>>7830099
Cool. I've not read it, but the only Barth I've read (*Lost in the Fun House*) was amazing. I've been meaning to read more of his stuff for years, and this one sounds interesting.

>>7830099
I just started it a few days ago, only like 50 pages in, but really loving it, will probably check out some more by Barth. The notion of Burlingame's "fickleness" was really interesting to me, and going along with it Eben saying something like "impossible to choose between ways of living, every life being so novel to be desirable to live" - I'm similarly troubled by what to settle on, but the impetus to jump from living to living is so fascinating. Only being as far in as I am, I'd definitely recommend it a read

>>7830104
It's incredibly funny if nothing else
The main character is something between Ignatius Reilly and Candide

>>7830111
>Eben saying something like "impossible to choose between ways of living, every life being so novel to be desirable to live" - I'm similarly troubled by what to settle on, but the impetus to jump from living to living is so fascinating.

struck a chord with me too. i find it interesting Barth laid the book out as a conclusion to his 'nihilism' trilogy only to discover what he thought of as nihilism was really the paralysis of innocence and inexperience

>>7830111
you sound like a huge faggot

>>7830135
he sounds like Eben Cooke

Potential reader here, how similar is it to Mason & Dixon?

>>7830135
why's that, friend?

>>7830279
Haven't read past the first pages of M&D but it's significantly easier, at the very least

>>7830279
i mean, john barth is not thomas pynchon
they're similar only insofar as they are postmodernist comedies of early america

>>7830435
I disagree with that. I find Sot-Weed much harder to read at times. I feel like Barth's prose is fairly authentic to the period and Pynchon's is just kind of playing a joke on it