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/lit/ - Literature

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4293001 No.4293001 [Reply] [Original]

What is some good truly contemporary fiction? Are there any novelists aside from Tao Lin that manage to reflect the current lifestyle and attitudes of intelligent young adults in a way that is funny, painful, and beautiful? I feel like a startling amount of writers I know of now are too weary of writing for their own time and instead write narratives that match whatever literary era they think was the final great one.

>> No.4293003

>>4293001
The world is too fractured, now.

>> No.4293007

Hi, Tao.

>> No.4293009

Comics by Chris Ware

>> No.4293019

>>4293003
Now, the world is also fractured.

>> No.4293028

>>4293003
>not embracing the post-modern condition

learn2amorfati

>> No.4293036

>>4293001
In a world with my little pony fan-fiction and twilight I would just stick to your cloister and your pre-modern lit.

>> No.4293039

>>4293009
I thought about this when I started this thread. Most of the art I see that best captures contemporary people is made by comic book artists. Chris Ware is definitely there. Adrian Tomine can be considered a slight more literary Tao Lin. Joe Matt I think captures something authentic too.

>> No.4293045

>>4293039
I should say narrative art in specific.

>> No.4293088

>>4293001
>Are there any novelists aside from Tao Lin that manage to reflect the current lifestyle and attitudes of intelligent young adults in a way that is funny, painful, and beautiful?
Stop throwing flowers at yourself, Tao.

>> No.4293094

Did you mean to write 'unlike' instead of 'aside from'?

>> No.4293102

>>4293039
This is exactly why im learning drawing on the side besides writing my own stuff. Some people may disagree but in terms of contemporary Literature I think Ware is at the peak of it.

>> No.4294004

>>4293039
Could you name an example of those comic book things that is a good example of this and that I can easily find online?

>> No.4294024

>>4294004
The good stuff is Chris Ware who combines medium and content perfectly to make visually complex stories. Maybe too visually complex to be found online but you can try searching his name.

The underground (usually confessional & biographical) comix include those made by
- Robert Crumb
- Joe Matt
- Seth
- Adrian Tomine
- Chester Brown
- Adrian Tomine

Ones which I like are Black Hole by Charles Burns, Asterios Polyp by David Mazzuchelli, Daytripper by Fabio Moon. I've also heard Cerberus the Aardvark by Dave Sim is quite good.

I don't think they're as psychologically or intellectually rigorous as Dostoevsky (besides Chris Ware) but they're the best contemporary stuff we got and the art dimension adds a different aesthetic sense to it which is separate from literature.

Also recommended is NNN by Dan Kim which is an experimental comic free online that's inspired by House of Leaves structure and can be pretty amazing.

http://manga.clone-army.org/viewer.php?series=nnn

>> No.4294038

I'm also interested in this.

Contemporary young writers all seem to be like 30 years old and treat the internet as something peripheral to life.

Tao Lin is a pretty shit writer outside of Taipei, and even that reads like something he tried to be experimental with then gave up and went back to the autobiographical formula.

The thing I'm worried about is whether fiction has to be boring to a large degree now if you're portraying people who stay in a lot or seem jaded etc.

>> No.4294055
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4294055

ben brooks is a writer i like

he does funny and writes good

>> No.4294093
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4294093

>>4294055
>you will never stomp the shit out of ben brooks for looking like he does with a group of drunken skinheads

>> No.4294101

>>4294093
I've got some razors and some booze. Meet me by his house at 8 tomorrow.

>> No.4294108
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4294108

>>4294093
I can taste the bitterness from here

>> No.4294134
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4294134

>>4294108
No, it would be a happy stomping, enhanced by the idea that you are improving the world by unleashing your violence on this thing like a crusader for everything good and beautiful in the world. It's not that he is merely ugly, he is sick. Those mongoloid little eyes, the diseased skinnyfat of his disgusting weak arms enhanced by the forced quirkiness in a sort of unheimlich imitation of the thing he tries to embody but never succeeds at. If there ever were a reptilian this would be him, just imagine the green ooze a boxcutter to his flabby stomach would release. He is nausea embodied and should be burned thoroughly so that his slime won't mingle with the soil.

>> No.4294142

>>4294093
> Because you're even more of a bitch than he is