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/lit/ - Literature

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9915915 No.9915915 [Reply] [Original]

So /lit/, I'm currently in the process of making up for my U.S. public school education, as well as my own shitty attitudes toward literature from when I was a high school student. I was going to read Adler's How to Read a Book after seeing it memed here, but after looking through its table of contents (as the authors instructed), it looks like it wouldn't be nearly as helpful in reading fiction as nonfiction. I've now come across pic related in my search for an alternative guide to not being a literature brainlet, has anyone here read it? Was it helpful?

>> No.9915947

The Bible -- Mythology and folklore -- Proverbs -- Idioms -- World literature, philosophy, and religion -- Literature in English -- Conventions of written English -- Fine arts -- World history to 1550 -- World history since 1550 -- American history to 1865 -- American history since 1865 -- World politics -- World geography -- American geography -- Anthropology, psychology, and sociology -- Business and economics -- Physical sciences and mathematics -- Earth sciences -- Life sciences -- Medicine and health -- Technology.

>> No.9915984

>>9915947
What's this?

>> No.9916035

>>9915915
Check out the autodidact general from the archives.

>> No.9916059
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9916059

>>9915915
Adler's book isn't very useful.

I much prefer pic related

>> No.9916071

>>9915984
What you should learn, Steve. Is your name Steve? Not that it matters or anything. *blushes*

>> No.9916384

>>9916059
I have no aspirations to become a writer, would this still be useful for me?
I guess what I'm really trying to address in my reading habits is a general inability to construct overall meanings and recognize patterns. When reading, I feel that I have no efficient way of telling what is supposed to be important, what aspects of the plot or prose to pay special attention to. I don't know where to start and end a literary analysis. I recognize the fact that there is much below the surface of a novel's plot, but it is as if all I've been given to dig below that surface is a plastic spoon.

>> No.9916422
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9916422

>> No.9917227

>>9915915
This book unironically changed my life. It may not be as significant for you as a (presumably) decently well-read /lit/ user, but when I was totally new to proper lit it not only gave me a crash course on not only HOW to read, but WHAT to read. It's kind of canon-lite and certainly is much less daunting than Bloom's list, but absolutely got the ball rolling for me. It's nowhere near endgame /lit/ tier, but it is absolutely perfect if you're trying to get some literary/historical/philosophical ground to stand on.

For at least your first few history and fiction books that you read on the list (stuff like Herodotus, Thucydides, Don Quixote), literally write out your responses to the suggested questions that Bauer poses. It seems wishy-washy and bullshitty, but it was only after I went through and finished all the questions for the first of these books that it really dawned on me how much I COULD be learning if I really stopped and thought about and interacted with the books.

Absolutely read this book, or at least the relevant sections of it for what you're trying to read, e.g., read the section on fiction if you're trying to grapple with fiction a bit better.