ThunderPeel2001

Books, books, books...

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Starting Heart of Darkness for the first time and it has that classic text feel where a wonderfully executed story is also very much racist.

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I read some cool books in the past month.

 

I read The Third Reich, by Roberto Bolano. It's another of his post-humous works, and it is not one of his best. It is pretty scattered, and while it builds tension in a very effective way, the expected apocalyptic climax never seems to arrive (this may be intentional, since many of his books have the same feeling to them). It is about a young German grognard, a rising star in European wargaming, on vacation with his girlfriend. The book is sort of split between two aspects of his vacation: his time with his girlfriend and another German couple, and his time spent playing a wargame, entitled "The Third Reich". Violence seems to lurk right around the corner and there is a very unsettling feeling throughout the whole book. It's typical Bolano and not likely to convince anyone who doesn't already like him, but I enjoyed it very much.

 

I especially liked the way the book addressed wargames. Bolano himself was apparently an avid war-gamer, but he must have had mixed feelings about them. In my view, the book treats war games as basically unhealthy (I think): they give the main character an illusion of control and of mastery of violence, but they also distract him from the violence (and threat of violence) that is right before him. Through the "Third Reich" wargame, he is convinced he can "win" WW2, but in the end, all he does is teach others how to use violence more effectively. As a narrative device, the war game is also interesting: the progress of the war game mirrors the main characters own progress and downfall. Interesting stuff, and novel (to me at least).

 

I also read Hell House by Richard Matheson, which I take it is a classic in the haunted house genre. I thought it was pretty good: it had moments of genuine spookiness and the somewhat dated pseudo-science was charming. I then watched an old BBC movie adaptation, which was hilarious: it was kind of like Clive Barker directs Masterpiece Theatre. 

 

I read Throne of the Crescent Moon, by Saladin Ahmed. It is basically a swords-and-sorcery romp set in an Arabian-Nights themed fantasy world. I liked it. Totally fun summer reading. The somewhat different setting livened up what would otherwise have been a pretty by-the-numbers fantasy yarn. It's also refreshingly brief: maybe 300 pages or so? I think it is the first book in a planned series. 

 

I'm nearly finished The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, by Haruki Murakami. I will have more to say on this when I'm done, but so far I love it. One of the best books I've read in ages. 

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I'm nearly finished The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles, by Haruki Murakami. I will have more to say on this when I'm done, but so far I love it. One of the best books I've read in ages. 

 

It's good isn't it?

Just finished Sputnik Darling by Murakami and as with all the books I've read by him I've really enjoyed his writing. However, as with the other books, it left me slightly confused as to what exactly was going on or what the message of it all was.

 

I'm thinking I might have to give all his books another go to just to see if I pick up something the second time around.

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Does anyone know if Kafka on the Shore is representative of Murakami's work? Because I really did not enjoy that book.

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That's a shame, I remember absolutely loving that book. Any particular reason why you didn't enjoy it?

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It was chock-full of the author being self-congratulatory about his erudition in a manner I found very grating (name-dropping classical music and books for no good reason), and there was basically zero payoff for me plot-wise in that the ending felt hollow, empty and resolved nothing. I don't mind a book being vague and confusing for a large part as long as things are tied up somehow, and Kafka did none of that for me. Perhaps being more grounded in Japanese culture could make things clearer but it's popular enough in western climes that that's probably not it.

 

This might not be entirely accurate any more, I read it several years back and as I said hated it so didn't exactly try to store anything except my opinion about it.

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Yes, I would say that it is quite representative in that regard. Most of Murakami's books have characters who are deeply invested in classical music and literature in some way or another. The biggest difference with Kafka on the shore is that it is the most explicitly supernatural of his books(Followed by the Wind-up bird chronicle), the rest mostly have odd occurrences and characters.

 

As for the ending... Yeah. As far as I've understood it is a common thing with Japanese novelists (at least according to my sister and the books she's read). They seem not to subscribe to the Western three act structure. I find it challenging and interesting to read something like that, but I can clearly see how it wouldn't work for a lot of people.

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I'm amused by how much criticism on this board is rooted in traditional Western criticism without questioning several assumptions, such as the three-act structure. Western literature is all about exploring the state of the family in post-millennial America. It is subtle. The stuff most people admire is rooted in everyday existence.

The world greatly varies on how literature is viewed, and reading a book by a Pakistani novelist or a classical Arab poet - say Al Mutanabbi - with certain assumptions is an exercise in frustration.

Take Arabic. It's a grandiose language, but allows for a lot of curve; the letters are quite blunt, but the way they are distributed allows for incessant flow. This results in the language being musical and magnificent, but completely blocks it from any sort of subtlety. This also meant that most great Arabic literature was capital R Romantic or at least partially of the fantasy genre.

If authors like Naguib Mahfouz write more commonly-accepted "literary" novels, it's because they switched from classical to modern, guttural Arabic, which allows for a bit more subtlety, especially in the dialogue.

So approaching international literature can be tricky business if you do it with your set of assumptions unquestioned.

I'd actually be interested in seeing the Thumbs Cast tackle something like that. Spring Snow by Yukio Mishima and (I'm struggling to think of something suitable minus context, so let's go with 20th century literature) The Thief and the Dogs by Naguib Mahfouz come to mind.

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I've read a few Mahfouz novels, and I'm not really sure I understand your point. Are you saying non-Western literature doesn't deal with every day life -- because the Mahfouz books I read definitely did -- or are you trying to say something about the use of language?

 

Maybe I haven't read enough international literature, but I'm not sure that I entirely buy the idea that the traditional structure of a novel is a purely 'Western' construct.

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I'd even say that the lack of conventional resolution isn't uncommon amongst literary fiction, which happens to be the fiction most likely to find its way into translation (outside of a few huge successes, which tend to follow the traditional structure).

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Yeah I feel my comment was unclear and/or misinterpreted. What I meant was that the end of Kafka to me seemed like it might actually feel like a resolution to someone more familiar with whatever Japanese stuff was being referenced with all the kami/shinto business, not that I found the actual structure of the book to be alien/offputting. It was the content, not the lack of three acts (my favourite books eschew this sort of rigid framework in fact).

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I've read a few Mahfouz novels, and I'm not really sure I understand your point. Are you saying non-Western literature doesn't deal with every day life -- because the Mahfouz books I read definitely did -- or are you trying to say something about the use of language?

I'm saying that the language itself informed the literature; because Arabic is so majestic but blunt, the stories were the same way. There's no room for the mundane. Arabic is about hammering words in; English is carefully chiseling them out.

 

Ask a person which band is their favourite, and they'll answer "Van fucking Halen". They need to emphasize with the fucking. Well, in Arabic, you don't need to do that.

 

The stories, in other words, were a reflection of the language itself.

 

As for Mahfouz: 20th century literature was different. Novelists finally adapted modern Arabic, which is far less grandiose, and the stories themselves were a bit of a push-back against the fantastical realm that the work had been set in - hence why Ahmed Shawqi and Naguib Mahfouz's books are more familiar to modern readers than the weird, philosophical, fantastical ones that preceded them.

 

This is mostly my theory, I should hasten to add, but it's one I find makes a lot of sense.

 

Either way, Arabic literature has traditionally been the polar opposite of English/American in this regard, and therefore so has the criticism.

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I finished Wind-up Bird Chronicles  a few days ago. I really ended up liking it a lot, and I keep finding myself trying to puzzle out the relationship between the characters and "solve" the ending of the novel (although it may not be solvable at all). 


Some thoughts:

 

The woman in the hotel room is Kumiko. She was calling Toru while waiting for "gentlemen callers" in real life. That much seems pretty clear. But there's also a relationship between the woman in the hotel room and the other female characters. For example, the woman in the hotel room speaks with the voice of other female characters. The woman in the hotel room is always shrouded in darkness and doesn't want Toru to illuminate her with his flashlight; shortly thereafter, May Kasuhara has a vision of her own shadow as a grown woman. That shadow woman cries warm tears, then Toru is almost drowned by lukewarm water in his well. These are all connected in someway, but I don't know how.

 

Duality is a theme in this book a lot, so I speculate that the woman in the hotel is some aspect of all the female characters in the book (May, Kumiko, Nutmeg, and Creta, at least). 

 

Toru and Noburo also exhibit some kind of duality: Noburo has the ability to split people into two aspects (as he did to Creta), while Toru seems to have the ability to heal. They are described as complete opposites and hate each other totally.

 

Toru is assisted by Cinnamon, who is the mirror image of Noboru's private eye (whose name I forget): Cinnamon is beautiful and impeccably dressed, but cannot speak, while the private eye is hideous and badly dressed, but talks up a storm. 

 

Anyway very cool book. Not a lot of clear answers but tons to think about. 

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I read Stoner, by John Wililams. I read this book based on recommendations in the Book Club thread from Osmosisch and Thyroid. It is a short novel about the adult life of an academic. Williams writes in a very plain style that is restrained and elegant. The book is told entirely from the perspective of Stoner, a  farm boy who goes on to lead a mostly undistinguished life as a professor in a small mid-western university. 

 

I didn't really like this book much. Parts of it are very beautiful, particularly the way Williams writes about the progress of Stoner's inner life. The moments early in the book when Stoner learns that he could be an English teacher touched me very much. I also loved the end of the book.

 

My problem with the book is that while Stoner and a few other characters are very well drawn, other characters seemed totally one-dimensional. Stoner's wife is one of the coldest harpies I have ever encountered in any book, who seems to live only to tear down Stoner. The book treats her with very little understanding or empathy, and I never really understood what her motivations were. Another example is Katherine, Stoner's mid-life fling. She is a much younger woman and one of Stoner's students. The book portrays their relationship as sort of a Platonic ideal of romance, both utterly passionate and compassionate for one another. But I have no idea why Katherine and Stoner fell in love, and I found their relationship inexplicable and hence unbelievable. It also made me feel uncomfortable, in that to the extent that the book considers what might be wrong with a relationship between an older teacher and a younger student it seems to say there is nothing wrong with it, and that society is wrong for opposing it. 

 

I guess I felt like the book felt too hagiographic. It doesn't portray Stoner as a saint, exactly, but the book sets up certain characters as unmediated villains (one of Stoner's graduate students, Stoner's wife) and other characters are not well drawn. 

 

I'm still glad I read it. Out of the many, many books written about English professors, I'd say this is one of the better ones. 

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I'm glad you enjoyed it! 

 

I have to say I don't agree that the secondary characters are poorly drawn, it's just that their motivations are only stated subtly and usually in one or two places at most.

 

I did not find Edith's motivations to be unclear at all - she's been warped by her upbringing, and has gotten basically nothing she wanted out of her marriage. Her reaction (an entirely obvious and human one) is to try and make Stoner as miserable as she is. This is corroborated in the deathbed scene.

 

Similarly, bright but lazy grad students attempting to coast by on a specific connection with a flawed faculty member are not far-fetched to me.

 

Finally the romance is...well, hero-worship is a thing, and being stuck in a loveless marriage is likely to bring in the goat in anyone. I did not find this part inexplicable either.

 

Your objection that the romance isn't presented as ethically troubling is the only one I share. It made me feel a bit icky. But then the book does not make judgement on almost any ethical dilemma; they are mostly stated as is, and the viewer is left to decide. Was Edith justified in how she acted? Stoner certainly seems to think so on his deathbed.

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I'm glad you enjoyed it! 

 

I have to say I don't agree that the secondary characters are poorly drawn, it's just that their motivations are only stated subtly and usually in one or two places at most.

 

I did not find Edith's motivations to be unclear at all - she's been warped by her upbringing, and has gotten basically nothing she wanted out of her marriage. Her reaction (an entirely obvious and human one) is to try and make Stoner as miserable as she is. This is corroborated in the deathbed scene.

 

Similarly, bright but lazy grad students attempting to coast by on a specific connection with a flawed faculty member are not far-fetched to me.

 

Finally the romance is...well, hero-worship is a thing, and being stuck in a loveless marriage is likely to bring in the goat in anyone. I did not find this part inexplicable either.

 

Your objection that the romance isn't presented as ethically troubling is the only one I share. It made me feel a bit icky. But then the book does not make judgement on almost any ethical dilemma; they are mostly stated as is, and the viewer is left to decide. Was Edith justified in how she acted? Stoner certainly seems to think so on his deathbed.

I don't mean that the characters are far fetched, really, just that they are more archetypes or sketches than they are fully realized. Like the grad student felt to me like Williams just inserted "archetypal lazy grad student" rather than developing an actual character. Same thing with Edith: she just felt like the archetypal crazy house wife rather than an actual character. They're both more like plot devices than actual characters, in that they exist solely as foils to Stoner as opposed to being believable characters in their own rights. 

 

In terms of Katherine, I suppose you could say she fell in love with Stoner as a kind of hero-worship, but what heroism is she worshiping exactly? I guess Stoner is supposed to be a great teacher, but I never understood what made him great. I felt like the book kept telling me that he was a great teacher and that his students liked him without actually showing me why he was a great teacher. So when Katherine fell in love with him it just made no sense to me. Likewise, Katherine is such a bland character that I didn't understand why Stoner fell in love with her. In theory she wrote a really great paper that spoke to Stoner, but the book never really explains what was great about her paper or why Stoner felt moved by it. Katherine is such a non-entity as a character that I have trouble even remembering anything at all about her personality, even though I just finished the book. 

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Ohhh I completely misunderstood what you said. That makes a lot more sense.

 

That aspect (characters being sketches) I found not so jarring either because to me it underlined the loneliness and isolation in which Stoner has placed himself. There is not a single relationship he has with anyone that is unreservedly close.He has so much trouble throughout his life relating to other people that it causes his relationships to and knowledge of others to be mostly sketchlike. The book has two threads in my mind: one of tragedy (Stoner's inability to connnect meaningfully with anyone except a doomed relationship) and one of victory (his discovery of a passion that gives meaning to his life, ie. literature and the teaching thereof).

 

That's completely my interpretation of course, but it made me really appreciate the novel.

 

As far as the romance/Katherine is concerned, I don't know what to say except I was completely able to empathise with the arc, but that might just be my mind doing a lot of the legwork filling in the pieces. A lot of the questions you raise I basically filled-in my own answers to. For example, I don't feel like I need the words to a lecture to accept the statement that he's giving a great lecture. I feel the 'show, don't tell' adagium has been overstressed a bit lately. But my explanation for why Stoner and Katherine fall in love is mainly that for both it's the first time they've found someone that they can really relate to, as is stressed several times in the description of their romance. The strength of such an experience cannot be understated to me.

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Correcting a literary blind spot by finally reading Brave New World. Out of all the dystopian future societies, I would say that Idiocracy still looks to be the most accurate.

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Sorry, couldnt go through 74 pages of this thread. Thyroid, are you of Arabic origin or are you just on a Orientalist-binge for a bit ?

 

I'm currently between Patrick Rothfuss, Lovecraft, and wrapping up some Frank Herbert.

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!يا للهول


...ايدل ثمز"...ألعاب ألعاب الفيديو ألعاب ألعاب الفيديو ألعاب ألعاب الفيديو ألعاب ألعاب الفيديو"


!انظر على ا الساحر...الساحر

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I get

! Oh Hall

... Idol Thmz "... Games video games video games video games video games"

! See a magician ... magician

Cool :D

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Correcting a literary blind spot by finally reading Brave New World. Out of all the dystopian future societies, I would say that Idiocracy still looks to be the most accurate.

 

Excellent.  And an excellent book.

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