pretentious cuck, or legitimately good writer?

>>7629140
He was good no doubt but there are hundreds better

>>7629147
list 5 right now.

>>7629140

I like him, but he is a product of his time.

he's a fucking idiot and the first example that comes to mind when someone says "pseudoscholar."

every idea he has is joe-rogan tier "WOW DUDE THIS WILL BLOW YOUR MIND" or "WOUDLNT IT BE COOL IF..."

>>7629154

annnnd i just realized that's kurt vonnegut and not terrance mckenna

>>7629159
emberassing

>>7629148
Dosto, Tolstoy, Hemingway, Faulkner, Heller, Steinbeck, Nabokov, Williams

>>7629148
From just the postmodernist movement: Gass, Gaddis, Pynchon, Barth, Hawkes, Bolano, and McElroy.

>>7629161

is it embarassing if i'm not embarassed?

/end_shitposting

>>7629168
faulkner better than vonnegut? emberassing opinion

>>7629170

what do you think about McCarthy?

>>7629174

not funny.

>>7629174
Faulkner is an infinitely better stylist than Vonnegut.
>>7629181
He's good, but a lot of people overrate him.

>>7629140
Deadeye Dick is good
Sllaughter-5 is a nice story about PTSD

>>7629159
oh shit never realised they look similar

>>7629140

judy blume tier desu senpai.

>>7629140
pretty bad, but at least he's better than pynchon

>>7629216
I love Deadeye Dick.

I think that Kurt Vonnegut is great. I like the voice of his books a lot. It's the same one in every book for the most part but I really enjoy it.

>>7629140
Reddit-tier.

>>7629140

he isn't a cynical cunt who killed himself, and his books are quite accessible; therefore /lit/ shits on him forever.

File: 1316655422288.jpg (18KB, 1920x1080px) Image search: [Google]

18KB, 1920x1080px

>>7629140
Comparing Vonnegut to people like Dosty isn't fair. Sure, Vonnegut wasn't always that serious of a writer, but he's an alright humorist, and how many legitimately 'funny' authors were there really in the 20th Century who were funny and also somewhat (or entirely) serious at the same time. The only other I can really think of is Peter De Vries. I actually can't really think of anyone who's writing now who handles serious themes well while also employing humor, which Vonnegut was alright at.

We don't have nearly anyone like Wilde these days in terms of a virtuosity in combining both seriousness and humor. And what's even worse is that I don't think we even have anyone on a lower level like Vonnegut either.

>>7629727
>The only other I can really think of is Peter De Vries

plz read Catch-22 it's onf othe the funniest books ever written, humorous and haha funny

>>7629140
I read Slaughterhouse 5, got infuriated since it seemed he wasn't even trying. I won't pick up another book by him, it's not worth wasting my time.

>>7629140
He's about as unpretentious as they come actually. Writing in such a simplistic style pretty much cemented him as a literary everyman. He is a good writer, but what's great about him is his innovation of the form in my opinion. When Slaughter House Five came out, novels just weren't written like that. Yes his books are very formulaic and a lot of his insights seem banal when you're not either in the 60s or in high school but the man basically started New Wave sci fi, and was a forerunner of postmodernism. And to his credit, unlike almost all postmodernist writers, he doesn't pretend to tear down the elitist (yes, patrician) literary establishment while in actuality writing books more elitist than ever, completely inaccessible to almost everyone on Earth (looking at you Pynchon).

So yes, people have done better, and he wasn't one of the greats. But he's essential.

>>7629727
Give George Saunders or to a lesser extant Dave Eggars a try.

>>7630032
He isn't essential. I don't necessarily disagree with other things you said, but nothing in the history of literature would make him essential. Even as new wave pomo sf Dick is far more important

>>7629140
Really? Is this a troll thread? Vonnegut is one of the best writers of the past fifty years. Cat's Cradle, Welcome to the Monkey House, Slaughter House Five also assure he was a great writer.

>>7629140

Philistine cuck, terrible writer. The great thing is, the book he got his war guilt from for Slaughterhouse Five is now completely discredited as written by a Nazi sympathiser, which means Vonnegut's entire life was lived in vain.

>>7630037
eggers is absolyte garbage. saunders is good.

vonnegut is reddit-tier.

>>7630552
retard detected

>>7630601
>not sharing opinions
>must be retarded

>>7630609
>Vonnegut is one of the best writers of the past fifty years

List every writer/book you've read from the past 50 years. It must be an embarrassingly short list if you legitimately believe what you said.

>>7630617
Just this month?

Beckett
Calvino
Chatwin
Transtromer
Rushdie
Hitchens
Amis (Father and Son)
Borges

or perhaps you'd prefer this year?

>>7630734
How the fuck do you manage to read so much? How many pages do you read a day?

>>7630741
A lot. 2 books a week sometimes 3 if I have a long weekend.

>>7630734

Hitchens? Kingsley Amis? Do you read anything anyone has at some point praised?
Nobody who's able to read Beckett should waste their time with that kind of crap.

>>7630734

> Hitchens

Christopher or based Peter?

>>7630743
Then you're obviously terrible at comprehension. Those authors take time to appreciate, they aren't Harry P that you burn through in a couple days. You shouldn't be on this board.

>>7629170
BARTHELME

>>7629181
NOT POMO

>>7630754
Hmm...not sure if troll. Check out Everyday Drinking by Sir Amis. Hitchens - enjoyed Hitch-22 and I don't apologize for that. Beckett - well I enjoyed Murphy.

>it's simple. read what you enjoy. who needs anons for consolation?

>>7630734
1. that list is pretty short
2. you consider vonnegut to be superior to beckett calvino transtromer amis and borges? embarassing

>>7630771
REI?

>>7630759
the hitch.

>>7630767
do tell how you infer such - I'd be interested to hear. More interesting (from my foxhole) would be to discuss the merits of such book. Would you not agree?

>>7630776
Did I say that he was superior to any of those that I just listed? This conversation is boring me - let's get back to doing what we love...reading.

>>7630792
>Vonnegut is one of the best writers of the past fifty years

>>7630795
And your point? Does that imply superiority to the others that I listed?

>>7630785
Oh, so you were just lying. Flipping through doesn't count as reading, neither does just buying the book. You definitely don't belong on this board.

>>7630774

Kingsley Amis - and you don't use the knighthood with the surname alone, it would be 'Sir Kingsley' if you wanted to use it at all - hadn't a scrap of talent. His son is just this vacuous passenger.

>>7630778

Try Peter - he had, and has, the denser cojones.

>>7630816
How does one measure testical density?

>>7630803
How did you surmise that I flipped through the books? Do tell... I don't need my ego stroked by an anon board. If you don't believe me - great.

I don't require your approval or consent. Take it over leave it - cheers!

>>7630807
Wonderful - I appreciate your well-considered and articulate response.

>>7630829
Because your English is shit. That's not a good sign for someone who claims to have read some notably dense English works in a day or so. If you're native English then it's pretty clear that you've never read a book in your life.

>>7630816
Ball size while perhaps critical to your choice of male writers - isn't necessarily a useful metric in my regard.

>>7630828

Stance.

>>7630843
lol...troll try harder. the grammar nazi shtick has been done before ... and better.

>>7630858

It's not that, it's that you're a fucking cunt who wants my big pipe down the slice I'll make in your fucking gullet, cakelord.

>>7630858
This is an incredibly autistic ruse.
But obviously I've been rused.

>>7630858
wew lad i am laffin'

>>7630866
lol

>>7630868
>no ruse my friend. I have no reason to lie and my time's better elsewhere than trolling a forum with folks i'll never meet in real life. don't particularly care if my anon posting are well written. as stated before, i have no reason to lie - i've read those books cover to cover in my free time and within the past month or so. i'm happy to discuss each at length...feel free to start a thread on any and i'll contribute.

ci sentiamo piu tardi? ... a dopo. a bientot. tschuss.

>>7630885
So then any Beckett books?

>>7630890
i've read murphy... and some of his poems published in the latest issue of the paris review. I'm intrigued and looking forward to reading more as time allows. Uni's started up again so pleasure reading is over for a while while I work on my masters

>>7630771
HE'S GREAT TOO. GOOD TASTE ANON.

>>7630898
What, in your opinion, are the main dialogical similarities between Beckett's Murphy and Joyce's Portrait, or do they share any at all?

>>7630767
Jealous-little-baby-fucker-deep-fried-faggot-on-a-stick.

>>7629159

even then there's not much difference, your original post holds

>>7631066
Not jealous, r/dawg.
Just skeptical.

>>7629168
and Joyce