I'm looking for more 'master stylists'. Writers like Nabokov, Conrad, Updike and Fitzgerald. Who else could be added to that list?

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Anonymous Mon Jan 24 14:44:59 2011 No.1489169 [Reply] [Original]

I'm looking for more 'master stylists'.

Writers like Nabokov, Conrad, Updike and Fitzgerald.
Who else could be added to that list?

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 14:46:59 2011 No.1489175 Just prose authors?

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 14:49:59 2011 No.1489179 >>1489175 Post whatever or whomever you want, friend!

Anonymous Mon Jan 24 14:51:59 2011 No.1489184

"O illustrious person," said Kai Lung very earnestly, "this is evidently an unfortunate mistake. Doubtless you were expecting some exalted Mandarin to come and render you homage, and were preparing to overwhelm him with gratified confusion by escorting him yourself to your well-appointed abode. Indeed, I passed such a one on the road, very richly apparelled, who inquired of me the way to the mansion of the dignified and upright Lin Yi. By this time he is perhaps two or three li towards the east."

"However distinguished a Mandarin he may be, it is fitting that I should first attend to one whose manners and accomplishments betray him to be of the Royal House," replied Lin Yi, with extreme affability. "Precede me, therefore, to my mean and uninviting hovel, while I gain more honour than I can reasonably bear by following closely in your elegant footsteps, and guarding your Imperial person with this inadequate but heavily-loaded weapon."

I like Bramah.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 14:53:59 2011 No.1489189 Proust, obviously.

Anonymous Mon Jan 24 14:53:59 2011 No.1489190

Angela Carter
James Joyce

Ted Hughes. Really, most poets write rich, beautifully worded prose. They have a relationship with words and a sense for language that allows them to pluck sounds and meaning from thin air, combining them into incredible pieces of work.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 14:58:59 2011 No.1489197 File: 350 KB, 1610x1799, ..jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] this thread is missing some chabon

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 14:59:59 2011 No.1489202 Bohumil Hrabal

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 16:15:59 2011 No.1489377 >>1489202 Are his English translators able to do justice to his prose?

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 20:25:59 2011 No.1490148 I have a weird soft spot for good prose stylists who frequently express dumb ideas, like Hitchens or Roger Ebert

>>	Fabulous !!GXZe+d0RTva Mon Jan 24 20:26:59 2011 No.1490153 File: 8 KB, 189x267, Wilde.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] strange it took this long

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 20:37:59 2011 No.1490202 Chekhov, Waugh

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 20:46:59 2011 No.1490225 Specific recommendations appreciated.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 20:53:59 2011 No.1490239 any french author

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 20:59:59 2011 No.1490246 Dodgson.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 21:04:59 2011 No.1490255 BORGES

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 21:35:59 2011 No.1490316 >>1490255 >>1490255 >>1490255 ...who? /lit/ is THE only place I have ever seen mention this guy.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 21:39:59 2011 No.1490332 >>1490316 Jorge Luis Borges. He's a Argentinian writer often associated with magical realism (think stuff like Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude). I've only read a few short stories, but he's pretty good. Very economical.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 21:41:59 2011 No.1490341 >>1490316 You serious? He's pretty well acclaimed. Unfortunately he's not European enough for American teens to be introduced to.

Arc Mon Jan 24 21:48:59 2011 No.1490362

Samuel Delany's prose is about as rich you're likely to find.

"All you know I know: careening astronauts and bank clerks glancing at the clock before lunch; actresses cowling at light-ringed mirrors and freight-elevator-operators grinding a thumbful of grease on a steel handle; student riots; know that dark women in bodegas shook their heads last week, because in six months prices have risen outlandishly; how coffee tastes after you've held it in your mouth, cold, a whole minute."

Don Delillo's pretty damn good too. And Cormac McCarthy's prose will knock your fucking socks off.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 21:54:59 2011 No.1490370 Ray Bradbury? The end of Fahrenheit 451 was pretty damn quotable. What do you think e/lit/ists?

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 21:55:59 2011 No.1490374 File: 4 KB, 114x152, 1255911731437.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>1490362 >And Cormac McCarthy's prose will knock your fucking socks off. Dunno about that.

>>	Continental Breakfast !!OJcbzwMDuSm Mon Jan 24 22:01:59 2011 No.1490396 McCarthy Salinger Pynchon - definitely has a really distinctive style, will make you realize that DFW is a rip-off on his best days Toni Morrison - i'm reading beloved right now, and holy fuck can that woman write.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:03:59 2011 No.1490399 >>1490396 >Salinger I'm a huge Salinger fan, love all his short stories, and still think you're wrong. He's not a style guy, he's a story guy.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:05:59 2011 No.1490405 >>1490396 I became a man the day I revisited the copy of Song of Solomon I skimmed and Sparknoted my way through in high school and went "holy fucking awesome"

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:06:59 2011 No.1490409 >>1490316 That's because you're an uncultured plebe.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:09:59 2011 No.1490415 >>1490332 Borges is nothing like GGM. He is often times credited as a major inspiration for the magic realism movement, but his writing is not magic realism.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:10:59 2011 No.1490417 >>1490415 >associated with

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:11:59 2011 No.1490420 >>1490415 But he was a major influence of all the artists classified as magical realists. He was also a huge name during the Latin American Boom of the 60s and 70s.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:11:59 2011 No.1490423 >>1490417 >think stuff like Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude no

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:12:59 2011 No.1490424 >>1490420 >He was also a huge name during the Latin American Boom of the 60s and 70s. What does that matter? Not all latin american writers were working in the medium of magic realism.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:13:59 2011 No.1490427 >>1490423 I think that parenthetical is referring to what "magical realism" is, and not Borges himself.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:15:59 2011 No.1490433 >>1490424 That was for the guy who had never heard of Borges before.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:17:59 2011 No.1490436 >have an interested reader inquire about Borges. >imply that he wrote magic realism >my face when americans insult my regions greatest writer

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:18:59 2011 No.1490440 God I love when a nice /lit/ thread devolves into a miscommunicative spergsplosion. It's like Frasier with people who donated money to the Ron Paul blimp

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:20:59 2011 No.1490445 >>1490436 No one has suggested Borges wrote magical realism. One anon mentioned that "he is often associated with" magical realism, which is true. He was a major influence on all the magical realists.

Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:20:59 2011 No.1490446

>>1490436

You clearly have no idea what you're talking about or are simply trolling. Borges influenced magical realism, and many of his writings could be classified as such, whether you appreciate the genre or not.

His arbitrary academic classification has absolutely no bearing on his quality as a writer. Cry more.

Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:24:59 2011 No.1490458

Kafka has a very recognizable style, although I must wonder how much is lost or added in translation.

Pynchon has an extremely distinctive style, to be sure.

Camus, for me, always wrote wonderful prose that has a certain love for life and appreciation of beauty that I've yet to find anywhere else.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:26:59 2011 No.1490462 >>1489197 Is he trying to become a better writer of fun genre trash by dressing like one? Next step: the GRRM salty sea captain hat and child pornographer beard

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:27:59 2011 No.1490469 >>1490462 There's something wrong with T-shirts now?

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:28:59 2011 No.1490474 >>1490469 /lit/ will bitch about anything

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:29:59 2011 No.1490475 >>1490469 There is when it's worn over another, longer-sleeved t-shirt. NB: This is a perfectly okay look if you're 13 years old, it's 1999, and you never know how cold it's going to be in second period social studies

Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:29:59 2011 No.1490476

>>1490409
So not knowing one specific author makes me an uncultured plebe?
This is fantastic news! Oh thank you, dear anonymous poster on 4chan, thank you for opening my eyes, nay, my very mind itself to my horrendous faults! Your honesty and simplicity have raised me from the pits of lugubriation and revealed unto me the folly of me! I am transcending ego and awakening into the pure rapture of knowledge!

Tl:dr, fuck you for looking down on someone you know next to nothing about.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:31:59 2011 No.1490485 welp, this thread went downhill fast.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:32:59 2011 No.1490488 >>1490476 unenthusiastic "cool story bro"

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:32:59 2011 No.1490490 >>1490476 He's the most famous author of South America outside of Pablo Neruda. If you only read Europeans or USians or Asians or Africans...naw, even then you should know his name.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:34:59 2011 No.1490494 >>1490475 I hate to break it to you, but this is /lit/. /fa/ is <<<<thattaway

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:35:59 2011 No.1490496 File: 93 KB, 677x335, maximum trolling.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] ITT: Pic related

Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:37:59 2011 No.1490508

I saw an interview with Bolaño once where he complained about coming to the United States and telling people he met that he was a novelist. Nearly everyone, if they could say anything at all, would talk to him about Gabriel García Márquez. Bolaño spent the entire article whining about it. He was soooo offended that people only knew García Márquez and kept bringing him up in conversation.

He came across as a real prick. Yes, it's true, most Americans don't know many South American writers. They were trying as hard as they could to relate to Bolaño and his profession with their small knowledge, to be friendly, and he pissed all over them. What an asshole.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:39:59 2011 No.1490516 Read Evelyn "Fucking" Waugh. One of the great stylists of English prose ever. Brideshead Revisited is an incredible work.

Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:42:59 2011 No.1490527

>>1490494
Yeah, I shoulda known this would not be a receptive crowd. Just wearing a black t-shirt to hide armpit yellowing is a fashion 10/10 for nerdy high school kids, depressive humanities grad students, and people who want to know some good books with explicit rape scenes in them

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:44:59 2011 No.1490537 >>1490527 lol yase the reason we don't want your faboo fashion tips on /lit/ is because we're all neckbeards or rapists (get out)

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:49:59 2011 No.1490555 >>1490409 4chan is a pleb website you moron. Your elitism holds no water here.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:49:59 2011 No.1490557 >>1490527 >>1490527 It doesn't fucking matter how receptive we are, this is a board for literature. If we wanted fashion advice, we'd go to /fa/. BECAUSE THAT'S WHY IT'S FUCKING THERE. Now please either leave or discuss the actual topic.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:53:59 2011 No.1490572 >>1490557 I was just trying to break up the Borges bitchfight and it all went horribly wrong. SORRY GUYS LET'S ALL GO READ SOME WILLIAM GASS

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 22:56:59 2011 No.1490580 >>1490572 You wanted to stop literature discussion and start fashion discussion? What is wrong with you?

Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:11:59 2011 No.1490635

Nabokov puts pretty much everyone else to shame, IMO. There are still some authors I need to read, especially the non-English ones, but of what I've read, Nabokov stands head and shoulders above everyone else, at least if you're only looking at prose. Plenty of other authors do other things brilliantly, but I've never read anything that can match Nabokov's prose.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:38:59 2011 No.1490704 >>1490446 >Bmayn of Borges' writings could be classified as magic realism lol no Don't talk about matters you have no knowledge of.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:41:59 2011 No.1490730 >>1490704 Yeah the person who introduced me to him by lending me 'Ficciones' said it was magical realism. People who label it such quite blatantly haven't read it or are idiots.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:42:59 2011 No.1490734 File: 132 KB, 1256x1075, 1290023680446.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >F3 >no Céline

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:43:59 2011 No.1490739 >>1490396 DFW is an improvement on Pynchon IMHO

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:44:59 2011 No.1490752 >>1490730 This man wins the thread. Borges did not write magic realism you dolts. Was he an influence to many of the magic realists? Yes. But, HE WAS AN INFLUENCE TO ALMOST EVERY LATIN AMERICAN WRITER AFTER HIM.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:48:59 2011 No.1490775 J.K.Rowling is pretty good

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:49:59 2011 No.1490780 >>1490752 He wins the thread for what? Having a lame anecdote and absolutely no argument?

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:50:59 2011 No.1490792 >>1490780 He wins it for calling people who believe Borges wrote magic realism what they are, misinformed idiots.

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:52:52 2011 No.1490798 >>1490780 Shits not even up for argument nigga. Borges' writing is not magical realism. FACT Y'ALL

>>	Anonymous Mon Jan 24 23:52:59 2011 No.1490804 According to Angel Flores in Magical Realism in Spanish American Fiction, Borges' Historia universal de la infamia (published in 1935) was his first (not his last) piece of magical realist writing.

Anonymous Tue Jan 25 00:01:59 2011 No.1490893

>>1490792
>>1490798
There's a lot of scholarly debate (read: debate by people who read more widely and think more clearly than you) about whether Borges was simply an inspiration or one of the first true magical realists. It's not clear cut in any away.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 00:16:59 2011 No.1491024 >>1490798 you's trollin at the very LEAST, it's up for debate. really though, why is "magical realist" an insult? the issue is trifling, at best.

Anonymous Tue Jan 25 00:21:59 2011 No.1491058

i personally think sir thomas more was the founder of the so called magical realism with his "utopia - libellus vere aureus, nec minus salutaris quam festivus, de optimo rei publicae statu deque nova insula utopia"
jorge luis borges' thematic axis made him a legit magical realist novelist.
the already mentioned garcia marques, also

-a phd in literary theory-

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 00:24:59 2011 No.1491081 these faggots... >>1490792 >>1490798 just got schooled: >>1491058

Anonymous Tue Jan 25 00:25:59 2011 No.1491086

>>1491058
i find claims about the roots of magical realism / fantasy / science fiction stretching back much before the 19th century pretty questionable, frankly. I think all of those things as literary categories are pretty much founded on the rise of modernism (particularly for F&SF). wrt magical realism, i don't see how you can argue that something like utopia is the founding of magical realism when it (a) doesn't really fit into commonly accepted definitions of magical realism (b) precedes the development of realism in literature by a couple centuries as far as i know

can't wait for your response, this is an interesting topic, not trying to yell at you, just like talking about this. one love, it's all good baby.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 00:26:59 2011 No.1491089 Hitler, and especially George.W.Bush.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 00:28:59 2011 No.1491104 >>1491058 It's marquez pendejo.

>>	Scarlett Tue Jan 25 00:34:59 2011 No.1491150 Haven't read much mythology, have you?

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 00:34:59 2011 No.1491154 >>1491086 not responding, i wus just dumb-trolling yall n00b /lit/erats imma sleeping now

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 07:04:59 2011 No.1492071 At least my thread devolved into a /lit/ related fuckfest. Thanks for all the serious recommendations! More, are of course, welcomed.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 08:46:59 2011 No.1492221 >>1491104 u made my day cabron

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 08:50:59 2011 No.1492232 >>1492221 You calling me cabron, conjo?

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 11:31:59 2011 No.1492422 >>1491024 still waiting for someone to explain why magical realism is insulting.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 13:09:59 2011 No.1492568 >>1492422 so... no reasons? pretentious twits.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 13:21:59 2011 No.1492585 David Foster Wallace.

>>	Neuro !qdUPARcrn. Tue Jan 25 13:21:59 2011 No.1492586 Emily Dickinson? I'm thinking Emily Dickinson.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 13:46:59 2011 No.1492606 >>1490739 Agreed tbh

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 13:49:59 2011 No.1492614 what if everybody went back and tagged their picks in this thread with an example of their delicious prose?

Anonymous Tue Jan 25 14:28:59 2011 No.1492685

>>1490374
McCarthy is so hit or miss it's shocking.

I used to laugh that he was acclaimed for "The Road" until I realised the guy was like 80 and almost dead, and that they were just trying to give him props before he keels over.

"Blood Meridian" does have incredible prose, but stinkers like "No Country for Old Men" and "The Road"--children could have written that crap.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 16:48:59 2011 No.1493007 >control-f >No Faulkner >Fuck this board.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 16:52:59 2011 No.1493013 >>1493007 This.

Anonymous Tue Jan 25 17:51:59 2011 No.1493150

I hate when people put Borges in the same category of a merely good writer like GGM. Borges' way of using the language is unique, the best prose stylist of the Spanish language ever.

To me, amongst English language writers - this will be the audacious judgement of an insolent, as I have no formal education in the language and I don't even use it regularly - , the greatest stylist of the 20th century was Evelyn Waugh who I love and Lawrence Durrell, who quickly tires me up. I could add Anthony Powell. A contemporary writer that impresses me is Joan Didion. Candidly, I'll admit that I've always enjoyed William F. Buckley's peculiar style. I reckon there are many English language writers I read translated though.

If I were to start such a list, the first name in it would be Montaigne though.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 18:22:59 2011 No.1493216 >>1490436 But nobody insulted Cortázar...

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 18:23:59 2011 No.1493220 >>1493150 I sometimes feel like Durrell lays it on too thick, but I only read a small part of Justine, so idk if I'm as qualified as you to make this judgement.

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 18:25:59 2011 No.1493225 GB SHAW, AC DOYLE, PG WODEHOUSE

>>	Anonymous Tue Jan 25 22:23:59 2011 No.1493772 >>1493225 WODEHOUSE FOREVZ

Anonymous Tue Jan 25 22:54:59 2011 No.1493833

the two greatest French prose writers that I'm familiar with would be either Céline; for the remarkable rhythmical quality of his tongue, and for his fascinating juxtapositions between the familiar and the technical; or Flaubert; for the incredible flow of his speech, for the sheer beauty of his images, and for the sound: Flaubert just sounds better than anyone that I've had the chance to read.

as for English, my choices would probably be Melville, Nabokov or Burroughs.

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/lit/ - Literature