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/lit/ - Literature

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2240581 No.2240581 [Reply] [Original]

"You make striking comments on James Joyce in the book. Do you think he could have been as original as Shakespeare?:

He could have been; he is already the dominant writer of the 20th century. He could have been even more than he was. I am an enormous admirer of “Finnegans Wake,” but we have to face the fact that only a handful of people would ever be able to read it. It is a great classic but a classic for a tiny elite. I do think that Joyce is above 20th century writers even Proust and Kafka, very original indeed. I think Joyce really wanted to rival Shakespeare. Sometimes I do wonder whether those enormous gifts should have gone into something more accessible for the general reader, for the common reader."
- Sir Harold Bloom

Apparently James Joyce wanted to write "a short book about the sea" after writing Finnegans Wake. I like to think that it would have been the greatest novel of all times.

This thread is in part about Joyce but more generally about the big "what if's" of literature. Lost works, premature deaths etc

>> No.2240586

What if Marx could be alive today?

>> No.2240592

What if DFW was talented?

>> No.2240601
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2240601

what if Gaddis got better, in stead of worse? or rather, less angry, in stead of angry?

>> No.2240600
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2240600

>> No.2240611
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2240611

What if this thread is very stupid?

>> No.2240616

Fuck you niggers.

I was hoping at least for some musings on Cardenio or Brothers Karamazov: The Sequel.

Fuck all y'all

>> No.2240618

>>2240581
My prof said that Joyce was actually going to write that "short book about the sea" in more normal prose, which would've been interesting.

And then Joyce would have been Hemingway.

>> No.2240623
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2240623

>James Joyce wanted to write "a short book about the sea" after writing Finnegans Wake.
Hmm....

>> No.2240625

>>2240618
Or Joyce would have finally superceded Shakespeare and created a masterpiece that would be as popular, accessible as it would become eternal.

I'm actually really pissed he didn't write that book.

>> No.2240627

>>2240625
Dubliners was that book

>> No.2240629

read some of Guy Davenport's essays on Finnegan's Wake. actually read all of Guy Davenport's essays on modernism. actually read all of Guy Davenport's essays. love that dude.

>> No.2240634

A short book about a boy or man waking up on the sea was his plan, he said. But seeing as ulysses was originally just a story in Dubliners....

>> No.2240641

Bloom's own views are too strong here. Joyce "failed" because his books aren't open to the common, general reader? It's very Steinbecky in here.

A book or piece of art does not have to be palatable to the "masses" to be good. That syllogism is false, being based on licentious premises.

>> No.2240653

if DFW had finished the Pale King

God, I long for that whole work...

>> No.2240651

>>2240641
false as is its opposite

>> No.2240659

>>2240641
I don't think Bloom is saying Joyce fails at all. Elsewhere he basically ranks Joyce as coming closest to Dante and Shakespeare. I think it's more of a personal preference of his. He says he reads Proust more often but that Joyce is richer.

>> No.2240675

>>2240659
You are correct. But it's the suggestion that Joyce's work "should" have been different, as Bloom wonders, that rankles me. I understand what he means, just as a casual observation, but it's worthless as criticism or commentary.

Joyce is Joyce is Joyce -- meaning, I don't think he could have written any other way.

>> No.2240685

>>2240675
> it's worthless as criticism or commentary

Are you suggesting that Bloom "should" critique differently? Bloom is Bloom is Bloom -- meaning, I don't think he can write any other way.

Nah, I jest.

>> No.2240691

What if Mervyn Peake had actually written the entire Gormenghast series chronicling Titus's birth, adolescence, departure from and eventual return to Gormenghast castle, the lifespan and subsequent recreation of its many Rituals?

He'd be right up there alongside Tolkien and Lewis as a fantasy classic they make kids read, that's what.

Goddamn palsy.

>> No.2240695

>sir Harold bloom
Made me rage.

>> No.2240699
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2240699

>>2240695
Made you anxious more like.

>> No.2240701

oh woah why are we calling harold bloom 'sir'

that ain't right

>> No.2240698

>Joyce planned to write another Dubliners-level book after all the experience of writing Ulysses and Finnegans Wake

Holy shit, this would have been the end of literature. Everyone else could have just gone home.

>> No.2240703

>>2240698
OP here.

My thoughts exactly. Would be a brilliant full circle.

>> No.2240710

Anyone else when thinking about Ulysses have a tendency to think of "[Harold] Bloom" instead of "[Leopold] Bloom" as the name?

>> No.2240726

>>2240710
"Leopold Bloom is the richest character since Shakespeare and Cervantes." - His Majesty Harold Bloom

Picture Harold Bloom walking around Dublin with such a rich interior life.

>> No.2240729

>>2240726

>Picture Harold Bloom walking

the fruit... it's so low hanging

>> No.2240735

I would REALLY like to know what Shakespeare's favourite works were. And I often think about what he would think of writers that came after him, like what he would think of Finnegans Wake, for example.

>> No.2240739

Finnegans Piece of Cake is for baby's who like eating shit

>> No.2241586

bumpity

>> No.2241611
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2241611

>>2240581
This man begs to differ.

I would have loved to read Fitzgerald's retrospective book (though explicitly not a memoir for some reason), as well as a completed version of The Last Tycoon.

>> No.2241636

>>2240729

<<cue the count's laugh (sesame street)

'ah! 'ah! 'ah! 'ah! 'ah!

>> No.2241694

Shakespeare and what's his face's play Cardenio would have been fascinating.

>> No.2241707

>>2241636
pic related?

>> No.2241711

I wonder what literature would be like if kafka's friend chose to burn Kafka's work (as he requested) instead of publishing them.

>> No.2241712

Shakespeare reportedly wrote a play based off of some of the episodes in Don Quixote Part 1, but it has been lost to history.

I would become a eunuch to read that play.

>> No.2241713
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2241713

My heart burns for a complete version of The First Man.

Not just that, the man was still young. Who knows what other masterpieces he would've written?

>> No.2241717

>>2241711
Yep. I feel that Kafka was a huge event in modernism, not to mention the entire history of literature.

I'm definitely in the camp that thinks that Kafka didn't really expect his works to get burned by choosing what's his face as his literary executor. Just more of "K" being self-loathing and butthurt.

>> No.2241721

I'm gonna come out and say it...

...I'm glad Kafka never finished any of his novels. I'm with Deleuze and Guattari in thinking they're necessarily open-ended, that they could never be finished and that they work better the way they are.

>> No.2241729

>>2241721
Exactly. It's almost as if they were written to be unfinished...they weren't, right?

>> No.2241740

>>2241729

Yeah. Seems almost certain Kafka at least intended them to be 'normal' novels which he would actually finish, but D&G argue that the nature of the works is such that, despite himself, they could never be completed, that something like the trial could carry on indefinitely (they also think it's wrong to assume what is usually accepted as the final chapter isn't simply a nightmare that K. has).

>> No.2241742

European here.

I have never heard of James Joyce before going on /lit/.

Doesn't mean shit outside of the US, like Vonnegut.

>> No.2241750

>>2241742
10 outta fucking 10

>> No.2241755

>>2241742
yes, it's a shame that american writers, like vonnegut and joyce,

>> No.2241792

>>2241742
Holy fuck this is stupid and nonsensical.

>> No.2241828

>>2241742

You are aware that Joyce was Irish, right?

>> No.2241832

>>2241828
Anon never implied that Joyce was American, he just said that his reputation wasn't large outside the US. I have no idea if this is true, but I would think NO, YOU FAGGOT.

>> No.2241834
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2241834

>>2241742

>> No.2241902

>>2241832
>Anon never implied that Joyce was American

If Joyce wasn't from the US then why would he be unknown outside the us? Yes, you did imply it.

>> No.2241966
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2241966

>>2241902
After reading Carvers final collection of poems "A New Path to the waterfall" and his last story collection "Elephant" I've become quite convinced that our Raymond was preparing to write a novel. We believe we have fragments of such a book entitled "The Augustine Notebooks."

What a novel it would have been. At that point in Carver's career, nearing his death, he most certainly perfected his style, abandoning some of the idiosyncrasies perpetrated by Lish as Raymond's editor, eventually finding a voice in his fiction as prolific and inexorable as in his poetry.

That novel would have been beautiful.

>> No.2242082

Thomas Pynchon considered (after Gravity's Rainbow) writing film reviews for Esquire.

What I would do to know his top 10 list.

>> No.2242093

>>2241966
This. Carver certainly had a great novel in him.
What if Joyce hadn't lost it and written a proper novel instead of Finnegan's Wake?
What if DFW had been able to deal with his demons and remain among the living?

>> No.2242099

James Joyce is the Tarantino of books. All he knows how to do is reference stuff and steal other people's ideas.

>> No.2242102

>>2242099
T. S. Elliot would be his Robert Rodriquez

>> No.2242134

Why does everyone imply that Joyce 'lost it' with Finnegans Wake? I kinda liked the book, although it took a few reads to actually grasp it. (Ok, a lot of reads.)

But the idea of a Joyce-book that's easily accessible to the masses (unlike Dubliners, which never got the fame it deserved) is intriguing.

>> No.2242150

>>2242134
I'm confused. Are you saying Dubliners isn't accessible or that it is accessible, it's just unpopular? Because both of those seem slightly foolish.

>> No.2242164

>>2242150
I'm saying that Dubliners is by far Joyce's most accessible work, but that it never is considered a classic, because Joyce most often is known as the guy who wrote "those totally complicated stuff", which casts a shadow over Dubliners and diminishes it's literary value.

I hope that was clearer. I'm kinda tired and thirsty.

>> No.2242168

>>2242164

>it never is considered a classic

The majority of people on this board would disagree with you there. It's a fairly popular opinion (which I happen to hold) that "The Dead" is the greatest short story ever written.

>> No.2242179

>>2242168
sadly /lit/ does not represent the whole reading community.

What I'd call a general accepted classic would be The Catcher in The Rye, the Great Gatsby.

Stuff that anyone has read at some point in their life.

And let's be honest, most of the English speaking population of the country has barely even heard the name Joyce. (which is a whole different problem, and has nothing to do with this thread.)

I believe the problem with Joyce is the impossibility of properly translating his work. This stopped his works in becoming popular in other cultures.

>> No.2242178

>>2242168
He's right. Dubliners isn't really held in high esteem. Sure, everyone loves The Dead and Araby but you don't hear much accalim for the work as a whole or the other stories.

> and the majority of the people on this board would disagree with you
That's probably a sign that you're right about something.

>> No.2242182

>>2242178

Second this.

And as for the hypothetical 'average reader' my experience is that they hate it and complain 'nothing happens' in any of the stories.

>> No.2242188

>>2242179

I read an interesting/hilarious thing about translating Finnegans Wake into Japanese

google search would probably bring it up

>> No.2242192

>>2242168
> "The Dead" is the greatest short story ever written.

Honestly, I love this story dearly but it is quite beyond me how anyone in any case would find it necessary and sufficient to qualify works of art with statements so laconic, so fatuous. The greatest, really? You favorite, fine. I can get on board with that. I can always get on board with something like that.

>> No.2242193

>>2242188

http://p-www.iwate-pu.ac.jp/~acro-ito/Joycean_Essays/FW_2JapTranslations.html

The formatting on this site is an abomination.

>> No.2242195

>>2242188
which Japanese translation are you referring to?
I have read the one by Yanase, but not the relatively new one by Miyata. Although I heard that version's a bit on the short side.

>> No.2242197

>>2242192

Hence the "opinion" qualifier.

>> No.2242200

>>2242193
Thanks for the article.

>>2242195
speaking.

>> No.2242224

>>2242182
"Nothing Happens."

Laughable.

I try to tell people that a good short story will naturally engage the reader to some extent in a bit of gumshoeing. Joyce and Chekhov are the modernists best known for formulating a story in the mundane often framing, but never touching, the main point, event, character, resolution, paralysis etc. Another name comes to mind, Maupassant.

Well, these guys really set the stage for the American minimalists in the 80's -- some my favorite short fiction ever written.

The casual reader, though, will not suffer this material. I've heard the claim "there is no point" one too many times. If not subtlety where in fact do we find grace, finesse and implication in style? Maybe I'm just a Romantic, but I've always love minimalism.

>> No.2242251

>>2242197
Surely you must understand my point.

Fine, let's do this.

Why is "The Dead" the greatest short story ever as opposed to Carver's "Cathedral"?

>> No.2242255

>>2242251

I get you're point. It was badly phrased on my part.

>> No.2242258

>>2242255

>you're point

I cannot into grammar.

>> No.2242276

>>2242258
It's fine.

The Dead, regardless, is an astounding short story. Probably should post those last few paragraphs:

Perhaps she had not told him all the story. His eyes moved to the chair over which she had thrown some of her clothes. A petticoat string dangled to the floor. One boot stood upright, its limp upper fallen down: the fellow of it lay upon its side. He wondered at his riot of emotions of an hour before. From what had it proceeded? From his aunt's supper, from his own foolish speech, from the wine and dancing, the merry-making when saying good-night in the hall, the pleasure of the walk along the river in the snow. Poor Aunt Julia! She, too, would soon be a shade with the shade of Patrick Morkan and his horse. He had caught that haggard look upon her face for a moment when she was singing Arrayed for the Bridal. Soon, perhaps, he would be sitting in that same drawing-room, dressed in black, his silk hat on his knees. The blinds would be drawn down and Aunt Kate would be sitting beside him, crying and blowing her nose and telling him how Julia had died. He would cast about in his mind for some words that might console her, and would find only lame and useless ones. Yes, yes: that would happen very soon.

>> No.2242277

>>2242276
The air of the room chilled his shoulders. He stretched himself cautiously along under the sheets and lay down beside his wife. One by one, they were all becoming shades. Better pass boldly into that other world, in the full glory of some passion, than fade and wither dismally with age. He thought of how she who lay beside him had locked in her heart for so many years that image of her lover's eyes when he had told her that he did not wish to live.

Generous tears filled Gabriel's eyes. He had never felt like that himself towards any woman, but he knew that such a feeling must be love. The tears gathered more thickly in his eyes and in the partial darkness he imagined he saw the form of a young man standing under a dripping tree. Other forms were near. His soul had approached that region where dwell the vast hosts of the dead. He was conscious of, but could not apprehend, their wayward and flickering existence. His own identity was fading out into a grey impalpable world: the solid world itself, which these dead had one time reared and lived in, was dissolving and dwindling.

>> No.2242281

>>2242277
A few light taps upon the pane made him turn to the window. It had begun to snow again. He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark, falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time had come for him to set out on his journey westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling, too, upon every part of the lonely churchyard on the hill where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.

>> No.2242285

>>2242281

That last paragraph always gets me. Absolutely beautiful. And people say Joyce is for snobs ...

>> No.2242306

>>2242285
The ending of the story is famous for getting both professors and students, even during a reading. It is quite beautiful.

To be quite honest I've always felt the message delivered, though, doesn't really fit that lovely cadence. It's quite a miserable moment for Gabriel, not because of his wife, not because of the dinner, not even because of himself, but rather because of the dead: past selves in permanent termination, selves lesser and larger than Gabriel himself. An epiphany, and unpleasant one for Gabriel at that, yelling "wake up asshole, and join the rest of the party!"

>> No.2242320

>>2242281
I've always believed that this is the most beautiful paragraph ever written in the English language. It must feel astounding to create something that powerful.

>> No.2242338

FUCK YEAH THE DEAD!

Looking forward to tackling Ulysses and Finnegans Wake but I highly doubt I'll encounter as much beauty as that. I've read Molly's soliloquy and it doesn't really come as close.

>> No.2242967

>>2242099
nah he's more liek the Godard

>> No.2242992

>>2242967
Godard is more like Pynchon except Pynchon is way more intelligent.

>> No.2243006

>>2242992
Writers are more intelligent than filmmakers, in general.

>> No.2243011

>>2243006
Not sure about that as a rule, but in general, yes. I'd agree.

There's that line from Fellini's 8 1/2 where the scriptwriter is telling Marcello (the director) that the cinema is always 50 years behind the other arts. Maybe it is?

I guess it's still a young art form. Should be interesting to see in a 100 years what will happen to film directors and novelists/poets.

>> No.2243050

>>2243011
hehe, ya, cause we're totes not gonna be dead by then

>> No.2243074

>>2242338
Just wait. Penelope is a tour de force but for my money the best prose is in Ithaca.

>> No.2243085

>implying a small group of joyce scholars couldn't produce a novel equal in greatness and in the same style as the book he would have written
hey let's do that.

>> No.2243099

you haven't lived until you've read finnegan's wake stoned or tripping.

>> No.2244110

>>2242082
Pauline Kael must have had him killed. Everything since has been ghostwritten.

>> No.2244130

>>2243099
Hmm.. once I was in Barnes and Noble while stoned off of my ass and I decided to read Finnegans Wake for shits and giggles.


.
.
.
.
.
.
It was underwhelming, but pleasingly unstructured and nonsensical (pretty much the embodiment of being really high on marijuana)

>> No.2244135

It was funny because the day I went out to buy a copy of Ulysses ended up in a crazy adventure around town cos of running into a friend at the bookshop and I didn't make it home until 24 hours later

Not even joking either. Life imitating art etc.

>> No.2244348

>>2243099
Actually when mildly stoned I understand the book a lot better. When on mescaline or the likes however, reading in general's hard for me.

>> No.2244360

Wasn't Brothers Karamazov supposed to be the first in a series?

>> No.2244373

>>2244348

i wish i had mescaline :(