Suggest a Book for the dissensus book club!

[IdleRich]

Well, there are five minutes to go and it's worse than before thanks to Slothrop - three way tie!
Not sure I'm comfortable with casting a decisive vote...maybe I'll toss a coin.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Sod it, let's all just read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_children_of_hurin
(I'll probably read this fairly soon anyway.)

 

[IdleRich]

Ok, I really hope I haven't missed anything or anyone, if I have let me know soonest. I can't find a vote from Ripley but I've got one from everyone else who nominated a book and a few who didn't.

Here are the results (in reverse order):

Regeneration - 1 (proposed Ripley, no votes)
Crime and Punishment - 2 (proposed Crackerjack, voted for by You)
Infinite Jest - 2 (proposed me, voted for by Mixed_Biscuits)
Mao II - 2 (proposed John Doe, voted for by Jenks)

And all with four votes

Brothers K (proposed PeterGunn and You, voted by Crackerjack and Sloth)
Gravity's Rainbow (proposed Tea and Sloth, voted by me and Don_quixote)
Austerlitz (proposed Jenks, voted Tea, Octopus and John Doe)

So, after all that looks as though we basically spent a pointless week being unable to separate any of them. Sorry about that.

If it is going to be me with the casting vote (and looks as though it's either that or tossing a coin) I'm going to go with Austerlitz because that seems to be the one that persuaded the most people who didn't nominate and (may not even have heard of it) to vote for it. It's pretty arbitrary but I consider that it's the one that won the most genuine votes and captured people's imagination so there it is. Unless anyone has any major objections.......


It's Austerlitz.

So try and get it over the weekend and get cracking.

 

[jenks]

I'm good with this - why don't we agree to one of the others as the next book - maybe Bros K to appease those who wanted a 'classic' and we could then do Gravity's Rainbow or Regeneration afterwards - if we have managed to keep momentum going! That way we won't get caught up in wrangles over choices.

I am quietly pleased that i am not committed to 900 pages for my the first text.

 

[DRMHCP]

Not to derail the thread, but I think this is a ridiculous reading of Austen. She is a cynical social satirist. Her sarcasm and near-nihilist critique of the position of women in her society is well-understood by many critics (and readers). Overwraught- are we even talking about the same author? QUOTE]

Definitely talking about her books had to read her for my English degree. Never actually seen any of the dramatisations.
And the word overwrought IMO could definitely be used to describe some of her writing...and if shes such a "near- nihilist" proto feminist how come much of her work revolves around her female characters adolescent obsession with some Mr Right.

For a nineteenth century female who wrote genuinely adult fiction you dont have to go any further than George Eliot*. Or even the Brontes. However clever Austen's novels purport to be there's no getting away from the fact that they're also suffused with a superficial "romanticism" of the kind that I should imagine is believed in by readers of "Hello" magazine.

*And in particular "Middlemarch" which although extremely long had me lamenting every chapter I finsished so reluctant was I to leave her near perfect construction of a Victorian community and its people.

 

[crackerjack]

I'm going to repsectfully bow out of this one as I read (more accurately, gazed at while slowly turning the pages) Austerlitz last year after it was recommended by my nonagenarian granny. This may something I'd rather not know about our respective attention spans, or possibly wishful thinking on her part about the way Austerlitz pieces his memory back together.

 

[IdleRich]

"I'm good with this - why don't we agree to one of the others as the next book - maybe Bros K to appease those who wanted a 'classic' and we could then do Gravity's Rainbow or Regeneration afterwards - if we have managed to keep momentum going! That way we won't get caught up in wrangles over choices."

Suits me.

"And the word overwrought IMO could definitely be used to describe some of her writing...and if shes such a "near- nihilist" proto feminist how come much of her work revolves around her female characters adolescent obsession with some Mr Right.
For a nineteenth century female who wrote genuinely adult fiction you dont have to go any further than George Eliot*. Or even the Brontes. However clever Austen's novels purport to be there's no getting away from the fact that they're also suffused with a superficial "romanticism" of the kind that I should imagine is believed in by readers of "Hello" magazine."

I wouldn't say that they are obsessed with Mr Right. It's simply that the books reflect the natural preoccupations of women in their situation in the early 19th Century where the hope of marrying someone wealthy is a career move rather than romance. It is often said that she never writes a scene in which no women are present, because she had no knowledge of such scenes and it's this kind of realism throughout the books.
I simply don't see the overwroughtness of her sentences. I always found them precisely formed and to the point.

"I'm going to repsectfully bow out of this one"

One down.

"possibly wishful thinking on her part about the way Austerlitz pieces his memory back together."

Mean but funny.

 

[ripley]

Not to derail the thread, but I think this is a ridiculous reading of Austen. She is a cynical social satirist. Her sarcasm and near-nihilist critique of the position of women in her society is well-understood by many critics (and readers). Overwraught- are we even talking about the same author? QUOTE]

Definitely talking about her books had to read her for my English degree. Never actually seen any of the dramatisations.
And the word overwrought IMO could definitely be used to describe some of her writing...and if shes such a "near- nihilist" proto feminist how come much of her work revolves around her female characters adolescent obsession with some Mr Right.

I will tell you exactly how.

Saying female Austen characters were obsessed with mr. right is like saying "subsistence peasants are obsessed with the weather." It's not adolescent, it's the reality of the time, when Mr. Right is a matter of material survival for women of that time. Are you not aware that because of the inheritance laws and the legal system middle class women were absolutely without option (as were families with no sons) without a man? Women could not own or inherit property, or work for pay except in the most abject and controlled way. The focus of 9/10s of Austen's writing is how that plays out - how little freedom was available to women.

It's not adolescent -it's life or death, or at least material survival vs. abject poverty, and it's cold calculation on the part of all the women in her stories (except for the witless few whom she mocks). None of it at all is about love - she makes that explicit over and over again. That's the nihilism. Genuine love between men and women seems almost completely impossible in Austen's world, even when the heroines get it the commentary undercuts it or the situation (where it is always backed by financial security) casts it in a different light.

 

[you]

Im going to try and see this through, ive ordered Austerlitz although it doesnt really appeal to me, but maybe ill be surprised or something.

I wont be able to start it because im going to Skye for a week, and I couldnt get it delivered before I go, shame really as it would be a great place to read but I guess ill just cane through the rest of my books before starting Austerlitz..

 

[Dial]

Austerlitz. Cool. Fortuitously, I happen to be on page 50 or so of my second go at Austerlitz. First time round (which I'd completely forgotten about until I embarked on the second reading), I gave up due to the quietism of the novel's tone. And I mean that 'quietism' in a broader sense than the strictly religious, but not unrelated. Perhaps thats one way into a discussion of it. And, of course, that claim of 'quietism' itself could well be confused and debatable.:slanted:

In any case, I look forward to hearing the reading experience of all, and will chime in if I feel compelled.

 

[Mr. Tea]

What does 'quietism' mean? I'm drawing a blank on Wiktionary.

 

[crackerjack]

What does 'quietism' mean? I'm drawing a blank on Wiktionary.

I'm gonna hazard a guess.

Quietism: sod all happens.

 

[you]

this isnt really filling me with high hopes for this book.

 

[Slothrop]

I wont be able to start it because im going to Skye for a week, and I couldnt get it delivered before I go, shame really as it would be a great place to read but I guess ill just cane through the rest of my books before starting Austerlitz..

It's a tough life. How about you stay at home and read it and I'll go to Skye for a week.

 

[Dial]

What does quietism' mean. I'm drawing a blank of Wiktionary.

Ha, you called my bluff there, Mr Tea. Quietism is a word I use without having a clear sense of what it actually means. I don't seem to be that far off, nonetheless...

Here's a couple of definitions from Merriam-Webster online:

qui·et·ism
Pronunciation: 'kwI-&-"ti-z&m
Function: noun
1 a : a system of religious mysticism teaching that perfection and spiritual peace are attained by annihilation of the will and passive absorption in contemplation of God and divine things b : a passive withdrawn attitude or policy toward the world or worldly affairs
2 : a state of calmness or passivity

You could say that although the information gathering/piecing together that Austerlitz engages in is of course active, and often digressive, it takes place under the guise of a steady tone of inward, meditative rumination. Passivity is seen not only in the lack of outward action but more especially in Austerlitz's receptivity to information and impressions.

The refined, intense, low energy state of this even, introspection and analysis (moving through the past towards self identity) is in line with the quietism I had in mind when I first used the word. An intense yet passive opening to a result that is nonetheless highly willed. And, the 'moving through the past towards self identity' found in the novel is not so far off the religious meaning of quietism as a search for God/The absolute.

Well thats one riff. I guess we could argue the virtues or otherwise of quietism. Myself I find it a little on the depressive side. Its clear, at any rate, that many are blown away by the novel's depth and power. I think its worth reading just to check one's own responses against so much fulsome praise.

 

[IdleRich]

OK, just bought the book and another for you Mr Tea - you owe me six pounds and twenty-nine pence.
Gonna get cracking on it tonight.

 

[John Doe]

Cool. A good choice, I reckon. What do we do now? Read it and then start arguing/discussing? Should we have some sort of timetable for finishing the book? Obviously, those that don't finish it on time get detention...

 

[IdleRich]

I reckon that we should kind of discuss it as we go really if we can do that without spoiling it for the slow readers....

 

[jenks]

Started it the other night.

I read when it first came out and can remember little of it - i don't know if that is a good thing or not - but what has struck me is the slow narrative pace which is deeply seductive, it seems to force you to read slowly, to stop and ponder which kind of runs counter to prevailing hyper fast pacy po-mo life. It feels both lovely and ominous from the opening sentence.

I'm going to post properly once i'm more deeply immersed in the book but i would say to those not yet convinced of the choice of Austerlitz that I think it will be an ideal first text for us.

 

[Dial]

but what has struck me is the slow narrative pace which is deeply seductive, it seems to force you to read slowly, to stop and ponder which kind of runs counter to prevailing hyper fast pacy po-mo life. It feels both lovely and ominous from the opening sentence.

I'd like to second this. I'm well into it now and reading it last night, I was struck all of a sudden by what - in my very own words at the time - 'a fucking beautiful read' it was. Lovely indeed. I'm not sure about the word 'ominous' though. Maybe grief? I was going to say 'forboding' but my dictionary says the word does not exist.