/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.21794912]

Every time I read a book recommended here it’s a fucking joke and a pathetic excuse of """literature"""

over half the book is
>muh I slept close to a lava crater
>I ate and drank and slept in the lava crater and drank and ate and slep—
>I found the girl!
>she looked at me in awe and wanted to sing songs about how alpha I am
>I was born to be her master
>I saved her from a monster and she looked at me in awe and kissed me and she was cute and obeyed me and kissed me and was in awe and craters and we hid in bushes and she was in awe and she obeyed me and she was naked and her feet and we kissed and we slept and drank and ate
>the end

pathetic get fucked /lit/

[Anonymous No.21794933]

isn't this the book that is written in really shitty archaic language as well?

[Anonymous No.21794949]

>>21794933
I read the French translation because of that yeah, it’s very much trimmed and more legible

seriously there should be a disclaimer in the dying earth chart that the book is maybe a precursor but also a heap of shit

copy/pasted from goodreads (part 1) :

At first, I thought it no wonder Lovecraft declared this a must read for any scholar or writer of Supernatural Horror--it's a great premise, not quite like anything before, with clear potential for unexpected moments, high tension, a depiction of the ultimate struggle of mankind to survive--and Hodgson squanders all of it. Everything about this book seems designed to work against the story, to undermine it, to remove any thrill or tension or genuine human sentiment.

Our hero isn't just psychic--he's the most psychic, with knowledge and theories that no one else can ever hope to comprehend. The message isn't just from some other survivor, it's from the reborn soul of his dead girlfriend. Though it's supposed to literally be a love for the ages, the romance is as naive and idealized as a Taylor Swift song, full of grand words and gestures but completely lacking in any emotional depth or personal connection.

It's the sort of romance that occurs automatically, without any participation from those involved--there is no connection, and their personalities (especially hers) are entirely superfluous to the relationship. The romance is really for him, to motivate him, to draw him out--it's your standard 'love interest as plot device'. The entire relationship is presented in terms of control and possession, until the 'hero' ends up creepier than all the faceless monsters.

[Anonymous No.21794952]

>>21794949
Here's a man who sees himself as far above others, in both body and mind, who constantly talks about his own amazing abilities (Hodgson was, himself, an early proponent of bodybuilding). Meanwhile, he is beset on all sides by a dark, incomprehensible world of faceless figures bent on destroying him. It is such a complete image of self-obsession, persecution complex, and profound entitlement. Hodgson's success in House on the Borderlands seems entirely to hinge on the fact that the protagonist was supposed to be a creepy, reclusive weirdo--'write what you know', I guess.

Then there is the physical style of the work, which begs through bloody lips for some kind of editing. We get the same information again and again, recapped and repeated. The agonist is constantly trying to explain the plot to us, as well as his thoughts, his desires, and every other thing. The story is never allowed to progress naturally, but is instead whipped and drug every inch of the way.

It’s as if an author wrote a short book, perhaps two hundred pages, and then went back through everything he had written and copied paragraphs and sentences, repeating them over and over throughout the story, changing the order here and there, until the book swells to six hundred pages. There is no thought, observation, description, or scene too banal to be repeated five or six times--usually capped off by the narrator saying ‘as I’ve mentioned several times before’.

There are entire chapters (and the chapters aren’t short) which are just the author walking for six hours (always six hours) across some barren plain or dry seabed before reaching some notable piece of landscape he’d mentioned before (usually a large rock), and then, ‘at the tenth hour’, realizing that he hasn’t slept or eaten anything in twelve hours, and collapsing exhausted in a shallow cave to a brief meal before passing out a good long while. When he wakes up, he’ll hear or see some terrible beast nearby, but it won’t notice him. Then he’ll get up and do it all again two or three times, until the chapter ends. That same scenario repeating is literally at least 50% of the book.

Finally, after walking ‘halfway across the world’ (in the narrator’s words), he reaches the only other human settlement on Earth, a place he’d never imagined existed, but which he was determined to reach against all odds. So, what does he do then: Check for supplies? See who else survived? Try to band together and save some of the other people? He doesn’t even look at the place, he just conveniently finds his girlfriend in a shallow cave outside, takes a nap, and then they leave.

Her only home has been destroyed, everyone she knows is dead or hiding from monsters, and yet when they meet, it’s all sweet kisses and blushing, holding hands, laughing and teasing--and of course him ordering her around for her own good, since she’s too stupid to do even the most basic things herself.

[Anonymous No.21794960]

>>21794952
Then there's the language, which is artificially archaic, as Hodgson seeming to think that the residents of One Million AD will all sound like a Roanoke colony parson. While I enjoy the carefully-constructed archaism of Dunsany and E.R. Eddison, which provide their works with a sense of tone and poetry, a beauty of language that is appreciable in and of itself, Hodgson’s archaism is clunky and serves only to draw out an already tedious narrative.

The book is odiously stupid, just a constant test of the reader’s patience. Yet, it’s not stupid like most books, which are simply cliche and badly written by accident of the author’s lack of skill--this book is terrible because of a series of increasingly stupid and pointless decisions, all despite the fact that it’s conceptually interesting and inventive. By all rights, this book should have been worth reading, but it simply fails to be, at almost every turn.

Posted this here because it sums it up well
imma move on to zothique before jack vance but it kinda put me off for the dying earth marathon

[Anonymous No.21795087]

Yeah it's great.

[Anonymous No.21795498]

Filtered.

[Anonymous No.21795527]

I heckin loved it. The archaic Engslishe was to grate utter upon mine nerves and yet I reached a meditative state as I waded through it, and through the many pages of bizarre waifuism. The supernatural entities and landscape were very fresh and spooky. As is often the case, the old shit is spicier. The final fight sequence read like some kind of anime battle, but in a manner both cool and ebin. A crude analogy, but I can't get it out of my mind. The MC is a giga-Mary Sue (or whatever the man version is), but I'm of the opinion that muh Mary Sue is a gay reddit meme. The book is uncompromisingly romantic and I teared up a little at the end
Overall, 11/10 it's OK

[Anonymous No.21795563]

>>21795527
Are all those locations and characters at least a little bit fleshed out? Or are they only just mentioned?

[Anonymous No.21795570]

>>21795563
Some are, some aren't

[Anonymous No.21795582]

>>21795570
Fuckin' bollocks. Thanks.
Any other books (other than the /lit/-famous ones) that do a good job of being descriptive? No matter if the story is shite.

[Anonymous No.21795615]

>>21794912
Truthfully, and with great verity.

[Anonymous No.21795630]

>>21795582
By what standards, literature or genre fiction? The Night Land is good by genre fiction standards, and you missed the worst of it by not reading it in the archaic original. If you want good fantasy(-adjacent) by literature standards then read Flaubert's Salammbo and Saint Anthony. The magical realism of Borges, Rushdie, and others will also meet the literature standard.

[Anonymous No.21795636]

>>21795582
>good job of being descriptive
If you read French then go straight for French decadence, go straight to French decadence even if you don't. Huysmans La Bas is a good starting point, if plot doesn't matter and you want the height of description go for A Rebours, each chapter is a sensory catalogue on a different category of items.

[Anonymous No.21795646]

True descriptive prose as a device that would occupy an entire page was started by Zola and his naturalism and then made good by his truant student Huysmans and his supernaturalist decadence. Flaubert was an antecedent.

[Anonymous No.21795678]

>>21794960
Bad review.

[Anonymous No.21795687]

>>21795630
>>21795636
Thanks. Have read Madame Bovary and Labyrinths. Among the Decadents, only read Au Claire de la Dune by Hannon. Will check out the other works.

[Anonymous No.21795725]

>>21795527
11/10 bait

[Anonymous No.21795788]

>>21795687
The Flaubert of Salammbo and Saint Anthony is very different to the Flaubert of Bovary and Sentimental Education but equally as great, a proto-decadent and amongst its best. The book so captivated French minds with oriental exoticism it literally rewrote the streets of Carthage.

[Anonymous No.21795790]

>>21795678
>>21795725
Both of the original posts are true. It's not good, it's genre fiction, but it has a charm if you excuse its failings. The opening is strongly romantic, and as the romanicism devolves into stupid insert-waifuism it's so throughly stupid and repetitive in it that it has its own charm in its rambling unashamedness.

[Anonymous No.21795806]

Terrible book.
Could be decent with one third of it's length.

[Anonymous No.21795844]

>>21794933
Not at all

[Anonymous No.21795859]

>>21794912
I am reading it now and in 150 pages all I can say is that it fucking sucks. It's all literally just hiding in "moss bushes" and eating and sleeping.
>>21794933
It was, the prose is pretty bad. Reading in English.
>>21794960
Jack Vance is fantastic and CAS is good, but not as good as Vance. Wolfe is the best in the dying earth bunch, but all besides Hodgson are well worth reading.

[Anonymous No.21795864]

>>21795806
This is it, it's a magnificent vision dragged to 400 pages while it has around 200 pages worth of actual content. It's like he just went repeating the same event over and over. This thing is scary, I'll run and hide, eat and sleep. Repeat this 10 times and that's half the novel. The whole romantic element is superfluous and adds nothing.

[Anonymous No.21795909]

>>21795725
it's not bait sucka

[Anonymous No.21795913]

>>21795790
The bait is in praising Mary Sues and blatant wish fulfillment while pretending to be an animefag.
>inb4 >pretending

[Anonymous No.21795915]

>>21795913
It's not bait retard. That is what I unironically think >>21795527

[Anonymous No.21796170]

>>21795915
I can understand your sentiment. The books is bad, but I see what some find endearing.

[Anonymous No.21796196]

Is the modernized one decent? Night land is a cool idea but man what a slog

[Anonymous No.21796207]

>>21794912
Cringe and filtered. Stick to pop lit.

[Anonymous No.21796213]

>>21796196
I suspect it's even worse because women speak in it.