/lit/ - Literature

>>4280205
Two months? You're doing fine. Just continue reading good books, if you need to check out the wikia link in the sticky for new recommendations.

>>4280205
>How am i doing so far ?
shit
>How do i continue from here?
go away. and don't return

That's a pretty good list. Do you feel you're "getting" everything that's going on?

>>4280210
0/10 Seriously, just kill yourself.

For a beginner, OP, you're fine. The recommendation lists on the wiki will help you a lot right now. Be sure that you're actually getting something out of these books, not speeding through them to make your bookshelf-- and, by extension, cock-- bigger.

>>4280242
How do you know if you're getting enough out of books?

I'm a new reader myself. Still struggling with more subtle incomprehension but it'll come.

>>4280242
not OP but also newfag. How do you know if you're "getting something out of" a book?

>>4280205
You read a book called "Philip Roth" by a man named "Goodbye, Columbus"?
why do authors do this I hate it

>>4280222
>>4280242
Well, i have plenty of free time so that's how i've read so much in just two months.

I also like writing a small essay after reading each book with my opinions, views etc.

The most challenging books so far were lolita and the castle. The reason i make this post is that i want recommendations "challenging" books.

Sorry for my english.

>>4280266
Is English not your first language?

>>4280260
>>4280256
Hey, op here.
My suggestion is to start writing a journal about your thoughts on defferent subjects(religion, ethics, politics, sex etc) and also start writing notes while you read the book.
Then after finishing the book write down what you liked most and critisize the main characters.

This has helped me a lot.

>>4280269
yes, it's not. I'm a greekfag.

>>4280256
>>4280260
Part of this depends on what you want to get out of a book. It would do you well to read up on different approaches to lit criticism / studies. These will show you certain ways of reading and extracting meaning from a text, but it ultimately has to be for you.

>>4280266
That's really cool to write essays for each book, but I'm assuming that it's very impressionistic. Same with the other guys, an intro to lit crit might help you.

>>4280291
>It would do you well to read up on different approaches to lit criticism / studies

can you suggest any good resources?

9/10

>>4280297
Texts and Contexts by Steven Lynn
It's a small textbook. It'll give you a nice overview of lit crit since the New Critics. There's further reading if you want to really dig into someone Lynn talks about.

Well as long as you're enjoying it.

>>4280222
i'm a newfag to reading for fun as well

how to increase my "getting it"s from reading?

All I can do is try to think of symbolism and themes and motifs and shit and then I read sparknotes/wikipedia to see if I miss anything

So far in your life? And all of that in just two months? Are there really people who don't read a single book in their life until they happen to wander to 4chan's /lit/ and decide to get cultured? Although my serious reading hobby of course started as an adult, I've read dozens of books, fiction and non-fiction alike since I learned how to read. I'm just wondering...

>>4281717
Well, first of all i'm 21yo.

And yes, the first novel i've ever read was two months ago and it was The Great Gatsby. This happened after i watched the movie.

I'm a college student in a fairly good faculty of the university which in order to get in you have to read a lot in your teenage years. I don't know how the educational system works in the US.

So i've never read any novels. My main source of entertainment were video games and movies. So i stopped playing any kind of games and started reading which is pretty helpful imo.

New stories = New ideas. New ideas = better life. That's how im seeing it.

Again , sorry for my english.

Try reading with a backlit screen and with a voice reader like IVONA. It will speed up your shit.

Some people just can't read normal paper, especially people with thick dark eyes, ive noticed.

Read more, read faster. This is pathetic. Don't post your list before you've read 100 books. You just make yourself look like a child.

>>4281777
Read Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.

>>4280205
you dont have a job do you

>>4281794
You say that like it's a bad thing

>>4281788
I'm reading this right now (not OP). its pretty boring and I always catch myself daydreaming and getting to the end of the page saying "what did I just read." Is his other work like this? I'm gonna power through Portrait of the Artist but I'm not sure I can muster another of these novels

>>4281802
Really? If this isn't a troll, I honestly feel sorry for you. I suppose . . . try to read it again?

>>4281794
No i don't. As i said i'm a college student and currently the college is closed so i have a 16 hours every day to do whatever i want.

>>4281786
this much projection

>>4281802
>not liking Joyce

>>4281824
Whats true for me is true for everyone.

So you read these 18 books over 60 days? What's the point? You're just cramming a book in every three days and within a year it won't matter because you'll forget all about them. Even with your "essays" it's really hard to imagine you're getting much out of this.

>>4281842
Well, if he has written his thoughts on each, he can always go back and look.

It's really not that hard either, sure he might forget all the plot details, but it's not hard to remember the themes ect

There's also the fact, that not every book is worth spending a lot of time on, maybe you don't enjoy it for example, or the ideas within.

I do somewhat understand what you're trying to say though. But it seems to me that he's at least reflecting on what he's read, which is more than can be said about many people who first start reading.

I was NEET for a time a while back, and with little else to do, i read quite a lot, within a short time, but i still feel as if i got just as much out of it as taking my time, now that i have responsibilities

>>4280265

>implying authors have any say whatsoever in the covers of their books

>>4280205

You need some Dosteyevsky (Notes; Karamasov);

also, if you liked Machiavelli, you could try other political "philosophers" - Plato, Hobbes, Rousseau; it will certainly give you some perspectives...

>>4281842
It doesn't really matter. Whether he reads a book in three days or a year, it probably won't make a difference. I still read books really slowly. Kafka's Trial alone took me three weeks, and yet I feel like I don't get much out of reading. I can never be introspective, and whatever book I read, however great, never leaves much to be desired. Whether I write an essay about it or not won't change a thing, because I am a very shallow person, who lives in the now and can never look past what I see.

Maybe it is a mental thing, I don't know.

>>4281837
Joyce is a cunt, and his style of writing makes me daydream as well.

>>4284561
Why is he a cunt?