Questions that don't deserve their own thread thread
I have enough room in my reading schedule to read either Pere Goriot or Blood Meridian? Which should I read?
>>7946547
Pere Goriot
Brothers karamazov vs the idiot; which to read first?
>>7946543
Is getting an ereader worth it? I never used one but as a poor guy the idea of pirating books like I do music is tempting.
>>7946561
The Idiot.
should I go workout or finish reading The Idiot? I only got 300 pages left. totally douable in one night.
>>7946571
Why?
>>7946568
Just go to the fucking library you trog
How do I combat reading fatigue?
>>7946568
you don't need an Ereader to pirate books. you can read 'em on your computer.
There's even a kindle app for whatever their file extension is (MOBI?)
>>7946572
Read a little, and then go work out and ponder it.
What's the best version of Goethe's Faust available on Amazon? Preferably one that has both parts combined.
Is there somewhere where i can download audiobooks directly, without paying like in Audible? Torrenting is getting harder when what you want barely has any seeders.
>>7946746
cocaine
>>7946814
Stuart Atkins' translation on amazon is great and has both parts 1 and 2. It's listed as Volume 2 of a larger set of Goethe's complete works. Stuart Atkins is an excellent Goethe scholar and his translation is phenomenal.
Tips on writing in first person?
>>7947016
Try not to overuse "I".
>read through the Foundation trilogy, the LotR trilogy, and the whole of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
>also read through 100 years of Solitude, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Childhood's End, and Crime and Punishment
>now halfway through the Iliad and I, Robot
As you may have noticed, I like fiction, but i think it was about time i read something more grounded on reality, what do you guys recommend?
Preferably if it has something related to or is about Psychology, since i'm studying that, but i can make do with something else as long as it's good enough.
My native language is not english. I can understand everything I read on the internet, but I've only tried to read one book in english (YA John Green bullshit that my gf asked me to read). What would be a good start point, or restart, since it's been a couple of years I've read that, on literature? Maybe Lord of the flies?
I finished reading Dubliners and got my mind blown when I got to The Dead. Gabriel has the same problems I have with a weak concept of self-identity and fixation on pleasing others.
I wasn't satisfied with just Joyce's take on it. Are there more works with similar protagonists? This is a problem that I've been struggling with for years. I'm in desperate need of answers.
Why is 1984 in the begginer's starting kit of the sticky.
It goes to fucking shit by the 3rd chapter.
Or is it a "Citizen Kane" thing where it's there for merits rather than actual quality?
Is there anything like Lingua Latina per se Illustrata for French?
>>7946561
Took a class on Existentialism & we read The Brothers Karamazov before The Idiot so I'd go with TBK
>>7946561
I read TBK, didn't read the Idiot.
>>7947613
>Virginia Woolf
Which work?
>>7947658
all
can someone rec me some french lit that isn't too hard?
>>7947687
The Stranger isn't difficult, also Bonjour, Tristesse
>>7946543
Is there a book I can read that will make me asexual? I'm tired of tfw no gf :^(
>>7947703
>Proust
No thanks I'm not a faggot
>>7947687
Madam Bovary is a pretty nice book.
>>7947737
just castrate yourself
>>7947742
>>7947687
Just saw this in another thread
>>7947737
Read the Symposium and find yourself a nice bf to educate in return for sexual gratification.
>>7947773
Sorry not a fag
>>7947803
Lol, gay
>>7946568
Read them on your computer. If you don't want to read them on your computer, then go to the library or pick up a kindle.
>>7947570
1984 sucks balls. If anyone wants an actual dystopian author that is accessible while interesting look up Bradburys shit yo
>>7946543
How do people studying English or Comparative Literature deal with finding time to read for pleasure outside of coursework?
>>7947070
The Master and His Emissary by Iain McGilchrist
>>7946568
Absolutely. Don't read on your computer. Only someone who doesn't read could recommend something like that. The library could be your thing too but an ereader would give you more freedom.
>>7946568
I bought one thinking what the hell they're cheap anyway but I ended up never reading from it as long as I had heaps of unread physical books. It's not like it's necessarily unpleasant to read from them (one huge advantage is that it weighs nothing and can be easily taken anywhere) but it's just not the same as a paper book somehow.
Whatever they're like $40 or something. Just buy one, realize it sucks and never touch it again.
Is there a phrase for novels that follow a family through generations? I mean stuff like 100 Years of Solitude, Buddenbrooks and such.
>>7948044
Thanks, will check.
Is archive.org down someone else?
why haven't you cunts read vurt or the once and future king yet?
>>7946543
What did it meant when the end of Notes from Underground and he gave the bill to the girl but then he didn't
Who should one read before Lacan? Obviously Freud but anyone else?
>>7948639
It's useful to know about Hegel, even if Lacan is antagonist to him. Also pic related.
Anyone have link to the hypersphere book by /lit/? Somehow never saved it on my drive
>>7948365
Family chronicle
>>7947114
Steinbeck, Hemingway and Fitzgerald are all pretty easy and enjoyable
I just finished watching American Psycho, like the slowpoke i am. Is the book supposed to be more clear about what the fuck happened at that last part? Or is it one of those "interpret how you like" endings?
>>7948621
She didn't want it because she's a strong independent whore who don't need no benefactor
>>7946735
>implying he has access to a university library
Public libraries are shit desu.
>>7947889
This isn't an answer.
Does Duolingo work?
Is regular conversation in a foreign language you're trying to learn necessary for fluency, or even competence?
>>7950417
I tried to pick up French on it. Wasn't too bad, but being taught a language by a real person would probably be easier. Someone I know went to France and used to it help her vocab, said it was sort of helpful.
>>7950417
Duolingo is extremely useful for learning the basics of a language. After completing the Duolingo course, then you should start trying to read stuff in the language, have conversations with people in that language, listening to radio/music/movies in that language etc... Duolingo also doesn't teach you much grammar so you probably need to do a lot of reading on that too
>>7950431
How would I go about finding someone to speak German with? IRL opportunities are pretty slim.
>>7950444
make a fake blonde girl profile on interpals
>>7946543
How viable is it to teach myself russian?
Textbook suggestions welcome.
What's some good comfy horror like The Shadow over Innsmouth?
>>7950447
Thanks, family
What were the Greeks doing the entire 9 years they were beached at Troy? Seems like the whole war ended in a matter of days after Achilles got pissed but what were they doing the other nine years?
Should I learn German phonetics to pronounce words better?
How do you guys define comfy with regard to literature?
starting to get kind of nihilist and it's making me upset.
>>7946568
I have a PW3 and it's been great for me. Whatever I can't find online I just get physical.
Which album should I start with Prince?
Who is John Galt?
What do people mean when they say that Arabic is a beautiful language?
What's the most /lit/ Cheese + Wine combo? I keep eating lots of Creamy Blue Cheese and cheap $7 merlot when I can scrape up enough money to buy it.
>>7950790
Camembert and Pinot Noir.
>>7950790
Get a job at at least a newspaper my dude 7$ is fucking nothing you're in poverty
Is there any evidence that Mucho cheated on Oedipa?
Why did Stephen Dedalus not want to stay the night?
What was Avril Incandenza's motivation?
Did l'etranger deserve death?
Which Dostoevsky book is best and why?
How would one contrast Steinbeck with Hemingway?
>>7948639
Read about structuralism and read Roy Harris' critique of Lacan in Saussure And His Interpreters. Lacan is garbage - his two actual ideas are derivative, and are more implicit in his general reception than in his actual writings. His writings are closer to being a really low-rent shitty French Finnegans Wake, intentionally so too, than actual philosophy. Don't go into Lacan looking for some kind of neglected genius. If you're into that, arguably go for Deleuze instead, and even Deleuze is significantly a hack.
Dudes like Deleuze and Lacan make sense once you've read a dozen or so other thinkers who say everything they're trying to say, but actually say it clearly. Then you go back and read Deleuze again and realise he's just another echo of this or that zeitgeist and this or that idea, and, if you're not a moron, you put Deleuze down. If you're a moron, you use your esoteric induction into "what Deleuze meant" to look like you knew what Deleuze meant all along, and then become a Deleuze cultist no one fucking cares about, at a Comp Lit department or some shit. Fake French obscurantist academics are for pretentious failed scholars to curate.
>>7950417
No, not at all. Yes, unless you don't care about speaking and only want to read, then conversation is whatever who cares.
>>7950569
Algernon Blackwood, The Wendigo + The Willows
>>7950967
Hemingway is way more Modern
Loved to use very pretty but unadorned language and loved pasion and rebellion and love
Steinbeck was also unadorned but wrote about the US in a less, uh longing way you might say it. Like less disproving of the new world I guess
>>7950963
I don't remember there being any, but at the end that doesn't matter by the end, when he is whacked out on acid
I never finished Portraits to be honest, but because Joyce did it maybe
Commitment to the school/esoteric grief
He shouldn't have shot the guy four extra times, but he should have defended himself better.
Notes From the Underground because a girl once told me it was her favorite book.
>>7946543
I feel apathetic and purposeless to the point of depression. Has anyone studied in a similar state studied philosophy and ended up mentally improving themselves, giving themselves purpose? I would like to try but don't know where to start.
>>7951003
Both signs of clinical depression. If you actually have the will to read and study any philosophy you won't have it though, kind of a catch 22. Maybe go to a doctor if the feeling persists
>>7950641
I'm John Galt.
AMA
>>7951034
this, lmao
I highly HIGHLY recommend going to therapy at either your university or elsewhere
really broke my depression just talking to someone as cliche as it sounds
like to the point where I can actually function again, and start reading and studying again
>>7951055
How often do you masturbate?
>>7950967
Hemingway's entire literary career was spent desperately trying to separate the physical and psychological horrors of war from the bleak new state of the world after it. This is well seen through Jake's impotence caused by his war injury in The Sun Also Rises.
Steinbeck, on the other hand, was all about forcibly integrating the injustice and futility he perceived as the birthmark of the American Dream into the visions of wealth and grandeur that the pre-War era had spawned. It's pretty telling that Lenny, a farmhand, strangles a girl that wanted to be a movie star to death and then dies too.
>>7951003
I was there. I stopped getting out of bed at one point.
I recommend reading some Dostoevsky. I first read Notes From the Underground which was pretty much how I felt. It helped me because I knew Dostoevsky understood nihilism and cynicism and how they can make you self-destructively apathetic.
Then Crime and Punishment and then The Brothers Karamazov.
>>7951034
This is also true and audio books are an option.
>>7951062
This too. I was actually clinically depressed and got therapy. It helped to talk and I felt a lot more alive. It didn't really solve my underlining nihilism though.
Reading Dostoevsky's books has helped me try to find meaning in my life. I'm still not there yet but things are getting better.
People here love to shit on this kind of post, but I'm just trying to be 100% honest with you because I really remember how much life sucked and I want to try to help others not feel that way if I can.
My community college gave away this.
Why?
>>7950580
Trying to conquer the city, you dumbass? Don't forget that the landing forces of the Achaeans were comprised of men sworn to several kings under the command of Agamemnon. It's not like every day was D-day, but the Trojans were put under seige for several years.
And also, it's a poem memorized by repetition, not a literal history chronicle.
>>7951066
Twice daily.
>>7950364
Interpretation. Though the book does make it more clear that A: Bateman is actually killing people and B: he's hallucinating. The book in general is just more batshit than the movie, though they end on almost the same note with the "this is not an exit" speech.
What's that expression with the word cunning in it?
It wasn't "skill and cunning" but something similar
>>7946568
Gotta agree with you. 1984's a moot point by now. Brave New World is a stronger work anyways.
>>7951077
>Reading Dostoevsky's books has helped me try to find meaning in my life. I'm still not there yet but things are getting better.
Crime and Punishment made me realize I was going to kill myself if I stayed in college, so I feel you on that.
Note: it did not send me bawling into the arms of the Catholic church, but you can't win 'em all
>>7951094
I wouldn't call 1984 irrelevant. The current totalitarism in the world is a mixture between those two books.
>>7951098
What's wrong with going to church? That's where true wisdom can be found.
WHERE DO I START WITH
G A D D I S ?
A
D
D
I
S
?
I figured probably Carpenter's Gothic but I'm not sure. This question might deserve it's own thread, but I don't know how often it's asked.
>>7951109
Carpenter's Gothic -> The Recognitions -> J R
>>7951109
start with the geeks
>>7951111
Thanks mate, I figured I'd leave J R till the end. What about A Frolic of His Own?
Also, checked.
>>7951109
Why would you figure CG?
>>7951117
>What about A Frolic of His Own?
No idea.
>>7951123
I read somewhere it's his shortest and most accessible.
>>7951101
Nobody's eyes are going to be opened by the messages in 1984 today. If they didn't already see what was wrong, they're wilfully blind to it.
t. Guy who read 1984 in Senior highschool english less than a full year ago and had to deal with people excusing elements if Socialist fascism irl
>>7951106
Church is literally a meme
I grew up on the bible and no Church I've ever been in seems to have done the same
>>7946543
Is skydiving overrated?
>>7951133
Well, there are good congregations out there. That's not to say the Bible isn't the most important of all.
>>7946543
Anyone here who experience getting published?
I am already midway into finishing my erotica and I am extremely anxious on where it will lead me. I heard the stories of how it take years just to find a merciful publisher and how it does not give them enough money to support a single lifestyle.
But I am ready.
Any information that I need to know?
>>7951140
No, and there really isn't any reason you shouldn't just find out for yourself
>>7950941
Nah I buy essentials first, on top of paying bills and other costs, I barely enough for pleasure at the end of the week
>>7947130
No More Mr Nice Guy - Robert Glover
When I Say No, I Feel Guilty -Manuel J. Smith
>>7951418
>i have no money
>i'm not living in poverty
ok bud
how much do you make? has got to be less than 20,000, much more likely is you're an hourly worker
>>7951098
> bawling into the arms of the Catholic church
I didn't do this either and I wasn't suggesting you should.
What it did for me was to show how people can react differently in desperate situations.
Trying to cut it short, Sonia's belief in God was what caused her to act they way she did and in doing so God became a real thing that could influence people.
Whether or not there is a literal God is irrelevant.
rate these books. crossed ones already read
I looooved that Dr. Strange book sooo muuuch!!!
>>7951084
wow this is easily the stupidest thing I have ever read. I am dumber for reading it. You should probably just kill yourself, or get a girlfriend, you faggot.
Is Lacan a hack? Is zizek too? I have always found myself being interested in what zizek had to say, mostly about events that happened or were happening, but after reading what Noam Chomsky said about both I'm beginning to doubt whether they are both just blurting out 'theories' with no evidence nor basis whatsoever.
Are they both posturing pseudo-philosophers?
>>7946543
Good books on ancient Egypt?
on Napoleon?
Duke of Wellington?
and on Persia? acheamenid Persia that is
>>7947609
http://www.google.de/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=2&ved=0ahUKEwiYm9fztaLMAhVKSZoKHZC9BUIQFggfMAE&url=https%3A%2F%2Fvivariumnovum.it%2Fedizioni%2Flibri%2Fdominio-pubblico%2FWorman%2520-%2520First%2520French%2520book.pdf&usg=AFQjCNF1OfMpIoCvcJva74_oyj6TSrTvxQ
How good is this ? Is it basically disguised YA ? Which edition should I buy ?
>>7952083
It's kinda fun, sometimes very, but if you don't like the humor of the 60s,70s counter-culture then you will be bored. Very repetitive sometimes, I dropped it somewhere in the second book.
It's not YA because some of the structure is too complicated.
has anyone read any of that /lit/izen who shills his work on here all the time?
Where to start with David Foster Wallace? And before you say >>start with the greeks<< I have already red all of the Grekks, and watched Crashing Coruset about the soggy knees in the Odysseus, so spare me!
I want the good old fashionded literary merit of the XIX, dare I say XXX century, preocuppied w/ sex and earthly goodies to notread anymore!
What is that one Chinese author who didn't believe in ghosts and spirits and was basically a nihilist, and wrote in praise of hedonistic emperors everyone hated and in denigration of traditional wise men who lived virtuously but not to their own advantage?
Is it just me or is this board becoming really terrible over the past few weeks? Much more than usual. The number of frogposts and shitposts has increased so much that it seems like we're being perpetually raided by other boards like /pol, /r9k, /mu, /tv and posts by high school students.
The number of dumb frogposts has gone up as well as posts asking for dumb help (with homework or otherwise). The discussion quality although always bad has become terrible of late.
Is anyone else noticing this? The number of big, well thought out posts are almost non-existent now.
>inb4 but /lit was always this shit.
no. it wasn't as shit before as it is now and I suspect that the people who use say this tend to be the ones who're the shitposters.
>>7952502
The key is not to feed them my friend and let their threads die by themselves
Are there published (not self-published) books that explicitly mention 4chan?
Are there good books by deaf people which don't revolve around their deafness?
>>7952549
I don't. But those threads that used to die out easily first don't anymore. These threads get more and more replies and bumps where half the people get riled up or add to the shitposting. These threads are becoming more frequent and dying lesser which is really unfortunate.
>>7950982
Kill yourself fampai
>>7952502
>>7952627
