books to read

[Deputy Wendell]

it has sparked a non-insignificant mental health heckride

...oh no...even here in Slap...he's inescapable...

...i both love and hate Baudrillard--as a modernist, he has been the bane of my academic existence at times, although i'd be lying if i did not admit that this has been super important in a bunch of my work in cultural studies (for instance, on the engineered necessity of the automobile, ontologies and phenomenologies of the freeway in Didion's Play It as It Lays, and this country's suburban landscape as conveyed in The Crying of Lot 49) and i HIGHLY recommend it, if you feel up to it after tussling with Simulacra and Simulation...i have heard this called his "most accessible" work, as it were...

[ChuckRamone]

Reading Crying in H Mart. Moving book that breezes by.

[rock2fakie]

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To be honest, I’m still making my way through it. It’s very intense and sad just as a warning so I’ve been reading it a few chapters at a time (and I haven’t felt much like reading overall) but I do like it and it is gorgeously done. And yeah, the author was originally commissioned to translate Gorman and Gorman’s reps agreed to it but the Netherlands press pointed out that they had a very different experience from Gorman and that no black Dutch translators or artists were considered so Rijneveld backed out when that came to light. I think it was a fairly cut-and-dry issue.

Good luck on book 6! I’ve talked about it before but that’s the first book I really had to work out a schedule to finish it in a reasonable amount of time. It’s definitely made me realize the enormity of 1000+ page works. I’ve never had a problem with traditionally long books but once you get past like 750-800 pages, it really is a whole different ball game.

[close]

Thanks for the heads up. I really appreciate it. In that case, I'll back off for now. The author sounds intriguing, but I'm sure she'll publish a second novel some time soon, which might not be as intense.

Yeah, I just read up on the issue and all in all it sounds about right.

Knausgaard's books are usually a page-turner for me. A 600-page Knausgaard book feels like a regular 200-page novel. Mentally, I haven't really prepared for the long haul. But maybe that's what's coming.

I hear what you're saying about long novels though. A 1000-page monster of a book is something you have to be ready for, because of the time and dedication it takes. However, these are also sometimes the most rewarding reads. 2666, War and Peace, and, despite its shorter length, Crime and Punishment, these books have stayed with me even long after I put them down. I'm thinking about reading The Brothers Karamazov as my next longer book project. Any other long reads that are worth the effort?

You posted this a while ago but the author did already publish a new novel, which I guess hasn't been translated to English yet. I haven't read it yet but from reading the synopsis and a couple pages in someone else's copy I know for a fact it's just as intense, if not more. (it's sort of a continuation of The Discomfort of Evening and delves into sexual abuse)

[botefdunn]

@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[Highonangeldust]

Solid, inspirational read right here.

[rocklobster]

Looking for recommendations on non-fiction - preferably business books that aren't a collection of opinions and self-serving masturbation sessions by the author.

For reference the last book I enjoyed was The Lean Start Up. Autobiographies are good too, thinking of reading Shoe Dog next.

[oyolar]

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To be honest, I’m still making my way through it. It’s very intense and sad just as a warning so I’ve been reading it a few chapters at a time (and I haven’t felt much like reading overall) but I do like it and it is gorgeously done. And yeah, the author was originally commissioned to translate Gorman and Gorman’s reps agreed to it but the Netherlands press pointed out that they had a very different experience from Gorman and that no black Dutch translators or artists were considered so Rijneveld backed out when that came to light. I think it was a fairly cut-and-dry issue.

Good luck on book 6! I’ve talked about it before but that’s the first book I really had to work out a schedule to finish it in a reasonable amount of time. It’s definitely made me realize the enormity of 1000+ page works. I’ve never had a problem with traditionally long books but once you get past like 750-800 pages, it really is a whole different ball game.

[close]

Thanks for the heads up. I really appreciate it. In that case, I'll back off for now. The author sounds intriguing, but I'm sure she'll publish a second novel some time soon, which might not be as intense.

Yeah, I just read up on the issue and all in all it sounds about right.

Knausgaard's books are usually a page-turner for me. A 600-page Knausgaard book feels like a regular 200-page novel. Mentally, I haven't really prepared for the long haul. But maybe that's what's coming.

I hear what you're saying about long novels though. A 1000-page monster of a book is something you have to be ready for, because of the time and dedication it takes. However, these are also sometimes the most rewarding reads. 2666, War and Peace, and, despite its shorter length, Crime and Punishment, these books have stayed with me even long after I put them down. I'm thinking about reading The Brothers Karamazov as my next longer book project. Any other long reads that are worth the effort?

[close]

You posted this a while ago but the author did already publish a new novel, which I guess hasn't been translated to English yet. I haven't read it yet but from reading the synopsis and a couple pages in someone else's copy I know for a fact it's just as intense, if not more. (it's sort of a continuation of The Discomfort of Evening and delves into sexual abuse)

Ooof man. Ouch

[ChuckRamone]

Finished Crying in H Mart and started on The Collected Schizophrenias. This book is excellent so far.

[bigdave]

“...While I was in Chicago last summer, the Honourable Elijah Muhammad invited me to have dinner at his home. This is a stately mansion on Chicago's South Side, and it is the headquarters of the Nation of Islam movement. I had not gone to Chicago to meet Elijah Muhammad--he was not in my thoughts at all--but the moment I received the invitation, it occurred to me that I ought to have expected it. In a way, I owe the invitation to the incredible, abysmal, and really cowardly obtuseness of white liberals. Whether in private debate or in public, any attempt I made to explain how the Black Muslim movement came about, and how it has achieved such force, was met with a blankness that revealed the little connection that the liberals' attitudes have with their perceptions of their lives, or even their knowledge--revealed, in fact, that they could deal with the Negro as a symbol or a victim but had no sense of him as a man...Therefore, late on a hot Sunday afternoon, I presented myself at his door.

I was frightened, because I had, in effect, been summoned into a royal presence. I was frightened for another reason, too. I knew the tension in me between love and power, between pain and rage, and the curious, the grinding way I remained extended between these poles--perpetually attempting to choose the better rather than the worse. But this choice was a choice in terms of a personal, a private better (I was, after all, a writer); what was its relevance in terms of a social worse? Here was the South Side--a million in captivity-stretching from this doorstep as far as the eye could see. And they didn't even read; depressed populations don't have the time or energy to spare. The affluent populations, which should have been their help, didn't, as far as could be discovered, read, either--they merely bought books and devoured them, but not in order to learn : in order to learn new attitudes. Also, I knew that once I had entered the house, I couldn't smoke or drink, and I felt guilty about the cigarettes in my pocket, as I had felt years ago when my friend first took me into his church. I was half an hour late, having got lost on the way here, and I felt as deserving of a scolding as a schoolboy...

...I felt that I was back in my father's house--as, indeed, in a way, I was--and I told Elijah that I did not care if white and black people married, and that I had many white friends. I would have no choice, if it came to it, but to perish with them, for (I said to myself, but not to Elijah), ‘I love a few people and they love me and some of them are white, and isn't love more important than colour?’

Elijah looked at me with great kindness and affection, great pity, as though he were reading my heart, and indicated, sceptically, that I might have white friends, or think I did, and they might be trying to be decent--now--but their time was up. It was almost as though he were saying. ‘They had their chance, man, and they goofed!’...

...And I looked again at the young faces around the table, and looked back at Elijah, who was saying that no people in history had ever been respected who had not owned their land. And the table said, ‘Yes, that's right.’ I could not deny the truth of this statement. For everyone else has, is, a nation, with a specific location and a flag--even, these days, the Jew. It is only ‘the so-called American Negro’ who remains trapped, disinherited, and despised, in a nation that has kept him in bondage for nearly four hundred years and is still unable to recognize him as a human being. And the Black Muslims, along with many people who are not Muslims, no longer wish for a recognition so grudging and (should it ever be achieved) so tardy. Again, it cannot be denied that this point of view is abundantly justified by American Negro history. It is galling indeed to have stood so long, hat in hand, waiting for Americans to grow up enough to realize that you do not threaten them. On the other hand, how is the American Negro now to form himself into a separate nation? For this--and not only from the Muslim point of view--would seem to be his only hope of not perishing in the American backwater and being entirely and forever forgotten, as though he had never existed at all and his travail had been for nothing...

... It was time to leave, and we stood in the large living room, saying good night, with everything curiously and heavily unresolved. I could not help feeling that I had failed a test, in their eyes and in my own, or that I had failed to heed a warning. Elijah and I shook hands, and he asked me where I was going. Wherever it was, I would be driven there—'because, when we invite someone here,’ he said, ‘we take the responsibility of protecting him from the white devils until he gets wherever it is he's going.' I was, in fact, going to have a drink with several white devils on the other side of town. I confess that for a fraction of a second I hesitated to give the address--the kind of address that in Chicago, as in all American cities, identified itself as a white address by virtue of its location. But I did give it, and Elijah and I walked out onto the steps, and one of the young men vanished to get the car. It was very strange to stand with Elijah for those few moments, facing those vivid, violent, so problematical streets. I felt very close to him, and really wished to be able to love and honour him as a witness, an ally, and a father. I felt that I knew something of his pain and his fury, and, yes, even his beauty. Yet precisely because of the reality and the nature of those streets--because of what he conceived as his responsibility and what I took to be mine--we would always be strangers, and possibly, one day, enemies. The car arrived--a gleaming, metallic, grossly American blue--and Elijah and I shook hands and said good night once more. He walked into his mansion and shut the door...”

One of the best books I've ever read. That whole portion with THEM is just fucking incredible.

[bigdave]

Reading some Kundera right now. This might actually the last book of his left for me to read.

[oyolar]

Finished Crying in H Mart and started on The Collected Schizophrenias. This book is excellent so far.

Nice. Good to hear. I have TCS on my to read list but forgot about it to be honest. I’ll revisit bumping it up now.

[AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice]

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To be honest, I’m still making my way through it. It’s very intense and sad just as a warning so I’ve been reading it a few chapters at a time (and I haven’t felt much like reading overall) but I do like it and it is gorgeously done. And yeah, the author was originally commissioned to translate Gorman and Gorman’s reps agreed to it but the Netherlands press pointed out that they had a very different experience from Gorman and that no black Dutch translators or artists were considered so Rijneveld backed out when that came to light. I think it was a fairly cut-and-dry issue.

Good luck on book 6! I’ve talked about it before but that’s the first book I really had to work out a schedule to finish it in a reasonable amount of time. It’s definitely made me realize the enormity of 1000+ page works. I’ve never had a problem with traditionally long books but once you get past like 750-800 pages, it really is a whole different ball game.

[close]

Thanks for the heads up. I really appreciate it. In that case, I'll back off for now. The author sounds intriguing, but I'm sure she'll publish a second novel some time soon, which might not be as intense.

Yeah, I just read up on the issue and all in all it sounds about right.

Knausgaard's books are usually a page-turner for me. A 600-page Knausgaard book feels like a regular 200-page novel. Mentally, I haven't really prepared for the long haul. But maybe that's what's coming.

I hear what you're saying about long novels though. A 1000-page monster of a book is something you have to be ready for, because of the time and dedication it takes. However, these are also sometimes the most rewarding reads. 2666, War and Peace, and, despite its shorter length, Crime and Punishment, these books have stayed with me even long after I put them down. I'm thinking about reading The Brothers Karamazov as my next longer book project. Any other long reads that are worth the effort?

[close]

You posted this a while ago but the author did already publish a new novel, which I guess hasn't been translated to English yet. I haven't read it yet but from reading the synopsis and a couple pages in someone else's copy I know for a fact it's just as intense, if not more. (it's sort of a continuation of The Discomfort of Evening and delves into sexual abuse)

Oh man. Well, looks like she's found her niche. Honestly though, I might look into that second novel once it's translated into English or German. Sexual abuse is a brutal topic, but speaking for me personally, it doesn't quite hit as close to home as grief and loss of family members.

[AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice]

@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

[Deputy Wendell]

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“...While I was in Chicago last summer, the Honourable Elijah Muhammad invited me to have dinner at his home. This is a stately mansion on Chicago's South Side, and it is the headquarters of the Nation of Islam movement. I had not gone to Chicago to meet Elijah Muhammad--he was not in my thoughts at all--but the moment I received the invitation, it occurred to me that I ought to have expected it. In a way, I owe the invitation to the incredible, abysmal, and really cowardly obtuseness of white liberals. Whether in private debate or in public, any attempt I made to explain how the Black Muslim movement came about, and how it has achieved such force, was met with a blankness that revealed the little connection that the liberals' attitudes have with their perceptions of their lives, or even their knowledge--revealed, in fact, that they could deal with the Negro as a symbol or a victim but had no sense of him as a man...Therefore, late on a hot Sunday afternoon, I presented myself at his door.

I was frightened, because I had, in effect, been summoned into a royal presence. I was frightened for another reason, too. I knew the tension in me between love and power, between pain and rage, and the curious, the grinding way I remained extended between these poles--perpetually attempting to choose the better rather than the worse. But this choice was a choice in terms of a personal, a private better (I was, after all, a writer); what was its relevance in terms of a social worse? Here was the South Side--a million in captivity-stretching from this doorstep as far as the eye could see. And they didn't even read; depressed populations don't have the time or energy to spare. The affluent populations, which should have been their help, didn't, as far as could be discovered, read, either--they merely bought books and devoured them, but not in order to learn : in order to learn new attitudes. Also, I knew that once I had entered the house, I couldn't smoke or drink, and I felt guilty about the cigarettes in my pocket, as I had felt years ago when my friend first took me into his church. I was half an hour late, having got lost on the way here, and I felt as deserving of a scolding as a schoolboy...

...I felt that I was back in my father's house--as, indeed, in a way, I was--and I told Elijah that I did not care if white and black people married, and that I had many white friends. I would have no choice, if it came to it, but to perish with them, for (I said to myself, but not to Elijah), ‘I love a few people and they love me and some of them are white, and isn't love more important than colour?’

Elijah looked at me with great kindness and affection, great pity, as though he were reading my heart, and indicated, sceptically, that I might have white friends, or think I did, and they might be trying to be decent--now--but their time was up. It was almost as though he were saying. ‘They had their chance, man, and they goofed!’...

...And I looked again at the young faces around the table, and looked back at Elijah, who was saying that no people in history had ever been respected who had not owned their land. And the table said, ‘Yes, that's right.’ I could not deny the truth of this statement. For everyone else has, is, a nation, with a specific location and a flag--even, these days, the Jew. It is only ‘the so-called American Negro’ who remains trapped, disinherited, and despised, in a nation that has kept him in bondage for nearly four hundred years and is still unable to recognize him as a human being. And the Black Muslims, along with many people who are not Muslims, no longer wish for a recognition so grudging and (should it ever be achieved) so tardy. Again, it cannot be denied that this point of view is abundantly justified by American Negro history. It is galling indeed to have stood so long, hat in hand, waiting for Americans to grow up enough to realize that you do not threaten them. On the other hand, how is the American Negro now to form himself into a separate nation? For this--and not only from the Muslim point of view--would seem to be his only hope of not perishing in the American backwater and being entirely and forever forgotten, as though he had never existed at all and his travail had been for nothing...

... It was time to leave, and we stood in the large living room, saying good night, with everything curiously and heavily unresolved. I could not help feeling that I had failed a test, in their eyes and in my own, or that I had failed to heed a warning. Elijah and I shook hands, and he asked me where I was going. Wherever it was, I would be driven there—'because, when we invite someone here,’ he said, ‘we take the responsibility of protecting him from the white devils until he gets wherever it is he's going.' I was, in fact, going to have a drink with several white devils on the other side of town. I confess that for a fraction of a second I hesitated to give the address--the kind of address that in Chicago, as in all American cities, identified itself as a white address by virtue of its location. But I did give it, and Elijah and I walked out onto the steps, and one of the young men vanished to get the car. It was very strange to stand with Elijah for those few moments, facing those vivid, violent, so problematical streets. I felt very close to him, and really wished to be able to love and honour him as a witness, an ally, and a father. I felt that I knew something of his pain and his fury, and, yes, even his beauty. Yet precisely because of the reality and the nature of those streets--because of what he conceived as his responsibility and what I took to be mine--we would always be strangers, and possibly, one day, enemies. The car arrived--a gleaming, metallic, grossly American blue--and Elijah and I shook hands and said good night once more. He walked into his mansion and shut the door...”

[close]

One of the best books I've ever read. That whole portion with THEM is just fucking incredible.

[Chavo]

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shout out to whomever recommended The Big Goodbye and You Can't Win.

Working through those two now

[close]

I just downloaded You Can't Win cause it was referenced a few times in that opium book I just read. I love books about crimes & drugs, and that sounds like a good one.

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Started reading The Fire Next Time on recommendation from @Deputy Wendell on this very page. It's good. Short too, I'm almost finished. Makes me feel like a braniac. Also picked up Confederacy of Dunces but it's way longer than I expected. I'll give it an honest try. Picked up a compilation of Groucho Marx letters, that one I'm really looking forward to.

[close]

Confederacy of Dunces is funny cause if Ignatius was born in the 90s and skated, he would totally post on Slap.

I thought the same about Confederacy of Dunces, not necessarily about being a Slap Pal, but he reminded me of disillusioned skaters from my generation.

[oyolar]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[close]

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

[birdplops]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[close]

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

[close]

Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

I've read a few of the KOK books and number 6 is a total wank. Read the first part and after skimming the second I decided to pass on the third. A Man in Love and A Death in the Family were a joy to read and refreshingly insightful- I don't need to drag myself to the end of The End because it's there and especially when the sole focus casts doubt over the contents of the rest of the series.

When I'm not being a moany trollop, I take great pleasure in reading pairs of books that meaningfully coalesce, like Treasure Island before Swallows and Amazons, though it's mostly coincidence. Having said that, I intentionally finished An Intro to AI for Thinking Humans as I start to get into Klara and the Sun and think I've ruined it.

[AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[close]

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

[close]

Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

At long last, I'm done with Book 6 now. I'm glad I re-read it, and that last part was heartbreaking to take in. Still, it's a book with obvious weaknesses. If you spend 400 pages on Hilter and still don't make your point clear, there might be something wrong with the writing as such. Knausgaard's a terrific writer when he talks about everyday experiences and self-consciousness, but I'm not a fan of his non-fiction. It'll be a while until I pick up one of the Seasons books or one of his first novels.

Ulysses sounds intriguing and I hope to read it one day (thanks for the suggestions!), but I'm not feeling like reading a long book anytime soon. After the Obama memoir and Knausgaard, both of which I read in English (which is not my native tongue), I somehow yearn for short pageturners. Just went to the bookstore and bought the newest novel from one of Germany's best contemporary authors.

[Frank]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

[close]

Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

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Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

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At long last, I'm done with Book 6 now. I'm glad I re-read it, and that last part was heartbreaking to take in. Still, it's a book with obvious weaknesses. If you spend 400 pages on Hilter and still don't make your point clear, there might be something wrong with the writing as such. Knausgaard's a terrific writer when he talks about everyday experiences and self-consciousness, but I'm not a fan of his non-fiction. It'll be a while until I pick up one of the Seasons books or one of his first novels.

Ulysses sounds intriguing and I hope to read it one day (thanks for the suggestions!), but I'm not feeling like reading a long book anytime soon. After the Obama memoir and Knausgaard, both of which I read in English (which is not my native tongue), I somehow yearn for short pageturners. Just went to the bookstore and bought the newest novel from one of Germany's best contemporary authors.

i love 1979. i actually haven't read anything else from him, but that is one of my favorite books ever. i read it when i was 16 and it was pretty new at the time, probably not even a year old. couldn't stop talking to my friends and even teachers at school about it.

[Peter Zagreus]

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@AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice on the subject of long reads, not the highest page count, but James Joyce Ulysses probably took me the longest. I read it over the course of 2 years, taking breaks and rereading parts. When I tried to move too fast I found I wasn't able to parse or retain much. Like you said about your long reads, it was nonetheless a gratifying experience.

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Wow, 2 years is a long period of time, but I see where you're coming from. I tried to read Ulysses after attending a Joyce seminar at university (where we delved into Dubliners Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man), but I just read it like a regular novel, which I guess, isn't really the way to do it. I love Joyce though, and maybe close reading Ulysses a piece at a time makes sense. Did you use any secondary literature?

Speaking of long reads, I'm almost done with My Struggle 6. I enjoyed it much more than when I first tried reading it and stopped somewhere in the Celan essay. Now, I read the Celan poem he talks about beforehand and took away more from that part. The Hitler essay was really interesting, even though I'm not exactly sure how it relates to the rest of the book. I understand that Knausgaard felt like he had to address the topic due to the similarity of the title and he connects his own background to Hitler's and the theme of authenticity, but it still feels like a bit of a stretch. Still, I just thought it was interesting to learn so much I didn't know about Hitler's youth and the Weimar era. I'm in the middle of the last part and reading about his relationship to his (now ex-)wife is heartbreaking. This is where Knausgaard is strongest as a writer IMO: Touching readers on an emotional level, being brutally honest, talking about everyday experiences. It's all there.

[close]

Glad you’re liking Book 6 a lot more and I agree with you 100%. The Hitler part does touch on how mundane his like was and how easily someone can become awful - same why he mentioned Breivik. Like, how evil isn’t always a once in a generation, born a monster type thing it instead a close accumulation of problems and deviancy and then suddenly you’re lost.

I can definitely find some secondary things to share about Ulysses. They’re somewhere in this thread. I’ve read it 3 times (once on my own, twice through two different undergrad classes) and the supplemental material really enriched the experience. I have it on my list to re-read again actually...

[close]

At long last, I'm done with Book 6 now. I'm glad I re-read it, and that last part was heartbreaking to take in. Still, it's a book with obvious weaknesses. If you spend 400 pages on Hilter and still don't make your point clear, there might be something wrong with the writing as such. Knausgaard's a terrific writer when he talks about everyday experiences and self-consciousness, but I'm not a fan of his non-fiction. It'll be a while until I pick up one of the Seasons books or one of his first novels.

Ulysses sounds intriguing and I hope to read it one day (thanks for the suggestions!), but I'm not feeling like reading a long book anytime soon. After the Obama memoir and Knausgaard, both of which I read in English (which is not my native tongue), I somehow yearn for short pageturners. Just went to the bookstore and bought the newest novel from one of Germany's best contemporary authors.

[close]

i love 1979. i actually haven't read anything else from him, but that is one of my favorite books ever. i read it when i was 16 and it was pretty new at the time, probably not even a year old. couldn't stop talking to my friends and even teachers at school about it.

Shoot! Wish my German was good enough to read that. I read Imperium years ago, and really dug it. I've got a a promotional copy of The Dead that I've been sitting on for a while, so maybe I'll read that now that I'm out of school for the summer.

Actually! Speaking of German literature, and long novels, I've been wanting to read Musil's The Man Without Qualities for a while now, and this summer might be the time to do it.

[AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice]

I had no idea Kracht was an author people read around the world. Wow. That's unexpected I guess.

I was on the fence between Eurotrash and 1979. I simply picked the first because it's readily available at bookstore's counters outside (you can't enter bookstores due lockdown restrictions) and the lure of reading a book that just came out. 1979 is at the top of my list though.

I've only heard good things about The Man without Qualities from people who are into Modernist literature. It sounds exciting, but also like a difficult read. I'd be curious to learn what you take away from it.

[Frank]

I had no idea Kracht was an author people read around the world. Wow. That's unexpected I guess.

I was on the fence between Eurotrash and 1979. I simply picked the first because it's readily available at bookstore's counters outside (you can't enter bookstores due lockdown restrictions) and the lure of reading a book that just came out. 1979 is at the top of my list though.

I've only heard good things about The Man without Qualities from people who are into Modernist literature. It sounds exciting, but also like a difficult read. I'd be curious to learn what you take away from it.

1979 is super short, i reckon you can finish it in one sitting, that's what i did. german original isn't even a 100 pages irc.

i'm just getting back into books and i think i want to catch up on kracht now. i remember i wanted to start reading musil, too, way back. but my adhd makes it hard for me to even start works that big like the man without qualities, because it always intimidates me.

ashamed to admit i haven't even started reading the last book i purchased, terranauts by t.c. boyle. i'm a big fan of water music and world's end. i just bought it on a whim when i had a coupon for the book store. got another coupon, if you guys have suggestions for authors similar to t.c. boyle, or thomas pynchon maybe, that would be much appreciated. i like that light beatnik flavor and weirdness without everything going overboard or becoming too incoherent.

[white guy in a durag]

I've been thinkin about this book a lot recently. An excellent haunted house novel for those into horror. I regret giving my copy to my mom because I'm itching to read it again.

[MichaelJacksonsGhost]

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shout out to whomever recommended The Big Goodbye and You Can't Win.

Working through those two now

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I just downloaded You Can't Win cause it was referenced a few times in that opium book I just read. I love books about crimes & drugs, and that sounds like a good one.

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Started reading The Fire Next Time on recommendation from @Deputy Wendell on this very page. It's good. Short too, I'm almost finished. Makes me feel like a braniac. Also picked up Confederacy of Dunces but it's way longer than I expected. I'll give it an honest try. Picked up a compilation of Groucho Marx letters, that one I'm really looking forward to.

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Confederacy of Dunces is funny cause if Ignatius was born in the 90s and skated, he would totally post on Slap.

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I thought the same about Confederacy of Dunces, not necessarily about being a Slap Pal, but he reminded me of disillusioned skaters from my generation.

This is a bit of an older post but I thought I’d respond nonetheless. I read CoD a couple times in college, and actually got the chance to go to New Orleans on this “research grant” to look at Toole’s old haunts and sort of connect Ignatius’ experiences to the actual city. After that, and reading some
biographies about the author (which is an interesting story in and of itself, not to mention the convoluted process of getting CoD published) the book got a lot sadder for me. Almost like the tears of a clown, if that makes sense—using irony as a way to really mask a lot of discontent or Weltschmerz.

On another note, after almost four months of reading, I’m down to the last fifty pages of the last volume of In Remembrance of Things Past. My god had it been a journey of a book. I feel like Proust has just totally hijacked my brain and revamped my thinking and the general structure of my thoughts. That being said, I already know I’m going to have to give it another perusal in a couple years; there’s just so much going on, so many things throughout the book that connect seemingly innocuous yet intricate ways. Anyone read Proust and have any takeaways from their experience? I’m keen to hear what other people got out of it.

[botefdunn]

I read several volumes of Proust, not all of them, that was never the intention. I was pretty young and I remember it had a calming effect on me, kind of inspiring a sort of comfort that life isn't just a series of disparate, lost moments. I thought maybe it would be a good idea to try and emulate this work, but I stopped thinking that long ago, I like moving around too much.

[TheLurper]

Picked up a copy of The Redneck Manifesto by Jim Goad at the used bookstore yesterday. I'm about half-way through and it is pretty terrible so far.The author leans heavily on partial truths and is purposefully offensive in a dumb way.

It is basically a book written by everyone's angry racist white uncle that somehow thinks the best way of bringing attention to the problems of poor white men is to belittle the problems of everyone else. He also thinks throwing out racial slurs to support his belief that accusations of racism (not racism, which doesn't exist or matter as of 1997) are the real problem in society. And, he pretends that only poor white men are made fun of in society.

It is terrible as a completed book, but it is an interesting look into the angry world view of Goad and those like him. Sadly, it reinforces the stereotype that Goad supposedly wanted to break when writing this book. Goad is very much the angry, violent, dumb, and hateful person rednecks get stereotyped to be and his book is evidence of his poor character.

Working class white dudes need a better advocate/voice than this dipshit.

[slappies]

Picked up a copy of The Redneck Manifesto by Jim Goad at the used bookstore yesterday. I'm about half-way through and it is pretty terrible so far.The author leans heavily on partial truths and is purposefully offensive in a dumb way.

It is basically a book written by everyone's angry racist white uncle that somehow thinks the best way of bringing attention to the problems of poor white men is to belittle the problems of everyone else. He also thinks throwing out racial slurs to support his belief that accusations of racism (not racism, which doesn't exist or matter as of 1997) are the real problem in society. And, he pretends that only poor white men are made fun of in society.

It is terrible as a completed book, but it is an interesting look into the angry world view of Goad and those like him. Sadly, it reinforces the stereotype that Goad supposedly wanted to break when writing this book. Goad is very much the angry, violent, dumb, and hateful person rednecks get stereotyped to be and his book is evidence of his poor character.

Working class white dudes need a better advocate/voice than this dipshit.

Jim Goad is the blueprint for guys like Gavin McInnes. It's interesting hearing how much Answer Me! ended up influencing people that ended up leading very, very different careers than Goad.

[TheLurper]

Jim Goad is the blueprint for guys like Gavin McInnes. It's interesting hearing how much Answer Me! ended up influencing people that ended up leading very, very different careers than Goad.

I had no clue who this guy was before you posted this. I found an interview of McInnes interviewing Goad. What a shit show.

Also, this book is a wild ride. Overall it is terrible. The first few chapters are the absolute worst, but at times, he can be an interesting story teller: His discussion of the "working-class" bar is interesting, although it is framed through a lens that promotes/normalizes the worst aspects of "working-class" life and contradicts itself. And, I'm now at the part where he is comparing being raped by Bigfoot to wanting Jesus's love or (the stereotype of) a white woman wanting (the hyper sexualized/masculine) black guy's dick over his emasculated down trodden white working class counterpart. The book is fucking stupid, but I get why Simon and Schuster gave this huckster a book (same publisher that was going to give Milo a book).

It is weird some of his critiques of capitalism could be found in Marx and Engels. This I think this the most interesting aspect of this form of far-right conservatism. It hates capitalism and it hates the bosses, but its proponents wouldn't have it any other way.

[oyolar]

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Jim Goad is the blueprint for guys like Gavin McInnes. It's interesting hearing how much Answer Me! ended up influencing people that ended up leading very, very different careers than Goad.

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I had no clue who this guy was before you posted this. I found an interview of McInnes interviewing Goad. What a shit show.

Also, this book is a wild ride. Overall it is terrible. The first few chapters are the absolute worst, but at times, he can be an interesting story teller: His discussion of the "working-class" bar is interesting, although it is framed through a lens that promotes/normalizes the worst aspects of "working-class" life and contradicts itself. And, I'm now at the part where he is comparing being raped by Bigfoot to wanting Jesus's love or (the stereotype of) a white woman wanting (the hyper sexualized/masculine) black guy's dick over his emasculated down trodden white working class counterpart. The book is fucking stupid, but I get why Simon and Schuster gave this huckster a book (same publisher that was going to give Milo a book).

It is weird some of his critiques of capitalism could be found in Marx and Engels. This I think this the most interesting aspect of this form of far-right conservatism. It hates capitalism and it hates the bosses, but its proponents wouldn't have it any other way.

Well, they just hate the bosses in charge now. They'd be fine with bullies and strongmen in charge - or at least bosses/politicians who match them ethnically/ideologically/etc. That's why fascism is actually an anti-capitalist politics as well: the far right think that the free market can be manipulated by "lesser" people so they need to be removed from the equation because it harms the "better" people and that if we didn't have capitalism, the strongest people who are currently most oppressed despite being the most deserving would be in better socioeconomic positions. Goad's (and people like him, McInnes', etc.) criticisms of capitalism aren't about how they oppress everyone and we all need liberation from an oppressive structure - their problems are that capitalism oppresses people like them and they don't deserve it - capitalism should only be allowed to oppress other people.

[AnotherHardDayAtTheOffice]

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I had no idea Kracht was an author people read around the world. Wow. That's unexpected I guess.

I was on the fence between Eurotrash and 1979. I simply picked the first because it's readily available at bookstore's counters outside (you can't enter bookstores due lockdown restrictions) and the lure of reading a book that just came out. 1979 is at the top of my list though.

I've only heard good things about The Man without Qualities from people who are into Modernist literature. It sounds exciting, but also like a difficult read. I'd be curious to learn what you take away from it.

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1979 is super short, i reckon you can finish it in one sitting, that's what i did. german original isn't even a 100 pages irc.

i'm just getting back into books and i think i want to catch up on kracht now. i remember i wanted to start reading musil, too, way back. but my adhd makes it hard for me to even start works that big like the man without qualities, because it always intimidates me.

ashamed to admit i haven't even started reading the last book i purchased, terranauts by t.c. boyle. i'm a big fan of water music and world's end. i just bought it on a whim when i had a coupon for the book store. got another coupon, if you guys have suggestions for authors similar to t.c. boyle, or thomas pynchon maybe, that would be much appreciated. i like that light beatnik flavor and weirdness without everything going overboard or becoming too incoherent.

Yeah, I'll definitely pick up 1979 some time soon. The only book by Kracht I had read was Faserland and I feel like I'd prefer Eurotrash over it, even though that's the novel that put him on the map and everyone's raving about it. That might be a silly starting point, but the narrator in Faserland was too much of snob for me. Eurotrash is a much more human and mature, but is just as sarcastic.

Haven't read any TC Boyle book since high school. We discussed The Tortilla Curtain in my English class and I was too young to get it, I guess. Which of his novels would you suggest though? Based on your description, I feel like I could be into his writing.