/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.8463765]

Can we describe books we love while making them sound terrible?

>bunch of guys run around and kill indians

[Anonymous No.8463774]

>blood meridian needs help sounding terrible

seriously. put proper punctuation in and it's pretty pedestrian. but "art communities" have such an unending hardon for the idea that anyone who disregards convention must be a genius mccarthy's blah tripe get heralded as brilliant.

[Anonymous No.8463777]

>>8463765
that sounds good to me though

[Anonymous No.8463778]

>jew gets cucked and walks around a lot

[Anonymous No.8463782]

Young man gets addicted to hookers and has an awakening.
>>8463774
Try harder.

[Anonymous No.8463791]

>>8463782
>implying i'm b8ing
take a pen, and fill out a page of his gobbledygook with punctuation. see how it reads. i'll wait.

[Anonymous No.8463834]

>>8463774
i don't think you've read this book

[Anonymous No.8463844]

>>8463834
not the whole thing, because it was shit. but i gave it a good go because /lit/ luvs it so, and got a little less than half way through before i realized my time was more valuable than that. and 40% of blood meridian is all the mccarthy i will ever read.

[Anonymous No.8463856]

>>8463844
McCarthy is kind of a challenging writer in that he's very boring and offers almost no suspense, however he attains some very sublime, artistic, and unforgettable heights. If you have read until the end, you definitely feel it was worth it and that you will remember the book for a long time IMO, particularly the ending itself. The ending taps into something primal and archetypal that feels like you've seen it everywhere in pop culture, already heard of it somehow, but can't tell how. It's the brilliance of something that's so primal it seems you should recognize it, but can't because it's also original.

idk, man, just my thoughts on it. you should give it a spin again, I hated it too at first (really fucking hated it), but now I'm even rereading it, it's that compelling to me.

[Anonymous No.8463883]

>>8463778
Sounds Kafkaesque.

[Anonymous No.8463887]

>>8463856
i'm glad for you that you appreciate it, but i'm done. i almost threw it out about 20 pages in, but another anon convinced me to pick it back up by saying that he interpreted it as mccarthy not telling a story, but stating facts, the way the bible is written (he said it better, but that was the gist. also, i'm not claiming the bible is fact, just that it's written as though it's fact, so plznobully). i continued, but all i could get was a pathetically transparent shtick attempting to mask caricatures and cliched hyper-violent world building.

it really just strikes me as in so many other art movements where "OH SO DARING" overrides actual technique and talent.

[Anonymous No.8463889]

>>8463887
K, I can't force you to like it or have the same aesthetic apparatus as mine which was so to speak tingled by the work, my friend.

Anyway, you sound smart, so you got any books you suggest I should read that you liked recently?

[Anonymous No.8463918]

>>8463889
anon accepting another's viewpoint on a subjective matter, and even offering a compliment? what bizarro version of 4chan am i accidentally on?

but to answer your question, nothing thoughtful. i have a 19 month old running around, so my personal attention span is limited to 3 minutes or less. but if you're in the mood for popcorn i managed to get through the last kingdom by bernard cornwell bit by bit, and was entertained. though as i was nearing the end i realized that it's just the first book in an ongoing series (already at 10), which i found moderately aggravating. if it was 3 or 4 i'd finish it, but i don't think i'm committed enough to uhtred and alfred to chase their story though 10 or more books. it seems like it threatens to become repetitive, and offer too many opportunities for false conclusions, i.e. "he's finally found peace. but wait!"

[Anonymous No.8463951]

just watch my video review of blood meridian

[Anonymous No.8463997]

>>8463778
Nausea?

[Anonymous No.8464003]

>>8463774
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEVX42Pg1xw
is this you

[Anonymous No.8464011]

>>8463791
>fundamentally alter the structure of the writing to make it bad
>ha! Told you it's bad!

I'm not saying you're wrong, but that's essentially your argument.

[Anonymous No.8464019]

>bunch of guys run around and kill indians
>terrible

Shieeet, /lieeet/.

[Anonymous No.8464055]

>>8464011
Not that guy. I see your point but I think what he's trying to say is: he is not making it bad, he is just showing how bad it really is by removing the magic of idiosyncratic punctuation.

This makes me think: Is the punctuation part of what makes it good writing (if you think it's good)? If so, it's an integral part of the prose and it wouldn't be fair to remove it and then complain about quality. On the other hand, if punctuation is just a layer of veneer added on top of the actual prose, then the writing should be good with any punctuation, or with none at all. I guess it's a question of what prose is.

I don't have an answer, I'm just writing down my thoughts.

[Anonymous No.8464074]

>>8463791
>>8464011
>>8464055

I've been thinking about it some more and I tend to favour the first point of view: punctuation IS part of whatever constitutes writing. A writer may use it in accordance with the commonly accepted rules of his time, or he can alter or disregard them to his will. Punctuation thus becomes a creative choice and should not be separated from the rest of the prose in order to expose the latter for what it 'really' is.

If >>8463791 thinks that McCarthy's prose is bad with 'proper' punctuation rules, does he think it's good with his own rules? If he thinks it's still bad, then the flaw doesn't lie in the punctuation at all and it should be addressed directly.

[Anonymous No.8464092]

People play tennis and try not to do drugs in Boston

[Anonymous No.8464114]

>>8464092
Unending Joke

[Anonymous No.8464828]

>>8463774
I like Blood Meridian because of it's beautiful prose and refreshingly bleak modern description of human nature.

[Anonymous No.8464841]

>>8463778
Ulysses

[Anonymous No.8464882]

>>8463774
This. YeCarthy is a talentless corncobbing hack with the same ideas as your average edgy suthren gawffic redneck 12 year old.

[Anonymous No.8464885]

>>8464003
>bought it
heh, no. i was smart enough to check it out from the library.

>>8464011
>>8464055
>>8464074
see >>8463887
i think it's fundamentally poor writing and the absence of punctuation has somehow given mccarthy a free pass.

[Anonymous No.8464904]

ALcoholic plays poker for 181 pages.

[Anonymous No.8464922]

>gurrrgurr i am genius isn't it obvious gurrgurr they are so dumb how do they even live

[Anonymous No.8465245]

>>8463765
read butcher's crossing
it's better

[Anonymous No.8465256]

>>8464003
jesus christ

[Anonymous No.8465268]

>>8463774
preach it. Corncobbers need to seriously STFU about their hack meme author

[Anonymous No.8465274]

>>8463778
bible

[Anonymous No.8465355]

Lord of dreams realises that he must change or else die, so he dies, then changes

[Anonymous No.8465379]

>>8463765
Naked lunch.

An edgy/juvenille tale of a gay junkie who is obsessed with shit and piss over the top tales of mental patients and gay orgies.

[Anonymous No.8465394]

>>8463774
Is this also /lit/'s opinion of Joseph McElroy, or is he still ya boy around here?

[Anonymous No.8465400]

>>8465394
no one here has read him senpai

[Anonymous No.8465779]

>Kid's family moves to the desert
>Kid's dad gets got by his crazy uncle
>Bunch of hard-ass muslims adopt the kid and think he's a pretty cool guy
>Some kind of subversion of bog-standard messianic undertones

[Anonymous No.8465809]

>>8465779
Dune

[Anonymous No.8465828]

>>8465809
Yep. Now for a harder one.

>Old man loves his evil bitch wife
>Like literally capital E evil
>Primeval forces of alien darkness that his bitch wife serves want him to suffer
>Flashbacks to him getting fucked up by earthly servants of said darkness throughout his life
>One lucid moment on his deathbed and he gives his grandchild to the forces of evil
>The end, fuck you

Really good book if you enjoy that sort of thing.

[Anonymous No.8465844]

>>8465274
solid 10/10

[Anonymous No.8465851]

>>8464922
no1? srsly?!!!

[Anonymous No.8466392]

>>8463765
>A guy is super whiny all the time
>His fuckboy gets snipped
>He goes into a megarage

[Anonymous No.8466397]

>a guy fucks a little girl and talks about why that's okay

[Anonymous No.8466407]

>stamps: the book

[Anonymous No.8467143]

>>8464904
What book is this?

[Anonymous No.8467209]

>>8466397
Or
>pedos have the best luck

[Anonymous No.8467218]

>>8463765
I read The Road and had mixed feelings about it.

I'm currently reading Blood Meridian, and his whole lack of quotation marks as an aesthetic choice really irks me. It makes conversations difficult to follow most times.

Has he ever given a reason as to why he has an aversion to quotation marks?

[Anonymous No.8467227]

Fucking Infinite Jest for Boomers

[Anonymous No.8467234]

>>8467209
Shit, yours is better. Well done.

[Anonymous No.8467239]

>>8467218
pretentious affectation to distract from subpar writing, character development, and world building.

not that he'd admit it.

[Anonymous No.8467248]

>>8467218
>I'm currently reading Blood Meridian, and his whole lack of quotation marks as an aesthetic choice really irks me.

Cool story, bro.

>It makes conversations difficult to follow most times.

It literally doesn't, you're just retarded.

>Has he ever given a reason as to why he has an aversion to quotation marks?

>Cormac McCarthy told Oprah Winfrey that he preferred not to "block the page up with weird little marks. If you write properly, you shouldn't have to punctuate."

Because they're kind of ugly and not necessary? Why are quotes necessary when you just start a new line for dialogue. In my own writing I never use hyphens, colons, or numbers to write numbers.

>2007
>two thousand seven

It's just more aesthetic Imho.

[Anonymous No.8467259]

>>8463782
A portrait of the artist as a young man

[Anonymous No.8467264]

>>8467239
>McCarthy
>subpar writing

*tips pinstriped trilby*
*unsheathes katana*
*evaporates into a shower of sakura petals*

Let me guess, it's because he's a FUCKING WHITE MAN who writes about cowboys and shit.

Every god damn sentence of Blood Meridian is sterling.

[Anonymous No.8467266]

>>8467248
>>8467264
Cormac pls do the nurses know where you are?

[Anonymous No.8467296]

>>8467264
no, it's because he's a shitty writer who uses a blatant gimmick to pretend like he's not. his prose is poor, his characters are flat caricatures, and his world is a mundane hyper-violent-old-west cliche.

[Anonymous No.8467308]

>>8463765
the brothers karamazov.

a bad episode of law and order.

[Anonymous No.8467327]

>>8467296

What is good prose to you?

While McCarthy's descriptions of scenery are quite pastoral and some might say "purple" which I can understand not liking so much, his diagloues and non-scenery descriptions are quite stark and blunt.

>and his world is a mundane hyper-violent-old-west cliche.

You've never read Cormac McCarthy have you? Only Blood Meridian even halfway fits this description. His other novels (all the Pretty Horses, etc) are quite tame in comparison and morally centered.

Also, I guess nothing can be exaggerated or romanticized for narrative or dramatic effect huh guys.

Moby Dick should have been just way more tame and realistic in its depiction of whaling, r-right guys?

[Anonymous No.8467332]

>>8465274
savage

[Anonymous No.8467353]

>>8467327
>You've never read Cormac McCarthy have you? Only Blood Meridian even halfway fits this description.
considering that's the book we're discussing...

in response to your question, i read a little less than half of blood meridian based off /lit/'s obsession, and that's as far as i got, and it's as far as i'll ever get with him. i found it to be quite mundane and not worth my time to continue, i haven't kept my limited experience with reading him a secret, either. see >>8463887

[Anonymous No.8467363]

A bunch of faggots chase a whale.

[Anonymous No.8467366]

>>8467363
Or
>a guy gets his leg eaten by a whale
>later it eats the rest of him

[Anonymous No.8467367]

>>8467363
Tropic of Cancer?

[Anonymous No.8467378]

>beta guy fucks a lot of desperate girls and is also a pedo

[Anonymous No.8467392]

>a hidalgo goes fuck crazy
>gets shit talked by a farmer for years
>dies

[Anonymous No.8467456]

>>8463765
Some Turkish poet goes back to his shitty hometown, and has feelings about snow and stuff.
>tfw no one will be able to guess it

[Anonymous No.8467470]

>>8465394
His book is too expensive to get a hold of, so I'm pretty sure nobody has read it.
>tfw I got a hold of a copy from a library sale for $6 and sold it for $90
>tfw I didn't even read it first

[Anonymous No.8467477]

>>8467143
Sounds like Dostoievsky

[Anonymous No.8467478]

>>8467470
>not typing it up word for word, printing out copies, binding them yourself and passing them off as classics whenever you're short on cash

It's like you hate money

[Anonymous No.8467483]

>>8467477
it wasn't poker though.

[Anonymous No.8467486]

>>8467296
>mundane
>hyper-violent-old-west cliche

[Anonymous No.8467493]

>>8467486
I love that pic so much. I use it too much though.

[Anonymous No.8467501]

A guy gets arrested. The only problem is, he's not even put into prison, just interrogated in his own house one morning and still allowed to go to work and live as usual. The setting is completely toneless and ambiguous, it could be anywhere in the civilized world in the 20th century before television, pretty much. They never even tell him what he's accused of, the author even explicitly says that he's never done anything. He goes to work and also goes to talk to lawyers and judges about his case, which fails miserably, with him just having to wait very long, and ultimately not finding anything out about his case. His uncle even tries to help him, suggesting that he get out of the country, The dude denies this for no reason, because he feels so proud he wants to fight this accusation, even though they'll never tell him what it is. This failing, his uncle gets him to talk with someone supposedly very high in the law, although this guy then claims to be higher than he'll ever be but still pretty low in this case and far from omnipotent, after which he tries to guilt-trip him, claiming how much he's done for him already in letting him see him and speak to him so easily when he's in fact done nothing.

Later, he's told at his job that he has to diplomatically assist a foreigner around the town, a businessman who's come to talk to them, and show them the sights, which he agrees to, even though he doesn't speak the language good, causing him to be somewhat anxious. He's supposed to meet him at the huge town church (a town unnamed and mostly undescribed), where he doesn't find him, but instead finds a dark, gothic, creepy, empty church where a priest miraculously happens to know all about his case, calls him over, gives him strange, Jewish-sounding parables about the law, and urges him to confess to his crime, saying he'll be executed and that he's a very proud, stupid man. He denies this, saying he still wants to fight, but then some night after this, he's taken out of his house and executed in the wilderness.

Phew, that was long.

[Anonymous No.8467507]

>>8466392
The Iliad?

[Anonymous No.8467519]

>faggy lord gets insurrected
>relocates and becomes a teacher
>sucks his neighbors cock

[Anonymous No.8467522]

>>8467501
Hey I finished reading that book this morning

[Anonymous No.8467523]

>>8467486
>a cliche isn't mundane if it's a violent cliche

[Anonymous No.8467529]

>>8467501
Sounds Kafkaesque

[Anonymous No.8467550]

>>8467523
So just setting something in "The West" is the cliche you're bitching about? Because graphic depictions of violence in west were from the norm when Blood Meridian was written.
inb4 you try to compare the rootin' tootin' Wild Wild West of pop culture with Blood Meridian. It was rarely if ever graphic, and with fairly traditional good vs evil morals associated.

[Anonymous No.8467562]

>>8467523

>A legion of horribles, hundreds in number, half naked or clad in costumes attic or biblical or wardrobed out of a fevered dream with the skins of animals and silk finery and pieces of uniform still tracked with the blood of prior owners, coats of slain dragoons, frogged and braided cavalry jackets, one in a stovepipe hat and one with an umbrella and one in white stockings and a bloodstained weddingveil and some in headgear of cranefeathers or rawhide helmets that bore the horns of bull or buffalo and one in a pigeontailed coat worn backwards and otherwise naked and one in the armor of a Spanish conquistador, the breastplate and pauldrons deeply dented with old blows of mace or saber done in another country by men whose very bones were dust and many with their braids spliced up with the hair of other beasts until they trailed upon the ground and their horses’ ears and tails worked with bits of brightly colored cloth and one whose horse’s whole head was painted crimson red and all the horsemen’s faces gaudy and grotesque with daubings like a company of mounted clowns, death hilarious, all howling in a barbarous tongue and riding down upon them like a horde from a hell more horrible yet than the brimstone land of Christian reckoning, screeching and yammering and clothed in smoke like those vaporous beings in regions beyond right knowing where the eye wanders and the lip jerks and drools.

Not saying McCarthy is everyone's cup of tea, but

>mundane
>bad prose


Lol back to Junot Diaz and your otherwriter's workshop bullshit you pleblord.

[Anonymous No.8467573]

>>8463765
should i buy that book or game of thrones?

[Anonymous No.8467592]

A guy with yellow fever gets cucked while working overseas, also a car explodes.

[Anonymous No.8467620]

>>8465274
Kek'd heartily

[Anonymous No.8467623]

>>8463791
>Change the way he wrote it and it's bad

='(

But seriously, the punctuation of Blood Meridian isn't even particularly sparse. Just read his sentences straight through and you'll find they have a nice rhythm.

It seems like everyone tosses McCarthy after the first 50 pages but if you get used to his style you can't go back. I read The Road first and it took me 10 days to get through 100 pages and I read the next 200 pages in a day or two once I became accustomed.

Don't give up on McCarthy, you won't regret it.

[Anonymous No.8467631]

>>8465379
Very accurate description. I thought that book would be some kind of surreal, dreamy story and I got scat jokes and homo orgies.

Still one of the best books I've read, but I was high on hydro due to surgery the whole time. Best state to read that book in.

[Anonymous No.8467636]

>>8467218
He's not particularly new to throwing out quotation marks, I'm pretty sure Joyce does that extensively.

And if the writer provides distinctive voice for his characters it makes the conversation flow more naturally instead of falling into the "he said" "she said" conventions.

[Anonymous No.8467637]

>>8463774
>>8464882
>>8465268

Careful, or the Ghost of Literature Past (also known as Harold Bloom) will put YA in your stocking

[Anonymous No.8467641]

STEM fag turns into a pseud and then gets cucked by a cripple

[Anonymous No.8467645]

>>8467573
Blood Meridian is undoubtedly better but Game of Thrones provides a 700 pages of comfy reading.

I would quit reading after the third book, I remember the fourth being terrible and I'm not sure if I liked the fifth. I probably won't read the new ones if they ever get published. I think /lit/ tainted me.

[Anonymous No.8467652]

>>8467631
>Naked Lunch
>Still one of the best books I've read

You need to read a lot more. This brings me back to my 19 year old self when I thought Chuck Palahniuk and Hunter S Thompson were the shit. Of course I also worshiped Naked Lunch.

[Anonymous No.8467660]

>>8467652
aye guy I'm well read.

I understand 100% why people wouldn't like the book though. I don't know if it was the drugs but about halfway through the book became immensely enjoyable.

It definitely varied depending on the chapter.

[Anonymous No.8467665]

A middle-aged man masturbates in a hotel room.

[Anonymous No.8468438]

700 pages about a fat guy doing literally almost nothing

[Anonymous No.8468451]

>>8468438
Oblomov?

>>8467641
Stoner

>>8467456
Orhan Pamuk- Kar

>>8465379
Still GOAT shit though
Junky is also great if you want a good half hour-hour read

[Anonymous No.8468456]

>>8463765
>black dude hangs himself because no one likes him anymore

[Anonymous No.8468611]

>>8464003
I stopped watching after he said toor-till-ers

[Anonymous No.8468660]

>>8467367

kek