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/lit/ - Literature

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8949082 No.8949082 [Reply] [Original]

>30+ pages of exposition

>> No.8949095
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8949095

>>8949082
>preface with tons of spoilers

>> No.8949099
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8949099

>>8949082
>50+ pages of reactionary conservative political theory

>> No.8949103

>>8949099
I'm a fascist and even this annoyed me

>> No.8949104
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8949104

>first chapter introduces more than 15 characters

>> No.8949115

>>8949103
Really? I quite liked it
Probably wasn't too good for you because Heinlein's Terran Federation has much closer resemblance to Athenian Democracy than Mussolini's Fascism

>> No.8949137

> it's a "I can't characterize through dialogue so I'm going to tell you about the characters' personalities instead."
> it's a "I'm going to tell you things about the world instead of showing them to you"
> it's a "I can't allude to the character's thoughts so I am just going to tell you in no uncertain terms the awkward relationship he has to teh love interest chick isntead of demonstrating it with a conversation"

Shit like this is why I now write with a cinematic style. The only writer I'll tolerate this kind of shit from is John Grisham because those books are cheap airport fiction that my mom got me into and are now my guilty pleasure.

>> No.8949384

>>8949137
> it's a "I can't characterize through dialogue so I'm going to tell you about the characters' personalities instead."
You can do that in novels, if it is interesting, imo. The only place you can't do that for sure is in theater.
> it's a "I'm going to tell you things about the world instead of showing them to you"
This is a common mistake in theater, but in novels that isn't a problem, or it is?

> it's a "I can't allude to the character's thoughts so I am just going to tell you in no uncertain terms the awkward relationship he has to teh love interest chick isntead of demonstrating it with a conversation"
That's the same as point one, isn't it?

>> No.8949389

>>8949082
>A play without action, characters or concrete space.

>> No.8949393

>>8949384
As far as points one and two go, it's only a flaw if the character's actions don't reaffirm the narration

Raskolnikov being weird without his rambling walks would be trite

>> No.8949399

>more than 1 paragraph of exposition
I find thee lacking

>> No.8949415

>>8949082
>You can feel the author's opinion through his characters.
>There's no world building or investigation behind the place of objects the characters interact with.
>The lack of knowlege about the thing the author is talking about is replaced by vague descriptions.
>The last chapters of the book has nothing to resemble the first chapters.

>> No.8949426

>>8949393
Oh, I understand now. Thanks.
I haven't read Crime and Punishment, still, but the same happens in White Nights with the main character.

>> No.8949441

>>8949082
>The state of the place of the story isn't a metaphor of what is happening inside the main character or characters.
>The author is good seeing the defects of the people he is basing his characters, but he can not see the virtues.
>There is no comparative character to know what would happen if the main character change his actions and attitudes.

>> No.8949446

>>8949082
>A character is introduced waking up.

>> No.8949459

>>8949446
True story: Because /lit/ has pointed out this trope, I removed it from a key scene in my story, and it made the whole chapter better.
Thanks!

>> No.8949520

>>8949446
Card Captors Sakura made this well.

>> No.8949552

>>8949115
It was so goddamn grating and boring, I read the book because I thought it was going to be a fun little action romp in space to kill time on and not think about too much, not a political manifesto

>> No.8949574

>>8949137
Really? What would you recommend from him?

>> No.8949589

>>8949082
I like your picture. Must be a powerful book.

>> No.8949644

>>8949552
read Armor, it's more what you're after and has a subplot that can be completely skipped if you really just want Halo

>> No.8949668

>>8949574
Not him but The Pelican Brief, The King of Torts and the story about the guy in death row are pretty good

A Time to Kill is probably Grisham's most /lit work though

>> No.8949782
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8949782

>The characters are never described because the author thinks that's the readers task.

>> No.8949900
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8949900

its a "no person, place, or thing" chapter

>> No.8949913
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8949913

>opens up with a pseudo cynical dialogue from the main character about the hardship of the world.

oh boy itsa one of these books

>> No.8950048

>>8949782
but this can be done to great effect, such as the nondescript Helen of Troy

>> No.8950142

>>8949520
So is card capture Sakura the best novel?

>> No.8950776
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8950776

>>8949913
Phony.

>> No.8950784

>>8949900
I love those

>> No.8950796

>>8949552
This anon does not represent /pol/. Real /pol/acks are reasonable, smart and attractive. Ignore COINTELPRO posts, don't reply to COINTELPRO posts.

>> No.8950822

>>8949441
>>The state of the place of the story isn't a metaphor of what is happening inside the main character or characters.
>>There is no comparative character to know what would happen if the main character change his actions and attitudes.
Fuck off, not every book has to be the same.

>> No.8950888
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8950888

>book has two epilogues

>> No.8950964

>>8949082
>>8949095

this.
>buy a short book (the kind of Animal farm)
>half of the books is a pedantic introduction by some Iamveryimportantatthis Ph D.

also.
>buy the Lord of the flies
>bullshit introduction. Skip it.
>read the book
>Go back to introduction.
>motherfucker spoils the end at the FIRST-FUCKIN-PAGE

thankis I didn't read it at first, but made me so mad

>> No.8951262
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8951262

>>8949082
5+ pages of just describing the scenery

>> No.8951326

>>8949668
Have you ever wanted to travel around and read books on planes while visiting beautiful scenic countries?

>> No.8951337

>>8949900
how

>> No.8951359

>>8950048
We can tell she's cross-eyed from all the fucking glancing she's doing.

>> No.8951364

>a new hero appears!
>fifty pages of a hero's ancestors
>twenty billion volumes of his descendants
>he dies shortly after
No one cares about your families you SHITTY DUSTY TRIBESMEN REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

>> No.8951404

>>8949574
A Time To Kill is really good. I also liked the Pelican Brief and the beginning of the Testament. The Innocent Man was also good. The new one is decent, too. Honestly I can't think of a book of his I really didn't like. He's a pretty good writer, not literature but they are fun books. They are plot-shit but you know what fucking deal with it faggots.

As I get older I find it harder to focus on books so he is a good fallback.

>> No.8951442

>>8950142
It's a great anime, based on a good manga, based on words and draws... so, yeah.

>> No.8951465

>>8950822
>The state of the place of the story isn't a metaphor of what is happening inside the main character or characters.
You can do that in infinite ways... and it has been done like that.

>There is no comparative character to know what would happen if the main character change his actions and attitudes.
If you had a character with a depressing conclusion, or a happy conclusion... people would end thinking (specially kids) that the world is like that, very depressing or very optimistic. To make things complex, you put characters that take different decisions and get different results to the main character.

>> No.8951473

>>8951364
I think author does that to make that death important.
Sounds like Togashi's deaths in HxH

>> No.8951494

>>8950888
Hotline Miami?

>>8951262
HUnchback of Notre Dame

>> No.8951496
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8951496

>The Case of Charles Dexter Ward has several chapters about the ancestor of the main character.

>> No.8951501
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8951501

Title of the books starts with "the"

>> No.8951649
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8951649

>>8950796
>reasonable, smart, and attractive
AAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

>> No.8951703

>>8949099
>not having a strong sense of civic duty

>> No.8951718
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8951718

>>8949913
>it continues like that throughout the entire novel

>> No.8951795

>>8949782
but that's a good thing

>> No.8951898

>25 pages written about man smoking a single tobacco.
Absolute literature.

>> No.8951912

>>8951718
No, it switches later to some stories about him being autistic with his sort of friends and talking to a hooker, actually read beyond the first fifty pages you faggot.

>> No.8951919

>>8951494
War and Peace is one off the top of my head, I forget if Anna Karenina had two as well

>> No.8952046

>>8949095
REEEEEEEEEEEEEE

>> No.8952142

>>8949104
which of his videos is that from? did he really cry?

>> No.8952148

>>8950888
w&p? don't be such a baby baka desu senpai

>> No.8952157

>>8951898
>a single tobacco
kek, what? is this camus?

>> No.8952173
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8952173

>>8952157
Actually I remembered wrong - it was 70 PAGES about smoking a single pipe of tobacco. 70 pages about man walking to other side of the room, and picking a pipe.

70. pages.

>> No.8952179

>>8951326
No but my family takes 12 hour roadtrips to lower Florida almost yearly and we usually pop in a Grisham audiobook

>> No.8952181

>>8951898
>several hundred pages of groundbreaking literary theory
>filled with tobacco and used for cigarette paper

>> No.8952187

>>8951703
>feeling duty towards the rotting corpse of a society
Heinlein hit the nail on the head talking about undisciplined children and the moral busybodies enabling them. I feel like Starship Troopers is going to eventually complete the political scifi trifecta with 1984 and BNW

>> No.8952263

>>8952142
Yes and its an incredible video. I almost cried with him.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnEFt20qe0o&t=18s

>> No.8952499

>>8949137
>Anna Mikhailovna was already embracing her and weeping. The countess was also weeping. They wept because they were friends; and because they were kind; and because they, who had been friends since childhood, were concerned with such a mean subject-- money; and because their youth was gone . . . But for both of them they were pleasant tears .
GOD WOW TOLSTOY IS SUCH A FUCKING HACK JESUS CHRIST LEARN TO SHOW AND NOT TELL YOU IDIOT

>> No.8952534

>>8952173
oh I've heard some anon talk about this, it's a pretty famous passage.

>> No.8952819
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8952819

>>8951262

They see me rollin'

>> No.8952916
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8952916

>book has no table of contents

>> No.8952948

>>8950964
>>8949095
>Spoilers
>Reading for plot
>>/tv/

>> No.8952985

>>8952499
To be honest as I read through this it's hard to relate or view some of the characters as people they seem to laugh and cry at the drop of a hat , men and women, though maybe it's just a different time

>> No.8953107

>>8951912

But it's all written from the perspective of his diary, which is pseudo-cynical and focuses on the hardship of the world.

>> No.8954048

>>8952948
haha

>> No.8954053

>>8952916
Yeah, this is pretty frustrating on e-readers.

>> No.8954062

>>8950964
i had that problem with animal farm many years ago, but after some time i stopped reading prefaces, even when they are made by the own writer (like LOTR)
i'm more interested in afterwords, i think they're usually richer

>> No.8954127

>>8954062

The original preface to Animal Farm is GOAT though.

>> No.8954622
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8954622

>>8949082
Please, get on my level
>300 pages of exposition

>> No.8954784
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8954784

>>8949082
>Still no main plot after half the book

I seriously feel like dropping this one...

>> No.8954834

>>8954784
>Stephen King
Should have dropped it before you even picked it up

>> No.8954845
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8954845

>Literally 900 pages of walking

>> No.8954846

>>8954784
Is there a list of King books that don't end in "And then he defeated the demon with the power of love(courage)(friendship)"

>> No.8954851

>>8951649
He's not wrong.

>> No.8954854

>>8949446
This is how every homosexual starts a song "woke up in the morning"

>> No.8954873

>>8954845
I distinctly remember there was a great deal of sitting in rooms and riding horses.

>> No.8954879

>>8950796
How do I know you're not a shill as well

>> No.8955407

>>8954845
>Literally 900 pages of words

>> No.8955462

>>8949913
Hahaha I actually like books with super cynical dialogue from the MC. Out of curiosity since you don't like cynicism what do you prefer?

I don't want to be inflammatory but to me the books that are the opposite of that, seem to be for entertainment and not actually taking an analytical view of things.

>> No.8955471

>>8951262
John Steinbeck East of Eden?
You have to learn all the ins and outs of the valley!

>> No.8955495

>>8954834
>>8954846
I dunno, I usually find his books to be enjoyable up until the end, he can't write an ending for shit. But The Dead Zone is going nowhere.

>> No.8955771

>>8954846
Most of them don't end like that. Many of them have bad endings, but they aren't anime. The only one I can think of that fits that is It.

>> No.8955778

>>8951703
>fascists
>civic duty
Only in speech, my friend.

>> No.8955848

>>8955771
The Stand literally ends with the hand of god setting of a nuke in Las Vegas, killing all the post-apocalyptic bad people that were drawn there by a devil.

>> No.8955942
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8955942

>never read moby dick before, know barely anything about it, especially about how the story goes beyond Ahab killing himself to try and get the whale
>introduction tells me the whole crew dies as well

>> No.8955950

>>8955942

>reading for plot

>> No.8955955
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8955955

>>8955950
be nice to know everyone encountered by Ishmael in the book isn't going to die by the end anyway and have that in the back of your head as you read though

I'm not enlightened enough by my own intelligence to solely appreciate the prose style

>> No.8955960
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8955960

>>8955950

>Not reading for plot

>> No.8956054
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8956054

>>8955942
>never read moby dick before, know barely anything about it, especially about how the story goes beyond Ahab killing himself to try and get the whale
>This post tells me the whole crew dies as well

>> No.8956119

>>8955407
>literally 450 pages of paper

>> No.8956120

>>8956054
sorry lad should've spoiler'd in retrospect

>> No.8956152

>>8954854
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxoBbpmMxKo

But idk if ke$ha is a homo

>> No.8956161

>>8956054
1. Stop being a pleb
2. This also means stop reading for plot
3. Stop touching yourself

>> No.8956165

>3 plus pages of one unbroken sentence describing the environment
PINECONEEEEEEEEEEEEE

>> No.8956166

>>8956161
if i don't read for the plot should i read for what nigger

>> No.8956184

>>8951364
I'm pretty sure it's the bible

>> No.8956263

>>8955848
That can only barely be described as "beating the demon with the power of love/friendship/courage." God reaching down to kill everyone is a lot different than the anime hero literally giving a speech about friendship and then beating the villain.

>> No.8956329

>>8950796

>reasonable, smart and attractive

shit b8

>> No.8956379

>>8956166
Have you taken a single literature class in your life? How about the insight? The prose? The ability to develop your own writing? If you could only read for the plot, poetry couldn't even exist.

>> No.8956461

>>8956119
>literally an outcome of the printing press

>> No.8957371

>>8954846
Dark Tower doesn't end like that brother

>> No.8957410

>>8949446
>character is described by means of looking at self in bathroom mirror after waking up

>> No.8957415

>>8949446
>First paragraph starts with a time and weather report

>> No.8957421

>>8949137
you don't get it yet

>> No.8957447

>>8955960
>reading for plot

>> No.8957456

>>8956379
I don't want to write anything just enjoy a good book

>> No.8957467

>>8957447
>not reading for plot

>> No.8957482

>>8956379
Not OP, but I honestly can't care for much of that. As long as the prose can get to the point and not dance too much around it I'm all fine with it taking a bit longer. Also, I have no idea why poetry exists. I have yet to encounter any form of poetry that invokes some kind of emotion and that doesn't come off as corny.

>> No.8957483
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8957483

>>8949082
>1,000 pages of exposition

>> No.8957496

>>8957467
>reading for plot

>> No.8957513

>not enjoying the introductory study

i understand you, english-speaking academy sucks.

>> No.8957526

>>8951496
>>The Case of Charles Dexter Ward has several chapters about the ancestor of the main character.

Im so glad someone posted this but also

>all those pages just describing the fucking old buildings of new england and Charles' passion for boring old shit

>more than half the story is just describing shit

I cant believe I fell for the meme that this is one of Lovecraft's best when it's actually one of his worst.

>> No.8957530

>>8949415
World building is the best part. I'm 74 pages and 30,000 words into the quick guide for my own reference about the world and plot points key to the story, and I'm having a grand time. People who skip that bit are lazy.

>> No.8957819

>>8956263
>>8955771
Needful things, Gerald's game.
And I did mean any cheap deus ex machina endings.

>> No.8957936

>>8957819
Oh, okay. I agree, both of those were deus ex, but I wouldn't say they were just "good guys win through their goodness."

>> No.8958102

>>8949415
>world building
who the fuck cares about this shit, honestly

>> No.8958163

>>8956161
>>8952948
You can keep repeating this but it will never be true.
Reading FOR plot =/= enjoying the story as it happens.

>> No.8958171
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8958171

>it's a Plato rambles on and on with one his myths episode

>> No.8958847

>>8950888
kek

>> No.8959152

>>8955950
>>8955960
is this reading for plot a /lit/ meme?

>> No.8959882

>>8950888
haha