What does /lit think about John Barth? I've heard some good things about him, but also that he's "overly-intellectual" or "soulless." Are his books really just attempts to be clever or is there more to them?
>>7809933
"lost in the funhouse" was a cool meta-short-story of his.
>>7809933
I've never read anything by him, but I think he was a big influence on DFW's thoughts on postmodernism, if that means anything to you.
I think that description fits Lost in The Funhouse well, where each story is a kind of conceptual game, but his novels are pretty loose and free form.
He's described his own writing methods as 'channeling The Muse' or letting his spine do the writing, so I certainly don't think it's his intention with his novels to write anything too clever or specifically structured.
For what it's worth I've read four of his novels (his first three, plus Chimera) and none of them came across overly-intellectual or "soulless" to me....
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I'm currently in a situation where I have to leave a girl I really fell for due to inevitable circumstances. I fell for her way harder than I wanted to and leaving is gonna be much harder. Recommend me books to indulge this sad but beautiful feels, I want to indulge in them
Pic unrelated
I don't have any recs but I just broke up with a girl I fell for on Friday. It hurts but I know she wasn't right for me and that it's for the better
You're gonna be okay, anon. I like jacking off to pictures of children
Snow Country
The Magic Mountain
It’s perfect.
am i stupid if i can sum up a book's theme after having read it
You're stupod
>>7809927
I dunno. I'm taking several literature courses this semester, and I feel so stupid that I never know what the theme is in class discussions.
Deep down, I like the not knowing :(
>>7809927
Sum up some themes for us OP and we'll tell you you're retarded.
I love you all
I love you too OP t b h
>>7809910
what's your favourite book?
Please save me then.
Hey /lit, literary genius here. How does it feel living a brief, insignificant, semi-conscious life without reaching the depths of human existence and discovering the truly sublime nature of human consciousness?
My favorite Gravity's Rainbow meme is Byron the Bulb because it requires you to have read past the first 10 pages to know it.
>>7809784
I'm even more of a genius than you --easily better than Joyce, Shakespeare, and Homer combined and already canon-- and your flawed, yet precocious grasp on the nature of consciousness amuses me.
>>7809784
>brief
>human
I don't know this feel tbqh
Ask an eternal entity of pure will anything, lads
Is there a name for this type of story? does anyone know something similar?
I'd classify it as (made-up) folklore. It sounds like something Native American.
>>7809792
any recommendation on made up folklore? or folklore for that matter.
>>7810016
Italo Calvino's Italian Folklore collection
So my girlfriend who never reads asked me for a book today. I wasn't sure how to proceed. Do I take her serious and give her a classic? Do I make a kek and hand her infinite jest. Does she even have the attention span for something like Anna karina. Should I give her some pleb genre fiction and hope she asks me for another book? Do I give her something girly. Fuck man I don't.
Wtf would you do? And why?
I gave her the virgin suicides hoping she falls in love with that dreamboat trip Fontaine.... like I did. It's not to long and it has girls and...
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>>7809712
>Anna karina
>>7809712
You should've given her the D
FW.
>Anna karina
hey /lit/
I don't often have a lot of time to set aside for reading or learning about new works and progressing through literature. Out of everything I've managed to finish these are the works I've found to have any kind of profoundness. Call it pleb if you want cause it probably is. I tried to go through others like crime and punishment, the brothers karamazov, anna karenina, etc but those were too long for me and I didn't really 'get' them.
Can anyone give recommendations based on this taste?
I want to discover new literature...
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Read the Tao Te Ching
>>7809691
The Martian.
Read some more Kafka, the metamorphosis is pretty neato and his shorter stories are good too (meditation)
Try out dracula too, if you liked frankenstein you might like it too, and Candide by Voltaire would be a good addition to the list
What do /lit/izens think of Mr. Mercedes?
Stephen King?
>>7809641
i thought misery and the one about the house were good movies back when I was like 15
id probably still like them today, even
>>7809641
Kys jackoff
I started The Shining and read something like 80 pages into it if I remember correctly, 100 tops. I liked what I read but obviously it didn't suck me in completely since I didn't finish it.
what are the best stories in dubliners?
read them all faggot
The Dead and the one about the girl who's basically forced to get married to a guy that rents an apartment from her mom but I don't remember the name of it.
>>7809455
i only read the first one about the dead priest so that one I guess
Where does it lay the inception of Dante Alighieri's vision for Hell in his comedy?
His Hell contains characters coming from pagan mythology as well, but how does one distinguishes between the conception of hell in the middle ages betweeen pagan beliefs and the christian vision?
I was taught the beauty was in the marriage of the two, and that when one tallies it all up there's a balance between the biblical and pagan allusions
>>7809363
Well beside that I think is a bit hypocritical for this vision to borrow concepts from whom they called "heathens/infidels", I do like it, but I feel like I have no idea where my vision stands, time-wise, what did Giotto pick up the ideas to paint this, the last judgement?
That seems a sort of Demon but is blue.
>>7809330
Pre-New Testament, Gods were regularly borrowed and shared throughout the mediterranean. Conquer Egypt? Enjoy your new Pantheon.
Remnants of the original thought likely remained until the times of Dante. Perhaps these Gods exist, but our God reigns supreme.
how the fuck do you people carry books around
I can barely fit a slim paperback into my laptop bag
what do I do
>>7809209
please help me
Use an e-reader you stupid retard
Bigger bag?
Alright /lit/,
There's a new magazine locally available in your town.
>title of magazine
>topics of articles you'd read
>something you've never seen in other mags
1..2...3
Go!
>>7809131
hello puppies!
who's a happy puppies? who's a happy puppies?
>title of magazine
Confluence
>topics of articles you'd read
Culture, Society, History, Religion, Science
>something you've never seen in other mags
my name on a byline
I just wanted to say hi to the puppies but now I want to read this
>>7809131
>Title
EVROPA
>Topics
Alt-right volkisch lifestile magazine
>articles
degenerates and how to spot them, This day in white history, ZOG exposed
>>7809131
The Catholic something
Arts, history, religion, economics and other stuff
Art classicism and distributism
Is this considered good poetry?
Fast and bulbous, that's right, the mascara snake
Fast and bulbous, also a tin teardrop
Bulbous, also tapered, that's right
Pena, her litle head clinking like a barrel of red velvet balls
Full past noise
Treats filled her eyes turning them yellow like enamel-coated tax
Soft like butter, hard not to pour
Out enjoying the sun while sitting on a turned-on waffle iron
Smoke billowing up from between her legs made me vomit beautifully
And crush a chandelier
Fall on my stomach and view her from a thousand...
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>>7809089
if it were a part of the dada movement, then yes. tristan tzara would have loved it.
>>7809089
You're in deeper waters here, /mu/. The answer is 'close the browser'.
>>7809099
Scaruffi could kick your ass
I'm going to make a print version of the first four arcs for my bookshelf. Give me some quotes to put on the back
>>7809074
"You can read this book on the train to Flavortown!"
"Not fanfic"
>>7809074
Why would you want quotes on the back if you're just making it for yourself? Those are a marketing tool and nothing else.
Though I guess if you read and enjoy web serial capeshit you wouldn't understand that.