^ Yeah, I decided to deliberately follow that train of thought by misunderstanding him for the sake of humor.
Had Jude the Obscure recommended to me by a sadist who didn't think I'd see through his master plan to send me spiraling face-first into 300ish pages of sunshine and unicorns bleakness. That said, it remains something I haven't read yet. Not for lack of interest, but genuine fear of feeding bad mojo in an already dreary month (plus whatever other excuse I can concoct when it's sunny).
you'd have to try pretty hard to be personally affected by hardy. his pessimism is almost quaint now. very much of the darwinist–determinist vein. nobody is quite so fatalistic anymore. plus it has a strain of Victorian melodrama and high gothic sensationalism, much like Dickens, who by the way I challenge you to be similarly personally moved by. great stuff, though.
I hated Hardy with a passion, plots which wouldn't make an Eastenders storyboard and trite analogies the average schoolboy could run off in five minutes with one eye on a copy of 'Commando' under the desk.
Dickens - If I could travel back through time and kill one person I think it would be him.
Dickens - If I could travel back through time and kill one person I think it would be him.
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I suffered through Tess of the D'Urbervilles back in grade school. The absolute worst. Despised it even more than Jane Austin.
"Ah, you miserable creatures! You who think that you are so great! You who judge humanity to be so small! You who wish to reform everything! Why don't you reform yourselves? That task would be sufficient enough."
-Frederick Bastiat
-Frederick Bastiat
Actually here is some literature news.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article … ounce.html
I think my whole childhood just flashed before me.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article … ounce.html
I think my whole childhood just flashed before me.
Last edited by Dilbert_X (2016-03-16 04:57:33)
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it makes complete sense that people without any express interest in literature hate hardy and Dickens and co. they are from a different era and a totally different sensibility. it's part of an old fashioned school syllabus that thinks teaching 'the Greats' to bored schoolchildren will morally enrich them.
There is good literature out there, ramming shit down kid throats isn't the way to promote it.
As part of our English lessons we had to listen to diatribes about every genre other than core 'literatoor', it was fucking tedious.
As part of our English lessons we had to listen to diatribes about every genre other than core 'literatoor', it was fucking tedious.
Fuck Israel
hardy and to a lesser extent Dickens are both Good Literature. it's really hard to deny it. they are great writers – hardy being perhaps one of the few novelists to rank as highly as a poet too. the man could write. just it wasn't for you. it definitely isn't for schoolchildren. tastes differ but appreciation should be unprejudiced as possible. there is not really a single thing you can call 'shit' about them. sure a lot of it seems dated and perhaps falls into a type or cliché too easily – but those clichés didn't exist back when they were writing and essentially forging their contemporary mood – but it's pretty hard to class them as low-grade.
Getting paid by the word made their works over-long and tedious.
"Ah, you miserable creatures! You who think that you are so great! You who judge humanity to be so small! You who wish to reform everything! Why don't you reform yourselves? That task would be sufficient enough."
-Frederick Bastiat
-Frederick Bastiat
Still got a big stack of them I used to buy on childhood holidays, great stuff.Dilbert_X wrote:
Actually here is some literature news.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article … ounce.html
I think my whole childhood just flashed before me.
this is the most banal and cliche observation about victorian novelists, period. no it didn't make their works over-long and tedious. most victorian novels rightfully considered 'classics' now are about a 1/3rd of the length of the 'modern' novels that people laud. compare the economy of 'jude the obscure' to pynchon's 'gravity's rainbow'. or compare it to something from a century before it. is it more prolix than 'joseph andrews'? more needlessly extended than 'pamela'? lol no fucking way. the fact is that serialisation (which is very different from being 'paid by the word') meant that the plots had to progress and had to go places fast. there was a central importance placed on things like dramatisation and character development. things had to happen in the serial instalments or there would be no incentive, financial or emotional or intellectual, to continue reading. it's not like they were just grinding out 1500 words of exposition every fortnight and raking in grands. it forced the books to be very mechanically efficient – often to the point of being overly determined.Jay wrote:
Getting paid by the word made their works over-long and tedious.
look at the 'greatest 100' list of modern novels from the most widely cited sources. i can guarantee you that most of the most recognised ones will clock in at 600-1000 pages. nothing from the victorian era that remains with us today seems shocking or extravagant.
Last edited by uziq (2016-03-16 14:42:51)
Off the top of my head, Fareignheight 451, Catch-22, Slaughterhouse Five, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, All Quiet on the Western Front, Lord of the Flies, Frankenstein, these are all relatively short books.uziq wrote:
this is the most banal and cliche observation about victorian novelists, period. no it didn't make their works over-long and tedious. most victorian novels rightfully considered 'classics' now are about a 1/3rd of the length of the 'modern' novels that people laud. compare the economy of 'jude the obscure' to pynchon's 'gravity's rainbow'. or compare it to something from a century before it. is it more prolix than 'joseph andrews'? more needlessly extended than 'pamela'? lol no fucking way. the fact is that serialisation (which is very different from being 'paid by the word') meant that the plots had to progress and had to go places fast. there was a central importance placed on things like dramatisation and character development. things had to happen in the serial instalments or there would be no incentive, financial or emotional or intellectual, to continue reading. it's not like they were just grinding out 1500 words of exposition every fortnight and raking in grands. it forced the books to be very mechanically efficient – often to the point of being overly determined.Jay wrote:
Getting paid by the word made their works over-long and tedious.
look at the 'greatest 100' list of modern novels from the most widely cited sources. i can guarantee you that most of the most recognised ones will clock in at 600-1000 pages. nothing from the victorian era that remains with us today seems shocking or extravagant.
I actually like Dickens by the way. Hardy and Austin? No.
"Ah, you miserable creatures! You who think that you are so great! You who judge humanity to be so small! You who wish to reform everything! Why don't you reform yourselves? That task would be sufficient enough."
-Frederick Bastiat
-Frederick Bastiat
austen is not a victorian novelist or around during the era of mass-market serialisation ("paid per word") and was definitely not serialised to anywhere near the same extent (women couldn't even get published let alone a magazine or fashionable journal serialisation). and you actually like dickens when you just made that argument? dickens is the only victorian novelist who can be accused of putting out a few 750pg+ tomes that are high on superfluous detail. hardy in comparison is extremely economical with his plots. you are a puzzling person. you don't seem to think that reason or consistency should apply where making a superficial smart-arse argument will suffice.
here are some long modern novels that were published on a different model to the paid per word 'flawed' model of the victorians:
ulysses
moby dick
gravity's rainbow
underworld
infinite jest
in search of lost time
the man without qualities
the brothers karamazov
war and peace
i could go on.
here are some long modern novels that were published on a different model to the paid per word 'flawed' model of the victorians:
ulysses
moby dick
gravity's rainbow
underworld
infinite jest
in search of lost time
the man without qualities
the brothers karamazov
war and peace
i could go on.
Last edited by uziq (2016-03-16 15:08:27)
wasn't ulysses serialized? that fucking book, man. i'd like to take another crack at it but i don't want to feel more dumb than i already do.
The feeling of utter relief (and surprise) was real when instead of being assigned 'Great Expectations' for the umpteenth time for a school report, I was instead given/allowed (I don't remember if it was suggested or I picked it) 'The Jungle.' I'm not sure how educators got off on overexposing kids to stuff like this while sitting back and not explaining structure or the often unrelatable context. Was it policy to simply stand by and wait for children to magically engage and start asking questions rather than simply abridging and rewording Cliff's Notes? And did teachers even try to coordinate this stuff from grade to grade? To this day I'm not even sure. It doesn't seem like a very reliable way to instill appreciation for the classics as anything other than a dreary chore. I sincerely hope that's not the way things are still being done.
To this day I can't look at a copy of 'Great Expectations' without getting a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. FWP.
To this day I can't look at a copy of 'Great Expectations' without getting a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. FWP.
most novels had early segments published in their friends journals first. it was a hype thing. definitely not the same as serialisation. ulysses was launched by a small independent press in paris based out of the shakespeare & co. shop. it was sold via a private list, because of censorship laws, at a very high price in a very fine binding to very in-the-know people. completely opposite model to mass serialisation. also considering the book is written to a mythical scheme and every chapter corresponds to a distinct part of the odyssey, it would be hard to accuse joyce of structuring or extending his work because he was 'paid by the word'. really that whole line of criticism is just shallow as hell.KEN-JENNINGS wrote:
wasn't ulysses serialized? that fucking book, man. i'd like to take another crack at it but i don't want to feel more dumb than i already do.
also finnegans wake is literally 10x more difficult. ulysses really is not difficult at all. there's just a lot of erudition and below-the-surface references going on. but you don't need them at all to follow and appreciate it.
i've had periods where i make a lot of money on the side tutoring kids in a very 'cliff notes' way and let me tell you, the jungle is a doozy. that book is basically a political tract written with some novelistic mitts on. the point bludgeons you to death and there isn't exactly a nuanced context to grasp.unnamednewbie13 wrote:
The feeling of utter relief (and surprise) was real when instead of being assigned 'Great Expectations' for the umpteenth time for a school report, I was instead given/allowed (I don't remember if it was suggested or I picked it) 'The Jungle.' I'm not sure how educators got off on overexposing kids to stuff like this while sitting back and not explaining structure or the often unrelatable context. Was it policy to simply stand by and wait for children to magically engage and start asking questions rather than simply abridging and rewording Cliff's Notes? And did teachers even try to coordinate this stuff from grade to grade? To this day I'm not even sure. It doesn't seem like a very reliable way to instill appreciation for the classics as anything other than a dreary chore. I sincerely hope that's not the way things are still being done.
To this day I can't look at a copy of 'Great Expectations' without getting a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. FWP.
And yet the public didn't especially take away the point that Sinclair was going for. Mildly amusing.
When I read it, I got caught up in the unfair working conditions and depressing poverty. That's where the, er, meat of the story was. I wasn't aware at the time that it caused an uproar about meat packing practices.
I wouldn't mind getting my hands on the uncensored edition for perusal.
I wouldn't mind getting my hands on the uncensored edition for perusal.
I entirely see that teaching kids to step into another time, another situation, another person's shoes is an important lesson and essential for personal development and learning.uziq wrote:
it makes complete sense that people without any express interest in literature hate hardy and Dickens and co. they are from a different era and a totally different sensibility. it's part of an old fashioned school syllabus that thinks teaching 'the Greats' to bored schoolchildren will morally enrich them.
They're just not going to appreciate how great these dreary old novels are when considered in context of their time when they haven't learned the skill of considering things in context or enjoy to literature at all.
Its as dumb as making them sit through hours of Rachmaninov in the hope they'll somehow learn to appreciate classical music despite the dreary dirge and pick up Vivaldi and Beethoven later in life.
I suppose its poetic that teachers who push this method of learning to consider things contextually through beating kids over the head with dusty old crap can't or won't consider what its like from the pupils perspective.
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Those books all contain elements of futurism, progressivism and intelligent incite - horrible sins in the eyes of the 'literati' who set syllabuses.Jay wrote:
Off the top of my head, Fareignheight 451, Catch-22, Slaughterhouse Five, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, All Quiet on the Western Front, Lord of the Flies, Frankenstein, these are all relatively short books.
Fuck Israel
I was actually assigned 'Fahrenheit 451' in either junior high or 6th grade, so apparently some of your 'literati' liked it.
Yeah, Slaughterhouse Five and One Flew are the only ones I wansn't assigned to read in school at any point.
such nonsense.Dilbert_X wrote:
Those books all contain elements of futurism, progressivism and intelligent incite - horrible sins in the eyes of the 'literati' who set syllabuses.Jay wrote:
Off the top of my head, Fareignheight 451, Catch-22, Slaughterhouse Five, One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, All Quiet on the Western Front, Lord of the Flies, Frankenstein, these are all relatively short books.
'literati' don't set-up high school syllabi i'm afraid. in universities those books are studied to death. the literati is hardy opposed to 'futurism and progressivism'.