luka

Well-known member
There's also the one the wasteland draws from heavily, Jessie L Weston – From Ritual to Romance
 

luka

Well-known member
I've embarked on against the day. I'm only 300 pages in but I'm enjoying it more than any other Pynchon I've read before.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
I read Howards End recently. I did not like it. Forster feels like a macho author (well aware of the irony of this). Each character felt flat, a person made to prove a point - not a person he empathised with
Particularly Leonard Bast I think the consensus says.

I also read Cosmopolis by DeLillo. This is the third of his I'd read. White Noise blew me away but since then this, and Zero K, have really left me disappointed.
I can't think of many that I've enjoyed other than White Noise. Maybe Americana or whatever it's called had some good bits. Underworld didn't really seem to have the ideas to justify its size.
 

craner

Beast of Burden
You should all give Anthony Powell's Dance to the Music of Time a crack. It's worth the investment.
 

luka

Well-known member
jim was having an interview to get onto his ma and they got to talking about ADTTMOT and the interviewer goes, well, its not proust is it, and jim goes, uh, guilelessly, ive never read proust, and the interviewer is thinking, yeah, nor have i mate its a figure of speech chill out mate
 

luka

Well-known member
I've embarked on against the day. I'm only 300 pages in but I'm enjoying it more than any other Pynchon I've read before.

took a break from this and read high kenners book about english literature in england. he wrote it in the '80s its called a sinking island its brilliant i loved it.
 

craner

Beast of Burden
One of my pieces of advice to Jim was, whatever you do in the interview, do not pretend you have read something that you haven't. You might feel embarrassed about it, but at least it won't involve the terminal disaster of being caught bullshitting. Petty academics love nothing more than catching people out. It gives them an almost erotic thrill.
 

jenks

thread death
took a break from this and read high kenners book about english literature in england. he wrote it in the '80s its called a sinking island its brilliant i loved it.

My copy of Kenner arrived today - based on your recommendation, i'm looking forward to it.
 

CrowleyHead

Well-known member
Just finished Tzara's "Approximate Man & Other Writings" today. The poetry is good and sits with me well in a way I can't elocute but can still appreciate. The manifestos though are all *crumples in a ball and lobs out a window*
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Slaughterhouse Five. Not sure entirely what I think yet but I am enjoying it a lot. Somehow last night's events have made me more eager to finish it, though I am too hungover to today!
 

catalog

Well-known member
Having a go with "This is Memorial Device" by David Keenan.
Anyone else on it? Or been through it?

It's OK... kinda interesting turns of phrase and a few good bits of conversation. Some funny bits, although a lot of feels completely unbelievable.

And the whole thing feels a little bit too imagined rather than done, if you know what I mean. As in, you feel like too much is made up and there is a lot of rapturous / over the top language on every other page e.g. stuff like:

"...and as I looked at the window and heard this long, sustained tone, this slow off-kilter drum beat, I thought to myself, when I die let me wake up here, let me reincarnate into this picture; let me live in this moment forever."

Feels like he's massively nicked the structure from Bolano's Savage Detectives, in that it's recollections from lots of different people around a particular scene.

Am about 80 pages through and will persevere cos it's very easy reading, just wondered if other people have read it, seen as it's a music book.
 

john eden

male pale and stale
I saw Keenan do a talk about the book and I've not started it yet myself, but a mate said it was better if you read it in his voice...

He said that these sort of scenes could only be accurately captured in a novel (rather than something factual) because they were all about impossible people doing mad stuff.

I am looking forward to getting into it after Volume 3 of Capital (820 pages in!)
 

droid

Well-known member
Probably the most compelling account of 1917 Ive read:

512iL-h8DjL._SX342_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg


https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/may/17/october-china-mieville-russian-revolution
 
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