/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.6088448]

>describing the main character looking into a mirror

[Anonymous No.6088468]

>le Rape of the Lock face

[Anonymous No.6088472]

>when they describe how "sad" their eyes look

[Anonymous No.6088483]

>describing how crooked a characters nose is

[Anonymous No.6088486]

>when they describe how a girl's curves are all "in the right places"

[Anonymous No.6088490]

>when they describe things
>when there are words in the book
>when the book is about something

*tips cane*

[Anonymous No.6088492]

>holding things in the crook of their arm

[Anonymous No.6088500]

>when the book uses dashes

[Anonymous No.6088503]

>when there are adverbs after said

[Anonymous No.6088522]

>when the main character is a good looking, "ironic" loner

[Anonymous No.6088528]

>>6088448
>book

[Anonymous No.6088532]

>having main characters

[Anonymous No.6088540]

>genres

[Anonymous No.6088544]

>the main character is a writer

[Anonymous No.6088552]

>The book ends

[Anonymous No.6088555]

>greentexting non-sense

[Anonymous No.6088560]

>We need diverse books!

[Anonymous No.6088565]

>glorified shitposting

[Anonymous No.6088567]

>>6088565
>>6088555
Would you rather have the eleventh Pynchon thread today?

[Anonymous No.6088572]

>>6088490
>when the book is about something

this one is semi true though.
"nothing happens" is a pleb critique for plot readers

[Anonymous No.6088574]

>it's written by a white male

[Anonymous No.6088580]

>>6088448>>6088468>>6088472>>6088483>>6088486>>6088490>>6088492>>6088500>>6088503>>6088522>>6088528>>6088532>>6088540>>6088544>>6088552>>6088555>>6088560
samefag
>>6088565
>>6088567

[Anonymous No.6088581]

>>6088567
Link me the Pynchon threads from today

[Anonymous No.6088584]

>when a female tries to write a male character

[Anonymous No.6088589]

>>6088580
I'm only responsible for three of those.

>>6088567
No. I was just stating that these "statements" are non-sense. And also funposting. But I enjoy funposting so I can't say I mind.

Also
>mfw getting banned for funposting

[Anonymous No.6088604]

W-Well, what about this?

>He walked up to the apparatus of self-abasement with great self-conscious confidence and put his face forward so that his nose almost touched it. He then tried intensely to have a feeling of profound reflection and introspection, as a great thinker ought to when confronted with a reflection of their mortal coil. Death and relations and convention and all the rest. These efforts went on for perhaps 20 or 30 seconds; having failed, he returned to his default state of ironic self-admiration, and began to contort his naturally androgynous - if not downright effeminate - face into as stern and manly a configuration as possible. The full, red lips he tried to turn into a thread of determination. The jiggly trunk of a neck he tried to turn into something resembling the shaft of a penis, veiny and well-defined. He then removed his clothes with immense care, as if performing for an audience, and glared desultorily at his flabbiness. He applied the masculinizing contortions he had affected on his face to his whole body, to little effect. Having made the day into an abject failure already, he clattered down the stairs, the ugly puke-yellow walls mocking and jeering all the while.

[Anonymous No.6088609]

>>6088604
What is this from?

[Anonymous No.6088615]

>>6088609

I came up with it on the fly, to see if I could make a mirror-looking passage interesting in the least.

[Anonymous No.6088652]

>>6088615
I really liked it anon.

[Anonymous No.6088662]

>>6088652
Well then, good. I dunno, I felt I might've been just a tad too verbose, but as you can probably tell I was kind of vacillating into and out of the character portrayed's point of view. But overall, I think it isn't bad, too.

[Anonymous No.6088878]

>>6088552
Lel good one

[Anonymous No.6088905]

>>6088662

I think it would be even better if that was a passage in the book that your main character is writing, because he should be a novelist.

[Anonymous No.6088940]

>>6088492
don't they carry off K like that in The Trial?

[Anonymous No.6088949]

>>6088584
>when Murakami tries to write a female character

[Anonymous No.6088962]

>> Katie's sad eyes gazed deeply into the mirror. A familiar feeling of disgust swept over her as she contemplated her crooked nose and mishapen eye brows. She let out a long sigh. All the boys at school said lustily that she had “curves in all the right places” but her strange face of which she was very self aware had ironically made her somewhat of a loner. In the crook of her arm was a book she was writing. Due to her lack of friends she had turned to literature for comfort. It was a genre fiction which didn't have any main characters. She had been up all night fleshing out the main character who was modeled on a boy from school – Chad.

[Anonymous No.6088971]

>>6088604
>He then tried
Fucking dropped

[Anonymous No.6088972]

>>6088962
Satisfying to read. Good job.

[Anonymous No.6088973]

> the title of the book is in the last sentence

[Anonymous No.6088978]

>>6088486
Bukowski?

[Anonymous No.6089042]

>>6088905

Wow, that hurts. For a second I thought someone on /lit/ actually liked what I wrote. Still, I give that burn a 9/10. Nice meme'ing.

[Anonymous No.6089055]

>>6088971

What's so bad about that? I tried the other two possible formulations, but in that context "He then tried" was by far the naturalest and best-sounding.

[Anonymous No.6089067]

>>6089055
>naturalest

[Anonymous No.6089076]

>>6089067

Go fuck yourself. It should be a word, so I use it.

[Anonymous No.6089086]

>>6089076
couldve used most natural my friend

[Anonymous No.6089092]

>>6089086

But I don't want to. I'm a naturalest advocate. It sounds better than "most natural."

[Anonymous No.6089103]

>>6089092
you became one 4 minutes ago
importanest
dangerest

[Anonymous No.6089104]

>when a male writes a female character and tries to make them seem like an actually interesting human being

[Anonymous No.6089106]

>>6089092
Would you say it sounds naturaler?

[Anonymous No.6089119]

>>6089106
I would.

>>6089103
Wat.

[Anonymous No.6089137]

>>6089104
Are you saying it is impossible or the writer fails to?

[Anonymous No.6089143]

In an interview I read, Borges brought up a word he'd only read in a single poet's work: "neverness". I hope it gets used more often.

[Anonymous No.6089152]

>>6088604
jesus christ

[Anonymous No.6089154]

>>6089152

That bad, huh?

[Anonymous No.6089171]

>>6089154
well it's exactly the kind of thing i'd expect from a poster on /lit/, is that the joke?

[Anonymous No.6089182]

>>6089171

I-It wasn't a joke. I was actually trying there to make a mirror passage interesting in the least. I guess I wasn't successful. Then again I haven't done virtually any creative writing since high school, so I suppose that's to be expected.

[Anonymous No.6089238]

>>6088962
underrated post

[Anonymous No.6089302]

>>6088973
But it's SO TEMPTING

[Anonymous No.6089316]

>>6088973
Gotta love Pynchon

[Anonymous No.6089364]

>>6088604
This is actually nice. I like it, it's not a mirror used as a sole excuse to describe the character physically, it actually shows his psyche well.

The ending phrase was especially good. Keep it up, anon.

[Anonymous No.6089387]

>>6089364
W-Well at least someone likes me!!

[Anonymous No.6089389]

>>6088490
that would honestly be a dope fit if he wasn't a fat ass and took off that faggot hat and scarf

[Anonymous No.6089438]

>>6089389
>socks with sandals

[Anonymous No.6089463]

>book has pages with numbers privileged in a patterned of ascending order

[Anonymous No.6089471]

>>6089438
>i don't understand fashion and i'm a huge fuccboi, please fuck my boipussy
what's your kik?

[Anonymous No.6089479]

>>6089463
>not conforming ZFC set-theoretical hierarchies
i'm honestly vomiting so much please why

[Anonymous No.6089489]

>>6088555
>not embracing the absurdity of existence in the couture neuveux

[Anonymous No.6089497]

>>6089387
You shouldn't take criticism too seriously here. Not that you should completely disregard it either, but funposting (as you can tell from this thread) is a thing and so is bringing others down for no reason in particular. It was good, you succeeded in making it interesting, if you like writing you can actually get somewhat good at it. Don't take /lit/ too seriously, it will do you no good.

I'm not sure what my point was, I probably came off as condescending but I didn't mean to. I'm just tired of seeing decent writing ripped to shreds by bitter people. Or maybe I just have shit taste and that's why I like stuff /lit/ doesn't. Who knows?

[Anonymous No.6089684]

In the mirror he saw himself thinking while looking at himself how behind the mirror was the ibuprofen he walked in here to get for his headache, watching himself snap to about how he wasn't sure if he'd taken three or four - one of those being the maximum number or else something bad would happen with his liver or spleen. He reached for the handle and saw his hand come forward in the mirror and tried to see if he could tell how many he'd taken, intuiting the subconscious vectors, when he noticed a fly he'd smashed hovering there smashed head to smashed head with a razor-thin slit of mirror's only real surface disillusioned by the self-met fly. Imagining himself backing up many yards that weren't there and gnashing himself into the mirror all symmetric he decided against the ibuprofen and took a long piss in the toilet, his askew yellow reflection distorted, his stream pissing into his own stream, but only the live fly, buzzing and widowed, could see from her place upside-down and underneath the toilet seat.

[Anonymous No.6089701]

>>6089684

That was fucking wild, man. I liked it. Good job.

[Anonymous No.6089710]

>>6089497
but it was terrible? it read like something rendered totally self-conscious by years of exposure to exactly the kind of /lit/ shitposting you're referring to
way too wordy and the penis comparison was way fucking out of place
i understand exactly what you're talking about with regard to needlessly harsh and undeserved criticism, but that was terrible

[Anonymous No.6089713]

>the main character is a college professor
>the main character is a tenured college professor under the age of 35

[Anonymous No.6089721]

>>6088604
>when the phrase 'abject terror' is used
>using the word profound unironically
>using the word ironic unironically

so many more but it's too painfully bad to reskim

[Anonymous No.6089742]

>>6089721

Well, for one thing, the phrase "abject terror" is not used. And if you read it (you admitted you didn't), you'd see that both of those words are used ironically. Poor show.

[Anonymous No.6089756]

>>6089742
not ironically enough

[Anonymous No.6089763]

>>6089756
/lit/ never disappoints.

[Anonymous No.6089766]

>>6089713
Stoner?

[Anonymous No.6089784]

>>6089766
haven't read it, speaking of novels written in our current shitty times mostly

>college professor has affair with student who is a Scheming Slut

[Anonymous No.6089810]

>>6088949
>When Murakami characters have boring, weird sex

[Anonymous No.6089836]

>>6089721
Do you get a sexual thrill off of being smug? Or is it just to fit in here?

[Anonymous No.6089862]

>>6088503
>smiled quite jewishly

[Anonymous No.6089972]

>>6088973
>so it goes

[Anonymous No.6089998]

>>6089710
I just liked the scene, in a general sense. I think the penis comparison was a decent enough analogy to a character who tries to be very manly and fails; there's also the lack of great details on the character's appearance (besides some very nonspecific stuff that complement the failed man character) which is unexpected for a mirror scene, and the dellusion of grandioseness that is, in the end, revealed to be completely fake (and the closing sentence was funny, it was almost cathartic to see the asshole shatter).

I'm not saying it's great, it definitely isn't, and it seems way too autobiographical - not only because it was posted on lit, where we can safely assume more than 1/3rd of the posters would fit the character, but also because the character's depiction sounds like it was written by the man himself. It was still ok. It was still creative. It's not great, especially by /lit/'s standards (I'm assuming we all read great books most of the time here), but not bad enough to warrant the disencouragement he got.

What do you mean by
>rendered totally self-conscious by years of exposure to exactly the kind of /lit/ shitposting
? I'm actually curious, I did not understand.

[Anonymous No.6090078]

>>6089684
Did you write this? Seriously incredible stuff, I'm fucking jealous.

[Anonymous No.6090139]

>>6088973
I-I totally didn't do that in the one I'm editing right now

[Anonymous No.6090791]

>>6088503

>using 'said' ever

are you serious?

[Anonymous No.6090817]

>>6088483
Kite Runner

[Anonymous No.6090820]

>hooked like a jew's nose

[Anonymous No.6090966]

>>6088971
There is absolutely nothing wrong with that phrasing, you pseudointellectual child.

[Anonymous No.6091000]

>>6089137
Knowing 4chan it's the former

[Anonymous No.6091006]

>>6089182
It's not that bad, don't you know /lit/ is overly critical of everything? Having said that, it's not that good, either. You have some skill, but much to learn.

[Anonymous No.6091110]

>>6089836
>fitting in
fucking normies get off my board

[Anonymous No.6091179]

>...but he did not see anything, for he was a vampire.

[Anonymous No.6091194]

>obligatory 'gurrrrl power' character

[Anonymous No.6091200]

>>6088503
>not using "sez"

[Anonymous No.6091259]

>>6090791
>Book color codes the speech of every character

[Anonymous No.6091275]

>>6091194
I'm so deeply afraid of women

[Anonymous No.6091278]

>Thematically important facial "quirks", usually involving the mouth, eyes, or brow

[Anonymous No.6091281]

>>6091259
That's actually fucken wicked.

Also

>each character gets their own unique font

Even better.

[Anonymous No.6091286]

>>6091281
>the chucklefuck character uses comic sans

[Anonymous No.6091297]

>>6091286
Perfect--let the nerds twist their blue coloured tighty-whites in a bunch.

[Anonymous No.6091320]

>>6088500
Tristram Shandy would break you.

[Anonymous No.6091335]

>passages where the character does nothing but listen to music and play with cats

[Anonymous No.6091338]

>main character's name is a biblical allusion

[Anonymous No.6091343]

>the book is spliced with dream sequences

[Anonymous No.6091344]

>several paragraphs dedicated to head patting

[Anonymous No.6091365]

>book is under 300 pages

[Anonymous No.6091366]

>>6091343
>dreams are mostly incoherent and don't contain any important details

[Anonymous No.6091367]

>drug use

[Anonymous No.6091368]

>Author dedicates book to self

[Anonymous No.6091377]

>>6089438

scrolled for ages to post this

[Anonymous No.6091385]

>>6091368
lol I've never seen this.

>A special thanks to myself, I'm that fucken awesome.

[Anonymous No.6091388]

>foreward of the book spoils plot points
>then shamelessly goes on to state that the book is better than Dune

To be fair, Lord of Light was, but I can't even think of a better way to try and alienate a reader before they even start.

[Anonymous No.6091390]

>>6091388
>reading anything before Chapter/Canto/Act/Book I
>Reading anything that doesn't have any of those things to begin it.

You do it to yourself anon.

[Anonymous No.6091398]

>character discovers important plot details by googling stuff

[Anonymous No.6091533]

>>6088448
>not using the mirror to render your protagonist through lacanian psychoanalysis

[Anonymous No.6091549]

>>6088486
>Meghan Trainor
>Le All About That Bass faec

[Anonymous No.6092693]

>character's internal monologue is broken by a qt3.14 asking him a question

[Anonymous No.6092717]

>book describes things that happen in real life
>book describes things that don't happen in real life
>book describes something that was described in other books
>book uses words that other books have in them
>author has stolen a bunch of words from the language the book is written in and written the book with them
>book is liked by anyone other than me
>even the author must hate it

*tips HD cans*

[Anonymous No.6092802]

>>6091281
>>each character gets their own unique font

Has any book done this?

[Anonymous No.6092808]

>>6088973

[Anonymous No.6092815]

>>6088486
>legs that go all the way down to the floor

[Anonymous No.6093038]

>>6091281
Holy shit that's fucking brilliant. Sorry, but I'm stealing this.

[Anonymous No.6093043]

>>6088973
>Asuka, we did it. We have finally reached... the End of Evangelion.

[Anonymous No.6093044]

>>6093038
while you're doing gimmicky bullshit that's horrible why not have the text on the pages be in shapes like hearts or skulls and stuff depending on if the character is good or bad

[Anonymous No.6093059]

>main character is a writer

[Anonymous No.6093084]

>>6091281
>>6091259
Homestuckers fuck off please

[Anonymous No.6093086]

>>6092802
A fansubbed episode of Zoku Sayonara Zetsubo Sensei did it. It's passé.

[Anonymous No.6093096]

>>6093044
Now you're talking!

While we are at it, add in "scare quotes," interrobangs ‽, and irony mark ؟

This is a new age of punctuation.

[Anonymous No.6093103]

>>6093059
that's shit but let me raise you one higher:

>main character talks about how much they love reading and how magical books are

[Anonymous No.6093104]

>>6093059
>the story is about a writer with writer's block as he can't come up with the story, and ends with the story of the book becoming his story

[Anonymous No.6093109]

>>6093103
>Proust whining about he'll never be a great writer

how did this shit get to be canonical again? can't we just ditch him and replace it with a underrepresented minority or something

[Anonymous No.6093416]

>>6093044
would buy