Now Reading Thread

[kmik]

There are no great passages in Madame Bovary, but then again, Tolstoy and Hemingway don't have any, too. There is a neat satirical part when the intimate words of love from Rudolph are juxtaposed with the hypocrisy of some stupid speech, which is an original technique for the time, I believe. And there are parts with subtle irony when he describes thing both objectively and through Emma's romantic eyes. But no, language is not a character in this book. Flaubert's almost scientific working habits have their disadvantages. A matter of taste, as you say (it was Joyce's favorite novel, though!).

Has anyone read Underworld by Don DeLillo? I've never read anything by this guy but its supposedly very good. Pretty long, however, so I hope its worth it..

 

[Murphy]

There are no great passages in Madame Bovary, but then again, Tolstoy and Hemingway don't have any, too. There is a neat satirical part when the intimate words of love from Rudolph are juxtaposed with the hypocrisy of some stupid speech, which is an original technique for the time, I believe. And there are parts with subtle irony when he describes thing both objectively and through Emma's romantic eyes. But no, language is not a character in this book. Flaubert's almost scientific working habits have their disadvantages. A matter of taste, as you say (it was Joyce's favorite novel, though!

Ah, then we are in agreement. I'm suprised how funny the book was though, especially towards the end when Homais takes over the show and Voltaires influence on Flaubert shines through.

I wouldn't trust Joyce (or any writer) when it comes to great books. He famously held Ibsen in higher esteem than Shakespeare, liked childish and shallow poetry and failed to see Proust's excellence.

 

[speed]

There are no great passages in Madame Bovary, but then again, Tolstoy and Hemingway don't have any, too. There is a neat satirical part when the intimate words of love from Rudolph are juxtaposed with the hypocrisy of some stupid speech, which is an original technique for the time, I believe. And there are parts with subtle irony when he describes thing both objectively and through Emma's romantic eyes. But no, language is not a character in this book. Flaubert's almost scientific working habits have their disadvantages. A matter of taste, as you say (it was Joyce's favorite novel, though!).

Has anyone read Underworld by Don DeLillo? I've never read anything by this guy but its supposedly very good. Pretty long, however, so I hope its worth it..

Thats all a matter of opinion. There are countless excellent passages in Flaubert and Tolstoy. Poetic passages.

I read his latest novel, Falling Man a few months ago. It was quite mediocre.

Anthony Burgess of course, wrote a Clockwork Orange and Earthly Powers among others. He was a master of language; but more specifically dialogue, patterns of speech, etc. His novels are decent, but made worthwhile by his amazing mastery of the spoken language.

I will have to post quite a bit more later. Some excellent discussion here.

 

[kmik]

Precisely the reason why Tolstoy and Flaubert are so great, in my opinion, that they don't have so called poetic passages. See, young, mediocre writers, who follow show-don't-tell philosophy, have this tendency to put their major ideas in a single passage but tend to "show" the unimportant. So we get a description instead of a "this was a beautiful house", but when it comes to feelings we get the side effects ("he was shaking" instead of really discussing what it means to be scared), and the philosophy or ideas are put in some characters mouth or described poetically to some effect. Great writers show everything; if they have something smart to say, they let it be inferred from the book in its entirely. That aside, Flaubert and Tolstoy may have "beautiful" passages so to speak, but they're not poetic in the conventional sense since they don't manipulate language to some effect, and their choice of words and sentence structure are secondary to "meaning". Contrast that against Joyce.
"Uncle Charles and Dante clapped. They were older than his father and mother but uncle Charles was older than Dante." Replacing "his father and mother" with "parents" is much more elegant but the whole effect of this sentence is lost. It is not so much about the age of uncle Charles and Dante as it is about the way a child thinks, with many "buts" and the attempts to have analogies everywhere. That's poetry.

Homias is one of the most hilarious characters in literature... but I wasn't laughing. It was bleak, if anything... he made me feel uncomfortable, at the end, especially. Another funny character that comes to mind is Kolya Krasotkin, the little 13-year-old socialist boy from The Brothers Karamazov. Now THAT's pure brilliance

 

[kmik]

If anyone's interested there's a site with Joyce's literary tastes:

http://www.robotwisdom.com/jaj/tastes.html

It's weird that the guy who wrote Finnegans Wake has this kind of taste... And it is said that he liked Yeats, even though he was supposedly opposed to Celtic revivalism. An interesting read, nonetheless

 

[kmik]

Finished Turgenev's "Fathers and Sons" today. All the way through, I couldn't stop thinking about Dostoevsky. They are very similar authors in many respects. Most notably, their characters represent wider social allegories. Plus, that Russian tendency to choose titles like Crime and Punishment, War and Peace, Fathers and Sons (lol). However he is a lesser writer. This novel only seems to touch the surface level... I was reading pretty fast, I must admit, but Bazarov seems, at best, like something Dostoevski would use as a joke. His ideas are somewhat dated. At heart he's a proto-Bolshevik. Then again, so are Raskolnikov's - however, the latter terrifies... every fucking Fight Club fan or something can tell you about Raskolnikov's theories, but his confusion and his pride and irrationalism make him such a real figure. And Bazarov merely... uhm... makes you think. It's not very clear how his ideology is connected to his feelings. He is humane, realistic, alright... but I tried to hate him and couldn't. He is not dangerous enough for such an extreme figure.. Turgenev hints at the possibility he uses extremism as a means of forming an identity, and he cannot repress his feelings. There's something very genuine about him, and I like how he is portrayed as somewhat of a mysterious figure to others even though he's just a shallow materialist. Perhaps not portraying his inner thoughts adds to the "atmosphere"? But it's hard to really feel any of the characters in the novel, they are characters. I felt emotionally distant even though the plotting, writing and ideas are superb. The topic is too "big" for such a short novel, though. At least there are no moral judgments. My appreciation for Dostoevski has increased

 

[Murphy]

Great writers show everything; if they have something smart to say, they let it be inferred from the book in its entirely.

They do, and the best of them do it while writing artful, as Joyce, Beckett, Pynchon and Woolf.

That aside, Flaubert and Tolstoy may have "beautiful" passages so to speak, but they're not poetic in the conventional sense since they don't manipulate language to some effect, and their choice of words and sentence structure are secondary to "meaning".

For Flaubert the work as a whole should be like a smooth, crystal clear surface (he once compared his ideal to the walls of the Parthenon), so you will never find anything overtly unbalanced in Madame that intentionally rips itself apart from the greater structure in a poetical paroxysm. But it is in no way true that words or sentence structure is secondary to meaning. I’d argue that diction and stylistic considerations are the things that shape the content in Madame Bovary, not the other way around.

(The more I talk about the book, the more I feel that I need to re-read it and perhaps revaluate it.)

Contrast that against Joyce.
"Uncle Charles and Dante clapped. They were older than his father and mother but uncle Charles was older than Dante." Replacing "his father and mother" with "parents" is much more elegant but the whole effect of this sentence is lost. It is not so much about the age of uncle Charles and Dante as it is about the way a child thinks, with many "buts" and the attempts to have analogies everywhere. That's poetry.

Madame Bovary is full of such passages.

Homias is one of the most hilarious characters in literature... but I wasn't laughing. It was bleak, if anything... he made me feel uncomfortable, at the end, especially. Another funny character that comes to mind is Kolya Krasotkin, the little 13-year-old socialist boy from The Brothers Karamazov. Now THAT's pure brilliance

The end made me both laugh and cry (figuratively speaking) due to Flaubert’s constant change of perspectives and the always lingering insipid and bourgeois reality that presses on the passages, like this wonderful bit:

“On the grave among the firs knelt a young boy, weeping and sobbing in the darkness, his heart overflowing with an immense grief that was tender as the moon and unfathomable as night. Suddenly the gate creaked. It was Lestiboudois, come to fetch his spade, which he had forgotten a while before. He recognized Justin clambering over the wall: at last he knew who was stealing his potatoes.”

Now reading:

Leaves of Grass – interesting and sometimes very good.
Père Goriot – story wise it’s rather capturing, but not much of an artwork.
Pride and Prejudice – don’t know yet.

 

[kmik]

Perhaps a beautiful passage so to speak is not defined very clearly. Coming to think about it I can't recall any great passages period. Some that stand out more than the rest, some that stand on their own, but I tend to enjoy books as books. It's akin to a "great riff".

Now consider a "beautiful" passage that sucks - a lesser writer could add a nice paragraph to his own version of The Crying of Lot 49 along the lines of "Information leads to more information, not to wisdom" and it would be nice and all but the novel is much more effective than that because it expands upon it. Plus I hate it when there are passages that are unrelated to the novel as a whole but are "smart", or unnecessary remarks that don't add anything at all. Flaubert and Tolstoy don't have these and for that I appreciate them. You are right that language is a hero in Madame Bovary, of course it, that is it's stylistic greatness and innovation (in that passage you quote, which is funny, we can see the stylistic contrasts between the two halves, plus "potatoes" is a funny word) but it is a well known fact that language and style became more and more important in literature with time. To say however that style dictates content there is a bit too far-reaching I think. Anyway, Tolstoy and Flaubert just seem to go hand in hand for me, and I've recently read The Death of Ivan Ilyich which is not very experimental in this regard (it has a simplistic style, which is suitable for the story, or perhaps it's like that so that you are not distracted - in any event it's not the focus of the work) and that was the thing that crossed my mind then.

I just needed some Dostoevsky after Turgenev so I started "The Idiot" today. Feeling at home. After 4 pages already it was clear it is going to be a masterpiece. Also started "The Waves" - read a few pages, quite slowly, but didn't seem to understand anything. Too many characters were saying obscure things at the begining and it had been like I have not read anything because I couldn't remember who said what and what it actually was that he said and what what he said meant . I'm used to reading real quick but this one I guess I'll have to take slower. Certainly a re-reading is a must

P.S
Does your reading go backwards or something? Familiar with Pynchon and Beckett but just now coming to read Madame Bovary and Pride and Prejudice. Somewhat odd.

 

[Nile577]

Plus I hate it when there are passages that are unrelated to the novel as a whole but are "smart", or unnecessary remarks that don't add anything at all. Flaubert and Tolstoy don't have these and for that I appreciate them.

Tolstoy is noted for such diversions. Have a look at the "election" section of the latter part of Anna Karenin, for example. I would not describe him as an economical writer at all.

 

[Murphy]

Perhaps a beautiful passage so to speak is not defined very clearly. Coming to think about it I can't recall any great passages period. Some that stand out more than the rest, some that stand on their own, but I tend to enjoy books as books. It's akin to a "great riff".

Now consider a "beautiful" passage that sucks - a lesser writer could add a nice paragraph to his own version of The Crying of Lot 49 along the lines of "Information leads to more information, not to wisdom" and it would be nice and all but the novel is much more effective than that because it expands upon it.

Of course, great writing is not created by one-liners or Nietzschean aphorisms. The ideas/meanings have to become a physical presence in the work, the work have to mean itself. Only then is the necessary space created for truly sublime passages that will tremble through the whole structure. But I do understand your standpoint, and at least we seem to dislike the same bad writing.

Plus I hate it when there are passages that are unrelated to the novel as a whole but are "smart", or unnecessary remarks that don't add anything at all. Flaubert and Tolstoy don't have these and for that I appreciate them. You are right that language is a hero in Madame Bovary, of course it, that is it's stylistic greatness and innovation (in that passage you quote, which is funny, we can see the stylistic contrasts between the two halves, plus "potatoes" is a funny word) but it is a well known fact that language and style became more and more important in literature with time.

Starting with Flaubert (and then you will always have Shakespeare and Dante looming in the background).

To say however that style dictates content there is a bit too far-reaching I think. Anyway, Tolstoy and Flaubert just seem to go hand in hand for me, and I've recently read The Death of Ivan Ilyich which is not very experimental in this regard (it has a simplistic style, which is suitable for the story, or perhaps it's like that so that you are not distracted - in any event it's not the focus of the work) and that was the thing that crossed my mind then.

I just needed some Dostoevsky after Turgenev so I started "The Idiot" today. Feeling at home. After 4 pages already it was clear it is going to be a masterpiece. Also started "The Waves" - read a few pages, quite slowly, but didn't seem to understand anything. Too many characters were saying obscure things at the begining and it had been like I have not read anything because I couldn't remember who said what and what it actually was that he said and what what he said meant . I'm used to reading real quick but this one I guess I'll have to take slower. Certainly a re-reading is a must.

I've never understood why one would want to read quickly unless the only thing that is of interest is the drama/story. Don't worry about not understanding everything at once, the characters will grow quite distinctive from each other in due time (and there are only six of them + Percival) and then you can go back to the beginning and read it again. Remember that in the beginning of the novel they are children whose thoughts are given as much care and level of expression as those of an adult (contrary to A Portrait), although the thoughts still remain essentially "childish" (not in a pejorative way).

P.S
Does your reading go backwards or something? Familiar with Pynchon and Beckett but just now coming to read Madame Bovary and Pride and Prejudice. Somewhat odd.

=) My reading goes everywhere. This week has been heavy on 1900-century authors and poets that I've never had the time or desire to read, but do not for that reason assume that I haven't read the classics (Homer, Virgil, Dante, Chaucer, Cervantes, Shakespeare, Milton, Goethe, Tolstoy, et cetera).

 

[kmik]

Tolstoy is noted for such diversions. Have a look at the "election" section of the latter part of Anna Karenin, for example. I would not describe him as an economical writer at all.

I stand corrected. To my eternal shame, I admit I have never read Anna Karenina in its entirely. Borrowed from a friend, had to returned it halfway, and never got back to it; but it was when I was younger and probably not able to appreciate it fully. Ill return to it someday. Familiar with many of his short stories though and his style is very clean.

Read The Idiot extensively and it's excellent. It's less scientific than Brothers K; a bit more confused, but the characters are more interesting, more crazy. A study of Myshkin as a Christ-figure would be very interesting. Very unmistakably Dostoevsky... Not the best prose, dated philosophical conversations, unmatched characterization and psychological depth. Soul, blood, pain! There's a part that is almost like stream of consciousness. Very interested in reading Justin's post now.

Did not go on with The Waves but your post cheers me up. I'll start over. Now it's not that I skim through or skip things. I like character study and change of styles more than plots, but I'm just used to reading quickly... That's just how I read. The problem is that while you understand, you are sometimes unable to, uhm, "grasp" it all that way, or become involved (i.e I don't slow my pace when reading an article), but it allows you to understand works more holistically.

 

[Nile577]

The Waves is excellent. For me Woolf’s finest work. I think Murphy was correct to liken it to Joyce. Where in Joyce we often encounter a stream of consciousness style, here the sentence cadences are structured to fall like the rhythm of falling waves – call it a “wave of consciousness,” if you will. Where Ulysses is revealed upon a being-historical disclosure of Greek mythology (the very modern dilemma of homelessness), The Waves charts the course of friendships in life against the passage of a rolling tide.

In thinking, perhaps the imposition of overt “metaphorical” chapters into the novel, functioning as dividers or indicators of progression would, in Joyce, be dissolved into the narrative itself. Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath as well as a recent Michael Houellebecq novel (two very different writers from Woolf) also use such sections. Perhaps the intention is to situate the work in some kind of “transcendental perspective.” I'm not sure. The best thinking, for me, is hermeneutic, whereby the structure of the “whole” can be modified by and in turn modifies the specificity of the locale, or the enquirer, and neither of these things can be taken as “object” or “subject.”

Mrs Dalloway, To The Lighthouse and Jacob’s Room are also very recommended. The structure of To The Lighthouse, with its absurdly condensed middle section and its killing of a principal character in parenthesis, is important. Likewise Mrs Dalloway, with the understanding of madness revealed through the character of Septimus being of particular interest (although in her journals Woolf wrote that she wished a group of mentally handicapped people she encountered while out walking “shot&#8221.

Her biographical sketches, entitled “moments of Being” coin the phrase of what are known as her “epiphanies.” That is, moments in which an intense, transitory insight into the “truth” of matters is granted. It is interesting to explore the relationship between these epiphanic moments (they are also found in Joyce, particularly in Portrait of the Artist, and Katherine Mansfield’s short stories) and the French theorist Michel Foucault. Woolf’s epiphanies – particularly in the character of Septimus – seem to represent what Heidegger might term “authenticity” for Dasein, or moments in which the “discourses of power” which comprise Foucault’s episteme are revealed, and the self is, for a moment, recovered. Perhaps the “elitism” of the “Modernists” (and some of its forerunners) is the bringing about of authenticity, which would account for their exile and isolation. Might “modernist” writings comprise a new “episteme” of authenticity?

The Dark Times
(inspiration in a passage of quotes)

"Anyone who cannot identify with Modern life while he is alive needs one hand to ward off a little his despair over his fate... but with the other hand he can jot down what he sees among the ruins, for he sees different and more things than the others; after all, he is dead in his own lifetime..." - Franz Kafka

"Like one who keeps afloat on a shipwreck by climbing to the top of a mast that is already crumbling. But from there he has a chance to give a signal leading to his rescue" - Walter Benjamin

"We say outright: these are madmen, yet these madmen have their own logic, their God even, and it's as deepset as could be." - Fyodor Dostoyevsky

"You made me confess the fears that I have. But I will tell you also what I do not fear. I do not fear to be alone or to be spurned for another or to leave whatever I have to leave. And I am not afraid to make a mistake, even a great mistake, a lifelong mistake and perhaps as long as eternity too" - Stephen Dedalus (James Joyce)

 

[kmik]

I think I "got" something. Though I'm familiar with the concept, Ulysses is still lying on my shelf (I'm afraid to start without that guide , but I think I had an epiphany myself with your explanation. It is an important book because it makes myth live again and shows us its "true" meaning - not its "properties" but its essence. In contrast to empty revivalism which invokes it and worships it blindly. The very idea of the novel is already worth of respect. The "Waves of consciousness" idea however I didn't really get :/, but I'll return to your post after I'm done with the book.

Thinking that unifies subject and object I also find very interesting. The medium becomes the message, not a vehicle for meaning. But I have a question. Does only "modernist" art disclose Being in some respect? For example, say, Crime and Punishment or the aforementioned Death of Ivan Ilyich? And what about "lesser" art?

The quotes are also excellent. PoA is full of very inspiring passages.

 

[speed]

Thinking that unifies subject and object I also find very interesting. The medium becomes the message, not a vehicle for meaning. But I have a question. Does only "modernist" art disclose Being in some respect? For example, say, Crime and Punishment or the aforementioned Death of Ivan Ilyich? And what about "lesser" art?
quote]

Modernist literature has ruined literature. I like it, and personally enjoy it, but its generally too intellectual, overspecialized with too many obscure allusions, and not of the heart and soul. And as 58% of the American population didnt even read one book last year, I dont see the point of continuing this ridiculous modernist experiment much longer. This is the same problem I have with Heidegger and modern philosophy, and everything else in the world these days. Overspecialization has essentially ruined anything of quality, and were left with a few attempts at decent pop art, while the rest is for professors and a few weird literary afficionados who say will read such difficult modernist texts that disclose being.

Look, the greats are accessible (or were to the time when they wrote), and about the heart and soul as well as the mind. And the greats apart from a few, were not modernist and did a hell of alot better disclosing being than any modernist, while retaining quite a bit of difficulty. Homer, Virgil, Horace, Lucretius, Dante, Cervantes, Rabelais, Swift, Shakespeare, Moliere, Goethe, Pushkin, Gogol, Schiller, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Flaubert and so on and so forth wrote for everyone and anyone that could read and was semi-educated. I dont even know if such writers can exist anymore today; or for that matter, artists, composers, etc. Sure one could say great artists, etc never were recognized or appreciated fully in their lifetime. However, just 50 years ago, everyone educated had a basic background in Shakespeare, a few classics such as Homer and Virgil, etc. Now educated persons have no shared background, and too many other choices and demands of their time. Not to mention inferior literature is forced on them by bad teachers, and most lose an interest.

I know I am rambling here, but, like Roquentin, the Underground Man, etc, I think literature has lost meaning. I hope we can get it back.

 

[kmik]

There's a logical fallacy there, I'm afraid. The fact people have no shared educated background because of modern literature, or because it's difficult - that has nothing to do with the actual quality of the works. Literature as art and, umm, "literary practice" are two different things. Besides, everyone knows what the classics are (Joyce, Woolf, Proust, Faulkner, etc...), and except for Ulysses everything is readable if you're just willing to take the time and effort. Literature and art can't stand in one place forever. It must be pushed forward, seek unexplored areas. It is no coincidence that no major novelist merely replicated what already has been done. And of course I don't have to tell you that not all great writers were respected during their time.

 

[speed]

There's a logical fallacy there, I'm afraid. The fact people have no shared educated background because of modern literature, or because it's difficult - that has nothing to do with the actual quality of the works. Literature as art and, umm, "literary practice" are two different things. Besides, everyone knows what the classics are (Joyce, Woolf, Proust, Faulkner, etc...), and except for Ulysses everything is readable if you're just willing to take the time and effort. Literature and art can't stand in one place forever. It must be pushed forward, seek unexplored areas. It is no coincidence that no major novelist merely replicated what already has been done. And of course I don't have to tell you that not all great writers were respected during their time.

No, it has nothing to do with the quality of the works at all. In fact, the quality of writing in the early part of the century was phenomenal. Literature has sort of been in a tailspin since, it was so good, dynamic, innovative, etc (however, I think it was dynamic and innovative within the context of the art itself).

I have a variety of points, all I think are related, and all are quite loose.

First, literature has become overly specialized and "difficult" for the average educated person, and in its specialization, has lost its relation to life, the soul, philosophy etc. This argument has no logic. I am merely sharing my concerns that I hear from 99% of educated people when I discuss literature with them. Its the same with art, philosophy, and so on and so forth. Is the average person going to pick up Ulysses or In Search of Lost Time? Will even the highly educated person open these books? Who will read them but professors?

Second, is there such a plethora of books and art, we cannot share or discuss the great or influential art? Example: The last book that won the Booker Prize (a prize which I admit is a crock) had sold less than 800 books before it won--and thats even when it was shortlisted as a finalist. One of the books on the shortlist had only sold 350 copies. And even then, I read last week, that Baby Spice's biography had sold more books in England than the entire Booker list combined (even with Ian McEwan).

Third, are the demands for time and entertainment too much for the common person? Why would tired over-worked persons totally sated materially, choose to contemplate literature, or entertain themselves with a pop suspense book, a video game, American Idol, etc?

Fourth, is it capitalism which only rewards the Jk Rowlings and Stephen Kings, not the serious writers, that is the problem?

Fifth, is it Academia and the book reviewers (the few left), those experts and gateholders, who either have very specialized taste, or have failed to bridge the gap and enter certain works of literature into popular culture, as they did just 50 years ago?

I have no idea what the remedy is, but I know a great many writers and other artists are thinking about it these days. As a spenglerian, hehe, I think our culture has reached its second to last late civilaztion phase: End of any development in stylistic form. Senseless, empty, cumulative architecture and ornamental art. Imitation of archaic and exotic them. The previous stage of modernism is Modern art detailed as: Attempts to alter and provoke metropolitan city consciousness. Conversion of music, architecture and painting into mere arts and crafts.

Finally, I'll end on Juvenal (as satire seems to be the only thing left worth doing in lit):

It is hard not to write Satire these days

 

[Murphy]

Great literature has seldom been enjoyed by many. Before the 20-century just to buy a book was fucking expensive, then you'd have to be able to read well, have the interest and the time for it. Most didn't. And there was so much less to chose from, I believe that 10-15 books were published each year in England in the beginning of the 1900-century, and almost every one of them is forgotten now. I’d agree that a book like Bleak House could be enjoyed by a whole family and retain a place in the "common" culture, but that isn't at all common by our standards.

The reading and writing has also gradually changed. From being part of a public creation (which still is limited to the few and is perhaps best shown in the literary culture of the Greeks) where the artist and everything that such a concept implies never was the focal point, to a more private indulgence with more and more awareness of literature as art.

The main difference between now and then is the explosion of a cultural consumption that never really has existed before (and when it did it was always shadowed by the higher strata of society). Our popular culture simply drowns everything else by its sheer size. At the same time the creative sides of culture have moved on in the artistic direction, shunning the public and getting more and more obsessive about original creation. Those two can not be united. And the artist can’t find a place in the earlier, traditional societies either. It’s quite a daunting situation.

And then we have the academics...

-----

For all lovers of modernist literature out there, here is the whole part of Joyce reading Anna Livia Plurabelle:

http://www.ubu.com/sound/joyce.html

If one wants to follow the text at the same time the e-text can be found here:

http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/j/joyce/james/j8f/complete.html

(Starts at: "Well, you know or don’t you kennet or haven’t I told you every telling has a taling and that’s the he and the she of it.")

This is the hardest work ever written, and it's overflowing with heart and soul.

 

[speed]

Great literature has seldom been enjoyed by many. Before the 20-century just to buy a book was fucking expensive, then you'd have to be able to read well, have the interest and the time for it. Most didn't. And there was so much less to chose from, I believe that 10-15 books were published each year in England in the beginning of the 1900-century, and almost every one of them is forgotten now. I’d agree that a book like Bleak House could be enjoyed by a whole family and retain a place in the "common" culture, but that isn't at all common by our standards.

The reading and writing has also gradually changed. From being part of a public creation (which still is limited to the few and is perhaps best shown in the literary culture of the Greeks) where the artist and everything that such a concept implies never was the focal point, to a more private indulgence with more and more awareness of literature as art.

The main difference between now and then is the explosion of a cultural consumption that never really has existed before (and when it did it was always shadowed by the higher strata of society). Our popular culture simply drowns everything else by its sheer size. At the same time the creative side of culture have moved on in the artistic direction, shunning the public and getting more and more obsessive about original creation. Those two can not be united. And the artist can’t find a place in the earlier, traditional societies either. It’s quite a daunting situation.

And then we have the academics...

-----

For all lovers of modernist literature out there, here is the whole part of Joyce reading Anna Livia Plurabelle:

http://www.ubu.com/sound/joyce.html

If one wants to follow the text at the same time the e-text can be found here:

http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/j/joyce/james/j8f/complete.html

(Starts at: "Well, you know or don’t you kennet or haven’t I told you every telling has a taling and that’s the he and the she of it.")

This is the hardest work ever written, and it's overflowing with heart and soul.

First, I'm just throwing around ideas here. Its such a complicated multi-faceted thing, I dont know if it can be reduced to a defined set of causes.

I dont know, I've read the first few pages of Finnegans Wake, and it seems like a lark to me. Maybe its written with heart and soul, but I had a terrible feeling in the few pages I read that Joyce was laughing at the reader attempting to decipher that particular book. he sure didnt write it for common people to read it. I cant remember the person who said it, but essentially the idea was to be considered a respected author of literature, one had to write to the professors not the people. I think Finnegans Wake is an example. And was it harder to write than the Divine Comedy? War and Peace? Paradise Lost, etc?

When does an overabundance become too much? I think we're hitting it. Hundreds of thousands of books are published each year, and it seems most disappear without even a mention. Moreover, most that are published, are published as they might make a profit (apart from the univ. publishers), not because they;re good--or more importantly, only books that seem marketable, will be promoted, and thats the true power. Can we ever have this past, where there werent thousands of books to shift through, and one could eventually become accepted, understood and read, not thrown in the landfill?

Then i come to the thought that really, we're witnessing the nausea if you will of the postmodern world, and this is why so many are trying to become artists. So many people are free materially to think about creating art, and the ability to do so with computers, and telecommunications, Amazon, etc, that they do so. And they create art, as it is one of the few means to validate ones existence in this cold world. Now that we see the faults of most things, and when all ideals as (democracy, liberty, religion, etc) are strongly questioned and reconsidered, what is left but creation and art?

 

[kmik]

Hey, that passage is nice. It seems to make much more sense than the first few lines in the book, which I have tried to decipher over the internet not too long ago; seemed like a little too much for me, though. I respect everyone who read that, really. It takes, what, over a year to read that? I guess nothing can ontologically disclose Being ( ) and be readable at the same time, but oh well...

 

[kmik]

Look, there are many books published now because it's become more fashionable, but that doesn't mean literature is dead. I mean in a sense it is but the two phenomenons are unrelated. People who are looking for serious art and not passing their time with a paper instead of TV will always be there, and they'll know how to distinguish between books that don't even try, those that fail miserably and those that merely fail (for they all fail). It takes time; admittedly, unlike with music, literary genius is not immediately evident in the first page and books require more attention than any other art form, but eventually crap is forgotten and the best is remembered. Well, there surely are a few neglected extremely difficult novels out there that people who can appreciate have not read, but look at Moby Dick which was considered a failure back in the day, or Ulysses which was banned, and Faulkner who was unknown before the Nobel. Geniuses are rarely acknowledged during their lifetime but there is always some humanity even when all seems lost . Regarding difficulty I also don't know. Finnegans Wake is indeed an extreme example. But no, if you're willing to take the time and effort almost everything is readable. And if you don't, you don't deserve it. Now you say it's becomnig difficult and it's true. Back in Newton's time an educated man could know all the physics there is. Things are getting complicated, not only in literature, in all arts. Can anyone easily understand Pound's poetry or listen to Allan Pettersson or understand the proof for Fermat's Last Theorem? So... I don't know. :\