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/lit/ - Literature


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23197127 No.23197127 [Reply] [Original]

There are some good books in western fantasy but they are the exception rather than the rule. Just imagine trying to create a top ten list of the best fantasy books that came out in the last ten years. In contrast when it comes to anime, it seems there is a great deal to choose from. Not just the rare exceptions. For some reason western fantasy though seems to have nothing unique. Everyone wants to be the next Tolkien or now the next Martin. They will make a very intricate world and they will try to make it as realistic as possible and as gritty as possible and then after all that realism and grittiness and in depth lore ends up making the series more of a chore to get through rather than it being a fun adventure. Everyone is trying so hard to do anything but write fun and unique stories that western fantasy becomes a bloated boring mess.



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23197094 No.23197094 [Reply] [Original]

Which Pynchon should I start with?

>> No.23197104

>>23197094
The one that clicked with me first was Mason and Dixon. I actually tried Crying Of Lot 49 first but didn't find it impressive.



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23197091 No.23197091 [Reply] [Original]

Your opinion on the author, Allan Nevins? I'm getting a book by him on Grover Cleveland.



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23197071 No.23197071 [Reply] [Original]

Are books about personal growth like picrel actually useful?
I can't help but a sort of cynical outlook on those type of books thinking they're only there to trick normies into consooming.
Am I wrong? Are there any worthy personal development books that one should read?

>> No.23197080

>>23197071
they are like motivational movies: they wont teach anything useful to achieve success, rather they will just motivate you to try something to achieve success. Often they bring stories of successful people or people who jumped over obstacles, but if you dig enough you will see they are not very credible. Just read and evaluate them by yourself

>> No.23197088

>>23197071
Well, self help books are the most popular in America and America has some of the worst social mobility of the western world. Do a 2+2.



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23196995 No.23196995 [Reply] [Original]

>Pynchon’s another one whom I regard as really kind of old fashioned. I like early Pynchon. I like The Crying of Lot 49. I like Gravity’s Rainbow. But the Pynchon of Slow Learner [sic] and Vineland, which I didn’t like very much, seems to be making the same tired jokes—“look how shallow and superficial the culture is.” All right—I’ve been told—TV itself now tells that to me. It just seems like more of the same. I’m not as big a Pynchon fan as some other people are.
Was he right here?

>> No.23197015

>>23196995
Sounds like the anxiety of influence. He compares himself to Pynchon and implicitly feels he comes up short so he works to criticise him and thereby exonerate himself in his own eyes.

I haven't read ANY of Wallace's work, not even his short stories or non fiction essays, but I have listened to a few sound bytes from interviews with him. In one, he's first asked what he thinks about the importance of humour, and, rather than give a from-the-heart off the cuff response, he immediately responds by quoting Wittgenstein. I have a personal aversion to people who do that. They tend to be overeducated, secretly conceited, with a faux neurosis that makes them difficult to deal with.

Will Infinite Jest be remembered in fifty years time? I have no idea. But what I will say is that what he's saying about television and sincerity is in no way original either, so it's difficult to take his criticism of Pynchon seriously.

>> No.23197032

>>23197015
>I have a personal aversion to people who do that. They tend to be overeducated, secretly conceited, with a faux neurosis that makes them difficult to deal with.
The bandana and glasses didn't tip you off?

>> No.23197046

>>23197032
No. I've known some nice people who dressed weirdly.

>> No.23197066

Seems odd to mention Slow Learner in that context since it's his early work before Lot 49 and GR

>> No.23197077

>>23196995
Pynchon is a fantastic writer. He lived a charmed life and came from a well established family.

I think people generally are inclined to resent those who not only have money and friends, but who are also brilliant on top of all that. It doesn't seem fair. People are too scared to admit they live in an essentially unfair world so they begin looking for problems in the individual and their work.



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23196976 No.23196976 [Reply] [Original]

Who is a "good" author you think is shit?

>> No.23196984

>>23196976
Cormac McCarthy

>> No.23196997

>>23196984
Why do you think that?

>> No.23196998

>>23196976
Hemingway, Pynchon

>> No.23197002

>>23196976
Pic unrelated

>> No.23197087

Donna Tartt



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23196962 No.23196962 [Reply] [Original]

What are some books that deal with the subject of resentment?

Is resentment a valid response /lit/? Would you say it's important to resent some of the time?

>> No.23196973

>>23196962
First it´s Nietzsche and others talked about this
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ressentiment
Books i don´t know others can help you

>> No.23197011
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23197011

>>23196962
Too many to list, Nietzsche is as good a place as any to start, although psychological theories on the subject may be a contender. I would say it is an inevitable aspect of being human, so this means that trying to pass judgment on another's resentment is best summed up by what the bible had to say about he who is without sin casting the first stone. That aside, what the individual does about resentment is what matters, and the best remedy is smashing it with a hammer.

>> No.23197050

>>23197011
How do you smash it with a hammer?

>> No.23197070

>>23197050
What is the root cause of your resentment?



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23196945 No.23196945 [Reply] [Original]



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23196930 No.23196930 [Reply] [Original]

any books like this
>dark sorcerer takes on naive but ambitious girl as apprentice
>girl ignores moral qualms of dark magic because she wants power
>dark mage takes advantage of her and controls her mind and body
>lots of smutty rituals
think Svengali but fantasy setting

>> No.23196949

The Snow Queen by Andersen is this if you don't mind gender reversal and no smut. Goethe's Magician's Assistant has fewer of the features.
You're probably looking for something styled on those



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23196923 No.23196923 [Reply] [Original]

Is it possible to read Cormac MacCarthy throough a religious lense? His work seems to delve into pessimism and damnation, redemption doesn't seem possible in the stories he creates, such as Blood Meridian. However, despite it being a story about the end of the world, The Road seemed more optimistic about a possible salvation of the human soul. His writing is also reminiscent of Biblical Gsopels, as several authors have mentioned, both in style and how he treats his characters and themes. I'm not sure I can reconcile these views, however. I'm not religious, so my perspective is extremely limited. That's why I'd like to hear different opinions.



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23196921 No.23196921 [Reply] [Original]

EXPLAIN PALI CANON TO ME OR I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU! DON'T DUMB IT DOWN INTO SOME VAGUE SHIT! EXPLAIN PALI CANON TO ME RIGHT NOW OR I'LL LITERALLY FUCKING KILL YOu!

WHY THE FUCK DID IT SPLIT INTO FIVE? WHAT IS DIGHA NIKAYA? WHAT IS MAJJHIMA NIKAYA? WHAT IS SAMYUTTA NIKAYA?
WHAT ORDER SHOULD I READ THEM IN? well, all of them are too long, I only want to read one, SO WHAT SHOULD I READ?
WHY IS KHUDDAKA NIKAYA CONSIDERED "MINOR" AND "SECONDARY" WHEN IT CONTAINS DHAMMAPADA AND SUTTANIPATA?
DON'T DUMB IT DOWN OR I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU

>> No.23196925

you already made this post, so here the same answer as last time
https://suttacentral.net/start?lang=en

the canon is here from the PTS team,
https://americanmonk.org/free-pts-sutta-ebooks/
you can read all this in 1 month if you are neet, otherwise jsut do this :
take 1h to read that and you'll be up to date and know more than 99% of the alleged buddhists :

>start
https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/MN/MN19.html
https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/AN/AN6_63.html
>middle
https://suttacentral.net/mn148/en/sujato
https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/SN/SN12_51.html
https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/AN/AN11_1.html
>finish
https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/SN/SN54_8.html

>> No.23196932

>WHY THE FUCK DID IT SPLIT INTO FIVE?
Isn't it split into 3? Although ig if you don't want to be a monk or expert on theravada theology you only care about the nikayas
>WHAT ORDER SHOULD I READ THEM IN
In The Buddhas Words gives you a pretty decent order to read suttas w/ commentary. Past that, either read suttas with themes you find interesting or randomly pick them
>>23196925
Didn't know this guy already posted this, rip



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23196888 No.23196888 [Reply] [Original]

Which to read first? Are both worth reading?

>> No.23196895

>>23196888
>Are both worth reading?
In translation? Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeh.



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23196880 No.23196880 [Reply] [Original]

>met with Zwingli to discuss their theological differences
>ended up shouting THIS IS MY BODY THIS IS MY BODY
Why was he so autistic?

21 replies omitted. Click Reply to view.
>> No.23197084

>>23197073
>To point it out, as if it were A WIN, that vulgarises religion.
Again, atheism is more readily associated with Protestantism given the fact that all former Protestant strongholds are now atheist (and were the first to turn atheist). Such a phenomenon is significant irrespective of your, quite frankly, desperate attempts to cover for it. Asking people to ignore it, or to simply regard the issue as being the same for Catholics, is obscene.
>pig brains
Your profoundly unchristian and unprovoked manner of discourse only reinforces the fact that you have no defence.

>> No.23197086

>>23196979
So I'm not German actually because I come from a catholic family?

>> No.23197089
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23197089

>>23197073
>You're simply speaking out of your ass about Catholicism being more integrated into societies.
No it's pretty obviously correlated with the theological underpinnings of Protestantism or at the very least how those underpinnings played out in practice. Read pic related.

Evangelicalism is outpacing mainline Protestantism because it has more of this sense of community. In Brazil it's outpacing the Catholic majority by a considerable margin at the moment fwiw.

>> No.23197106

>>23197084
And, again, I should care what you think is associated with what? You think associations is a rock solid argument, despite the COLD, HARD FACTS of the matter? Look at modern religion on the whole, and tell me your wins are anything other than relative. If you want to speak of desperate arguments, only children resort to justifications like that.

Righteous anger is an entirely Christian trait, and if you insist on blaspheming religion then you tolerate being insulted. Your entire anti-Protestant discourse is already on the level of an insult. Derived from no true respect for culture or faith. Even if you would like to pretend it is any more intelligent than Tradcath LARPing. Have you even asked yourself if, perhaps, specific Christian sects are not the singular cause for the greater or lesser atheism of particular countries?

>>23197089
I'm not reading your Catholic propaganda, and I don't care for your prosaic explanations for religious growth. The continual decline of Christianity is a testament to the real sources of the religion, being as it is that real faith is declining, and which cannot be found in an Evangelical megachurch, and should not be sacrificed to the practices of the latter. Throughout history, the Protestant faith was no inhibitor to communal religion. If it was like that throughout most of its history, then it can just as easily be like that again: if the essential thing is got, that is, FAITH, and not a suburban American sense of community.

>> No.23197123

>>23197086
I'm saying you're, more likely than not, spiritually Protestant. Germany arrived at a perfect union with Catholicism, because the seeds of Protestantism coexisted with the Catholic church. But if it were not for Protestantism, when Rome inevitably became more and more oppressive, that union would have turned into a bridge for the total Latinisation of German culture, and that Bavarian culture which German Catholics love so much, would be lost forever. The damaging influence of Rome can already be seen in Austria.

Every German should thank Luther.



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23196875 No.23196875 [Reply] [Original]

What do you think abou her?
I like it, honestly.

>> No.23196884

>>23196875

Idnk

>> No.23196910

>>23196875

Sources??



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23196840 No.23196840 [Reply] [Original]

did any author predict clownworld? did anyone even come close to predicting the level of silliness we see in modern times? give me your best clownworld books, please.

>> No.23196846

>>23196840
in the tv show ''Call Me Fitz '' there's an episode about the same thing as your picture

>> No.23196849

CALL ME DIAPER DEMON
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yeE4AtfCGkA

>> No.23196889

Riders of the Purple Wage

>> No.23196933

>>23196840
Picrel is weird as hell but it's not like they're hurting anyone, can't we just live and let live?

>> No.23197121

>>23196933
It's hurting OP's view of his world



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23196838 No.23196838 [Reply] [Original]

What do we think of Richard Britain’s The World Rose, /lit?/
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=i5hf6oZaIDU

3 replies omitted. Click Reply to view.
>> No.23196869

>>23196838
absolutely based basedchad

>> No.23196871

>>23196863
>I like when le polchuds ruin their lives by maiming women
average leftcel

>> No.23196876

>>23196838
Back in my day authors would shoot an arab.

>> No.23196885

>>23196838
>Had a long history of harassing and stalking women
Why are millennials like that?

>> No.23196896

>>23196838
I hope someone kills him in jail. What a scumbag. He knew his writing was shit, but couldn’t handle the truth.



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23196819 No.23196819 [Reply] [Original]

>My favorite book is The Prince by Machiavelli

What kind of person do you imagine?

9 replies omitted. Click Reply to view.
>> No.23197069

>>23196819
Yuppie who desperately wants to be an influential politician or business executive but is probably assistant manager at a Target or some shit.

>> No.23197072

>>23196819
Someone rather boring.
It is an interesting book but I can't imagine it being anyone's favorite.

>> No.23197076

>>23196819
>What kind of person do you imagine?
Cesare Borgia.

>> No.23197097

>>23196819
Someone who also reads and values Think and Grow Rich, How to Win Friends and Influence People, 48 Laws of Power, and so forth, who works in Marketing, Politics, or Business, and is an xSTP, ENFJ, or ESFJ.

>> No.23197101

>>23196819
A good person



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23196790 No.23196790 [Reply] [Original]

I love reference books, encyclopedias, dictionaries, directories, etc....
Is this a symptom of autism?
Also, post ur favorite books from the genre.
I'm thinking of buying like 50 encyclopedias about dinosaurs:)

1 replies omitted. Click Reply to view.
>> No.23196950

>>23196807
:<

>> No.23197001

If you find an encyclopedia about dinosaurs where they have feathers, please tell me

>> No.23197006
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23197006

>>23196790
The Dictionnaire Infernal 1863 illustrated edition, I think there are some english translations or you can machine translate the ocr'd pdf on wikimedia.

>> No.23197052

>>23196790
All too often reference books are annoying because they’re guaranteed to be incomplete. An Encyclopedia Of Oscar-Winning Films, for example, will very rarely cover anything after the year it was published. Awful! So you really want a topic that’s fixed. Dinosaurs isn’t bad, because they aren’t making any new ones. (They are FINDING new ones though, so even that’s not perfect.)

That said, of course, collecting information and categorizing it is a praiseworthy and satisfying endeavour. One feels one is imposing ORDER on a RECALCITRANT UNIVERSE. When one makes a really good list, one becomes, for a brief moment, God.

I'm not autistic, but I think if I ever had to impersonate an autist I could do a pretty good job of it. One of my favourite collections is a collection of collections. Lots of famous people collect (collected) interesting / unusual things. A few examples:

— Peter the Great: TEETH
He was a keen amateur dentist and extracted them himself. He had thousands and hoped to advance the science of dentistry.

— King Farouk of Egypt: ANTIQUE WATCHES & COINS
What makes this interesting that Farouk was a keen amateur pickpocket. Not sure how much of his collection was actually stolen but I bet a lot of it was. Famously, he stole Winston Churchill's watch when they met in 1942. There was a mild diplomatic kerfuffle and he had to return it.

— Frederick Wilhelm (father of Frederick the Great): GIANTS
F.W. was himself only 5'3", but he really loved tall men. He created a regiment of them, called the Potsdam Giants. The original entry requirement was 6'2". He used to make them parade outside his window. He thought they would be an elite fighting force. They weren't that effective, though, and they soon got disbanded when he died.


Don’t forget collections by fictional characters:

— Oswald Cornelius (Roald Dahl): WALKING-STICKS
He has e.g. Joseph Goebbels’ stick and encourages visitors to use it so they can feel the icy tingle up their arm.


There are also *non-material* collections:

— James Thurber: GENERALIZATIONS
Thurber described his hobby in an essay called ‘What A Lovely Generalization!’. He basically listened out for people making weird generalizations in conversation, and just noted them down. “Peach ice-cream never tastes as good as you think it's going to”, for example.)

— Hannibal Lecter: CHURCH COLLAPSES
“I collect church collapses, recreationally. Did you see the recent one in Sicily? Marvelous! The facade fell on sixty-five grandmothers at a special Mass. Was that evil? If so, who did it? If He’s up there, He just loves it, Officer Starling. Typhoid and swans — it all comes from the same place.”

>> No.23197060

>>23197052
>will very rarely cover anything after the year it was published.
This implies sometimes they do somehow



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23196788 No.23196788 [Reply] [Original]

post examples of nepotism in the literary industry

6 replies omitted. Click Reply to view.
>> No.23197009

>>23196813
Gaiman's parents are Scientologists. He has never publicly stated that he is too but he has donated money to them in the past.

>> No.23197043

everyone in the literary industry is there due to nepotism.

>> No.23197045

>>23197043
explain

>> No.23197048

The Gaimans moved in 1965 to the West Sussex town of East Grinstead, where his parents studied Dianetics at the Scientology centre in the town; one of Gaiman's sisters works for the Church of Scientology in Los Angeles. His other sister, Lizzy Calcioli, has said, "Most of our social activities were involved with Scientology or our Jewish family. It would get very confusing when people would ask my religion as a kid. I'd say, 'I'm a Jewish Scientologist.'"

>> No.23197124

>>23196795
Haven't seen the doc, but Gaiman was part of the translation of Princess Mononoke. He didn't translate it but had some hand in the final dialog of the English translation, so he was directly connected to the release of the movie in a very direct way. I think he's even credited on the movie poster.



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23196769 No.23196769[DELETED]  [Reply] [Original]