/lit/ - Literature

>>10904580
reposting my Kurosawa post because I think it's a book people on /lit/ might enjoy.

When I started getting into Akira Kurosawa's films, somebody bought me his autobiography and said I needed to read it. I didn't know much about the guy apart from attempting suicide and kinda getting fucked over by Hollywood, so I read it and it's genuinely fascinating.

He explores his childhood fascination for silent films (he has a complete reference in the book for most of the films he saw as a kid and teenager and they're mostly wonderful films), the tragedy of his older brother who used to be a silent film narrator with theatre expertise but who later committed suicide, Kurosawa's experience with Toho and screenwriting (it's genuinely interesting to see how early japanese film studios used to operate) as well as quirky little stories about how he met his wife on the set of one of his films, how he let one of his colleagues sleep on set by hiding him (i hope i remember that correctly) and a weird fucking story about hearing a child scream, sneaking into the apartment to find the kid tied to a chair and then the kid is swearing at Kurosawa to fuck off. The stuff about the American occupation and Japanese censorship laws is interesting too, I swear it's not as dry as it sounds. He genuinely manages to make this engaging.

One of my favourite stories from the book is about how Kurosawa and one of his friends were seen as "slow" in school, but one of their teachers saw their potential and encouraged their creativity in art classes. Eventually Kurosawa and his buddy became screenwriters and invited their teacher - now an old man - to the screening of one of their films and their teacher just cried with how happy he was they succeeded. That genuinely made me feel quite emotional as I could relate to similar experiences in school and that there were definitely teachers who encouraged me.

It's a pretty short read, you could probably get through it on a weekend, but if you like Kurosawa or early cinema (he details his films up to the early 1950s), then it's great.

>>10904580

For me Titus Groan by Peake and Bely's Petersburg. I absolutely adore both books on every level.

Herodotus' The Histories. I know it's a meme-history book and it's not accurate, but it's a genuine treat and a joy to read. I don't know if Herodotus believed a lot of what he wrote or if he just wrote it because he wanted to have some form of archive of what people believed back then but I'm so glad he did it anyway.

I know it's an obvious meme choice but Cormac McCarthy peaked with Suttree and Blood Meridian. I love his dry prose that is both spiritual and ambiguous in the right doses. I did think I was desensitized but Blood Meridian managed to make me squirm and although I don't think I fully appreciate everything about the book - I definitely need to re-read it - I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Cue the popular passage about the native americans riding in wearing wedding dresses. That passage is fucking gorgeous and unsettling.

>>10904580
Lol

I am going to do the same thing as Kurosawa poster.

Crime and Punishment Is my favorite book. I loved the story and all of the characters, but the mood that is created is probably the best part other than the ending. It is incredible how the book manage to truly express what Raskolnikov was going through and how time in it felt lost. The ending and the epilogue hit me hard in my heart as well.

Another great book is The Great Gatsby. I didn't like it at first, but thinking over it after a relationship I understood how Gatsby felt for Daisy, but I also had a better understanding of one of the themes of the book, and that is making a girl from the past your reason for living is a terrible decision to make.

>>10904580
This book is inflating my pride and smugness that not only do I descend from Trojan kangz but I'm one of the few that even know this because the Saxon scum has the goyim believing false Victorian revisionism based on thier foolish belief that the city of Troy never existed. Too bad Heinrich Schliemann uncovered it proving that Homer didn't make it up and Romans really were descended from Trojans and Aeneas' grandson, Brutus was exiled for murder and found his way to Britain and brought his people there while the foolish Romans killed their royal bloodline, the British kept their's all the way into the middle ages.

the confusions of youg törless

Invisible Cities. Everything about it is perfect. The register, the imagery, the thematic depth, the layered structure, the dialogues, the ending, everything.

You mirin, plebs?

I'm also posting my post from the other thread

The insanity and intensity of the battle, the constant backstabbing and squabbling between the Gods and which sides they're on, the thematic development of honour and will, Diomedes and Hector are based and the inevitable tragedy that is when Troy fails to win the war and now they just have to wait it out until their city, women and children are fucking wrecked to shit, especially the line from Hector's widow about their child never reaching adulthood. The book genuinely left me feeling a little shaken, it's amazing.

>>10904653
Both books are wonderful in my opinion too. I kind of wish people weren't so torn on Gatsby but to each their own. I understand partly why it doesn't resonate with everyone, but I also find it hard to believe people don't empathise with Gatsby on some level: poor broke ex-soldier who falls in love with a girl who is out of his league so he gains immense success, wealth and tries his best to appeal to her and she's still way out of his league. The book fucking floored me, dude.

The Peterson poster just got his posts deleted and probably banned. He'd been samefagging/derailing for straight up 90 fucking minutes what the fuck is wrong with some people

>>10904583
I'm a huge kurosawa nerd and have never heard of this. A genuine rec from /lit/. Thanks.

>>10904721
It's well worth the read, dude. I still use his list of films in the book that he saw as a kid and teenager and mentally check off which films I've seen. He became very cine-literate from a young age.

Its almost entirely different from the movie.
There's multiple paragraphs to be written about how different the 3 movies are from the 3 books, but it's really the first book that is best anyway.

>>10904583
> One of my favourite stories from the book is about how Kurosawa and one of his friends were seen as "slow" in school, but one of their teachers saw their potential and encouraged their creativity in art classes. Eventually Kurosawa and his buddy became screenwriters and invited their teacher - now an old man - to the screening of one of their films and their teacher just cried with how happy he was they succeeded.

oh god i feel it

>>10904700
You cant choose the Iliad, too easy.

READ SIEGE

>>10904746
> that picture

Sir, this is a Christian Minecraft discussion board, please refrain from posting imagery that makes our lord savior cry.

>>10904679
what is this, anon

>>10904746
What a terrible ass.

>>10904900
yeah it looks like a twink

>>10904961
is this book for real

I thoroughly enjoy this book and I sort of wish it was talked about more on /lit/. Marlon James shows he is versatile with his prose, balancing American English and Jamaican patois and spreading a narrative over an ambitiously sized cast of characters all with different perspectives, ambitious, motivations and understandings of - basically - what is a fictionalised account of an assassination attempt on Bob Marley. It's one of the most ambitious gangster epics I've read that spans two decades, the slums of Jamaica to the crack epidemic of America, fraud, politics, music, drugs, hardcore sex, grotesque violence, manipulation, gangland strategy, etc. It's fucking intense and I don't know how Marlon James hasn't gotten lost in writing this beast.

A real treat, would recommend as long as you don't mind "battyboy" this and "r'osscloth" that. If you're not used to the patois, it doesn't feel alienating as the context it's used in makes sense (and you probably know what much of it means already).

>>10905010
hello mr james...

>>10905012
You meme, anon, but I am actually enjoying it very much.

>>10904866
Limited edition 2 volume complete collection of the 16th century wizard, John Dee.

>owned largest library in Britain
>worked for the queen
>worked for the king of Bohemia
>recorded his conversations with angels he summoned in his journals and stored them hidden for people to find after his death

Here's a great video about him
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnuENt0ZuQU

Best price on the book is still bookdeposity though its slowly getting more expensive (when I bought it 2 weeks ago it was $10 cheaper).

https://www.bookdepository.com/Complete-Mystical-Records-Dr-John-Dee-Kevin-Klein/9780738752587

Heres a full review of the book

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vl6GnnVBidw

Great collectors item for anyone interested in esoterics or, as I am, just interested in a piece of amazing British Renaissance history.

>>10905016
This sounds amazing, anon. How's the book?

>>10904679
Teach me how to speak to angels, that will tell me and my best friend to wife swap as I get cucked into raising his child?

>>10904746
>back acne
>boring taste in firearms
>obviously male ass
no thanks

>>10905045
The angel was testing them with the most subtle and deceptive vice of all, lust. Immediantly after they commited the sexual act they could never again contact angels. Lesson is never to give into lust and perversion or else that perfect angel you know will be lost forever...

>>10905081
2deep4mem8 I"m going to go fuck Stacey. See ya nerds, have fun with your fanfiction.

Eugine onegin

>>10904679
I'm fuckin' mirin

>>10904744

>>10904583
I thought Rashomon was a disaster, but my image of Kurosawa changed drastically when I saw Ran and Kagemusha, What other film by him do you recommend me?

>>10904679
Only vaguley related - But a Domme I spoke briefly with on collarspace was into this.

>>10904591
I'm reading Titus Groan right now and I'd be interested to hear what you have to say on it. Why was it the first thing to come to your mind?

If you have any interest in philosophy whatsoever this book is absolutely indispensable. It will revolutionise your entire understanding of the history of the subject. The author writes with the confident urgency of a man with a groundbreaking idea.

Crime and Punishment. Call me /r9k/ but Raskolnikov is the person who I can relate to the most in literature. Intelligent enough to see that there are superior and inferior people, but not intelligent enough to fall into the first category. In the same way I feel extreme amounts of ambition in order to prove myself, but at the end of the day realize that I'm not just lazy but simply lack traits that some people can effortlessly exercise.
Another thing i enjoyed very much was Dostoevsky's deep details into Raskolnikov's depression after realizing he's not an 'übermensch'. I can relate to that aswell unfortunately - for quite a while I've been frequently struck by such severe despair that I got home and just lay in the bed and have foggy suicidal thoughts.
I don't have many problems with the often criticized Sonya arc either. The only thing I regret tremendously is that there is no Sonya in my life - which is of course not surprising, considering that she is rather a metaphor than a character to be analyzed like Raskolnikov.

>Nevertheless, ere long, the warm, warbling persuasiveness of the pleasant, holiday weather we came to, seemed gradually to charm him from his mood. For, as when the red-cheeked, dancing girls, April and May, trip home to the wintry, misanthropic woods; even the barest, ruggedest, most thunder-cloven old oak will at least send forth some few green sprouts, to welcome such gladhearted visitants; so Ahab did, in the end, a little respond to the playful allurings of that girlish air. More than once did he put forth the faint blossom of a look, which, in any other man, would have soon flowered out in a smile.

>>10905491
His Rashomon is great but not a faithful adaptation. I'd say give it another shot. Ran and Kagemusha are beautiful and if you liked those try his essential samurai films: Sanjuro, Yojimbo, Throne of Blood (it's Macbeth) and Seven Samurai.

He was a versatile filmmaker who spanned many genres, had a good sense for beautiful and restrained performances and thematic development. His crime films are worthy too: Stray Dog, High and Low, The Bad Sleep Well. Shoutout for Dreams which is very spiritual, ethereal, haunting, nightmarish, playful and life affirming. Also Dersu Uzala is his only film outside of Japan (it's Russian) which gives a beautiful friendship between a Russian surveyor and a Mongolian mountain man before it wrecks your fucking shit.

You really can't go wrong with Kurosawa, even his really early stuff and his propaganda films offer something special.

>>10904744
I need to read this now

>>10906375
>>10906448
I have to agree with you, lads

>>10904583
Very convinced, will check it out, thank you for the unique and sincere recc. This is why i use /lit/

I've loved this since like elementary school, It's just simple and enjoyable

>>10904583
This sounds great. Thanks, anon.

>>10904580
In the Labyrinth, Les Enfants Terribles, Recognitions and Complete Poetry of Alberto Caeiro are the only ones I'd call that.

>>10906894
Ran and Kagemusha are extremely beautiful, Ran is one of my favorite movies, and the dream scene in Kagemusha...
You convinced me to watch Shoutout for Dreams, thanks for the recs anon.

>>10908791
It's just called Dreams, anon, but you'll fucking love it. Keep in mind it's a film made up of short vignettes inspired by Kurosawa's dreams so it doesn't deliver a linear narrative but it is gorgeous. If you like it, please watch more of his films, dude. When I discovered Kurosawa I just couldn't get enough.

>>10908070
I know this gets memed on a lot but it really is a life changer

>>10904647
>That passage is fucking gorgeous and unsettling.
it is absolutely insane imagery

Unironically

>>10909073
you can't go wrong with Kafka

The Shepherd's Life is a solid 10/10. It looks a little middle of the road on the cover but it's Knausgaard-tier solitude and it'll make you appreciate the quieter moments in your own life. Walden but English.

>>10904647
I love Cormac McCarthy but usually I can just burn through his books in a sitting or two but Blood Meridian really took me a lot longer to read. It wasn't due to the violence either, it just felt like a slower read. I did enjoy it but I'm not sure if I get why everyone else seems to love it immensely.

It did leave me feeling a little blank at times, like what does the ending mean? What is the reason for the judge being the way he is? Why did he drown the puppies and why did he want to stalk the desert looking for the kid and the priest? I get he's a manifestation of evil but I don't fully understand what the motivation is there.

A book written by two good friends who explore Iceland together and discuss the sagas. One of them is a professor in Icelandic sagas who grew there, the other is an Australian radio host. The way Kari talks about his relationship to Iceland and his father aches my heart. This book makes me want to go outside and enjoy nature.

Real talk, The Bible.

I don't actually think it's a well written, interesting book with deep lore and I'm not christian nor religious in anyway but I just find it incredibly fascinating that a simple book filled with a few stories can have so much of an impact on a society that it completely and utterly chances the behaviour of the human race, the moral laws that they abide by and the way they interact with each other. Just that alone is enough to make the Bible and other religious books like it a 10/10 in my eyes

>>10909608
fair choice, anon

Second part of Brothers Kamarazov. Kólia, Aleksiei und Iliúcha are my favorite characters of all.

I don't care if it's entry level, I still thove this trilogy to pieces.

>>10909590
woah, noted.

10/10

Some of my personal 10/10 are

>The Remains of the Day
The characters here are lovely, and with personalities so well-defined that every quirk and word is as natural as a breath of air. The nostalgia in this book is only made greater by the traveling-journal structure and vivid description of beautiful landscapes.

>The Trial
There is little to be said about Kafka that has not been said before. Kafka is a world on its own, surreal, dark, sometimes funny, sometimes tragic - it is a vain attempt of us to categorize what he has written. The absurd in which the reader is thrown will only open his eyes to the absurd in which we sometimes live.

>Invisible Cities
When I read it for the first time I thought of Borges, but now I think I like Invisible Cities more than anything Borges ever wrote - although my opinion about the authors themselves may be different. It's truly hard to describe Invisible Cities, so I will only say it comes very close to what I consider literary perfection.

>The Heights of Despair
Despair at its purest, I believe. The older he got, the milder he became in my opinion. Whether one agrees with Cioran or not doesn't mater. Reading this book, I truly felt Cioran was on the heights of despair.

>>10911130
Seconding The Trial. Never has helplessness and alienation felt so amusing yet so devastating. Kafka feels like a true enigma really as The Trial was unfinished and he never wanted it published.

Need to read Invisible Cities and Remains of the Day sometime, sounds right up my alley.

>>10904744
Fuuuck, I got teary eyed just thinking about it

>>10905433
what manga is this from?

>>10904744
great now i have to read the book. thanks a lot asshole.

>>10905016
voynich manuscript was just old turkish, nothing even remotely occult, it teaches prospective farmers which plants they should grow for profit.

it's quite cancerous when someone projects themselves into everything dark nook and cranny. it's the intellectual equivalent of those keyboard cleaning putties, you'll end up dirty and discarded, having done a half assed job.


the john dee stuff is interesting though, he was a master manipulator and one of the early spymasters

>>10904961
A title like that, how is this not a meme

>>10909073
Dropped $50 on a nice edition of the complete works of Kafka for my brother's christmas gift. Still hasn't read it or any of the books he picked up for himself...

>>10911836
a good way to get people into reading is to do it together, just say- hey you got 30mins? let's sit together and read. (silently of course).