crackerjack
Well-known member
I was going to say 'forboding' but my dictionary says the word does not exist.
Try it again with an 'e'.
I was going to say 'forboding' but my dictionary says the word does not exist.
As an aside, on pretty much the first page there is a comparison of some nocturnal creatures with "certain painters and philosophers who seek to penetrate the darkness" and then (in my edition at least, presumably in all?) a picture of two pairs of eyes - does anyone know who they belong to?
I think I can sort of see what you're getting at here but I wouldn't say that it is a bad thing."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."
Could do I guesss....but I don't think anyone has really put any spoilers up yet, merely discussions of style (I was just being ultra-careful with that spoiler warning I put up). I tend to think that if things are highlighted safely it ought to be ok but if anyone disagrees with that very strongly then make it known."Maybe we should have a seperate thread for spoiler laden posts by people who've finished it and a spoiler-free thread for people who are still in the middle or something..."
No problem. Anyway it shouldn't take you too long to read."Sorry, im in the midlands, no worrys, I expect ill get it tomorrow or wednesday really. Thats very kind of you though"
I wonder, are they sci-fi? What about Jules Verne? Surely around the same time as Alice In Wonderland and more how I imagine sci-fi. I bet there are earlier ones though. Edit: how about Frankenstein or Edgar Allen Poe?"Actually I had an interesting discussion with a friend last night..... he said apart from Frankenstein "Alice in wonderland" may be the first sc-fi novel, or gullivers travels.... interesting thoughts, im kinda just getting into sci-fi at the mo"
Thank God for that."less chance of soilers"
Likewise. Excellent choice of book."I am thoroughly enjoying it and can't wait to start getting involved in the discussion."
OK, won't give anything away but I have to say that I'm really getting in to it now.
I think I can sort of see what you're getting at here but I wouldn't say that it is a bad thing.
There is some sense of things a times feeling as though they are happening underwater or on the other side of a sheet of glass, actually I think the water description is more accurate or better still through a covering such as a quilt. There is a kind of blunt melancholic feel rather than a sharp sadness.
SLIGHT SPOILER
This bit really affected me:
She said, so quietly that you could hardly hear her: What was it that so darkened our world? And Elias replied: I don't know, dear, I don't know
This bit really affected me:
She said, so quietly that you could hardly hear her: What was it that so darkened our world? And Elias replied: I don't know, dear, I don't know
Similar links for me between where as I was and where the novel was happening as I travelled to work last week."Last week i had to travel out of Liverpool Street and felt distinctly odd to be reading about Austerlitz's moment of clarity in a ghostly version of the station."
I guess so. What do you think of the extended passages where the narrator is describing Austerlitz describing a story that is being told to him? There seem to be a lot of (clumsy?) sentences ending "...said Vera, Austerlitz told me" which further reinforce this separation."However, isn't part of the point that 'history/historical events' have made him like that - he is sheered clear of his past. Ultimately a rootless man through no fault of his own?"
Certainly."Just first thoughts here really - i think Memory, Loss, History are some of the big ideas here"
Maybe. I don't think it was so much the way that things were revealed as just the way things happened in general. The revealing was thus necessarily of that same style."something about the manner in which the story is revealed that is both comelling and essential to the novel's success - it is reticent and doesn't allow the reader easy comfort."
Well, a sentence like that one I just quoted is bound to walk that line but I think it came down on the right side of it on that occasion."Yes it is beautiful. Allow me to to be a little contrarian, though, and say that like much of the book it teeters on the edge of being poetry prose cheese."
Who is being indulged? That's not reall a feeling I got at all."At bottom, dare I say, its hugely indulgent."