/lit/ - Literature

>>8827824

Oblomov and The Magic Mountain.

>>8827824
Tolkien and the Elder Edda.

Just finished reading Hamlet. Then I will move on to Macbeth.

>>8827824
Gonna finish up Moby Dick and then read The Castle.

From Ovid, of course.

The golden age was first; when Man yet new,
No rule but uncorrupted reason knew:
And, with a native bent, did good pursue.
Unforc'd by punishment, un-aw'd by fear,
His words were simple, and his soul sincere;
Needless was written law, where none opprest:
The law of Man was written in his breast:
No suppliant crowds before the judge appear'd,
No court erected yet, nor cause was heard:
But all was safe, for conscience was their guard.
The mountain-trees in distant prospect please,
E're yet the pine descended to the seas:
E're sails were spread, new oceans to explore:
And happy mortals, unconcern'd for more,
Confin'd their wishes to their native shore.
No walls were yet; nor fence, nor mote, nor mound,
Nor drum was heard, nor trumpet's angry sound:
Nor swords were forg'd; but void of care and crime,
The soft creation slept away their time.
The teeming Earth, yet guiltless of the plough,
And unprovok'd, did fruitful stores allow:
Content with food, which Nature freely bred,
On wildings and on strawberries they fed;
Cornels and bramble-berries gave the rest,
And falling acorns furnish'd out a feast.
The flow'rs unsown, in fields and meadows reign'd:
And Western winds immortal spring maintain'd.
In following years, the bearded corn ensu'd
From Earth unask'd, nor was that Earth renew'd.
From veins of vallies, milk and nectar broke;
And honey sweating through the pores of oak.

>>8827824
I'm currently on a Weird Fiction binge.
Lovecraft, Arthur Machen, Algernon Blackwood, Lord Dunsany, Clark Ashton Smith, William Hope Hodgson, and Thomas Ligotti.

>>8828731
Kafka is always very nice for this time of the year.
>>8828688
Is the Elder Edda a good place to start with Norse mythology?
>>8827831
These sound like great suggestions, thanks.

>>8827824
I was thinking of reading Salammbô. Some decadent adventures in a lush faraway land depicted in dreamy prose sound like just what I need these days.

There's also some Maigret or Sherlock Holmes or Agatha Christie novel for some lighter reading by the kerosene lamp near the purring stove.

>>8827824
turgenev and leskov.

>>8827824
I'm spending the holiday season with Mr. Dickens, ending with A Christmas Carol.

>>8827824
Dostoevsky short stories and finishing up some others I have on the go.

Robert Walser

>>8828758
I second Turgenev

>>8828772
pfft, yeah i'm going to get a nice steamy cup of cocoa and read fucking microscripts. cmon guy.

>>8827824
Dubliners

>>8828754
Love a bit of Sherlock Holmes - I'm reading pic related at the moment myself, pretty gud.

>>8828748
Also patrician. Ligotti's "Christmas Eves of Aunt Elise" reminded me a little too much of my own family holidays.

>>8828759
Which of his is more seasonal, Pickwick or Oliver Twist?

>>8828772
Amazing choice.

>>8828778
You don't really have to squint, you know.

I'm gonna snuggle up with Goethe

>>8829139
Why is he wearing a snuggie?

>>8829139
I do want to get his Italian Journey. Very comfy reading

>>8827824
I'm reading the Silmarillion, probably the comfiest book I've ever read.

>>8827824

Maybe The Magic Mountain, Life & Fate or Anna Karenina, something long and epic.

>>8827824
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

Going to be getting my doorstopper on and going through The Count of Monte Cristo.

>>8829192
I guess he just liked being comfy

I finished this recently Anons, and it's not even half as comfy as people make it out to be.
Is Murakami actually comfy? Or is it just a meme?

>>8827824
The Devil in a Forest

Nothing, probably. IDK why but it's been a month since I've read anything seriously. After I slogged through The Waves I tried Eco and the short stories of Dostoievski but I dropped halfway through. I just can't seem to be arsed read lately, which has never happened to me before. I'm watching a lot of great films and have to read for uni, that seems to keep me content enough along with music.
I'll probably pick up something from my favourite authors after christmas or reread a great book if I'm still apathetic.

Thanks for reading my blog, please don't forget to like, suscribe and reply!

>>8828754
>Is the Elder Edda a good place to start with Norse mythology?

It can be. It's probably the most authentic source we have, but also not as accessible as some of the Icelandic sagas. Some familiarity is probably recommended. I read a retelling of the myths by Kevin Crossley-Holland before anything else and it was extremely helpful (and an enjoyable introduction!).

>>8829347
kafka on the shore is comfy

>>8828748
Lord Dunsany is maximum comfiness

War and peace

>Tfw too busy revising for January exams to read what I want

>>8829347
Is this really not comfy?
I was going to read it soon, but if it isn't comfy I might reconsider.

>>8830551
it's like watching a harem anime where all the characters are suicidal what do you think

>>8830591
Sounds comfy.
Sounds like Eva.
Eva was comfy as fuck.

>>8829228
P comfy senpai. Really good shit.

Is Dead Souls comfy? It's been on my shelf for a while. My copy contains a map. Seems unlike that a book with a map wouldn't be comfy.

I thought Catcher in the Rye was pretty comfy.
>winter setting
>comfy inner monologue
>those feelings
>sneaking into old Phoebes room to chat

Sanshiro by Soseki is comfy as fuck.
Also, like >>8830880 said, catcher is comfy as fuck as well.

>>8828743
>ed is replaced with apostrophies.

Why the FUCK do poets do this shit?

Is Virginia Woolf comfy core? Was going to buy Mrs Dalloway in my next book purchase.

>>8830913
That's a good book for the spring. Very dreamy styling

>>8830903
i think it's so you don't make the "e" sound in your head, and that might fuck up the rhythm of the words by adding an extra syllable or something. i have zero fucking knowledge of poetry but that's the best explanation i can come up with

I don't read literary stuff to be comfy. I read plebian trash like Harry Potter.

Cozy af.

>>8830913
Fuck no, Mrs. Dalloway is so fucking unnerving tbqphwyf.

Gonna tackle Mason & Dixon after my finals.

The Odyssey desu. It gets comfy after you've read it so many times, will probably reread an easier translation though

>>8830994
I'll pose this as a general question, would M&D be fine for a first Pynchon novel to read?

>>8830903

For metrical purposes, to clarify that the "ed" is not to be pronounced as a separate syllable. In most modern printings, however, the instances where "ed" is to be pronounced as a syllable puts a grave accent over the "e" and leaves other instances of particles and the past tense are left as they are, as in modern English we do not pronounce the "e" (except in certain words which still strike us as extra dignifi'd, like "cursed" or "blessed'). I kind of like it, personally. It has a quaint antiquity to it.

>>8830725
thanks senpai. it's the first snowfall in my area today, watching the cones of snow fall under the street lamp on my corner, cat on my lap, wool socks on, re-reading the part about the Clongowes students getting ready for Christmas/winter break. Perfect for this moment, got me right in the feels tbqh, beautifully written by the shit sniffer himself.

The Aubrey/Matruin series is max cozy. Adventure and bants on the high seas.

>>8831028
Depends what you're comfortable with. M&D is long and dense, normal starters for Pynchon are Lot 49 or Inherent Vice. But if you're good with a long, difficult book then by all means.

George Eliot !!!

>>8831203
Might have to get into this, sounds comfy and fun.

>>8831882
Silas Marner or Middlemarch? I asked for Middlemarch for Christmas but might read Silas Marner first if the comfort levels are equanimous

>>8831203
I definitely want to try out the Aubrey/Maturin series as well as Hornblower, but I am mostly looking forward to Aubrey/Maturin. A shame the film didn't make enough money to spawn a sequel, which definitely seems to have been the intent. What I'll be reading though is Prester John by John Buchan, and then getting back to Sharpe's Siege. After that, I dunno. I think this'll be my 11th or 12th novel, and then if I can finish Sharpe's Siege before 2017 (unlikely) that'd be my 12th or 13th novel this year, I think. I don't read as much as I ought to.

Why hasn't anyone mentioned Steinbeck?

Of Mice and Men was by far the most comfy book I have read, and i'm sure The Grapes of Wrath and East of Eden will be much the same.

The sorrows of Young Werther was very comfy, almost surprisingly comfy. One would like to be friends with Werther and Charlotte.

>>8832429
They are pretty comfy despite the suffering. Cannery Row is peak comfy-Steinbeck though.

What is a good comfy slice of life book, where the characters are friends who do things? Not Necessarily limiting it to normal everyday things, I just want something like my Japanese animes, but /lit/.

>>8827824
I'm probably going to be reading my way through most of Kerouac's works. But for ultimate comfy, I'm going to re-read "Cannery Row" and several other Steinbeck novels because you don't get much comfier than that.

>>8832447
The terrible tragedy is that "Cannery Row" was my first real re-introduction to Steinbeck since maybe middle school or high school some 15+ years ago. It can't get any more comfier than what I've already felt now.

"The Snow Country" by Yasunari Kawabata. Set in a Japanese onsen sometime in the first half of the XXth c. The beginning is /comfy/ incarnate.

>>8832450
Try Banana Yoshimoto, critics actually mention time and again that her works are like anime in novel form, yet not really LNs.

>>8831203
Outstanding advice. Reading one of those books by the fireplace with a dram of something tasty on a rainy day is supremely comfy.

Other unrelated but still comfy works: Kazuo Ishiguro's "Artist of the Floating World" and "Remains of the Day" (devastating ending on that one, but everything before the ending is super comfy), Norman Maclean's "A River Runs Through It," the first half of Donna Tart's "The Secret History," many of George Saunders' short stories (strange, but still pretty comfy), Joshua Slocum's "Sailing Alone Around the World," and all of Oliver Wendell Holmes' "Breakfast-Table" books.