/lit/ - Literature

>>6361115
I read about half of it and then I wanted to give myself a "break" but I never went back to it.

I've made two attempts, the first time to about page 80, and the second to about page 250. I liked it but just couldn't commit

read it one and a half times in five weeks while working full time and then read the ETA sections last week. It's definitely easier than most people think. It's certainly not as difficult as Brief Interviews or Wallace's influences like Pale Fire, Gravity's Rainbow, or Portrait of the Artist

read it and enjoyed it but totally dont blame the people who shit on it. it's really long and tedious at times. wouldnt consider it a difficult read, just a long one. has its moments though

>>6361292
Is Portrait of the Artist really difficult? I figured I'd read it before plunging into Ulysses as a warm up. I was under the impression it was significantly less dense. Didn't find Dubliners hard to read.

>>6361292
>>6361311
>Portrait of the Artist really difficult?
What? No, not at all. The sermon part is really long and boring, but that's it.

>>6361311

Depends. If you haven't studied Aquinas, the last few chapters seem like one long philosophical dialogue between Daedalus and anyone who will listen to him talk about Aquinas. It's much more interesting when you understand the theory that's being referenced, as far as that goes.

The 1st section is touch and go: some sections are quite vivid and engrossing, while others reference a fuckload of 19th century IRA political history (in the conversation between the father and various uncles/friends).

tl;dr depends on how much you understand of the novel's context.

>>6361311

It's difficult if you are a pleb like me who only reads contemporary American fiction. Reading it before Ulysses won't really help you though. Bloom and Dedalaus's adventures are their own monster

It is sad that most threads about books on lit revolves about
>I liked, not so much, but it is good
>It is shit, go away pleb
>le meme spotter

Nobody EVERS talks about the books, just when it is something simple as Game of thrones bullshit.

I never finished Infinite Jest but I had a good time until that part when the genius child start came online (I guess isn't very far, to be fair). It gets bore some really fast imo, so I end up dropping, but until that point I really liked even though I don't think I got the point of it yet.

>>6361366
I mean, if not even Infinite Jest that is mentioned everyday on this board can't be discussed seriously why this board even existed? Should just rename /phil/ after all.

I read it before I discovered this shithole

If anyone bothers to make a decent thread (unlike yourself) I'll respond to it

>>6361115
i've read it. its because theres not much worth talking about. dfw was also an essayist, and that aspect comes out a lot in his novel. lots of scenes and characters he unpacks the discussion himself in the middle of the text. eg: the bit on suicide, hal's essay about hero characters.

even if he doesn't do it himself its pretty easy to grasp what the book makes of things like addiction, entertainment, etc...

Did Don and Hal meet up between end of novel and year of glad? Yeah, right?

Hal recalling it in the first section of the book is like the best line, for real.

And gatelys fever dream about it is fucking great too.. Like genuinely terrifying and awesome

>>6361793
>If anyone bothers to make a decent thread (unlike yourself) I'll respond to it

kek

>>6361115
I got that book on xmas and i've been procrastinating, only readed until page 80 or something.
I mean, i'm liking it A LOT, it's a really nice book so far but just the fact that it has over 1000 pages and i can't carry it around easily like a pocket book kinda makes me put it aside.

I have read it twice and both times I found nothing to latch on to.
It seemed to be a collection of random thoughts and little to nothing else.

>>6361366
>>6361373
then go back to reddit faggot

>>6361115
I did. I loved it. Still do. Few books have made me laugh that much and that often. I recall having to set the thing down because I was laughing so hard I couldn't see the page. (The part where the guy trying to get into rehab pets the dog with the skin condition in mid-seizure - legs sproinged out to the points of the compass - still makes me smile.)

It's been a while tho...I read it when it first came out, so some of the names have left me. Still recall PGOAT tho. Every time a new hot actress comes along, I wonder if she'd be cast in the roll if IJ were filmed.

What did people think of the sections written in black vernacular? Still trying to figure out what they were doing there

>>6362514
I just thought of them as kind of a tone poem at the time, but in a thread on /lit/ recently, someone claimed that DFW used it as a test about racism when people brought it up. Personally I doubt that, but there ya go.

>>6362532
What do you mean by a test about racism? I've been thinking about how the book may be viewed in terms of its racial politics as well, so I'm curious about this.

>>6362550
I'm not really the one to elaborate on this, since I'm just reporting what I saw in a thread. If it's real, it's probably on the interwebs somewhere. Sorry mang.

>>6361311
Dubliners is the essential pre-read for Ulysses, not Artist, as nearly three dozen characters are shared by U and D whereas A and U only have Dedalus, his father and references for his mother. I find artist almost harder than Stephen's segments in Ulysses because the former employs jump cuts much more frequently.

Talking of Ulysses as a one cigerent work is not smart though - each of the chapters apes one or more mediums, leading to the chapter being the main determinant in the difficulty of proper understanding. You have smooth rides such as Telemachos and Eumaeus, extended jokes like Cyclops and Nausea and then impossibly difficult pieces such as Proteus, Sirens and Oxen in the sun. Plunge into it, if not for anything else than Joyce's faux Shakespeare porno.

>>6361115
I got through the first Hindi pages but thought it wasn't worth it. Heard it got better by 300 but Jesus christ.

>>6362532
I don't find it hard to believe, it's close enough to DFW's shade of stupid

>>6362666
I disagree, satan.

He didn't strike me as a SJW at all. I've read all his stuff and all the interviews I can find, btw.

>>6362693

And IJ is pretty heavily invested in the privileged white male experience without being critical of it

>>6362703
Oh fuck you, SJW. Go back to womyn's studies and continue to waste your life.

Or, grab a clue:
http://americamagazine.org/content/all-things/catholic-pagan-10-questions-camille-paglia

>>6362713

>americamagazine

>>6362693
Not being a SJW, but including a whole otherwise out of place chapter for the sole purpose of silently building a moralistic judgment based on his own projected insecurities

Of course it's probably fake - but not unbelievable.

>>6362720
Ok, I'll take you at your word, but I just hate this trope:
>privileged white male experience

>mfw people legitimately can't tell if that anon making up fake Franzen quotes is serious

I hope you have some more in you, you creative bastard

>>6362713

I think you're confused.

I (anon you are replying to) was agreeing with the anon who said DFW didn't seem to be an SJW, at least in the context of IJ, because it's a book *largely* about affluent white males and an affluent tennis academy and how boredom and suffering lead to substance (or non-substance—i.e. entertainment ['the entertainment' being no coincidence]) abuse/addiction, all of this intersecting through the Incandenza thread.

I'm not sure what made you think I'm a women's studies scholar. I'm a lit grad student and find that line of scholarship incredibly boring.

>>6362764
Then most humble apologies. My bad.