so /lit/ I have never read any DFW or Pinecone am i missing anything or is this some random bullshit you guys like to obsess over? pic related, just an awful, awful cover

File: 22 KB, 350x500, Terrible.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 01:59:25 2015 No.6351248 [Reply] [Original]

so /lit/
I have never read any DFW or Pinecone
am i missing anything or is this some random bullshit you guys like to obsess over?
pic related, just an awful, awful cover

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:00:15 2015 No.6351252 imo that cover is pretty cool

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:02:31 2015 No.6351257 >>6351252 im not sure if i can trust your opinion now but have you read any Pynchon?

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:18:17 2015 No.6351290 >>6351257 tcol49

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:19:31 2015 No.6351295 >>6351248 >Hey guys I haven't read really acclaimed author X! >Is he actually good or just some bullshit because I'm incapable of making up my own mind and if I don't end up liking it I want to be able to call you guys phonies! Go fuck yourself.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:23:09 2015 No.6351303 >>6351295 theres a difference between really acclaimed and lit circlejerk just wondering if these two are overhyped calm down buddy

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:27:27 2015 No.6351316 >>6351303 why don't you just read col49 which is an incredibly widely taught book and is like 150 pages and then just actually know at least sort of what you're talking about

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:29:43 2015 No.6351321 >>6351316 I didnt realize talking about books on lit was such an issue

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:30:42 2015 No.6351322 >>6351321 you're not talking about books you're making retarded threads about the reception of books. you're the kind of person who immediately clicks the "reception" or "legacy" heading on the wikipedia page of books you look up

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:33:16 2015 No.6351330

>>6351248
Honestly the other guy is being pretty harsh but he has a point. We are just a bunch of people like you. We read and form opinions. None of us can give you a satisfying answer beyond what you likely already know. Do you like postmodern fiction? Do you like lightly satiric novels? Thoughts on metafiction? If yes then check it out and tell us what you think.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:34:39 2015 No.6351334

Pynchon is the real deal, literary establishment heavyweight of contemporary American fiction

he will be read and studied 100 years from now

DFW wrote a rad 90s dystopia about drugs and entertainment then killed himself 15 years later

both are worth reading

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:49:18 2015 No.6351380

>>6351248
Pynchon's probably the most American writer of the last 65 years. Crying's a good place to start, then V. or Gravity's.

>>6351316
I actually don't think this is too far from how we should respond to threads like this. Threads that are just "guys, should I read this?" without any info on what you like, what you're into, what you've read before, etc. are worthless. If you want to read Pynchon or Wallace or Tolstoy or whatever, just fucking read it.

>>	Bannanna Bla !E3mQ4RftbU Fri Apr 3 02:51:12 2015 No.6351390 File: 18 KB, 202x249, asefa.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] Its the zeitgeist of the more modern age, if you wanna read something familiar to the time you livei n

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:51:42 2015 No.6351392 >>6351334 >he will be read and studied 100 years from now i honestly doubt it his writing is very gimmicky at times what he is getting at can probably be deduced from a quick listen of an assortment of 60s music

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:54:59 2015 No.6351399

>>6351392
I'm not the person you responded to, but no. Look at the scholarship, the influence, the living people who name drop him, etc. He's probably the most accomplished American writer living and he outdid most of the folks publishing alongside him. His fiction sets the tone for the second half of the 20th century in a way that the other pomo canon doesn't and he follows a much bigger tradition of American lit.

Not to mention that Crying is a codex for a lot of pomo lit in a little over 100 pages.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:59:00 2015 No.6351407 >>6351399 tcol49 might have lasting value, but something like GR is already incredibly outdated why would people bother reading GR, which depicts a hysterical society, when we already live in one?

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 02:59:18 2015 No.6351409 >>6351399 >>6351334 but philip roth is the best living american author

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:01:03 2015 No.6351422 >>6351407 um

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:04:03 2015 No.6351429 >reading anything by authors who are still alive oh right

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:05:28 2015 No.6351433

>>6351407
You can question why people read it, but the fact that a lot of people still read it, write about it, mention it, talk about it, and talk about how it's the best thing Pynchon wrote tells me that it's not going anywhere. GR's the peak of high pomo and widely considered one of the best novels of the 20th century. Just because you don't love it doesn't mean it's not going to be read in the future.

>>6351409
I've read Portnoy's Complaint, The Plot Against America, some of his stories, and Sabbath's Theater. He constantly lets me down. I'm not interested in reading any more of him and my money is on Roth to slip from the canon in the next 50 years.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:08:13 2015 No.6351436 >>6351433 yes but that's because you dont understand the subtleties of roth's FIS git on that james wood shit muthafucka

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:08:52 2015 No.6351437 File: 62 KB, 560x423, image.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] incidentally that's one of the best early postwar covers for a novel

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:09:23 2015 No.6351440 >>6351407 >Literally just parroting anti-bloom Wow man. You haven't read anything by him have you?

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:10:46 2015 No.6351446

>>6351433
im not looking at it from a "i liked it or i didnt like it" perspective

Pynchon is an obscure author, he is obviously respected in academia but the fact remains he is a mystery and an obscurity to most people. tcol49 is his most mainstream book, and whatever valuable messages he might have, will be much more evident and more accessible than slugging through 700+ pages of hysterical, dense prose

btw there is no "peak" of any movement or classification, that mode of thought is an absurd delusion

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:11:47 2015 No.6351449 >>6351440 what the hell does anti-bloom mean?

>>	Some namefags Fri Apr 3 03:13:18 2015 No.6351454 >>6351449 So you've basically answered my question, and too many people have seen the Woods hystericalpostsmetabedpostreality whatever thing lately for you to be playing coy right now.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:13:49 2015 No.6351458 >>6351454 i have absolutely no idea what you're on about

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:15:12 2015 No.6351463

>>6351454
i think you meant to respond to my post which actually mentioned james wood who is definitely not the anti-bloom, whose name does not end in an "s", who i have read works by, and who i was referring to largely in jest anyway

so like ur dumb or whatever LMAO how many mistakes can you make it one post

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 03:32:12 2015 No.6351511 >tfw I read "pomo" as "porno" sometimes Dammit /lit/

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 04:50:55 2015 No.6351679 File: 1.43 MB, 1210x3613, Tommy P.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6351248 Pynchon good DFW not so much

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 05:15:07 2015 No.6351719 >>6351380 I had more issues reading Crying than V. ...

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 05:19:33 2015 No.6351727 what if im a dumb fuck who can ount the number of books read on two hands what if its to hard to read and it gives me a bad impression and i have to give it a while before i can read it again

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 05:56:00 2015 No.6351783 >>6351446 He is not obscure, he was name dropped on The Simpsons for Christ's sake.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 05:59:18 2015 No.6351790 >>6351446 >Pynchon is an obscure author he's one of the most widely known postmodern authors, he won the national book award in 73, most of his books have been best sellers and a big screen adaptation of his recent work came out last year

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 06:05:34 2015 No.6351795

>>6351783
and The Simpsons portrayed him as extremely obscure

>>6351790
>he's one of the most widely known postmodern authors
Postmodern fiction in itself is obscure
>he won the national book award in 73
And that really catapulted him to mainstream fame, didn't it?
>most of his books have been best sellers
No they aren't.
>a big screen adaptation of his recent work came out last year
A big screen adaptation of a second-rate book came out last year.
If I were to say Pynchon to you, or someone who has actually read his works, would you think of the Inherent Vice Hollywood adaptation?
If I were to say to the average moviegoer Pynchon, they might think of Inherent Vice, the Hollywood adaptation, but they won't think of the work that has given him a name.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 06:21:31 2015 No.6351816 >>6351795 Gravity's Rainbow was an answer on Pointless yesterday ffs. Pynchon is about as famous as a literary novelist can be these days.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 06:24:50 2015 No.6351822 >>6351816 I'm not trying to just use this as evidence, but I've never heard of Pointless before. >Pynchon is about as famous as a literary novelist can be these days define "literary novelist"

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 06:31:10 2015 No.6351831 >>6351783 they shamelessly namedropped him on Orange is the New Black also

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 06:31:22 2015 No.6351832 Well, let's just say this. Timothy Leary called Gravity's Rainbow the best book ever written in English. So are you missing something? Yeah, you're missing the greatest book ever written in the English language.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 06:58:55 2015 No.6351864

>>6351822
>I'm not trying to just use this as evidence, but I've never heard of Pointless before.

It's a prime time gameshow on BBC1 in the UK. Pretty much the definition of 'mainstream'.

>define "literary novelist"

Someone whose books provide more than mere light entertainment, as opposed to, e.g., J. K. Rowling or George R. R. Martin.

>>6351831
And Mad Men.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:02:03 2015 No.6351869 >>6351864 >Someone whose books provide more than mere light entertainment, as opposed to, e.g., J. K. Rowling or George R. R. Martin. That's an opinion, not a definition.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:03:04 2015 No.6351873 >>6351864 >It's a prime time gameshow on BBC1 in the UK. Pretty much the definition of 'mainstream'. I thought those shows deliberately asked obscure questions.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:04:53 2015 No.6351879 >>6351869 >anon tries to damage control by disingenuous attacks on semantics

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:06:41 2015 No.6351881 >>6351879 Saying "semantics" doesn't help you in an argument, buddy. Why do people thinking discussing semantics is inherently bad? If you cannot even come up with a definition of something you claim, how can you expect to be taken seriously?

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:08:14 2015 No.6351882

>>6351873
Not really, it's just trivia that the average Joe at least has a chance of knowing. Same sort of questions you'd get in a pub quiz.

I'm not claiming that Pynchon is a household name like Brad Pitt or something, but as far as literature goes he is right up there, probably one level below the likes of Murakami.

>>6351869
Define 'definition'. (Don't really, just fuck off.)

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:08:39 2015 No.6351883
File: 43 KB, 640x360, Pynchon-simpsons.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

>>6351446

>Pynchon
>Obscure

V and The Crying of Lot 49 sold over 3 million copies each you mong.

Just because you're the only person in Coonkill, Alabama who's seen Inherent Vice at the picture show doesn't make you an intellectual, kiddo.

>>6351783

More than namedropped - he's appeared as a guest star at least twice. Some recluse.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:09:13 2015 No.6351884 It's been said that there were two books in the twentieth century. Joyce's Ulysses and Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow. Yes. You are missing out.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:11:43 2015 No.6351889 >>6351884 lol who the fuck said that

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:12:02 2015 No.6351890 File: 53 KB, 536x118, Screen Shot 2015-04-03 at 10.11.23 pm.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6351884 Ugh.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:12:35 2015 No.6351891

>>6351881
I'm not the anon you've been arguing with.

Because 'literature/literary' is one of those terms like pornography that's "I'll know it when I see it." So to attack the statement of "Pynchon is as famous as a literary novelist can be" is to weasel your way out of admitting Pynchon is extremely well-known relative to the audience he's aimed towards -- the one that reads literary fiction.

But whatever, it's clear from the rest of this thread that you're too stubborn for me to keep on interfering, so if that other anon wants to keep wasting his time that's fine but I won't.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:13:03 2015 No.6351892 >>6351890 >>6351889 I did.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:13:17 2015 No.6351893

>>6351433
>Just because you don't love it doesn't mean it's not going to be read in the future.

Just because you do love it doesn't mean it will either.

There's honestly just as much chance that future academia will be studying Stephen King as they will Pynchon - everything is entirely led by fashion and consensus, and has little to do with quality (assuming Pynchon is higher quality than King, which is a whole other can of worms).

The truth is that very few people are read 100 years later, no matter how huge they were in their own time. Look at the list of nobel laureates. More than half of the "giants" of the early 20th century are people nobody's ever read since while hacks from all corners dominate the canon.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:14:05 2015 No.6351897

>>6351891
>So to attack the statement of "Pynchon is as famous as a literary novelist can be" is to weasel your way out of admitting Pynchon is extremely well-known relative to the audience he's aimed towards

I have already stated I am as aware as you that Pynchon is a respected writer amongst academia and people who read books of similar caliber.

>the one that reads literary fiction

This means nothing.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:15:48 2015 No.6351898 >>6351795 >The Simpsons portrayed him as extremely obscure The simpsons mocked his obscurity and reclusiveness. See pic >>6351883

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:16:10 2015 No.6351900 >>6351898 What does that change?

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:17:25 2015 No.6351902 >>6351897 >This means nothing. >continuing with weaksauce attacks on semantics as damage control. You're done m8. Give it a rest.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:17:50 2015 No.6351903 >>6351897 >This means nothing. So what does "similar calibre" mean in your post, then?

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:19:02 2015 No.6351907

>>6351902
Stop trying to have the last word for the sake of it. If you have no argument left just stop posting. I cannot respect someone who refuses to actually to refer to what I posted and just throws blanket terms, which you seem to attach to negative for no particular reason.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:20:01 2015 No.6351910 >>6351893 King might be remembered as a pop phenomenon and Pynchon will almost certainly be remembered for his impact within the literary tradition. To forget Pynchon would be to botch the whole time line of art in the 20th Century.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:20:50 2015 No.6351914 >>6351903 Would you have questioned what words I used if I said "similar quality"? stop trying to reverse the roles here.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:21:05 2015 No.6351915 >>6351907 You appear to be a non-anglophone teenager from reddit. Please leave.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:21:51 2015 No.6351918 >>6351915 I am now only replying to let you know that having the last word as an attempt to undermine me will not work.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:22:05 2015 No.6351920 >>6351914 Define "quality".

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:23:32 2015 No.6351922

>>6351900

It doesn't change anything - it demonstrates that a mass-market entertainment like The Simpsons feels that its massive audience is familiar enough with Pynchon and his famous shyness that they can make a sight-gag about it.

Pynchon is not an obscure author, he's a bestseller. Inherent Vice was a recent Hollywood movie.

Your hipster dreamboat is pretty mainstream m8 - you maybe need to find some new guy you can dickride without reading or all the other hipsters will laugh at you.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:23:35 2015 No.6351923 >>6351920 For what particular reason?

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:25:44 2015 No.6351925

>>6351922
>it demonstrates that a mass-market entertainment like The Simpsons feels that its massive audience is familiar enough with Pynchon and his famous shyness that they can make a sight-gag about it.

Don't try and pretend that the "mass audience" would know who Pynchon is.

>>6351922
>Pynchon is not an obscure author, he's a bestseller. Inherent Vice was a recent Hollywood movie.

Inherent Vice, the work, is not something Pynchon is particularly known for, at least in the sense of this thread.

>Your hipster dreamboat is pretty mainstream m8 - you maybe need to find some new guy you can dickride without reading or all the other hipsters will laugh at you.

Why post this?

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:26:07 2015 No.6351927

>>6351910
>Pynchon will almost certainly be remembered for his impact within the literary tradition.

What is that impact, exactly? Just because /lit/ thinks he's great doesn't reflect the rest of the world.

Pynchon's influence is mainly over pop bands, TV writers who want to look intellectual and undergraduates.

DeLillo is a more influential writer on the fiction that came after him.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:27:15 2015 No.6351929 >>6351914 Seriously, I don't understand your angle. You dispute the term "literary fiction" as a distinction of perceived merit, yet refer to undefined standards of "calibre" and "quality" yourself. You are just arguing for the sake of arguing.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:27:45 2015 No.6351930

>>6351925
>Don't try and pretend that the "mass audience" would know who Pynchon is.

Of course they do you idiot, otherwise the whole joke with the bag on his head doesn't work.

You're really clutching at straws to prove that one of the world's most famous novelists is obscure and edgy m8. Grow up.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:28:23 2015 No.6351933 >>6351927 You clearly don't know shit about contemporary literature. I'm done here.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:28:26 2015 No.6351934 >>6351929 You are arguing for the sake of arguing. "literary fiction" has no fixed definition, and is entirely dependent on opinion. The other words have fixed definitions, that may differ very slightly, but everyone has the same understanding of them.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:29:26 2015 No.6351935 >>6351930 The joke with the bag over his head would be for a portion of the audience that would know who he is. The Simpsons is famous for targeting all different types of people.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:30:57 2015 No.6351937 Gravity's Rainbow was #8 in the bestseller week in the same week that The Odessa File and Serpico were published. It sold over 100,000 copies in the first week. It was a phenomenally popular novel. The last time Pinecone was obscure was around 1969.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:32:34 2015 No.6351940 Pynchon is mainstream in the same way David Lynch or Jim Jarmusch or Lars Von Trier is mainstream. Many people know of them or have maybe seen a film or two from them but the majority by far has never touched any of their work.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:32:48 2015 No.6351942 File: 90 KB, 269x305, cunt_blister.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6351933 >I'm done here. >because I can't prove my bullshit statement I pulled out of my ass and didn't expect anyone to call me on Thanks for playing. See you next time.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:34:00 2015 No.6351943 >>6351937 Do you honestly think a novel like Gravity's Rainbow is one that was going to pick up momentum in sales? Because it didn't. The 100,000 would have obviously almost exclusively been critics, academics and fans of Pynchon.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:36:10 2015 No.6351946

>>6351943

What are you talking about? That's a huge number of books in a week.

>The 100,000 would have obviously almost exclusively been critics, academics and fans of Pynchon.

Laughable. You really are reaching.

http://www.bookforum.com/archive/sum_05/pynchon.html

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:37:40 2015 No.6351949

>>6351946
>What are you talking about? That's a huge number of books in a week.

It's a good number, but when you relate it to the population of the entire country it is miniscule.

>Laughable. You really are reaching.

Huh?

>http://www.bookforum.com/archive/sum_05/pynchon.html

What was the point of linking this?

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:39:40 2015 No.6351952

>>6351949
>What was the point of linking this?

Why not read it and find out?

PROTIP: it's a recollection of publishing Gravity's Rainbow by his publisher and it describes the surprising poularity of what everyone thought would be an obscure novel.

You can carry on with your hipster affectation that Pynchon's obscure, but he's just not. He's probably the most famous author of literary fiction in the world.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:41:23 2015 No.6351956 >>6351934 "literary fiction" and "quality literature" are synonymous you moron.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:41:31 2015 No.6351957

>>6351952
>Why not read it and find out?

I'm not just going to read a rather long article just because you linked it. If you cannot summarise or provide a personal opinion of why you linked the article it is plain posturing.

>PROTIP: it's a recollection of publishing Gravity's Rainbow by his publisher and it describes the surprising poularity of what everyone thought would be an obscure novel.

So, it went from what people would assume would be incredibly obscure, to somewhat obscure?

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:41:57 2015 No.6351959 File: 121 KB, 600x828, amy2.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6351943 >he thinks there are 100,000 academics in the USA.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:42:31 2015 No.6351960 >>6351956 No they aren't. But I would love for you to explain why you say that.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:43:31 2015 No.6351964 >>6351959 I also said critics and fans. Not just academics.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:44:39 2015 No.6351968

>>6351957
>So, it went from what people would assume would be incredibly obscure, to somewhat obscure?

Are you retarded or deliberately missing the point? Or both?

Obviously Pynchon was more obscure when he'd only written two books, but that was in the 1960s way before you were born. Gravity's Rainbow broke him as an author and put him on the bestseller lists.

Pynchon has never been an obscure author in your lifetime and you're not the edgy, out-there intellectual you think you are. You're mainstream and your tastes are undeveloped. Nothing wrong with that, you're like 20 years old and unformed.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:44:54 2015 No.6351970 >>6351959 There are far more than 100k academics in the US.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:45:40 2015 No.6351971 File: 80 KB, 325x429, amy21.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6351964 >has 100,000 fans >still obscure Are you even reading what you post? >>6351970 >There are far more than 100k academics in the US. >and they all study Pynchon

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:47:17 2015 No.6351975 >>6351971 >an academic only reads what he studies

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:49:56 2015 No.6351980 >>6351975 >I have no argument, so I'm going to increasingly muddy the water with retardation OK kid.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:50:25 2015 No.6351982

>>6351968
Gravity's Rainbow gave him fame, but not the sort of fame you would count as mainstream.

>you're not the edgy, out-there intellectual you think you are
I never claimed to be anything of the sort, nor would I want to be perceived that way.

>You're mainstream and your tastes are undeveloped

Why would this bother me?

>tastes are undeveloped

Tell me what a developed taste is.

> Nothing wrong with that, you're like 20 years old and unformed.

>Nothing wrong with that, you're like 20 years old and unformed.

>if i make him look young enough to seem immature I can win the argument!

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:51:26 2015 No.6351984 >>6351980 i gave you my argument, academics read more than what they study for their careers are you retarded?

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:51:54 2015 No.6351987 >>6351933 So what is his impact? Where does Pynchon's influence lie? I don't see it myself.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:54:41 2015 No.6351991
File: 558 KB, 2000x1330, 1fallacy.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

>>6351984

>100,000 copies sold
>oh they can be disregarded, they're all academics and critics

I'm not sure what the name of this rhetorical fallacy is. Just pick your own from pic related.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 07:56:30 2015 No.6351993

>>6351991
>if i post this infograph of logical fallacies maybe it will fall into the argument i think im presenting

>>>oh they can be disregarded, they're all academics and critics

When did I ever say or even imply to disregard them. I also said fans. Why are you deliberately leaving out vital parts of what I am saying? Actually I know why.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:02:29 2015 No.6351997

>>6351993
>Why are you deliberately leaving out vital parts of what I am saying?

Because the whole statement is too retarded to deal with entire.

No matter what figures or evidence are presented, you're going to maintain your opinion that Pynchon is an obscure author, because that makes you feel good about yourself and makes you feel special, and because in your limited social circle, knowing Pynchon is intellectual and obscure.

The truth is that almost every educated adult knows pynchon and most have read something by him (or pretend to have). He's not obscure, he's in the heart of mainstream literary fiction with Franzen and Self and Amis and he sells millions of books.

Everything he publishes is met with breathless expectation by every non-tabloid paper in the English Speaking world, he's on The Simpsons, he's had a youtube video. If this counts as obscure, then words have no meaning to you.

Arguing the obvious with idiots is tiring. I'm going to have some lunch so you've got a while to compose your inevitable retarded response.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:03:41 2015 No.6352000 File: 1010 KB, 233x226, 2much4me.gif [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6351993 >he has 100,000 fans >such obscure, many hipster

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:05:01 2015 No.6352002

>>6351997
>because that makes you feel good about yourself and makes you feel special, and because in your limited social circle, knowing Pynchon is intellectual and obscure.

I couldn't care less about any of that.

>The truth is that almost every educated adult knows pynchon and most have read something by him (or pretend to have). He's not obscure, he's in the heart of mainstream literary fiction with Franzen and Self and Amis and he sells millions of books.
>every educated adult

Show me the proof of this.

>Everything he publishes is met with breathless expectation by every non-tabloid paper in the English Speaking world, he's on The Simpsons, he's had a youtube video. If this counts as obscure, then words have no meaning to you.

And they all treat him as obscure, because he is.

>Arguing the obvious with idiots is tiring. I'm going to have some lunch so you've got a while to compose your inevitable retarded response.

Good riddance. Try and form a consistent argument instead of clutching at straws and redeveloping arguments I have already addressed ITT.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:06:13 2015 No.6352004 >>6352000 >if i keep making him look like he wants to remain obscure and hipster maybe i can win the argument!

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:07:24 2015 No.6352005 >>6352004 What else is the argument about, retard?

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:08:25 2015 No.6352007 File: 182 KB, 367x451, hahaha.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6352002

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:09:14 2015 No.6352010 >>6352005 It is not about that at all. Why do you consistently keep trying to make me look like I am trying to disregard his number of fans? 100,000 fans is good for someone like Pynchon, but to say he is mainstream is completely false.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:10:18 2015 No.6352013 >>6352007 Oh look, another guy that thinks having the last post as an attempt to undermine me will disprove anything I have said.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:15:20 2015 No.6352024

>>6352010
>but to say he is mainstream is completely false.
>according to you, judged by entirely arbitrary standards you've defined.

100,000 copies is best-seller material m8. If you sell 25,000 you're a popular author, if you sell 100,000 on publication, you're a giant. Since publication, it's sold millions more.

V has sold 3,000,000 copies. That's like sci-fi popular.

Also, you're ignoring the fact that a lot of those 100,000 copies of GR sold in the first year would have gone to libraries and been read by dozens of people.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:16:22 2015 No.6352025 >>6352013 >the irony

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:17:56 2015 No.6352032

>>6352024
>Since publication, it's sold millions more.
>V has sold 3,000,000 copies. That's like sci-fi popular.

Show me where you are getting these statistics.

>Also, you're ignoring the fact that a lot of those 100,000 copies of GR sold in the first year would have gone to libraries and been read by dozens of people.

I think you overestimate the dissemination of library books.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:18:57 2015 No.6352035 >>6352025 What is the irony? You completed abandoned any form of argument and just posted a reactionary picture. You are pathetic.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:20:37 2015 No.6352036

>>6352032
>I think you overestimate the dissemination of library books.

I think you're just pulling things out of your ass to continue your retarded argument that an author who's appeared twice on The Simpsons is obscure. I suppose you think Jasper Johns is some kind of underground hero as well.

I think you're pretty dumb to argue this stupid point so long and hard when you're self-evidently wrong and I think the other guy had the right idea to bail out.

You can have the last word, then you've won. Go for it.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:21:20 2015 No.6352038 >>6352024 >That's like sci-fi popular. Sci-fi isn't very popular.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:21:44 2015 No.6352040 File: 10 KB, 257x307, kramer.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6352035 >trying to have the last word is pathetic >I'm going to have the last word if it kills me

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:22:19 2015 No.6352043 >>6352036 Stop trying to make me look like I am implying that Pynchon is some sort of underground hero. Also, where are the links to those statistics? >You can have the last word, then you've won. Go for it. Stop appealing to egotism.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:24:16 2015 No.6352047 >>6351891 >to the audience he's aimed towards -- the one that reads literary fiction. Pynchon writes campy sci-fi, you fucking dunce. He was even nominated for the Hugo award.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:24:41 2015 No.6352048 >>6351330 >We read and form opinions I thought I'm in /lit/.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:24:53 2015 No.6352049 >>6352040 It's pathetic because you abandoned your argument. You stopped arguing about the topic. You one aim was to have the last word. I want to keep arguing about the topic. You don't because you don't have anything else.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:30:22 2015 No.6352057 >>6352049 You haven't made a single valid point. Even this post is just a blatant attempt to have the last word. Please present an argument and we'll shrek it.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:32:18 2015 No.6352059 >>6352057 How about you start with the post where you replied with a reactionary image, and we'll go from there. But feel free to address any other posts I have made, because you have failed to prove why they are not valid points.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:32:32 2015 No.6352062 >>6352047 >I literally don't know what science fiction is

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:33:22 2015 No.6352064 File: 423 KB, 320x240, blah.gif [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6352059

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:34:22 2015 No.6352068 >>6352062 >sci fi is what I define it to be.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:39:37 2015 No.6352084

>>6351407
Are you fucking 17 years old, son? Time to get off the computer and read for once, man. GR is part of the postmodern cannon.

>>6351449
>>6351458
Harold Bloom. you clearly don't belong here
>>6351409
No he isn't

>>6351891
Well said/ #rekt

>>6351893
MacArthur Fellowship grant? National Book Award? William Faulkner Foundation Award? Books taught at Ivy League schools? I studied TCoL49 way back in the first year of my undergraduate at Canada's best university. Just because you don't read doesn't mean that other people don't. He will continue to be read, make no mistake.

>>6351925
Naw sorry, Pynchon is pomo giant. There's no other argument to be made. Not everyone reads Barth, dfw, Markson, Calvino, Gass, Borges, but Pynchon is right up there with them, and surpassed almost all.

>>6351982
You're still going on with this eh?
I'm one of the many people here laughing at you

>>6352002
>The truth is that almost every educated adult knows pynchon

I'm proof of that motherfucker. And so are all the other correctly informed people here calling you an idiot. You're a fucking idiot. Harold Bloom called Mason&Dixon his favourite novel. This is Harold Bloom. Of Yale. I don't know why I'm trying.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:39:54 2015 No.6352085 >>6352062 >>I literally don't know what science fiction is Yes, I do. Science fiction is a literary movement (not genre!) that rejects realism and builds on romantic ideals, except in a modern, disillusioned post-WWII context.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:42:06 2015 No.6352091 >>6352084 Not one of those retorts had a single argument disproving anything I said.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:43:07 2015 No.6352095 >>6352084 Also Harold Bloom is literally mocked in academia. No one treats him as a serious academic. He is like the Cliffnotes of highbrow literature.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:45:38 2015 No.6352102

>>6352084
>Just because you don't read doesn't mean that other people don't. He will continue to be read, make no mistake.

Your bullshit ad hominem aside, I don't think you really grasp how books become "timeless". When Pomo fiction goes right out of fashion, then it'll be revealed who's writing about them in the future, which will be based mostly on what academics of the future research and study for their post-graduate degrees, because that's what they go on to teach.

I didn't say Pynchon won't be studied, I said that basing his longevity on his current popularity is dicey at best. Augustus Dore was fucking massive 100 yeats ago, and I bet not more than 1 in 1,000,000 people have read his work these days.

It's all academic fashion, and at the moment there's a lot of fashion for critical studies of genre fiction, so I can see Stephen King fitting into the canon of 2115 just as well as Pynchon.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:46:38 2015 No.6352104 >>6352095 You haven't been to university have you?

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:49:34 2015 No.6352110

>>6352104
Bloom's argument is insubstantial, unscholarly reactionary bluster that relies on illogical categories and an unsatisfying, limited view of history to attack invented adversaries with the seeming intent of stopping professors from reading literature written by minorities.

I am not even exaggerating this, no one takes him seriously. He even admits himself he is not taken seriously, and it is for good reason.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:50:16 2015 No.6352112 >>6352110 You haven't been to university have you?

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:52:09 2015 No.6352115 >>6352112 You haven't been to university have you?

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:53:49 2015 No.6352118 >>6352110 The only person not being taken seriously is you. Bloom is fantastic, you should read him sometime, you might learn something

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:54:57 2015 No.6352119 >>6352118 >you might learn something The only thing I learned from Bloom is that /pol/'s opinion on the perfidiousness of Jews turned out to be right.

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 08:56:30 2015 No.6352122

>>6352118
I actually have read him, I used to agree with him. But I realised he is nothing but a pseudo-elitist reactionary.

He has no real insight into any of the books he talks about, all he does is draw arbitrary links between writers and summarises works.

He obviously has a lot knowledge about literature but his stances on how a work is critiqued are really dumb.

I am seriously not exaggerating when I say he is mocked in academia.

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 09:21:02 2015 No.6352156 >>6352122 >I am seriously not exaggerating when I say he is mocked in academia. You haven't been to university have you?

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 09:32:04 2015 No.6352170 File: 541 KB, 300x300, puke.gif [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>6352122 >taking academia seriously

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 09:34:06 2015 No.6352176

>>6352170
Bloom is a reactionary tilting at windmills. He appeals to a popular but largely inaccurate idea that cutthroat postmodernists have shown up to wrest Shakespeare from the hands of the reading public and force them to read Mary Wroth instead. Who are the people saying this? A shadowy cast of Frenchified literary critics that Bloom never seriously engages with. Why, it's almost as if Bloom's idea that the discussion of canonicity in the eighties and early nineties is affirmative action designed to replace aesthetically superior authors with minority also-rans is a broad caricature that can't descend to taking the claims of those who sought to expand the canon seriously, because rather than being a serious scholarly claim, it's sky-is-falling nonsense for people too coy to say directly that they think "anti-racist is anti-white."

The peculiar thing, of course, is that Bloom's accuses his enemies of wanting to stop people from reading the works he considers canonical - which, though I'm sure one could dig up critics saying inflammatory things about the canon, let's be clear that there was never a moment in time where there was any real threat that the literature Bloom identifies as canonical would stop being taught or studied - but, in point of fact, his argument is really about suppressing his opponent's views. He insists that people shouldn't teach or study aesthetically inferior works. In effect, he says, "It's not about stopping people from reading books written by people of color/women; it's about ethics in aesthetic selection!"

This is dissatisfying to me for many reasons.

First, I think that describing the history of literature is central to what critics should do. Bloom's Anxiety of Influence work is an attempt to rewrite the history of literature so that it takes place only in the personal and aesthetic realm rather than on the larger stage of history. I don't know if you've ever looked at that work, but it's mystagogic bullshit, interesting in its goals but deeply unsatisfying in execution. To avoid giving a "political" analysis of literature, you have to segregate the aesthetic from the rest of history, since as soon as you bring history on to the scene, literature looks like another form of political and social writing. To me, accounts that put literature in the context of the wider scene of history are much more convincing and much more critically productive.

1/2

Anonymous Fri Apr 3 09:35:26 2015 No.6352178

>>6352176
Furthermore, how can we isolate the aesthetic from the wider scene of history? I've never seen a real answer to this question. Art has a special value to me in that I often find it profoundly moving. How can I justify making imaginative-objects-that-are-valuable-to-me into a special category distinct from both imaginative-objects-that-are-not-valuable-to-me (bad aesthetic objects) or other historical objects? To this, Bloom might turn to attack me rather than my questions about how he came up with his categories, and say that I was a relativist interested in demolishing the canon and stopping his grandchildren from reading Shakespeare - which of course doesn't at all address the question of the validity of his categorization.

Third, as I said before, while it is true that many critics sought to expand the canon and place greater emphasis on the literature of the oppressed, at no point in time were the central figures of the canon really under attack. I suppose one might make an argument that if we spend a week in class reading Blake, or the Huts of America, that's one less week to spend on Hawthorne, but nobody ever said that canonical authors aren't important. They just said that there was another, at the time largely unread crowd of minority authors that had interesting things to tell us about history, literature, and even aesthetic analysis.

2/2

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 09:47:43 2015 No.6352197 i hate new /lit/

>>	Anonymous Fri Apr 3 10:58:22 2015 No.6352353 Holy shit, /lit/ If you have not read an authors work but want to know what they're about, read their work. Then discuss their work. Copies sold and references made on American cartoons are irrelevant.

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/lit/ - Literature