/lit/ - Literature

I would bet more than half of those books lie unread and unfinished.

>treating erotica like literature

You do realise that this is on par with getting depressed about a PornHub video having more views than some obscure art film, right?

sex selling more than magic boys, why is this a surprise?

>>5308955
>shaded
>harry potter

i really don't care that one badly written popular piece of shit has sold more than another badly written popular piece of shit
plebs gonna pleb

>>5308992
>badly written
do you even read HP? or do you just sit on here shit posting all day long, circle jerking over 'classics' that have been approved by your neckbeard peers

>>5308983
Before the inevitable shitstorm this bitch causes

>>5308983
Harry Potter is not an obscure art book. It'd be more like being depressed that a PornHub video is more popular than, say, the Harry Potter movies

>>5309001
Am I allowed to say I like the tripfag

i read the first 4 books when i was on holiday with my family and that's all i had available because my cousin had brought them
they were pretty fun but not exactly great literature

seriously who gives a fuck what children's books or housewife erotica people read? of course it's gonna be disposable shit, and of course it's going to be shittier than war & peace or whatever

most people want easily disposable shit with simple plots and wish fulfillment, not great literature with amazing prose and insight
big whoop

>>5308983
>harry potter
>obscure

its more on par with some porn video having more views than star wars

>>5309009
whoops, forgot quotes, that was a response to >>5308997

>>5309002
People complain about Fifty Shades being more popular than better literature all the time. I was just broadening the opinion of the OP. But yeah, sure, your comparison works too.

>>5308997
Lel not the guy you are responding to but
"Ineluctable modality of the visible: at least that if no more, thought through my eyes."
And
"A screaming comes across the sky. It has happened before, but there is nothing to compare it to now.

It is too late. The Evacuation still proceeds, but it's all theatre. There are no lights inside the cars. No light anywhere. Above him lift girders old as an iron queen, and glass somewhere far above that would let the light of day through. But it's night. He's afraid of the way the glass will fall--soon--it will be a spectacle: the fall of a crystal palace. But coming down in total blackout, without one glint of light, only great invisible crashing."
Are good writing not
"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense."

>>5308955
Develop a superiority complex and view the world as a madhouse that testifies to your glory.

>>5309013
Addressed here: >>5309017.

>>5309022
sounds good, but the facts dont lie. complexity =/= superior writing

>>5309029
If you think the second example is complex you should probably kill yourself.

>>5309044
>if you think the second example is complex you should probably kill yourself
im actually an editor for penguin books, over 300 confirmed books published...

>this pound of shit sells more than that pound of shit

The angels are weeping.

>>5309022
>"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much. They were the last people you'd expect to be involved in anything strange or mysterious, because they just didn't hold with such nonsense."

>quoting the very first book of the series
>a book that was LITERALLY targetted at middle schoolers

as the subjects of the books became more mature, so did the writing. either as a way for the children to grow up with the books, or because she felt she needed to target an older audience. go read half-blood prince, or deathly hallows

>>5309059
Oh, yeah.

I'm a Navy SEAL with over 300 confirmed kills...etc. & co.

>>5309029
complexity isn't what makes those examples good, here is another example of a satisfactory opening.
"Someone must have slandered Josef K., for one morning, without having done anything truly wrong, he was arrested. His landlady, Frau Grubach, had a cook who brought him breakfast each day around eight, but this time she didn't appear."

>>5308955
It's not true, so cheer up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_books#100_million_copies_or_more_copies

Harry Potter - 450 million
50 Shades of Grey - 100 million
That's the series in total, btw.

>>5309067
Ok here

From the deathly hollows opening
"The two men appeared out of nowhere, a few yards apart in the nar- row, moonlit lane. For a second they stood quite still, wands di- rected at each other’s chests; then, recognizing each other , they stowed their wands beneath their cloaks and started walking briskly in the same direction."

M&D's opening

"Snow-Balls have flown their Arcs, starr'd the Sides of Outbuildings, as of Cousins, carried Hats away into the brisk Wind off Delaware,-- the Sleds are brought in and their Runners carefully dried and greased, shoes deposited in the back Hall, a stocking'd-foot Descent made upon the great Kitchen, in a purposeful Dither since Morning, punctuated by the ringing Lids of Boilers and Stewing-Pots, fragrant with Pie-Spices, peel'd Fruits, Suet, heated Sugar,-- the Children, having all upon the Fly, among rhythmic slaps of Batter and Spoon, coax'd and stolen what they might, proceed, as upon each afternoon all this snowy December, to a comfortable Room at the rear of the House, years since given over to their carefree Assaults."

>>5309059
Confirmed troll.

>>5309086
your book sounds like shit. Deathly Hallows is actually readable kek.

>the children, having all upon the Fly, among rythmic slaps of Batter and Spoon
my sides are in orbit

>>5309096
>>5309069
so his ad hominem is alright but my outrageous appeal to authority (something i thought you bumblefucks might recognize) is bad.

Kay

>>5309105
lel, sorry if it's to hard m80, you should really stay away from actually challenging books books.

>>5309114
>hard
more like unintelligible. But keep on reading shit books in the hopes that you will feel intelligent kid.

>>5309109
Appeal to hypocrisy

>>5309109
You really are a bundle of laughs
1. You were obviously lying
2. Even if you weren't appeal to authority is a argumentative fallacy
3. My ad-homonim wasn't actually such, just an observation, wasn't really part of my argument.

>>5308997
But whether you should buy [Harry Potter] at all is another matter. For I have come, with some regret, to this conclusion: their style is toxic. And this is Rowling's fault. I know that I am anticipating what the style of the latest book will be in advance of actually seeing it, but really, I don't think I'm going out on a limb here. Of course, if she has turned into a first-class writer with her forthcoming Potter book, I will happily, no, joyously, eat my words.

But until then, we have to swallow hers. And for all that she is gifted enough in devising popular scenarios, the words on the page are flat. I think it was Verlaine who said that he could never write a novel because he would have to write, at some point, something like "the count walked into the drawing-room" - not a scruple that can have bothered JK Rowling, who is happy enough writing the most pedestrian descriptive prose.

Here, from page 324 of The Order of the Phoenix, to give you a typical example, are six consecutive descriptions of the way people speak. "...said Snape maliciously," "... said Harry furiously", " ... he said glumly", "... said Hermione severely", "... said Ron indignantly", " ... said Hermione loftily". Do I need to explain why that is such second-rate writing?

If I do, then that means you're one of the many adults who don't have a problem with the retreat into infantilism that your willing immersion in the Potter books represents. It doesn't make you a bad or silly person. But if you have the patience to read it without noticing how plodding it is, then you are self-evidently someone on whom the possibilities of the English language are largely lost.

This is the kind of prose that reasonably intelligent nine-year-olds consider pretty hot stuff, if they're producing it themselves; for a highly-educated woman like Rowling to knock out the same kind of material is, shall we say, somewhat disappointing.

Children exposed to this kind of writing aren't learning anything new about words, or being stretched in any way; as Harold Bloom said, they're not going to be inspired to go off and read the Alice books, or any other enduring classic.

People go hoopla because they're delighted that Rowling has got children reading books - big, fat books without pictures at that. Can't argue with that: and maybe they will learn something about sheer reading stamina in the process. But it's all too easy.

The popular writer whose style is most similar is, it suddenly occurs to me, Jeffrey Archer (all those dead adverbs). All that paper, all those trees felled, all those words ... surely Rowling could have chosen some better ones, or put them together in a more exciting way?

She has, in her grasp, the power to galvanise minds instead of reeling out cliché after cliché. Will The Deathly Hallows do this? I hope so. But I fear not.

>>5309124
Does baby need a summary of what happened ? Just because you can't understand it doesn't mean I can't.

>gf convinces me to read 50 shades of grey
>okay this is porn but at least it is controversial
>book 2 and 3 slip into wedding/honeymoon/children bullshit
absolute proof that women are basically the plebest of pleb and can't even read a porno that doesn't end happily ever after

>>5309086
>he stood up from his desk, went over to his book collection, grabbed Deathly Hallows, the book he was ardently reading as a teenager, that he enjoyed so much, from the series that sparked his passion for literature, but not to reminiscence, but to slander it and call it shit years later in some cynical forum post, by his cynical grown up self

This sad nigga.

50 shades shit sold so much in part because of the scandalous image, people bought them as a mommyporn phenomenon. They're horribly written and won't last any time. And I mean really horribly written.

house wife escapism vs YA/future house wife escapism

>>5309155
It's fine for children, but you should be embarrassed if you think it has halfway decent prose.

>>5309135
you're so delusional

>>5309170
Ad-hominem

>>5309170
>being this insecure
It's okay to like shit, I like the dresden files for example, but at least i realize it's shit.

>>5309105

>>5309080
GERSBERMS

>>5309072
Not that anon, genuinely interested and not incredibly experienced.

What, in particular, makes these examples better than the beginning from the subjected HP books?

>>5309182
Please learn what "ad-hominem" means.

Dude, if trivial shit like this makes you depressed I'll fucking pity you when the resource wars start.

>>5309608
Personal attack

>>5309163
THIS