What would you say is the most carefully-wrought, intricate, detailed, purposeful piece of literature? Something where every single sentence has been worked and reworked by the artist until it has been made absolutely perfect, at least to their standards. Would Hamlet be the best candidate? Plays, books, poems, albums, anything is good. I am immensely bored and I'm looking for something to memorise or read over a lot or otherwise pour a lot of time into. Thank you very much.
>>8230950
You could do worse than John Keats. Sounds good aloud, regular rhythm - will be good to recite to the woman in your life, perhaps?
To Autumn
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cider-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.
Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,-
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
>>8230950
>the most
dropped
>>8230950
The Great Gatsby. Pretty much every sentence is beautiful and essential.
>>8230950
Finnegans Wake is what best fits your description, but isn't what you're looking for.
>>8231008
I've been wondering about that book. I know that it's very complex and complicated, but is there that much thought behind it? I could write gibberish Latin and Spanish puns with my knowledge of the languages, but that doesn't mean that they're meaningful. I just saw a biography of Joyce at the library, and I think I'll check it out the next time I'm there, to get more of an idea of how he wrote.
>>8231007
My 11th grade English teacher was in love with that book and I certainly remember enjoying it, but I will go back and reread it! I know that colors play an important part, so I'll keep an eye out for them.
>>8230992
What did I do wrong?
you're obviously not ready for heavy literature
read the starter chart first
>>8230950
What book is that?
>inb4 odyssey
I'd make a case for Pale Fire, it's extremely well written, the authors aesthetic philosophy shows beautifully, each plot detail has multiple interpretations which are actively built into the text, and as usual with Nabokov, the narrator fucks with you and you shamefully enjoy it.
I don't need to make a case for Ulysses, it's fucking Ulysses.
For generally meticulous prose writers I'd recommend Borges, Rushdie, Amis (jr), and Bellow.
Most of Borges stories can be found quite easily, I'll drop a wee link to my favourite here on the off chance you fancy a peek.
http://www4.ncsu.edu/~jjsakon/FunestheMemorious.pdf
>>8231076
>For generally meticulous prose writers I'd recommend Borges
>meticulous prose
>Borges
someone doesn't spanish. borges is utilitarian af.
>>8231083
You are very right sir, I do not Spanish. I'm afraid I only English and Gaelic, sometimes I french but that's a different story entirely. The edition I have of 'Fictions' contains some excellent sentences, but that may be an act of translation.
That's the worst inter linear edition I've ever seen of anything.
>>8231083
How are "utilitarian" and "meticulous" at odds? I do think he's very meticulous. Not in the way OP requests, but that poster otherwise isn't wrong
>>8232553
>Not in the way OP requests
hmm so you're disagreeing with my quote choice if you willingly disregard the whole context of this thread
interesting
The only appropriate answer is Finnegans Wake
