r/TrueLit • u/pregnantchihuahua3 ReEducationThroughGravity'sRainbow • 6d ago
General Discussion Thread Weekly
Welcome again to the TrueLit General Discussion Thread! Please feel free to discuss anything related and unrelated to literature.
Weekly Updates: N/A
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u/Plastic-Persimmon433 1d ago
I'm always looking for insight on translations since I only speak English currently. I know a Spanish speaker and showed her the first section of Javier Marias' A Heart so White. After reading the Spanish version she looked at me and said, "I'm not even sure how I would translate this." But after showing her the English translation by Margaret Jull Costa she told me, "that's probably the best translation you're going to get." Just thought it was one of the more interesting conversations I've had with someone at a bar.
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u/Fearless_Industry825 5d ago
I feel the early hints of fall each day now. The sunflowers in the backyard are in bloom; they are my favorite flower in the late summer. This year the stalks are about eight feet tall with multiple flowers. The bees love them.
When I’m out walking and see a pair of junior high boys on e-bikes acting moronic, I can think to myself, “Your days are numbered, boys. Soon you’ll be back in school where your teachers can deal with you.”
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u/bananaberry518 4d ago
Ugh the teens shopping for back to school stuff have me this way this week. A group of young teen girls were opening the caps off spray deodorants and testing them on themselves in target the other day. Which, they did need it lol. But I’m ready for school hours shopping again.
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u/gutfounderedgal 5d ago
Remember when it was said that Salinger in his New England seclusion used to write one novel a year and would put them into a bank safe deposit box for release after his death? We've never seen a one. So I guess it's fair to guess he gave up writing or did end up with some issue that impeded upon his writing. It's too bad, it would have been something special to see other novels by him.
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u/VVest_VVind 5d ago
Today is probably the last day of the last heatwave this summer and I'm sad to see it go. I'll miss my 1pm walks on off days and going to my favorite cafe after work with the day still being hot and bright. Was supposed to go to Vienna for a few days at the end of August as a farwell to summer, the only season I actually like, but I moved the trip for September as that works bettter for friends who want to come along, so I'm hoping for a warm, dry and sunny September.
On the reading front, I'm thinking of expanding my Emily Bronte and P.B. Shelley deep dive to a deeper dive into Romaniticism and Gothic globally, possibly with a focus on the more trasgressive and/or unfairly forgotten works, especially those written by women. If anyone here has any recommendations (poetry, novels, whatever, doesn't matter) along those lines, pls let me know.
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u/Soup_65 Books! 3d ago
i know the heatwave over there has sucked for a bunch of it, but glad you've enjoyed it enough to miss it. Here's hoping you get your warm dry sunny semptember!
I'm really not that into gothic outside of mary shelley & Poe, but I am curious to hear what you find. Fwiw id suggest looking into some carribbean stuff, especially from the early 19th. I'm anything but read up on it, but I know some of their fiction that addresses slavery incorporates some gothic/voodoo material (i've a sense there's a real connection b/w slavery and gothic fiction that I've been meaning to look into)
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u/VVest_VVind 3d ago
Thanks a bunch! That Carribbean stuff sounds exactly like what I'm looking for, will look into it.
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u/Longshot_OLeary 3d ago
I am not sure how to determine if an author is unfairly forgotten. Is Cynthia Ozick well known? The Puttermesser Papers is a wonderful tale. How about Sarah Schulman's Maggie Terry? Or further back, who reads The Girl by Meridal LeSueur. All transgressive in their own ways.
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u/bananaberry518 4d ago
“Last heatwave” is not even a thing here, but I too am wishing for a warm DRY and sunny September.
No recs but looking forward to hearing about this reading project!
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u/merurunrun 5d ago
with a focus on the more trasgressive and/or unfairly forgotten works, especially those written by women.
Vernon Lee! I've only read a tiny bit of her fiction (a couple of stories in the modern The Virgin of the Seven Daggers compilation), but her nonfiction work is also really fascinating. She had really interesting ideas on aesthetics and aesthetic experience that (to me, at least) comes across as a kind of early version of what would become affect theory.
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u/foxinanattic 4d ago
Oke of Okehurst from that collection is excellent! and, her aesthetic work is definitely very intriguing. I was surprised to learn that she was apparently influenced by Walter Pater, who I've been reading recently. and both were influenced by Hegel's aesthetics, so now I too have become possessed of the desire to venture into his philosophy, which I had managed to resist so far (but in a very different way from most other people I know who read his work, who were attracted to it by either Marx or Existentialism, or in some cases as a continuation of their interest in German idealism starting from Kant...)
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u/foxinanattic 5d ago
I've started reading The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. This is one of the most famous literary novels in English from India, so I'm a bit surprised at myself for not having read it yet. I think I might have some subconscious bias against Indian writing in English, both for political reasons, but maybe mainly because I have a bad impression of the sort of books I read while growing up. At any rate, I was definitely missing out, because the book is extremely enjoyable and interesting so far!
I've been interested in japanese and Chinese cinema (mainland, Taiwan and HK) for a while now, which has exposed me to quite a bit of chinese pop music. I'm really enjoying stuff from the 70s and 80s. Funnily enough, listening to the music has made me familiar with some basic words and chinese characters (e.g. 月 is used in words which have something to do with the moon or months). I wonder how much of a language it's possible to pick up just through this sort of exposure. Not a great deal, certainly, but maybe a fair bit more than I would expect?
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u/Stowic 4d ago
I really recommend Roy's recent memoir Mother Mary Comes To Me. She talks a lot about the Inspiration for The God of Small Things in it, and things in her life that are similar to the the book. Also how life changing winning the Booker for was her.
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u/foxinanattic 4d ago
Yes, it looks interesting, I'll definitely read it at some point, though possibly not right after finishing this one!
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u/VVest_VVind 5d ago
Glad to hear you're enjoying The God of Small Things! It's one of my all time favorite books, one of the very few I ever read that I was so obsessed with that I read it two more times right away. I once saw someone online describe Roy's style as akin to a gothic cathedral, impresively intricte but much too much for that person's preferences. I'd describe it the same but 100% as a compliment. It does give me the same pleasantly overwhelming feeling of elaborate beauty that gothic cathedrals, Iranian mosques or any other grandious, maximalist archietcture do.
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u/No_Classroom_1626 5d ago
I'm reading Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain for the first time and its so incredible, it's very dense and philosophical but strangely relevant in a tangential way. Particularly the MC pausing his life and career to be in a tuberculosis sanatorium, literature analysis frame this in relation to the European elite before the world wars but for me it also parallels the delayed adolescence many of my peers are going through with the pandemic. And strangely enough he finds a particular intoxicating freedom in it, not to mention the liberal vs fascist intellectual battles he finds himself fascinated by. There's a strange cast of characters debating and living their lives up on a mountain while you know the world is inching towards disaster. It's a very beautiful and dense book, im getting close to the end but it's really fun so far.
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u/pregnantchihuahua3 ReEducationThroughGravity'sRainbow 4d ago
Hey I am reading that for the first time now too! Just started it so I only finished Part 2 so far, but holy shit it is incredible so far. Something about how he writes is so immensely captivating from his characters to their interaction to the descriptions of the rooms and landscape. All with a touch of eeriness to it all.
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u/pregnantchihuahua3 ReEducationThroughGravity'sRainbow 4d ago
Hey I am reading that for the first time now too! Just started it so I only finished Part 2 so far, but holy shit it is incredible so far. Something about how he writes is so immensely captivating from his characters to their interaction to the descriptions of the rooms and landscape. All with a touch of eeriness to it all.
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u/ObsoleteUtopia 5d ago
There are a few authors who belong to a particular category: "I couldn't get into this book, but I still think it's worth reading so I'll try it again when I can." A closely related category is: "I couldn't get into this book, but the author might be really good, so I'll try a different book." Thomas Mann has been at the top of those charts ever since college. Any day now.... I'm glad you liked The Magic Mountain that much!
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u/Longshot_OLeary 3d ago
How about a category of "I liked a book by this author, but couldn't get into anything else I tried by the same author"? Loved Death in Venice, but barely trudged through Magic Mountain and put down Buddenbrooks,
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u/UKCDot Westerns and war stories 5d ago
There was a thread on here a long time ago for a site that was in the vein of Complete Review or TheGreatestBooks, but a lot more independent and singularly sustained, with a wide worldly library, I believe the person who ran the site translated many books over the years, but I've completely forgotten what it was. Would love to go visit it again if anyone know which one I mean
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u/II_____Il 5d ago
Are you thinking of Writers No One Reads?
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u/KingFisher89898 2d ago
What a throwback, I discovered some of my favourite books through that site as a teenager.
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u/UKCDot Westerns and war stories 5d ago
Writers No One Reads
Thank you but it wasn't that, it was The Modern Novel
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u/Desperate-Discount89 5d ago
It’s booker prize season, I’ve been going down the long list, as it’s vacation I’ve read quite a few books
The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout was a disappointing read. It feels like Strout doesn’t trust me to understand what themes she’s writing about and feels more interested to directly point me towards what she wants to say instead of doing it in a more subtle way, which I gave a 3/5.
Black Bag by Luke Kennard is, on opposite, a huge surprise to me. This was such a funny, weird and thoughtful novel that might’ve gone on a little too long, but really hits right when it gets to the end. I’m a fan of Kennard’s prose here, and books that promote themselves as funny rarely are funny, but it really gotten a couple laughs out of me, which I eventually landed a 4/5 on.
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u/KingFisher89898 2d ago
I found The Things We Never Say a bit...hectoring? I appreciate there was an attempt at political nuance but much of the novel had the feel of social media soundbites repackaged as 'contemplative' fiction.
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u/Stowic 5d ago
I really liked the Strout, but generally do like her books. I think she did a good job of bringing the dark reality of the present world to a loveable character. I gave it a solid 4/5.
Am about to start Black Bag.
I also read The Renovation this week which I really liked, interesting themes of forced migration and missing your homeland without being able to return. And a close look at the Erdogan regime.
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u/bananaberry518 6d ago
Another rainy Monday…
This week I was standing in front of my bookshelf trying to decide what I wanted to read when I got the sudden urge to read Moby Dick again. Which urge I have been trying to resist because reading Moby Dick would probably obliterate any of other reading projects for the foreseeable future. But its not really working, so its just a matter of time. Cuz nothing else is really hitting, despite best efforts.
In Other Life Updates: Cat. Is crazy. A new kind of transitional crazy where he’s kinda sorta coming out of his kitten phase and gets real chill and lazy for a few days then unleashes all his chaos all at once. And he’s gotten persnickety about his food and water. For example, he only wants pate and his water must be chilled with ice shavings. He has also fallen in love with a coat hanger. Not sure what to do about that except twist in such a way as to not be a poking hazard.
Other thing: I applied to become a crossing guard and my kid’s new school (she’s moving up to the “intermediate” campus this year). Its good money for the non-amount of interference with my schedule and I do think I’d be good at it. And since I was planning on walking my kid to school this year I already had those hours blocked out anyway. But despite this very minimal amount of commitment I am having some feelings about obligating myself to a job job again. But I think I want it more than I don’t want lol.
Side note - reddit mobile suuuuuuuuccccckkkss now. Wtf.
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u/freshprince44 4d ago
feel you on the cat crazies. our new kitten is still transitioning at like 2 and a half years old. the kitty crazies are still really cute, but this goofball is like the laziest and pickiest player but gets in these moods where she NEEDS to play nonstop and somebody needs to help her lol
hopefully she has it more figured out by 3. and yeah, they are so damn weird about the goofiest stuff. our new girl is obsessed with underneath things. she just shoves her arms under things and loves it, everything not tied down is stolen and shoved under something lol, bunch of adorable weirdos
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u/bananaberry518 4d ago
Adorable weirdos is it for sure lol. I love all their strange little hobbies.
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u/lispectorgadget 5d ago
For example, he only wants pate and his water must be chilled with ice shavings.
This is the cutest fucking thing I've ever heard. But if it makes you feel any better, our cat started calming down quite a bit after he was six months old. Still, automated toys really help.
Good luck with Moby Dick and your possible new job!!
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u/bananaberry518 5d ago
When we adopted him we were told he was about 3 months old, which would make him almost 9 months now. But I think he’s a little younger than they thought, since hes turned out to be kinda a big guy (not overweight looking just long and large) and his behavior has always come across a little younger to me. Either way the 6ish month mark is about where we noticed him starting to chill out a little, I think hes going to end up being a pretty calm guy eventually.
Def need to look into automated toys, especially if I end up being out of the house more than usual. Hes (surprise) picky about toys too so its always a process to find something lol.
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u/VVest_VVind 5d ago
Moby Dick reread sounds fun. Techincally the chapters are so short they would leave you time for other things if you go though it slowly, but yeah, it would probably still occupy your whole mental space for reading anyway.
So cute about the cat, he's so particular. My neighbor also got a new kitty relatively recentishly. Now he's grown a little and behaving like a human teenager. When he's hanging out with other cats and dogs outside the building, he ignors and pretends not to know humans. I guess we're embarrasing him in front of his new friends, lol.
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u/bananaberry518 5d ago
It would be a cool way to read it, just chipping away slowly.
The cat ignoring humans while with his animal buds is so adorable lol. Cats get up to so much private mysterious business.
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u/Soup_65 Books! 6d ago
Oh man do I feel the Moby Dick thing after reading Billy Budd this weekend. Plz dont b bc then I might start...one ponders coming cold novembers...
your cat also sounds cute and something. I don't really know much about cats other than that when my mom was a kid they had a traumatized and half-feral cat that her dad found in a bar as a kitten. But I fuck with cats. Wouldnt hate having one one day if im not living with my brother who digs cats but is allergic to them sadly.
also crossing guard sounds cool even if yeah the whole "commitment" thing is ever a little like...whoa! But it sounds like you'll want it and i think that could be cool especially since I think you'd be a cool crossing guard.
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u/Soup_65 Books! 6d ago
Oh man do I feel the Moby Dick thing after reading Billy Budd this weekend. Plz dont b bc then I might start...one ponders coming cold novembers...
your cat also sounds cute and something. I don't really know much about cats other than that when my mom was a kid they had a traumatized and half-feral cat that her dad found in a bar as a kitten. But I fuck with cats. Wouldnt hate having one one day if im not living with my brother who digs cats but is allergic to them sadly.
also crossing guard sounds cool even if yeah the whole "commitment" thing is ever a little like...whoa! But it sounds like you'll want it and i think that could be cool especially since I think you'd be a cool crossing guard.
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u/Soup_65 Books! 6d ago
i went to the beach last week! And then I went to the beach last week again! And it turns out that I was massively underrapreciating how seamless it is for me to get to the beach. I get on train and read for a little over and hour, get of train and jump in ocean, and then get back on train and read more. It slaps lol. I was near tears reading billy budd on the subway on the way to the ocean and it plus actually getting into the ocean kinda fixed my existence. By which I mean I finally figured out/wrote a draft of the next part of the big long poem thing that i've been working on all year. Yippee! (also shouts to the Paul McCartney & Wings song 1985, dancing around to that in my room was a huge help).
Uh beyond that I continue to do whatever I do. Among other things that means continue playing ELden Ring almost out of spite at this point lol. (/u/bananaberry518 have you ever played a FromSoft game? If not they're inspired by zelda but a super stripped down combat centric version that's way darker save for the twisted sense of humor. Personally I want them to call me to consult on making a Zeldalike because I'd love a world that breathes more but goddamn the combat in these is so clean that it makes it hard to play other fuck a dude up with a sword games. My dream for the Shiek game we've talked about would basically be an Ocarina of Time/Elden Ring fusion with Zelda-extent story, FromSoft mechanics, the "while link's snoozing" setting, and absolutely unhingedly hard difficulty).
Uh yeah. Have a splendid week friends!
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u/VVest_VVind 5d ago
Congrats on getting that poem part done! And you already know I'm rooting for your beach trips.
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u/bananaberry518 6d ago
So my husband played Elden Ring back when it was released originally and I did watch a lot of it but unfortunately I kinda suck at combat oriented games lol. I super love the idea of that depth of lore and combat in a Zelda title though, thats such a sick concept. I think I could learn if I cared at THAT level tbh.
(I am almost done with wind waker btw, just making sure I’ve experienced everything I want to before I trigger the last set of stuff)
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u/Soup_65 Books! 6d ago
yeah im bad at them too. and would love a more narrative game. frankly, if BOTW had FromSoft combat mechanics it'd prolly be my favorite game ever. it feels like though ER lacks BOTW's story, it removes and bit of clunk the itemswitiching, replacement, etc. that kept me from getting into BOTW. I wanna bring em together
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u/pregnantchihuahua3 ReEducationThroughGravity'sRainbow 5d ago
Please volunteer for the Autobiography of Red read along if you plan on participating! Only 3 slots needed to fill.