/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.1268574]

okay /lit/,

after a thread that no less WORSHIPPED this book, I finally decided to get it.

Holy mother of God, what a piece of crap.

I'm about 50 pages in and I'm convinced this is pretty much the worst piece of literature I have ever read. Are there any redeeming qualities further along or should I just burn it now?

inb4toodeepforyou

[Anonymous No.1268577]

You're just dumb. It's fine. Goodbye.

[Anonymous No.1268588]

Okay, well... for starters, what don't you like about it? Then maybe we can start to have a real, interesting discussion about what's probably one of my three favorite books ever.

Also, 50 pages in means you probably haven't gotten to the asphyxiative sex rituals and gay alien orgies yet.

[Anonymous No.1268589]

>>1268574
ME GOT YOU!!@!

[Anonymous No.1268591]

Are you reading it in chronological order? Because even though I haven't read it myself, I've heard that that's the worst possible way to read the book.

[Anonymous No.1268603]

>>1268588
Okay, honostly, I'm just a seventeen year old who was recommended this book by a friend. When I asked my English teacher and my librarian, they told me not to go near it. I was just a bit conflicted and turned to /lit/. Do you think this book would do it for someone my age, or too deep you think?

[Anonymous No.1268613]

>>1268603
you lying cunt

[Anonymous No.1268615]

You really should have seen this coming.

[Anonymous No.1268620]

[Anonymous No.1268622]

There's some person here that thinks it is the greatest piece of literature in the 20th century.

Or maybe most influential of the 20th century...

Either way, it is pure rubbish.

[Anonymous No.1268625]

>>1268622

No it's not, it's a great book.

[Anonymous No.1268632]

[Anonymous No.1268647]

>>1268632
good god, as a patron of /fa/ i HATE it when my friends wear big dog apparrel...

ugh! WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?!?

[Anonymous No.1268648]

so just a no then? :/

completed avoid?

[Anonymous No.1268660]

>>1268648

Read it, it loves you.

[Anonymous No.1268719]

The average denizen of /lit/ enjoys atlas shrugged, a clockwork orange and catcher in the rye. The average denizen of /lit/ hates Naked Lunch. Hmm...

Naked Lunch is an extended, valuable exercise in giving up on the contemporary fixation on causative narration, whereby A causes B causes C causes D etc and we can read the thing page by page and understand the whole sequence of events, gee whiz that's great, the boxcar kids followed the clues and got the bad guy and tied up the loose ends and it is given that what is important in such a sort of narrative is precisely that sort of programmatic procession through neatly related events to a satisfying conclusion.

It's really juvenile, is what. This fixation on narrative order and neatness, which restrains prose the same way nursery-like rhyme schemes restrain poetry and reduce both to caricatures.

In Naked Lunch, Burroughs says: fuck that shit. Going through the sequentialist motions is just that, and is not what good prose (and art) is about. Art is about evoking and exciting and inspiring and eliciting, is about punching you in the fucking face with an idea so vivid you have to read with a tissue pressed up against your bloody and battered nose. And then punching you with another one, and another, and another. And who cares if these jabs are related in any cheap narrative sense?

So that's why Naked Lunch is awesome and essential, because it transcends the bondage of causal bookkeeping that other books let themselves be ordained by. And, having transcended it, it can engage in the exciting and breathtakingly novel business of slapping your shit in ways it's never been slapped before.

[Anonymous No.1268762]

This book is basically a mind destroying morass of fucked up imagery, metaphor, and blatant insanity.

If you really want to get down in it, there's a lot there. But it ain't the Great Gatsby, man.

[Anonymous No.1268774]

>>1268762
Naked Lunch >Fountain Head > Great Gatsby

[Anonymous No.1268780]

>>1268719
This guy is right.

>>1268762
Indeed. It's much better, and more interesting, than that.

[Anonymous No.1268787]

>>1268719

this. pay close attention, but at the same time just let the book wash over you

[Anonymous No.1268795]

>>1268719
this shit is hilarious.

[Anonymous No.1268800]

>>1268774
The Great Gatsby >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
> Naked Lunch

[Anonymous No.1268808]

>LOL ALIEN GAY SEX! LETS PUT THE BOOK IN RANDOM ORDER!

A masterpiece, it is not. Poor quality shock literature for 15 year olds.

[Anonymous No.1268924]

>>1268808

No. It's not about shock. Shock is only the beginning.

[Anonymous No.1268941]

>>1268924
you sound fucking retarded. This isn't a shitty trailer, you know.

[Anonymous No.1268947]

Why do people see the new to "express their individuality" (i.e. complain like little bitches) when they read a book they don't like?

[Anonymous No.1268956]

It reads like a porno, I love it. About halfway through. Hoping the Sailor makes a return.

[Anonymous No.1268975]

>>1268947
It's not even that. It's teenagers who think they've "ascended" beyond the immature satisfaction of reading/being/watching something edgy and they need everyone else to know how superior they are. Like a "dumb kids. curse words aren't cool." type thing.

[Anonymous No.1269003]

>>1268719
...are you a crazy person?

[Anonymous No.1269008]

>>1268947
>>1268975

So true, it's a pain in the ass.

Well done kids, you scorn all the advances made in literature in your parents' lifetimes. For your next trick, prove Chaplin isn't funny.

[Anonymous No.1270074]

>>1268719
I agree that Naked Lunch shatters the narrative, but aside from that I find nothing in the book all that interesting. To me it just feels like a big unfocused gimmick piece.