Soup /lit/
I haven't seriously read anything (as in picked up a novel/nonfiction book and decided to read it) in the past 2 years or so. So I went on here and someone recommended I read Ulysses.
I am reading it and quite blown away by the poetic writing style and how he gets into the head of Stephen Dedalus.
The only possible criticism I can make is that there are so many grammatically incorrect sentence fragments. Did Joyce ever take an English highschool class?
No you aren't you living fucking meme. Stop this. Every time I go into the fucking bookstore or come on /lit/ there's some post-ironic faggot who is like "Ulysses' language.. it's so poetic. It's the PINNACLE of PROSE! IRISH MEN, RUNNING THE WORLD.. A NEW AGE!"
NO IT FUCKING ISN'T
IT'S A FUCKING IRISH FARTFAG PLAYING GAY IRISH WORDSMITHERY GAMES
>>7987897
>grammatically incorrect sentence fragments.
>Did Joyce ever take an English highschool class?
*head explodes
>>7987897
I'm in your position except I just finished Shipping Out. It's a pretty funny read, on the surface, but it's morbidly transfigured by DFW's suicide.
Every other page includes a note on self-elimination as a 'wry joke.' The ocean as a 'primordial stew of death and decay' is a running motif. The entire conceit of the piece is DFW-as-clever-neurotic 'seeing through' the corporate processes used to induce relaxation in cruisegoers.
DFW's go-to capsule synopsis of Jest called it an investigation into the purposes and limits of pleasure; its central device, a magical film that is so enjoyable it makes viewers want to do nothing else but watch the tape continuously.
It's stupid to try connecting authorial biographies to literary analysis and it's stupid to guess at contributing factors of a suicide. In the case of DFW it's incredibly difficult to respect these rules. The question animating his entire career was, 'why bother?'
In interviews, DFW comes off as maybe the gentlest author ever recorded. He's unfailingly patient, respectful, and soft-spoken. But in 'Shipping Out,' seated next to middle-aged, midwestern dining companions whom he professes to deeply like, he spends eight paragraphs deconstructing these peoples' foibles to hilarious effect.
Have you seen the Charlie Rose talk where DFW is seated opposite Franzen, his long-time friend and, at that time, much lesser rival? DFW is polite and deferential towards Rose. DFW cautiously qualifies his generalizations in case you think he's leaping to conclusions or putting words in your mouth. But then Franzen, his friend, says something pretty innocuous about literary fiction; that its fans are much less likely to spend time with lowbrow TV entertainment.
"So the only people who read serious fiction are people who don't watch TV?" Says DFW. He's looking directly down his nose at Franzen.
"No, no--...ah, thank you for drawing that out for me, Dave..."
"No, no. If I misheard, enlighten me," says DFW. There's no mistaking his tone for the quaint circumspection marking DFW's NPR appearances. He's telling Franzen to fuck right off.
I could keep going, but basically I agree with OP. I'll try DFW's fiction but I'd be shocked to discover he could render a character believable, broken, and also loveable. I think most of DFW's life was spent mistaking one cause of unhappiness for another and proving that hatred is a habit that you can conceal, but which is very hard to slow or break.
