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/lit/ - Literature

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7236463 No.7236463 [Reply] [Original]

What's the most beautiful book you've ever read? In prose, style, whatever.

>> No.7236470

For me I'd have to go with Dubliners

>> No.7236473

lolita

>> No.7236491

>>7236463
Holy shit OP, thank you! I've been looking for that picture since my last hard drive died over a year ago, it's so captivating.

>>7236473
Either this, or Blood Meridian, or To The Lighthouse.

>> No.7236501

Cynan Jones - The Long Dry.
It was short, bittersweet, simple, beautiful. I'm thankful to the anon who recommended him.

Appreciation of this book may be aided by some hands-on knowledge of what's been happening to small-hold farmers in the UK in the past 30 years.

>> No.7236514

In terms of beautiful narration, Things Fall Apart. In terms of insight Heart of Darkness

>> No.7236533

>>7236501
r u ceit tbh

>> No.7236536

Manalive by Chesterton.

Changed me.

>> No.7236543

Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man

>> No.7236581

>>7236491
>Blood Meridian

I am so tired of this shit meme

>> No.7236620
File: 222 KB, 1024x762, 1024px-Joseph_Mallord_William_Turner,_English_-_The_Burning_of_the_Houses_of_Lords_and_Commons,_October_16,_1834_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
7236620

>>7236491
From here on out just remember James McNeill Whistler.

I'd also recommend the English painter J. M. Turner.

>> No.7236747

infinite jest
not joking

>> No.7236753
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7236753

Honestly? This right here.

>> No.7236769
File: 16 KB, 200x299, mason and dixon.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
7236769

>>7236491
>To The Lighthouse
Seriously, nigger?

>>7236747
Infinite Jest is right up there for me as well, but pic related is my GOAT.

>> No.7236776

>>7236514
That's a remarkable post, anon

I did enjoy Herman Hesse's Demian

>> No.7236779

>>7236491
I saw your response in the poll.

>> No.7236789

>>7236769
>Mason & Dixon

my man

>> No.7236803

>>7236789
This is really immature and edgy but I started taking one of my literature professors way less seriously when I learned she hadn't read Mason and Dixon (she's a professor of contemporary and postmodern fiction). Eighteen years seems like a long time for someone in that line of work to ignore the masterpiece of the most recognizable author in her curriculum.

>> No.7236878

>>7236533
r u nt?

>> No.7236896

I recently read August Kubizek's biography of Hitler.

It stuck in my mind because I really got a sense of the fuhrer, like his speeches and shit suddenly became coherent.

>> No.7236908

>>7236803
I don't think that's too edgy. Would you trust someone who has a Classical degree but hasn't read Euripides?

>> No.7236913

>Huntsman's Sketches
love of nature
>Storm of Steel
so manly and modern
>Spring Snow
dat firm subtleness
>Lolita
dat prose
>Blood Meridian
wild wild wild
>The Magic Mountain
so beautiful and gentle
>The New York Trilogy
so clever
>Ficciones
the goat

>> No.7236914

Ulysses, The Waves, and Siddhartha all have moments that just transfix me

some of Borges' short stories are mindblowing as well (The Aleph in particular)

The Death of Ivan Illyich tore me to shreds near the end

>> No.7236921

>>7236581
Thank you for the recommendation.

>> No.7236940

>>7236463
Style - Iliad or Paradise Lost
Prose - >>7236543 my nigga, Dubliners too
I see some Hesse in here which makes me happy, though I find most of his prose doesn't dazzle me, he has his moments.
Dostoevsky has amazing moments, like the Grand Inquisitor tale in Karamazov
"A Hunger Artist" by Kafka and a few of his other shorts really grabbed me on the first read.

>> No.7237058

The Sound and the Fury

>> No.7237065

>>7236463

Can someone give me a simple general definition of prose? Is it just a fancy word we used to talk about how good the dialogue is written and feels?

>> No.7237074

>>7236463
The Shadow of the Wind.

I wish all books were as verbose and beautiful as it is.
It's a love letter to reading.

>> No.7237080

>>7237065
nigger, i got this straight from the first link on google

>written or spoken language in its ordinary form, without metrical structure.

this is the exact definition 4chan uses

>> No.7237084

just purely in terms of language I'm not sure anything ever written in English tops Paradise Lost

>> No.7237086

It's the mode in which we're currently speaking, the other mode for literary expression would be poetry.

When we say the prose was good, we tend to mean the beauty of the language. There's a lot of different ways for prose to be good, DFW's prose is good because it's very clear and analytical, but it's contrasted by being tangential in nature, you can see it crystal clear but the difficulty comes from it's tendency to sprawl out in many different directions. Nabakov's is good because of how poetic it is, the first passage of Lolita has some of the best alliteration in an english novel. There's a lot of different ways prose can be good.

>> No.7237087

>>7237086
>>7237065

>> No.7237089

>>7236463
Probably something by Mishima, The Sound of the Waves and Confessions of a Mask are probably his prettiest works. I also really like the last passage in Anne of Green Gables though, reading the whole last third or so of that book was the most moving thing that I'd done in so long. Something about it just works for me.

Is liking Mishima's prose strange since it's all translated? Even between different translators it comes across the same but I still feel odd appreciating it so much.

>> No.7237110

Ficciones was great, some of the stories included made my mind vibrate. It's always amazing how Borges managed to construct an entire universe within a few pages.

Stoner also had a unique beauty about it, I guess it was the empathetically given closeness that never felt intrusive. You basically followed the guy through huge swaths of his life.

>> No.7237192

>>7237089

>Is liking Mishima's prose strange since it's all translated?

Not at all. Don't believe the >translation meme
I rarely find translated books to be among my favorites, so there's some truth to it. But as you said, Mishima's prose, even when translated, is beautiful.