Archived threads in /lit/ - Literature - 963. page
- Home
- Board: /lit/ - Literature
- Reading: Archived threads in /lit/ - Literature - 963. page
Here and there along the walls were bookshelves packed full of books, some that struck me as being...a bit odd. As I walked towards the center of the living space, it dawned on me that this didn't cover the entire second floor, for all that it felt like it; the open-air plan really threw my senses off. It was almost as if I HAD been able to somehow alter my perception though, I could see the rest of it, whatever I was using the second floor for. My silent musings then broke harshly as I realized I wasn't alone between one moment and the next. Whirling into a crouch, my fingers flexing, I prepared to throw myself into a fight only to draw myself short, my breath catching.
The beautiful, ebony-skinned woman gazed about the room slowly, as if not seeing me at all, nor at the shock of recognition plastered on my stupid face. Stupid was certainly the word for it – stupid I felt, and wool-headed, and all at once a series of incredibly personal and intimate memories flooded me and my Voice, damn near overpowering me as much as her presence had.
The woman wasn't that tall, perhaps five-foot-five, but her shoulders spoke of a quiet strength and her aura was gigantic, her presence breathtaking. Her hands and ankles were slim, I knew that, and her back and buttocks were strong - her hips were somewhat wide, having aided her in giving birth multiple times even as she could use them for stability in a killing blow. What little makeup she wore was either nonexistent or so classy that I couldn't tell - those lips of hers, though, they stood out full and a dark raspberry color. Her breasts were shapely and sweet, and her breath - my head swam with the flavor of strawberries and cherries, cheerfully shared with artistic passion.
Passion. I could feel my libido kick into overdrive and, for once, I was glad that my Voice hadn't chosen now to try and butt in with a stupid joke or comment.
Her neck was strong yet slim, her limbs graceful yet full, and her face...my god, how many poems had I written about her beauty? The fullness of her lips, the sweet shape of her face, the soft chocolate brown color of her eyes that...that...
“Wait, didn't her eyes change color or somethin' like that?” My Voice asked me breathlessly, even as her eyes did indeed darken in a whirl of black. I frowned, wondering at how he...it...I?...could know that. Her eyes were definitely dark now, and they moved about the room with a strange, patient power, a knowledge that I somehow lacked.
For whatever reason I found that slightly galling and, hanging onto that emotion, was able to find my angry side again. Puffing myself up to prepare for a verbal attack, full of questions, like why this woman was in my house, she instead cut me off with a strangely familiar manner, her speaking patterns even and without betraying a hint of emotion beyond that thinly-veiled sense of hidden knowledge.
"Thomas, why aren't you answering your phone?" Though her eyes were busy taking in the room in that slow, devouring manner, I somehow knew she was talking to me despite the name that clearly wasn't mine. I was Frank Todd, wasn't I? I zoned back in as she continued, "I've tried calling you all day. Daniel said he hasn't seen you since yesterday evening, and Abbacus has foreseen great danger to you. The bones warned me to come here," her eyes finally settled on me with a strange weight, as if her very gaze had a gravity all of its own, "and I'm starting to understand why."
After pulling my own gaze away from those raspberry-red lips of hers, I realized that she was wearing clothes - it was only those weird memories that made me think she was nude. Black leather pants, a long purple sleeveless shift with gold lace (no buttons, only those laces - some strange kinda old style?) that ended in a hoodie which she currently had up over what I knew would be dark, long cornrows. I could see the iron buckles at the tops of her collared boots, and tight gloves of black leather - the shift itself was barely a scrap of cloth, revealing interesting peeks at her well-shaped sides. A wide, black leather belt at her waist brought the long shift in tight against her luscious curves.
"Your aura is full of holes, Thomas."
I blinked, the desirable scent of her clogging my nose. I shook my head slightly and patted the back of it with the heel of my palm - something was up, and even as everything about me screamed to feel her in my arms, her lips against mine, the taste of her in my mouth, something equally as primal was telling me that she was as dangerous as they come.
A brotha could seriously fall for someone like her, and I was getting the sinking suspicion that brotha was me.
"Thomas, what's wrong? You haven't reacted like this since...well," she wet her lips with the tip of her tongue, an unconscious act, as she gazed back at me with slight confusion in her sweet eyes. My god, the look did adorable things for her, "Ever. Why is your aura so full of holes?"
I took a deep breath, centering myself in more ways than one and began my tirade, "Look, lady...I don't know who this Thomas guy is, but I think you've got me mistaken for someone else. Lucky bastard, whoever he is. I don't know who any of these people you're speakin' of are, but I'm certain that there's someone out there who can help you - I'm, sadly, not the guy for ya. Sorry. And my aura, or whatever, feels absolutely fine thanks - I'm just not who you think I am."
As I spoke, her eyes betrayed nothing until I mentioned that I wasn't the guy for her. For a moment quite a bit of hurt flashed through those dark eyes of hers before returning to their normal mode of grave consideration - it dawned on me suddenly that I really, REALLY wanted to be Thomas, if anything just to see that she didn't feel that kinda hurt again.
She frowned and suddenly the considering look turned into a disapproving one, and I bit back the urge to gulp as she growled in that velvety voice of hers, "Thomas, this isn't funny. Daniel is worried sick about you and besides - you left your gloves at the Hold. I came by to drop them off and find out what's going on myself only to find you gazing about the Shop as if you've never been here before!"
When did she draw so close to me? When did I think it was okay to let this strange woman get close to me the way she did, her legs moving her luscious form about as if on coiled springs?
Her arms came up around my neck and my body relaxed; she drew me down to her and kissed me deep, my eyes closing naturally even as she melted into my arms. Time stopped, completely and utterly, and I knew what was wrong.
Any good books dealing with the Spanish civil war? Read Hemingway, which was quite good already. A Homage to Catalonia is being ordered right now. Would like to dive deeper, but prefer novels.
Movies and so on are also okay if you happen to know some.
La familia de Pascual Duarte is set in that time, and there are few allusions to it, but isn't really about it
>If I bought all my required college books the total would come out at over $430
Why the fuck are the books so expensive? I only have three classes. Do college book authors become rich as fuck?
Pic unrelated
>>7721871
To rip off college kids
Why dont you buy the last edition for 15% of the current edition price?
>>7721871
Its an industry with no competition and no alternatives.
>>7721871
Pirate your books faggot.
Harper Lee, the author of "To Kill a Mockingbird" has died. The real question is, does anyone here really care?
I for one don't but I'm making a thread about it anyway because I want to appear cool.
>>7720323
>/pol/sters shitting on Lee in my /lit/
Apparently in this day and age on 4chan you can get called a "SJW" for wanting all people to be treated equally and fairly like it's written in the goddamn fucking Constitution.
>>7720326
I have no idea what you're on about. All I was referring to is that she is a shit writer. But I guess you're living proof that oversensitive manchildren online will see what they want to see regardless of facts presented to them (or lack thereof). I mean, tell me, autist where in my post did I bash the content of the novel?
She seems like a nice person, but seriously, what's with the huge reaction to her death?
She wrote a children's book about racism, that's all.
http://www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/stephen-king-the-rolling-stone-interview-20141031
>Bloom never pissed me off because there are critics out there, and he's one of them, who take their ignorance about popular culture as a badge of intellectual prowess. He might be able to say that Mark Twain is a great writer, but it's impossible for him to say that there's a direct line of descent from, say, Nathaniel Hawthorne to Jim Thompson because he doesn't read guys like Thompson. He just thinks, "I never read him, but I know he's terrible."
Is he right?
On Writing is better than anything Bloom put out.
Also, everyone in America knows King.
>>7720015
yes
king is not an idiot
he knows his place, the problem is with plebs that don't know king's place
>>7720019
Bloom's 'the visionary company' is better than anything king has ever written.
Not that it matters because /lit/ and the general public doesn't read poetry.
Fuck. Rest in peace David
>>7719402
Wow, he didn't hang around too long.
and but so damn...
It is with great sadness that we share the news that after hanging himself in 2908, DFW was pronounced dead only eight short years later. Our prayers go out his family.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/21/opinion/sunday/the-data-against-kant.html
>>7717842
>It would be absurd to suggest that we should do what we couldn't possibly do
This would explain why everyone in my Ethics class likes to fold their arms behind their head and smugly deny all moral responsibility by saying 'no I'm too busy to spare the time' not as a joke, but as a serious argument against altruism
>someone will think I'm making this up
I WISH
>>7717886
>"The Data Against Kant"
>tell us why your article is relevant to literature
>>7717842
Another old, dead, white male humiliated and dethroned! Cast down the old idols! SMASH THEM TO PIECES!
>read novel
>it's about a struggling but brilliant artist who frequently does drugs, has numerous sexual flings, and lives a bohemian lifestyle
>>7717337
Are you reading The Recognitions, anon?
I have never read a Novel like that
>read a thread
>OP is a shitty but jealous artist who's never done drugs, has relatively few sexual flings, and lives with his mom
What does /lit/ think of Harlan Ellison? I've only read The Function of Dream Sleep, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Year ago I was reading his short stuff. Loved Delusions of a Dragon Slayer, The Beast that Shouted Love at the Heart of the World and the one with the psychic ants.
>>7721684
I liked The Beast that Shouted Love at the Heart of the World (the story, not the whole collection).
Didn't think much of his story (nor most of the others) in his Dangerous Visions collection, but PKD's contribution was stellar. I also liked I Have No Mouth back in the day but haven't read it in ages.
If only every bad writer was as self-aware
http://www.lancemanion.com/why-im-not-successful-as-a-writer/
Fails as humor, fails as education, fails as prose.
I guess he really is a bad writer. At least he's telling the truth.
better story, really happened.
propria cures (mind your business in latin ) is a literary review by students from Amsterdam, 125 years old.
http://www.propriacures.nl/
Basically satire, all reviews are ad hominems, etc. One of the funnest things to read.
>1970ies some deranged guy publishes short stories
>PC review says he is a hack and should kill himself, since his existence detracts from Dutch writers and he's is competing with better writers in the ever shrinking book market (even then)
>Guy jumps out of a window, dies
>PC celebrates by having biannual competition for most deranged story, named after book
What is the funniest book you've ever read?
pic related.
It's funny because it's all true.
>>7721507
I remember guys in hs saying that a book called "I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell" was funny. I never read it though. Yours sounds better
>>7721517
Murphy's dead.
How do you feel about the phenomenon of channels like Wisecrack that have emerged over the past 5~ years? I just watched this video and found it interesting (not necessarily the commentary, more it's existence):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlptgqP_PEA
Channels like Wisecrack, The School of Life, The Nerdwriter etc condense really hug ideas into unworkable timeslots and end up giving entry level insight into the topics discussed. An earnest intellectual inquiry can't be the reason these channels are successful, given that they're usually discussing books, ideas or individuals that you could go and look up yourself.
Both the Nerdwriter and Wisecrack have done this same head-patting dismissal of Donald Trump where they act above it all and talk about how he's wrong but "his fans don't care if he's right". It feels like the point of these videos is to affirm the viewer's personal prejudice about most people being idiots and make the viewer feel as if they're one of the enlightened few. They capitalise on an anxiety to be (not necessarily to be seen as) intelligent, overloading people's brains with trivia about x famous writer or w/e.
The video and the culture surrounding it are a much better demonstration of all the society of the spectacle than the actual commentary itself.
The entire culture surrounding these videos is just pure fucking narcissism. You have to put in a good amount of intellectual effort to become actually intelligent but viewers of these sorts of channels want to be seen as intelligent without doing the work. It's a very particular phenomenon since being "intelligent" is pure interpretation, it's not like hitting the gym for months and becoming physically fitter, you just have to come across as smarter than the person you're talking to. It's one of the only traits you can make people think you possess without actually possessing it.
>How do you feel about the phenomenon of channels like Wisecrack that have emerged over the past 5~ years?
they're good
I think the people making these videos, especially Nerdwriter since he's just a guy and not a huge YouTube publisher like wisecrack and doesn't sell self-help seminars and "philosopher's jackets", have an authentic desire to understand the topics they talk about and promote intellectualism. It's not a bad idea to encourage people to think deeper about things and introduce a large audience to philosophy. Their videos can't give a complete overview of anything, but they're not meant to. They're entry level by design, and that's why they're popular.
If there is a problem with these channels it's that some part of their audience will use their videos as their only source of education on complex topics and become annoying pseudointellectuals.
>An earnest intellectual inquiry can't be the reason these channels are successful, given that they're usually discussing books, ideas or individuals that you could go and look up yourself.
Because clearly only the people with time to read books upon books are allowed to know what a Kierkegaard is. Entertainment may never dare to overlap.
>Both the Nerdwriter and Wisecrack have done this same head-patting dismissal of Donald Trump where they act above it all and talk about how he's wrong but "his fans don't care if he's right". It feels like the point of these videos is to affirm the viewer's personal prejudice about most people being idiots and make the viewer feel as if they're one of the enlightened few.
You only watched a single video, didn't you?
>The entire culture surrounding these videos is just pure fucking narcissism. You have to put in a good amount of intellectual effort to become actually intelligent but viewers of these sorts of channels want to be seen as intelligent without doing the work.
This is just unbacked conjecture you got after reading 'grow smarter' at the top of the page. Ironically, you are also being narcissistic by indirectly calling unintelligent anyone who hasn't invested as much work as you into studying.
People watch these videos because they are entertaining, nothing more. Whether they decide to be pretentious about it is unrelated. It's not as if the channel constantly reminds it's viewers that they are intelligent.
what did you make of moby dick?
I thought it was a bit of an anticlimax but I can see why it is considered one of the greatest literary pieces ever, the descriptive and imaginative language throughout was enjoyable, if a bit long-winded
>>7721583
>if a bit long-winded
The "Moby Dick is too long and uninteresting" meme strikes again.
>>7721583
The point of MD is that revenge is ultimately futile. You might have found it an anticlimax, but it wasn't from the whale's POV.
>>7721590
>whale's POV
how was the white whale different from every other whale?
it probably didn't have two rational thoughts to scrape together so was just an angry animal, it had no POV
>Feel in love with Russian literature and poetry
>Really want to read them in their native language, as /lit/ told me translations were not the same
>Spend years learning perfect Russian
>Actually pay to take afew classes and hours a day reading textbooks and online resources
>Finally think im ready to attempt it
>Buy the original russian text on amazon
>It just arrived today
>Cover is cyrillic, looks really cool
>Open it up
>Its all French
>>7721552
>losing your russian virginity
>actually ordering the book from overseas
>it's published by Aзбyкa
Nigga what are you doing
Pretty sure the best introductory text to Russian lit is Moscow-Petushki. Considering this boards jerks off to both postmodernism and Russia, and the book is also good, I find it weird that it doesn't get reccommended in every second thread.
sux2bu m8
Anyway, I think I share your love for ruski lit and have just started taking the Duolingo course. How hard was learning it? Did you have to converse with any native speakers?
>>7721577
Duolingo a shit
A Russian course that allows the Latin alphabet is shit.
The alphabet is much easier to learn that most people think, after you know it, spelling word phonetically in Russian is easier than in English.
Plus duolingo doesn't teach grammar at all, which is the hardest part
Picked this book up at an auction yesterday, I never read any of his books but I've seen some of his movies on /tv/ and I figured I'd pick this up since it was only 12 bucks.
Is the book any good, and do you like him as a writer?
he's crap.
and i really tried to like him, because i have a cousin who really likes him. read probably a half dozen of his books. and i shamelessly enjoy stephen king, michael crichton and game of thrones, so i'm not just some smug e/lit/ist who disregards koontz out of hand because of "muh genre" bs.
oh, and also
>12 bucks
for future reference, you can pick his stuff up at a thrift store for like a quarter.
>>7721573
It's got his signature, so I thought it was interesting.
![cover_16589[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/6fnXBlz.jpg "cover 16589[1]")
