you made a perfect country you'd create this elaborate chart that would tell people who to fuck, steal their children from them, and you'd ban all poetry that deals with anything bad. Oh, not only that but at the end there's like a Armenian mythology fan fic with a cameo by Ulysses where he descends into this spindle on a bed of rainbows or some LSD shit...no prizes for guessing the name now so ignore the last sentence, and the worst part is, half of the dialogue is just the other guy saying "that is so" "correct" "that would seem to be the case" which is mindlessly repetitive. It was weird shit and I could be wrong but I think it's name was an Ancient Greek work for "the household".

>>20544387

Book of tongues by Gemma Files
It's about a gay ex-priest outlaw that uses a bible to cast magic spells, and plans on sacrificing himself and his lover to an aztec goddess for immortality. It was pretty good.

Las aventuras de un novelista atonal by Alberto Laiseca or Psiconeurociencia II by Leonardo Stemberg.

>>20544387
madoka magica anime made me feel mentally ill

crossed out just means i read it not saying not to read it
>>20545352

https://www.burzum.org/eng/library/irminsul.shtml
More of a short pamphlet than a book, but the gist is that the Aryan race was created by spacefaring robots so that we could develop advanced technology and eventually travel through space ourselves, manipulating the position of black holes to stave off the collapse of the universe, giving the universal mind more time to contemplate its own purpose before it reincarnates in the next iteration of reality.

There’s a chart for this.

>>20545352
>>20545356
these are great, but weird and disturbing aren't the same thing

>>20545390
that is weird

His intention was to find the source of mankind's endless wars.
He found himself tracking down an extraterrestrial conspiracy, one he never wanted (or intended) to find.
His work is EXTREMELY well researched; the footnotes go on for dozens of pages.
He never wrote another book.

>>20544387
Naked Lunch. Dropped it because it was too weird and degenerate. It’s a shame because I can tell Burroughs is talented, he just misused it

"Ubik" by Philip K. Dick.
I can't even tell you what it's about, because it's not important.
It's how we writes it, and how the events unfold, that's important.

invisible cities is probably the weirdest that has literary merit

>>20547258
He wrote Jesus Goes to Hollywood midwit

Francis of the Filth

Durcheinandertal by Friedrich Dürrenmatt - no idea if it was ever translated into english...

>>20545390
Stupid neo nazi bullshit.

I read it in dutch, the English translation sucks because of cultural and linguistic differences.

>>20547267
thats not even the weirdest book with literary merit by Calvino (If on a winter's night), let alone the weirdest with merit amongst the collective Oulipo group.

>>20544387
this thread is strangely disappointing. Do most people on this board really only read stuff that they see posted online 100+ times? There are less than 5 books in this thread I haven't seen posted dozens of times. Here are my picks

My Tired Father by Gellu Naum
Autobiography written by a Romanian surrealist by doing cut-ups of American fashion magazines. great stuff, by far the best Surrealism work I've ever read

Pataphysical Essays by Rene René Daumal
Pataphysics is as far from Metaphysics as Metaphysics is from Physics.

Travesty by John Hawkes
Recit work about a guy driving a car with his wife, friend and daughter. The whole book is him explaining why hes going to smash the car into a wall and kill them all. It's a parody of Camus to an extent (Camus died by driving his car into a wall)

thats enough books for now I think.

>>20547262
>degenerate
Shut up you fucking nazi, quit being a little bitch

>>20548808
People on this board don't read

>>20548808
This is a problem everywhere, not just this board. Most people are not invested/intelligent enough to really dive deep into whatever they're into. They just enjoy whatever they see everyone enjoying.

>>20548877
I know that's normal for most things but I always get my hopes up that with the amount of autists on here who delve into the deepest reaches of seemingly every other hobby like video games music and TV/Movies that I'd find the same level of dedication on lit. Sadly this is barely better than Reddit ffs.

Read more obscure shit you dolts. It's obscure because it's good.

>>20548994
I agree but
>It's obscure because it's good.
kek...

>>20548994
I don't know about the TV and video game boards, but I can confidently tell you that on /mu/ hardly anyone listens to truly obscure music. I also disagree with you on everything obscure being good. Some stuff fails to go mainstream for a good reason. When going underground, you often find yourself wading through a good deal of shit just for a handful of gems.

>>20548808
>Travesty by John Hawkes
thanks, definitely going to check this one out

>>20549015
>>20549022
>You'll find yourself wading through a bunch of shit before finding hidden gems.

Not really true at all. Obscure for literature doesn't mean some random self published book that less than 5 people know exist like you seem to think it does. I read pretty much nothing but obscure books from publishers who pride themselves on publishing nothing but obscure works and virtually all of them are amazing. I can't remember a time I found an obscure book to try reading that sucked. Obscure doesn't mean random trash you find in a dumpster outside a library. It means little known works that most can't enjoy because it's too much for the average Marvel movie enjoyer.
But really though, you guys should work on finding actually good sources for little known works. I never find obscure books to be bad. They're good and obscure because they go against everything the lowest common denominator pleb enjoys. Same goes for music and movies too

>>20548821
Not a Nazi in the slightest. The book was over the top

>>20549419
>I read pretty much nothing but obscure books from publishers who pride themselves on publishing nothing but obscure works and virtually all of them are amazing
Can you give some recs

>>20549022
>When going underground, you often find yourself wading through a good deal of shit just for a handful of gems.
so literally the same as the mainstream and the midstream?

>>20549437
Wakefield Press is the best. My favorites from them are Book of Monelle, the Conductor and Other Tales, Cathedral of Mist, Pataphysical essays I rec'd above. Their whole catalogue is focused on these sort of forgotten gems.

Dedalus Books (not press that's different)
Atlas Press UK
Twisted Spoon Press
Snuggly Books

That's all I can remember for now but yeah, all those presses publish exclusively obscure and awesome literature.

>>20549419
I’m guessing you consider yourself a contrarian. Sometimes a piece of art becomes well known because many people enjoy it. Sometimes a book is obscure because it is trash. There aren’t too many hidden gems in the internet age anymore.

>>20549463
Thanks, will check them out

>>20549473
not contraian. I just recognize that popular works are popular because they appeal to a very wide amount of people which makes them sell well. Since I personally don't enjoy things that try their best to appeal to basically everyone such as Marvel movies and instead enjoy things which try to appeal to a very small subsection of people I do my best to share these things. Most of my favorite books, movies, anime, music etc are made without any thought given to the lowest common denominator of people, which makes them obscure. Hence why I say obscure stuff is the best.
This is why I find it sad that we don't have an aristocratic class anymore. When such things existed media often seemed to try its best to be the exact opposite of what the common man liked. Hence why great literature has fallen off in the 21st century.

>>20549473
>There aren’t too many hidden gems in the internet age anymore.
Oh, I wouldn't say that. If it's not on some google list, it can be pretty hard to find. Sure, it's out there, but it doesn't mean it's not hidden behind a wall of better known books.

>>20549627
You shouldn’t worry about liking or disliking something based on what others think. That’s just as bad as appealing to the common denominator. I would be extremely skeptical if a bonafide reader of literature didn’t like any of the greats. Not saying you have to like them all, but if you don’t like any books that are typically on the lit top 100, and are popular everywhere, I think you are more concerned on basing your opinion on others’ opinions instead of thinking for yourself

>>20549457
Yeah sorta. Ordinary people lack the ability to discriminate, so they enjoy both good and bad things alike.

Lukewarm but Cannibal by John Hawkes. Someone earlier mentioned Travesty which I haven’t read but the plot sounds even more fucked up

>>20548735
Oh that's cool. I have that on my ereader, but it's in english. I got distracted by other books, because I got the impression that the writing was somewhat juvenile. I wasn't aware that it was a translation. I know german and I'm learning dutch, so I'll definitely check it out in its original lanuage

Probably Call of the Crocodile. Nothing’s quite as weird as that book.

>>20544387
Watt by Samuel Beckett

>>20548674
lol. When jews get angry and spit insults you know it's something good. Thanks for convincing me to read it.

Even if it's Varg retardation there must be something to it if you hate it :)


>>20544387
This one is a meme but it's actually a really fun book. Not only is it it grotesquely surreal, it's the best lampoon of holocaust survivor narratives you'll ever read.

>>20549670
Believe it or not there are people who just don't like Marvel movie tier media and it has nothing to do with wanting to be contrarian. Your comment seems like projection. It's ok to like what everyone else does. But some people don't, and that's ok too.

>>20550074
John Hawkes is ridiculously unknown for how good he is. The Lime Twig is one of a very, very small list of books I've read that actually push the boundaries of the medium. The second person murder scene where its written as though you personally a raped/killing is just *chef's kiss*. Travesty is a much less complex read than Lime Twig but its still a lot of fun in its own way.

>>20551762
He never mentioned marvel movies, just renown literature

>>20545352
Opened this looking for Zombie by JC Oates and pleased to see it. I started reading that in a public library and couldn't put it down. I identified with the protag so much I was terrified by it.

That was the worst part. I'm not a psycho, sadist, homo, or rapist, but I have a lot of anger+alienation issues, and I so many superficial things in common with the character I felt it was about me. The idea was totally irrational, but I felt if anyone knew what I was reading they'd call the cops.


Pic related is the best book in the Burroughs collection of experimental fiction. It's the most mature and well-structured cut-up novel and contains the best of his wild scifi ideas. Naked Lunch isn't worth reading when this exists.

Geek Love: a novel

>>20552112
that definitely sounds interesting, thanks for the rec

>>20544408
You need to get a life.

>>20552130
>"Marvel movie tier media"
The most famous literature of all time is the same tier as Marvel movies, the most famous movies of all time. "Tier" refers to a general level of something in this case famous stories/narratives. Marvel movies are comparable to the most well known literature of all time because both achieved their renown in large part by appealing to the lowest common denominator of people.

62. A model kit

Finnegans Wake

bump

Call of the Crocodile

>>20555235
I am going to smash your dick with a hammer.

>>20554380
This you?