Case (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
case) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomsecrets2011-01-26 04:05 pm
case) wrote in fandomsecrets2011-01-26 04:05 pm
[ SECRET POST #1485 ]
⌈ Secret Post #1485 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
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[image possibly triggery for self-injury]
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Notes:
Friending meme is still going!
Secrets Left to Post: 06 pages, 134 secrets from Secret Submission Post #212.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 1 - too big ], [ 1 and again 2 - repeat ], [ 1 - what ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
no subject
Will you please name one of these mysterious shitty books that everyone claims are wonderful but are actually shit? It's really hard to meet your demand of giving clear, precise reasons that a series of hundreds of works is relevant and important, particularly when you keep falling back on the fact that some (one? ten? all?) of the works on that list are "shitty" without providing any reasoning.
no subject
The Sound and the Fury
Hunger
Pride and Prejudice
ANYTHING JAMES JOYCE EVER WROTE
no subject
Luckily, you've actually picked a good selection from my point of view, because I love one, and don't like one, and hated another before I liked it. The fourth I haven't read. Also, they're quite modern... I think the oldest book on your list is P&P, which isn't quite 2 centuries old. So really, you're talking about fairly recent fiction rather than the "western canon", no?
Pride and Prejudice is my favorite novel of all time, and I happen to think Austen is a brilliant writer, but since taste isn't the issue here, I'll explain what I think are its greatest contributions. First, it provides an intimate view of the role of women in Regency England from the point of view of a woman, and an imperfect woman at that. That alone is pretty unique, and certainly a perspective worth knowing. It gives a portrait of genteel country life at the time, celebrating what Austen saw as the pure and good ideals, while pointing out the foibles and contradictions common to the class and to society as a whole. Austen's work is especially interesting because, although she was writing during the height of the Napoleonic Wars, her novels make almost no reference to the wars or their effects on the everyday lives of the English. The books present an idealized view of love and marriage, English manners, and proper living, but at the same time are an excellent example of social satire, betraying some of Austen's true thoughts on the state of the gentility and society in general. Overall quite witty, an excellent example of novels about women, by women, that focus on the everyday experiences of those women (as opposed to the excessive gothic novels that were more common at the time). One of the earliest examples of the modern novel.
I'll pick Ulysses as the Joyce example, since you didn't specify, and it's certainly one of the most difficult modern classics to work through (although quite entertaining on a second or third read, most people find). It's an early example of stream-of-consciousness, which is a literary technique that pervades modern narrative. It is extensively structured and quite complex, which makes it hard to get through the first time without taking notes, but that structure allows Joyce to illustrate an insane number of modern writing techniques and styles, all of which have been influential in later work. It provides insight into human emotions and thought processes (always interesting), and gives a view of life at the time it was written. I hated it the first time I read it, but after I saw part of a 24-hour reading (because a guy at a bar told me about it) I gave it a second try and it was definitely worth the work. The novel takes place over the course of 24 hours, and can be read in 24 hours, which adds a dimension rarely seen in a written work.
As for The Sound and the Fury, that one isn't to my liking at all. What I took from it was an interesting commentary on the failure of antebellum Southern culture to translate into modern times, and the failures of the South as a society in general, and the damage done by pigeonholing women into specific sexual roles which define their places in society (madonna-or-whore type of thing). This is actually a great example of a book that I personally dislike, written in a style that I think is unnecessarily confusing, but which is still valuable as a literary work despite my personal preferences.
I haven't read Hunger, so I really can't comment on that one.
Now you tell me why they don't have any merit.
no subject
The worst part about the book is that it has no point. Oh look at this guy, he's starving and crazy. THAT'S THE ENTIRE BOOK. It's a load of self-indulgent wash with no redeeming value, yet apparently it gets praised as the beginning of modern literature (it was published in 1890) because the author (who I should note, was an advocate for Hitler and the Nazis) picked up a few prose tips from his time in the United States.
no subject