/lit/ - Literature

>>6900167
>reading for fun

its honestly shit

read my books instead you'll be better off my man

Her writing is the acme of subtle humour. Her biting wit flies over the head of many an avant-teen.

>>6900192
examples pls
I'm trying to build up my knowledge of canon but books like this and tale of two cities make me skim and go to sparknotes

Austen is like top 10 prose artist. Have you been even read Emma? It's sheer ecstacy sometimes when you read her aloud.

>>6900196
top pleb

>>6900200
both books are boring as shit and slow reads
it was before the concepts of 'brevity' and 'conciseness' were invented

>>6900210
>it was before the concepts of 'brevity' and 'conciseness' were invented
This has to be bait.

>>6900226
no
it isn't
goddamit they use pages to describe things the need a well-written sentence
there are so many goddam WORDS

>>6900232
I think Graphic Novels may be more suitable for you. 400 page novels are far from long. If you are baiting, please stop, this is just embarassing.

>>6900167

Because the English think that an old maid being catty about happy, attractive people is what the novel should be, and a lot of Americans think it's all terribly sophisticated. It's sad. Austen was only of interest when Said suggested reading one of her books (can't remember which, don't care) as being 'about' slave labor, in that the profits from that are what's bankrolling these tedious people.

>>6900253
I've read books that are over 600 pages long in a few days (not harry potter fyi)
these book are just so slow
nothing happens
its like how a four minute song can feel longer than a twenty minute one

Wit =/= looking down your nose at people whose lives are more worthwhile than yours while delivering quips you've been polishing up in your bedroom. When you hear Martin Amis say Austen should be the model for English novelists, you know why the English novel is fucked at present.

>>6900254
>Because the English think that an old maid being catty about happy, attractive people is what the novel should be.
Name a good novel that doesn't include this in some way, shape or form.

>>6900196
>>6900210
>>6900232
>pls
>sparknotes
>before brevity was invented
>hemingway 'no words' meme
>goddam

That's what happens when you read wymn.

>>6900264
>whose lives are more worthwhile than yours

>people who do literally nothing but dance like robots and breed are better than people who write entertaining novels.

>>6900268
I'm sorry i dont like my authors to show off who has the fanciest dictionary
i prefer it when authors tell stories

>>6900167
English prose is shit

>>6900274
>entertaining

>>6900253

It's not about the actual length, its about the impression of long-windedness created by the fact that here we have a world that's already really restricted, and a writer describing it whose understanding is even further limited by isolation and asexuality. When Ivy Compton-Burnett does it, it's funny, because she knows she's limited and that becomes the whole point. Jane Austen genuinely thinks she's writing about heavy shit, and the weight given to inconsequential twitterings becomes intolerable.

>>6900279

I think you are digging yourself a hole here bub there isn't really much vocab in there a HS grad can't handle.

>>6900232

It's well under 200k words

>>6900289
honestly i dont know why i wrote that
the vocal wasn't difficult
the whole thing just started nowhere and went nowhere
i have no reason to care for the characters
darcy is an ass and elizabeth is a bitch
mr collins is mildly amusing
the rest are interchangeable
>>6900288
this dude gets it

>>6900303
for someone on /lit/ you have a hard time understanding deeper meanings
i dont mean its long in the literal sense
it feels long
like how an hour at church last for days but an hour enjoying yourself slips by

>>6900288
>Jane Austen genuinely thinks she's writing about heavy shit
lol no

>>6900285
Read Emma.
>Inb4 I have
I know you haven't, you probably read mainly translations of meme writers.

>>6900266

Ulysses, The Good Soldier, Naked Lunch, The Unnameable, Moby-Dick... wait, you're going to have me transcribing the canon of actually worthwhile literature here.

>>6900312
Don't read it then,
people
like
different
things.
>inb4 muh subjectivism.

>>6900315
who are said meme writers
but its gonna be a long time before i read another bit of austen's hack work

>>6900320
>Moby-Dick
That is the only correct one that you have posited.
>Naked Lunch
>good
kek

>>6900304

Well reread it sometime, all first reads are fairly useless in measuring the worth of a book.

>>6900274

But of course they are. They're the real world. They're life. A writer who starts from the position than sterility is better than fecundity has bungled the wisdom project. Also, Austen's novels aren't entertaining.

>>6900332
a lot of the books i like hooked me on first read and then got better each read
im not getting any sense of 'hidden genius' here
just boring ass 'satire' of a boring time in a boring country

>>6900325
Borges
Kundera
Mann
Hesse
Svevo
Calvino
Dostoevsky

Just to name a few, England is the only nation not infected with a juvenile character.

>>6900315

Lol yes. Her whole project implies that there's nothing more serious she could be doing. That's why she's such a defeating model for any writer - you have to be stupid, or pretend to be, to be content with her notion of the novel. The southern English middle class find this all too easy.

>>6900352
haven't read any of them

>>6900334
>A writer who starts from the position than sterility is better than fecundity has bungled the wisdom project.
It is like you haven't read Austen, I suspect you are parroting the words of your favourite essayist. Probably some empty aesthete like Nabhackov.

>>6900328

Naked Lunch is a great book.

>>6900274
This is sorta the crux of all the controversy in this thread. Austen wrote novels at a time when most novels were, in fact, just entertainment. They were long-winded and slow the same way a soap opera is slow, and for the same reasons. Looking back on these as if they're particularly good is the epitome of praising something because it's old and well-known.

We don't write like Austen for the most part anymore because if we want to drag on an entirely plot-driven story for the entertainment of air-headed women we just broadcast it these days. Romance novels are quite short now, so don't give me that as a counterexample.

>>6900332

Nope.

>>6900358
>Her whole project implies that there's nothing more serious she could be doing.
This is just meaningless and completely unfalsifiable.
>you have to be stupid, or pretend to be, to be content with her notion of the novel.
I read other authors, substantiate your claim.
>>6900358
>The southern English middle class find this all too easy.
I'm from a working class family.

>>6900377
this guy gets it
as a young american man i dont feel a novel written for middle class victorian women will have much relevance to me
its a fucking soap opera

>>6900377
>Looking back on these as if they're particularly good is the epitome of praising something because it's old and well-known.
Or because it is genuinly funny and clever.
>drag on an entirely plot-driven story for the entertainment of air-headed women
I think I have detected the issue here.

>>6900366

Yes, I have read her. Her position of superiority to her characters is untenable, and if her fans are coming away with the notion that writing novels is more important than living the lives that novels are about, she's done them a disservice.

>>6900388
>as a young american man i dont feel a novel written for middle class victorian women will have much relevance to me
I think I would have preferred the days when you jumped up colonials deferred to your cultural superiors.

>>6900393
the only mildly funny part of the book is collins' long speeches and elizabeth bitching at lady catherine
the rest is pretentious bullshit

>>6900398
What the fuck are you even talking about? Do you want all writers to be humble men of action. I fucking hate hemmingway plebs. A writer is naturally going to be biased towards the life of writing.

>>6900407
this may have to do with the fact that i dont get the anglophile trend in america
british culture seems really shitty, its the epitome of everything i hate in people
pretentious and boring

>>6900383

Look at the world during the years of her life, look at what was being written about by others, then look at Austen. You're welcome.

Your second statement is meaningless. Of course you read other authors. Of course you're a dunce if you think Austen is one of the greatest. No real connection between those two facts.

Then you should stop trying to social climb through novels and read some real writers.

>>6900410
>pretentious
There is that word again.
Every sentence is loaded, even if you hate the content you have to appreciate her style, unless you were brought up on a meagre hemingway diet.

>>6900433
her style is really bland tbqh
i often find myself reading pages several times just to get what she's trying to say
(inb4 you have add)
nothing in the book draws me to continue reading it
just my own stubbornness

>>6900423
>Look at the world during the years of her life, look at what was being written about by others, then look at Austen. You're welcome.
She was also a women with limited experiences.
>>6900423
>Of course you're a dunce if you think Austen is one of the greatest.
I do not think she is one of the greatest, but I disagree with your claim. For one you do not have to only read writers whose projects are completed aligned with your own world-view.
>>6900423
>Then you should stop trying to social climb through novels and read some real writers.
Fucking idiot.

>>6900421

You've just outed yourself as having read nothing. None of the serious writers think writing is all that matters. It may be all that matters TO THEM, but they know their job as writers is to live in the world and care. Ask George Eliot. Ask Tolstoy. Housebound fangirls - like Austen, basically - think writing is all that matters in the world, because it's all the world they have.

>>6900442
>i often find myself reading pages several times just to get what she's trying to say
I bet that happens to you a lot.
ps. Capital letters and full stops are pretty basic.

>>6900449
>None of the serious writers think writing is all that matters.
Did I say that they did?

>>6900454
the prose is boring as shit
the book reads like 50 shades: the prequel

>>6900469
Whatever.

>>6900449
Also, I would like evidence that Jane Austen ever claimed that the most important thing in the world is writing.
(Not that there is anything particular morally outrageous about such an opinion).

>>6900445

It's not lack of experience, but lack of curiosity which is the problem.

It's not a question of her aligning with my worldview, it's a question of whether she is even looking at the world.

Ah, hit a nerve there.

>>6900484

I never said she did. I'm talking about the tone, and also responding to the comment that her life was more worthwhile than that of the people she was writing about. A writer who sends you away with such unreflecting misanthropy has failed to enlarge your sympathies or your imagination.

It's not morally outrageous, it's morally unserious. It disqualifies those who hold it from serious consideration.

>>6900393

Nope, wrong again, this isn't about her being a woman. Besides, Austen hated women.

"“I got the book and studied it. And what did I find? An accurate daguerreotyped portrait of a common-place face; a carefully fenced, highly cultivated garden, with neat borders and delicate flowers—but no glance of a bright vivid physiognomy—no open country—no fresh air—no blue hill—no bonny beck. I should hardly like to live with her ladies and gentlemen in their elegant but confined houses. These observations will probably irritate you, but I shall run the risk.” - Charlotte Brontë on Jane Austen.

>>6900486
>It's not lack of experience, but lack of curiosity which is the problem.
That is an interesting point, do you feel writers should be more akin to activists? I am a touch more formalist.
>>6900486
>It's not a question of her aligning with my worldview, it's a question of whether she is even looking at the world.
She wrote about what she knew and I feel that a criticism of human shallowness is a worthwhile endeavour.
>>6900486
>Ah, hit a nerve there.
Maybe you did, I don't know. Just didn't like that.
>>6900504
>that her life was more worthwhile than that of the people she was writing about.
I think it was, they contributed nothing.
>>6900504
>A writer who sends you away with such unreflecting misanthropy has failed to enlarge your sympathies or your imagination.
She does not leave me with such a feeling, I am trying to restrain my agressive nature but I feel that that speaks more about your reactions than it does her writing, which is not entirely cruel.
>>6900504
>It's not morally outrageous, it's morally unserious. It disqualifies those who hold it from serious consideration.
The contemplative life is underrated in todays age though. Nobody today needs to be told that work and actions is worthwhile considering we are bombarded with it daily.

I have not even read a Jane Austen book in about 3 years. I do not know why I am getting so involved in this thread.

>>6900196

Notice how they came back with bluster when asked for examples.

>>6900547

No, I think writers should be interested in other people, rather than in coming to conclusions about other people.

A criticism of any human behavior that doesn't begin from, or return to some measure of self-knowledge is of doubtful use. Her criticisms are always of people thought of as 'they', or 'you', never 'we'.

Well it's worth thinking about. It seems a bad reason to rate a writer.

Then I would question how much you've gained from your other reading. They contributed infinitely more. Books aren't more important than children. Scorn isn't more profound than happiness. Cleverness which doesn't become about something other than cleverness is finally nothing to do with wisdom.

That wasn't my reaction, that was what I found. She must have left you with that feeling, or else why would you have the idea that what she did was more important than the lives of the kind of people she was writing about?

The contemplative life I take to mean a process of going within, or looking out in appreciation and acceptance, seeing things anew. Austen looks out in judgement, certain she knows the score and missing everything. Just because someone's incurious and idle doesn't mean they're really thinking. But this is why she's such an influence on privileged English writers.