/lit/ - Literature

>tfw Pynchon will never win a Nobel prize and will always be a bitch nigga

Feels good, nigga.

>>5550841
I doubt any american writer is getting it anytime soon. Shitty politics.

>>5550819

>Pic related: obvious winner.

Fixed.

Serious question. Why americans are betting their asses on Murakami? He's topping the charts right now.

>>5550851
Stay pleb


Vargas Llosa is based.

>>5550888
Vargas Llosa is peruvian bro.

>>5550819
at what time is the nobel prize going to be given away?

>>5550907
Few hours.

Benno von Archimboldi is way over due for a Novel Prize

>>5550819

reminder that the previous japanese winner of the nobel prize for lit thinks murakami is shit

>>5550929

>based Archimboldi

>>5550937
Any more like this?

>>5550912
you're going to be waiting a while. it's only being announced on thursday

>>5550891
You gotta a problem with that?

Where are you from?

>>5550891
Fite me irl, you dumb faggot

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/oct/07/creative-writing-killing-western-literature-nobel-judge-horace-engdahl

>>5550997
It's true. Creative writing and MFA programs are creating a Procrustean template for The Novel. Originality is stifled.

>>5550891
Answer me, csm

>>5550956
really? I read it was wednesday 8?

>>5551041
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2014/

>>5551002
>didn't read the first paragraph of the article

>>5551054
not him, but his point is still relevant. writers, like all artists, shouldn't be insulated from the world, nor should they be moulded to write in the accepted, 'proper' way. how could anything come of that but sterility and monotony, esp. when most everyone entering these programs are usually all white and middle-class?

>>5551146
The part about most of them being white and middle-class isn't particularly helpful, but I agree that all they're writing is boring cookie-cutter shit, essentially genre fiction for people who want to think they're cultured

>>5550929
more like the novelty prize, just like bolaño, the hot new ephemeral novelty for americans avid for the newest incarnation of the The Obscure latin american Literary Experience

>>5551235
It's good americans are reading Bolaño. That means there's still hope for western literature.

50mins left until Will Self gets his first Nobel Prize.

>>5552007
he manages to be so cute not being handsome

>best betting odds
>black african
>left wing
>has written in English
>getting on in years

He's a guaranteed winner

>>5550819
Murakami. You'll see.

Lol at all the Murakami boys in here. He'll never get it.

I'm betting on Krasznahorkai, though I don't really think he deserves it, his stuff is good but not that good. Also that african dude, those are my two bets.

They should obviously give it to Borges posthumously.

why not to gene wolfe

Martin Amis

>>5553343
From a practical point of view, he's a conservative Catholic American science fiction writer, he has less than zero chance of ever getting it.

From a purely literary point of view, he's still not even close to being the best living American writer with no chance of winning as long as Pynchon is out there. So they have him coming and going, as it were.

Sam Harris

#teamroth

>>5553358
lol, fucking dawkins, what a piece of shit

>>5553347
Not even remotely feasible in any possible universe.

>>5553358
3 Nobel Prizes for the sciences aren't enough, they have to take over the prize for literature as well

>>5553358

>Dawkins

>>5552097
i wish but it's gonna be murakami.

>>5553358
>Dawkins

>>5553402
Has he gone senile or something?

>>5553402
Noice. Is it legit or some fake account?

>>5553402
Was hoping so hard that this was real

>>5553352
Pynchon won't be the next American to win the prize. In fact he might well be dead before they next award the prize to an author from the USA.

>>5553409
It's a photoshop, dude...

>tfw based saunders wont win

>>5553414
I hope it's Ashbery. He's probably America's most highly-regarded living poet, and he's gay, so they've got a token LGBT person in him as well

>>5553419
>>5553411
>>5553409

It's a legit screenshot, he deleted it

https://twitter.com/RichardDawkins/status/519063403542085633

>>5553439
Lmao holy shit

>>5550878
For some reason I thought he was much older.

>>5553433
seconded
I'm so happy he's still alive.

>>5553414
I said in my post he's not going to win.

My point is that if we're talking about American writers with no real chance of winning, Gene Wolfe is not at the top of that list.

its 9 pm in sweden
is it announced at midnight?

>>5553455
>>5553414
what do you think pynchon's plan is if he wins
, does he send a proxy to get it? has he ever had to do that before?

>>5553455
Well obviously the highest person on that list is going to be like Stephenie Meyer or some random fanfiction.net contributor

>>5553419
>>5553439
it's real

if you search richarddawkins fedora on twitter you can see people answering that tweet

>>5553468
>At the 1974 National Book Awards ceremony, the president of Viking Press, Tom Guinzberg, arranged for double-talking comedian "Professor" Irwin Corey to accept the prize on Pynchon's behalf.Many of the assembled guests had no idea who Corey was and had never seen the author, so they assumed it was Pynchon himself on the stage delivering Corey's trademark torrent of rambling, pseudo-scholarly verbiage. Toward the end of Corey's address a streaker ran through the hall, adding further to the confusion.

>>5553468
I think he has, and he sent some comedian to accept the award for him, I forget who

>>5553319
Nobel Prizes are never given posthumously (with the notable exception of last year biologist who died a few days before the ceremony).

nobel prizes in the non sciences are just marketing and political ploys. not even saying this as a stem bigot but at least with science there is some way of measuring impact. with the peace and lit prizes we just have politics and appetites.

>>5553480
lol

>>5553516
>>5553480
you can find some of Corey's other speeches on YouTube, they rule. he starts every speech with the word, "However"

They should give it to Parra. He's been proposed for the prize numerous times, he has influenced many spanish-speaking writers, Bolaño among those. Also, he recently won the Cervantes Prize which is the most important award a spanish-speaking author can get, and he turned 100 this year, I know that his age has nothing to do with all this, but it would pretty cool anyway if he won at that age, because I think is amazing how lucid this guy is.

We have to find a gay black transexual anarcho-syndicalist writer for America to have any chance to win.

>>5552007
50 minutes? isn't it tomorrow at 1pm?, that is in nearly 15 hours?

>>5550878
I would like this, but maybe in a few more years

>>5550933

Incorrect. After Murakami became socially conscious starting with The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, Oe changed his mind about him.

>>5553902
source for this?

>>5553497
You can totally measure literary impact. Munro, for example, got it for having an outstanding imagination and crafting skills, she was the master of modern short story. But I'd give you that most writer at the top of the game have had significant impact on their tradition, genres and cultures, so from there, it's just politics.

>>5553604
also amputee or something

So how much time left?

>>5555785
it's 7 am in Sweden right now and their website says they'll announce it at 1 pm so about 6 hours

>>5555794
Thanks french bro. Stay tuned guys.

>>5551235
>>5551998
I'm glad that at least American aren't only reading American authors, if nothing else.

The quantity of translation they make hints at how English-centered they are (even considering that every country is centered on its main language).

>>5555208
>>5555794
>>5555795

Sure is namefag in here.

>>5553497
The purpose of the lit Nobel Prize is to draw attention to an underecognized writer, with an emphasis on those who display "an ideal".

>>5550819
Everyone in this thread seems to be bashing the Nobel Prize in Literature with fair enough criticisms, but are there any other major awards in literature that are nearly as noteworthy or would you say are better at distinguishing the most influential authors?

>>5555818
Pulitzer, National Book Award, Man Booker. none of them are particularly better--as a list to scan and pick a new author to check out I think the Nobel's the best

>>5555802
I wonder where these creeps come from and why they think they need tripcodes.

>>5555847
mine was an accident bc i made a new post

Three hours to go! Who's excited?

>>5556152
But anon, it's actually less than 2 hours to go

>>5556152
>>5556164

1 1/2 hours I think, yes
It's 1pm Central european time, it's 11:30 here
Is there anywhere to watch this on a stream? Where do I best follow this?

>>5556195
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2014/announcement.html

>>5556197
http://www.nobelprize.org/index.html
looks good

>>5556164
but anon, it's already been anounced here in japan. Time zones and all that, google it

>>5554061

Can't find it online, except mentions that the Yomiuri prize (pretty big deal in Japan) was awarded to him by his harshest critic, Oe etc., etc. I remember reading about this in his translator Jay Rubin's book about him, "Haruki Murakami and the Music of Words", if you're really interested. Apparently it was very socially awkward between them even after Oe said he thought Wind-Up was an important book.

>>5555843

Two of the prizes you mentioned are restricted to US literature, and the last one to what's written in English. Goes to show how big a deal it is. On the other hand, it's always mostly been Europeans winning, though that is changing, so that's good.

>>5556231
that's not how timezones work man

>>5556288
BUT WHAT IF THEY DID

Let's write a sci-fi story together where time zones DO work like that while we wait for the stream to start.

Less than half an hour now.

itshappening.gif

>>5556293
No, that sounds like retarded Genre fiction and time travel is fucking acid for a plot

>>5556297

It can be about some sophisticated, French guy, and his love affairs, and the time zone stuff is just something in the background.

MAGICAL REALISM.

>>5556302
magical realism is outdated, but if we included something about a nut-based biscuit dunked in tea and a brothel I think it could be pretty good

>>5556293
you can consider to read greg egan's 'the hundred-light-year diary'

30 min left. Are you ready for disappointment?

>>5556312
What if it's Joyce Carol Oates, I hate that cunt

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xxd6QuDynXA

>>5556307

It was a dreadful night in February when sophisticated French guy Paul Paris found himself dipping a nut-based biscuit in tea at a brothel. He had a prostitute in his other arm, and raised the biscuit to her mouth, the tea dripping all over her slutty dress.
"Do you like it when I feed you nut-based biscuit dropped in tea like this, baby?"
"I like everything you do to me, Mr. Paris."
"Is that only because I paid you, or do you really feel that way?"
"Whatever you would like to be the case, Mr. Paris."
"I would like it for to be about the money," say Mr. Paris, hiding his rage.
"Well, dear, then I'm only into it for the money."
This reminded poor Paris too much of his own mother, and so he lunged the biscuit at the window, and punched the poor whore in the jaw.
"Mr. Paris!" she exclaimed. Then began to cry, and scream. Men in dark suits wearing sunglasses came into the room. The kicked Mr. Paris's ass, and threw him out on the street.
"And don't come back!" yelled a scrawny-looking man who had been directing the suits. Mr. Paris got on his feet, brushed street stuff away from his clothes. He wasn't done with that whore yet. He crossed the street for the cafe there, ordered today's newspaper, a coffee, and a croissant, and he sat there reading, waiting for his whore to come out to go home. There was a large article about how some time zone business might be the actual cause behind the recent financial crisis, but Paris had more pressing concerns. It was getting late, and the cafe was closing. Still, he was determined not to go home yet, and hid in a nearby trash can. "That whore must pay," he thought to himself.

>it's Bob Dylan

It's someone obscure who was never discussed on /lit/ before.

>>5556333
>Bob Dylan

who's that? You surely don't mean the singer?

So far Philip Roth seems to be the most decent out of the bunch.

>>5556344
>http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/opinion/columnists/article4211133.ece

>>5556341
It's parra. Screenshot.

>>5556341
Considering we discuss maybe 10 authors here this is very plausible

It might be that African dude but most likely it will someone out of left-field, possibly someone with 25/1 odds on Ladbrokes

>>5556349
>Dylan is indisputably one of the greatest lyrical poets of the age

r-really?

I hope that gibson win

>>5556364

Someone might be justified in disputing it, but I agree nonetheless

10 minutes, bastards.

ITS MINE

>>5556356
>pynchon is on 25/1

>>5556377
>so is Bob Dylan

If Pynchon wins will /lit/ get hysterical?

>>5550819
Svetlana's gonna win.

i thought bob dylan was a musician

>>5556383
>he actually shows up

>>5556383
>yfw Pynchon wins, but declines it

>>5556383
It will be incredible.

STREAM IS LIVE
http://www.nobelprize.org/index.html

Action Action Action

PINECONE JUST ANNOUNCED AS THE WINNER!

are these fucks going to speak in swedish?

>>5556401
Yes, but then they speak in English usually

>>5556384
Once again Svetlana Aleksijevitj, you'll see.

aaaah i'm so excited

it reminds me lol thread during a tourney :3

>>5556341
It's Patrick Modiano, called it

WHO?
PATRICK MYYUDNEOU?

literally who?

whooo the fuck is patrick modiano :')

IT'S A FROG

Patrick Modiano

>>5556399
He did have his teeth fixed afterall huh

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Modiano
who?

>a fucking frenchie

Seriously?

>>5556424
frenchie named patrick?

How can they work so fast?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Modiano

that was pretty anti-climactic

>>5556428
I looked literally straight after he said it and it was already updated

>>5556428
I've managed to shitpost twice since the announcement, should be easy
that sucked

>>5556428
>most books untranslated
wtf Nobel Prize committee, you guys are weird

>>5556438
anglosphere is very snobbish about translations

>Book you would most reccomend
>Missing Person

>Its about a detective who lost his memory...its a fun book about him trying to find out who he is.

Welp.

Fug!
I went to my local library's website like one minute after the announcement, and the fellow's books have already receive reservations in the hundreds

French literary master race here.
Que je suis content de vous voir présenter un mal au cul pareil !

>jap boy don't win

Annnnnnddddd......I am a fan of the Nobel commission again.

>>5556465
Next time, just you wait...

>>5556457
>French literary master race
>not German
bèbè pls

>>5556449
First sentence of the work

>I am nothing.

>>5556465
Oh please, Murakami will never win.

>>5556473

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/emma-brockes-column/2014/oct/09/patrick-modiano-nobel-prize-literature-prize-philip-roth-loser

Oh my god, they had this column ready to go and just put in Modiano's name, . lol

>>5556493
I wonder how long they have had that article ready....two years?

>>5556476
The fact that /lit even consider YA-writer Murakami as a laureate reveal the incongruence between the commitee and /lit's "taste".

>>5556507
Hey, half the world thought Murakami might get it, lit mostly reacted against it

>>5556507
Murakami has been hyped up to win for years

I love Murakami and have never read anything by Modiano. Guess I'll give him a chance.

What book did he write to win though?
Somehow finding it difficult to uncover.

>>5556507
His work is in dialogue with Japanese culture.

>>5556510
>>5556512
>shitty wanna be writers, couldn't be critics, so became click bait journalists say Murakami gonna win

>>5556516
He didn't win for a specific work. This was the only thing directly mentioned

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missing_Person_(novel)

>>5556517
He'll never win because the Japanese hate his books.

>>5556517
Which is largely infantile, even more so than western
>>5556516
La Place de l'Étoile seems like the serious work, it won a prize when it got translated into German, apparently it deals with the war and Nazism or Anti-semitism in some way

>>5556519
He's always near the top if not top of the betting odds too.

Patrick Modiano was had like the 5th or 6th best odds of winning of betting sites, and they are usually pretty accurate.

>>5556521
except he is massively popular in Japan and everyone drops everything to read his books

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-N99S8n2TiA
is literature dead now? yes, yes

>>5556493
I wonder if some paper will call Harold Bloom and ask him if he's read Modiano like they have done before with implications that if he hasn't neither should anyone else

Most of Modiano's books are only 12-130 pages and should be easyreads the Nobel panel secretary said. Maybe one should spend the weekend to get to know him.

Anyone got an epub / mobi / pdf of any of his work? Couldn't find any on library genesis.

>>5556521

I'm so tired of hearing this. Initially, when Murakami first started out, when he wrote semi-nihilistic books about slackers to a Japanese literary establishment unreceptive to postmodernism. YES. He was controversial, he was accused of being shallow, he was badly reviewed, and so on, and so on. But today he's widely seen as the greatest living Japanese writer, both inside, and outside his country. By the wider public, and by the literary establishment. His books have become highly socially conscious, and he's not really as un-Japanese as perceived either. His heroes, and Western concerns are just an extension of Natsume Soseki's, taken to greater lengths following the even deeper Westernization of the country. Of course, the Nobel committee are probably reluctant to give the prize to such a popular writer, but if they don't do it at some or another point, it's going to be one of those weird times when they didn't give it away to X who clearly deserved it. Especially when, with time, he becomes less read, and it stops being uncool for snobbish literature people to like him.

>>5556546
Very few of them have been translated though.

Wow, so Modiano won? The first I'd heard of him was in the speculation thread on worldliteratureforum a couple days ago. Seems like a weird choice.

>>5556551

You can't read french? Pleb

>>5556556
I know anon ;_;

>>5556527
Except no they don't.
>>5556550
>this mad

Dude, your hack writer isn't going to win and the Japs hate him

>>5556550
I mostly agree with you except for the "clearly deserved it", he really is only a good but mediocre writer, if he got it it wouldn't be a scandal but he doesn't need it

hmm probably would've liked thiong'o to win, but at least it's not roth or murakami and it has decided what i will read next as i admit to having never heard of this guy, i hope he's good

>>5556572

I was pretty sure Thiong'o would win. Turns out the Nobel panel are more patrish than we thought.

>>5556567
"Finally, native here, pretty much biased though.
As others have already mentioned, he is undoubtedly the most famous writer in Japan. His books become phenomenal bestseller soon after they are published, even if people don't know what kind of story it would be like. Even a person who never reads knows about him. For recent years, a large part of the reason comes from the news and rumors that he is most likely going to recieve the Nobel Prize, which has now bocome an annual event. Also, his name is everywhere. Even at a small bookstore, you will never miss his book or if you go to a secondhand bookstore, you will find his books written in various languages. Students read his story in Japanese class. His effects are so big that many people (amateur and professional critics) try to find the connections between his literary sense and the recent Japanese pop culture. For example, many of Japanese video games and animes are said to be under the influence of Murakami."
from a leddit post

>>5556575

are you saying thiong'o would have been a poor selection or simply revering obscurity?

>>5556581
lol

Murakami sucks bro

>>5556517
>His work is in dialogue with Japanese culture.
What? Haruki Murakami is the most "Western" writer of all contemporary Japanese writers. Most of his books could be transferred to New York with American characters and only very little would change. That's the reason why he's so successful in the West, if he'd write about the wabi-sabi of an old Shamisen no-one would buy his stuff

>>5556585
I'm not saying he is a great writer, but he is obviously very popular and liked in Japan

>unknown french writer doesn't even have a book with a rating above 4 on goodreads

into le trash he goes

>>5556592
No, he's not.

>>5556593
>caring about goodreads ratings

into le trash you go

>>5556587
>if he'd write about the wabi-sabi of an old Shamisen no-one would buy his stuff

but kobo abe and akutagawa ryunosuke haven't done it either

Why do we have to go through these inane discussions about Murakami every single fucking Nobel season? Is it the same idiots every year or are the old idiots annually replaced by new idiots?

>>5556598
stop trolling on a literature board faggot

>>5556603

it was a poor troll that you fell for

>>5556605
Could you see Rashomon or Kappa set in New York? I can't.
Abe's Ark Sakura or Kangaroo Notes: maybe.

>>5556612
>liking Murakami

Exactly who is the one trolling?

>>5556613
But you just fell for the trolling of the troll

>>5556622

shit

>>5556582

I would have nothing against Thiongo'o winning. The man wrote a novel on a roll of toiletpaper in prison and choosing him would be yet another crypto-political statement from the Nobel prize panel. In choosing Modiano, the swedes show they a hardcore literates and it stands as a mark of literary quality. Modiano's writings usually centers on protagonists who lives in a hallucinogenic world, have amnesia and are struck with perplexity and alienation. Modernity has won!

>>5556655

Disregard my typos and misspellings please ;_;

>>5556614

not in new york, of course, but rashomon set in any medieval european city like london or paris? why not, it doesn't have ideas which would be alien for the west, even for medieval west, and as for in a grove, it's just a modernist story

also kobo abe's ruined map is quite close to noir novels, box man is postmodernist...

i.e. no mumbo jumbo wabi sabi there, their main japanese feature it's probably heavy gloom

>>5556662
>their main japanese feature it's probably heavy gloom
Have you.... even read these books?

>>5556667
yes

>>5556593
So le goes

>>5550819
Today anon asked how to use semicolons; he was a total pleb

Why do they hand out thousands of dollars for making shit up?

France has the most nobel prize in history.

I'm proud of our superior culture!

>>5556803
>ayy lmao

>No translations to english
>Obscure frenchie
>Jew that writes about antisemitism
BRAVO NOBEL COMMITTEE. Just proving how irrelevant you are.

>>5556493
>http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/emma-brockes-column/2014/oct/09/patrick-modiano-nobel-prize-literature-prize-philip-roth-loser

>There are lots of theories about Nobel “bias”, few of them involving the possibility that writers from non-English speaking countries, many of whom readers in the west have neither read nor heard of, might actually be quite good.

kek

>>5556526
I had only heard of Modiano once or twice (and forgotten about him since) but when you look at the prize he got before it's pretty impressive. Like the guy is playing Mario Bros: Literary Prizes Adventure, and finally got to unlock the final boss.

>>5556550
The nobel prize isn't really about who deserves it more. It's about who deserves it more among people who are not that well known. Faulkner was not very famous in the US before he got the Nobel.

>>5556493
Shout out to Marilynne Robinson, who always deserves more love

>>5550819
Fernando Vallejo.

>>5557094
Munro's win last year kind of undermines your point. As does Llosa's win a few years before that. And virtually everyone who won in the '90s was a living legend.

>>5552097
Literally who?

>>5557159
except that munro has been recognized as a master of the modern short story, so it's not surprising at all that she won. murakami has never been acclaimed by anyone older than 30 as a master

>>5557159
There's a dimension of "it would be a waste to skip this big guy", which is perhaps a consequence of the prize being the most famous in the world: they've got to balance it out somehow, because a prize only awarding underdogs wouldn't be that credible, and a famous prize not rewarding some of the very best would seem unfair.

I think they have perhaps acquired that fear of missing out on a literary giant before he dies. 15 French got the Nobel but Proust didn't, for instance. They may have tried to avoid that.

So there's a hybrid concern, recognizing the living literary greats in time, and bringing light to the more obscure of the greats.

And finally there's that issue of not awarding all prizes to the same countries. American may complain about not getting the prize once again, but they already have had more than their fair share (the proportion of American nobel laureates is twice the proportion of Americans among literate people), sam for most Western Europeans and North Americans countries with France as the ultimate overrepresented.

>>5558183
the western world is also the leading purveyor of media culture though. delivering mass selections of books, movies, tv, and music are what we do. entertainment is our top export.