Is it really worth the effort? Or just a pseudo-meme at best?

less than 10 people (if even that) on this board have read it

it's a meme.

it may or may not also be good, two separate issues really.

>>7643032
less than 10 people in the world have actually read it t b h

I own a copy that I bought because I managed to find it cheap and wanted to be able to say I own a copy but I havent read more than ten pages.

The writing is weird as fuck.

>>7643028
It's the biggest meme ever because it's a massive out of print book that no one's read. It might be good, it might not but the meme comes from its inaccessibility.

It's the next best thing to literally making up a book (which /lit/ has also done at some point).

It's a thousand page book that's been out of print for decades. What do you think, my friend?

get the EPUB version of it. its not that hard

>>7643076
yes?

I read a few sections and the writing is beautiful. McElroy is a talented man.

>>7643028
Whether it's any good or not, its rise to prominence here is solely down to its reputation for being a big difficult book, with people angling for pseud points by talking about it.

>>7643142
You've read it? Was it difficult?

>>7643028
W O M E N A N D M E N
O
M
E
N
&
M
E
N

>>7643072
Hello Borges.

>>7643028
The only texts referring to it I've read are Dissertations, comparative Lit. mostly. Seems like it is relevant to academic study of some weird devices. Seems like not many people read it for pleasure.
>Is it really worth the effort?
Seems like studying ontological implcations in fiction or something makes it worth it.

Seems like it's a book meant to read for in-depth academic study not pleasure/admiration.

So no. Don't read it. I don't even think it's still in print anyway.

>>7644254
>hasn't read it

Difficult but amazingly rewarding by the time you work your way through to the end, I made a big thread about it once and wrote a lot about it but got no replies from anyone who has actually read it which was disappointing. I can't be bothered writing it all again but check the archive I gave a summary and some analysis to give people an idea of what they're in for and to try and entice them into reading such a standout novel. Also if you do opt to read it, as I hope you will, check your local libraries or local university libraries for copies rather than splashing out on the ridiculously over priced copies a valuable online.

>>7645211
how long did it take for you to read it, familia?

>>7645261
About 2 and a half weeks maybe

Can anyone even give me a basic premise of this novel? Let's go beyond the memes for once family.

>>7643028
Where the fuck do you even read it anyway? It costs 150 bucks.

>>7646505
Apparently, it's in some university libraries. Also probably a few higher end local ones.

>>7646505
ebook.

>>7646425
Yes please

>>7643028
Based on what I've read of one of his more recent novels, Cannonball, I'd guess Women and Men is fantastic and, in addition, ridiculously hard to understand.

>>7643040
post pics
or excerpts

>>7646545
Can you post a working one? I downloaded one from libgen and it doesn't work.

After reading some of his short stories I can't even imagine how hard this book is to read
He's a great writer I just can't see myself reading 1000 pages of him

CHALLENGE ACCEPTED. Someone post an ePub & I'll read this fucker when I'm done with 2666.

>>7646811
Can you dl this one and see if it works for you, I'm the guy above who said it didn't work. I want to see if it's just my shitty computer or something or if it's just a broken file.
http://golibgen.io/view.php?id=670516

>>7646823
>http://golibgen.io/view.php?id=670516
workd 4 me

>>7646882
What are you using to read it?

Who's better between McElroy and Gass?

>>7646774
http://a.pomf.hummingbird.moe/xhdjfc.epub here's the one i have.

>>7646887
calibre

>>7646901
and Gaddis, for that matter?

>>7647007
Speaking of Gaddis, I just downloaded a pdf of the Recognitions and the cover is some painting of a slack jawed neckbeard dude. I feel like I've seen it somewhere before but I can't think of the title for the life of me. Can someone who actually knows about art tell me what it's called?

Also should I just jump into The Recognitions or is there anything that'd be helpful to read beforehand?

>>7646747
"I beside her shot on film or tried to his dive but she just as she'd been interrupted passing on to me a weird family yet neighborhood question Corona's Italian wife Bea had put to her as they had biked home the night before through rain divided and gathered and caressed by trees now tonight saw him pull off a two-and-a-half at a public pool under the lights that went out totally for a moment, a breaker fluke that went unexplained, as he left the board plunging us if not my camera into nowhere and came back to reveal him just passing the crest of the yet undisclosed dive now crunched into tuck – as I became aware of the old woman of a year ago with the spotted skin and the veins materialized now as if by the power glitch itself beside me seeming to say hello with a word: for Umo's dive was so busy a somersaulting that when he just came out of it he's someone unaware of you headed somewhere else gone forever, my sister said, or executed, it came to me she had murmured to herself or me, I thought if anything a sucked-downward tongue or perfect loss."
This is from Cannonball. The thing about McElroy is that he places each word deliberately where it is to create a unique and confusing form of stream-of-consciousness that, in my opinion, makes Joyce's and Faulkner's look like a walk in the park, which, I guess, contributes to the fact that no one knows who he is.

>>7647094
Is everything he writes like that? I can see why no one's heard of this guy if it is.

>>7646901
>>7647007
They're kind of hard to compare because they are all great in their own individual ways, but I'd say Gass, since his prose is the most beautiful I've ever read.

>>7647120
Everything in Cannonball is. And it's a shame that he is such a nonentity. I can only hope that, in the decades to come, he, along with Gass, who is, in my opinion, a better stylist, receives the recognition he is entitled to.

>>7647094
Can someone translate this shit

>>7647007
Gaddis is miles better than those two

>>7647242
I can't; but I can sort of explain what he is trying to do. His writing, which is often flowing and unbroken by punctuation, mimics the way things are experienced: it is without the structure and focus; it is a whirlwind of musings, sensations, and on-the-spot thought; it's stream-of-consciousness in its purest form.
>>7647281
I disagree. Gass is definitely a better stylist than Gaddis.

>>7647094
From what I've read, Women & Men isn't as difficult as Cannonball, thankfully

>>7647596
That's a relief. Over a thousand pages of the writing in Cannonball would kill me.

I found a copy of The Letter Left to Me and Agape Agape. Are those two worth buying or should I buy the hard cover that has The Prince and Leviathan in it?

>>7647094

That is some of the worst shit I have ever read in my life. It's like that "has anyone been so far as" meme but serious. Awful.

>>7647094
Guess what, Gertrude Stein did this first and better

File: Hugo_van_der_Goes_Portinari_Altar.jpg (858KB, 4096x1745px) Image search: [Google]

858KB, 4096x1745px

>>7647042
He's in the center of the triptych
one of the shepherds

File: Screen Shot 2016-02-01 at 12.44.02 PM.png (238KB, 504x653px) Image search: [Google]

238KB, 504x653px

>>7648437
I don't know, I'm slightly intrigued. It seems along the lines of Burroughs cut-up technique. Putting strange words next to each other to create meaning from the dissonance in between them.

On which note, has anyone really been far as decided to use even go want to read Women & Men & what are their experiences?

>>7648450
But Gertrude Stein is female and, thusly, inferior :^)

>>7648555
Thanks.

>>7648555
I did not know this. Thank you, anon.

>>7648437
Not your thing, I guess. I don't know. Try to appreciate it for what is. Just saying it's bad is a disservice to McElroy, and terribly arrogant.

is this book rare or something? Found a site selling the 1993 paperback for 22$, should i by it?

>>7648450
>Gerty Stein
>better than anyone

Even in American letters, she was the meme writer of her age.

>>7649919
Extremely and 22 dillas is a steal.

>>7649950
You can think that, but do read her piece 'Henry James' from Four in America (spoiler alert: barely about Henry James)

her popular works are not her accomplishments

>>7649950
If she's good enough for Gass, she's good enough for me.

>>7649919
That's a Dalkey archive reprint, which is also out of print. The original 1987 edition is the one people tend to be charged an arm and a leg for.

You should still buy it if you're interested in the book because it's fairly uncommon.

File: IMG_20160201_152450937.jpg (3MB, 2340x4160px) Image search: [Google]

3MB, 2340x4160px

>>7649950
>>7649957
She's my very favorite

>>7649960
>Gass
>good (for anyone)

Even in American letters, he's the meme writer of his age.

Also, I just want to say, this post took me like three tries to write because I'm extremely drunk. Shitposting is hard work.

>>7649919
According to McElroy, it's supposed to go back to print soon.

>>7649969
Pls no. Pls don't speak ill of the greatest writer still walking the Earth.

>>7649971
Sauce?

>>7649979
Don't worry, man. I think Omensetter's Luck is fantastic, and his novellas are his most underappreciated work. Haven't read The Tunnel or his new book, but Middle C was kind of a slog tbf (to be frank).

>>7650002
There's a screenshot of him saying it on Twitter floating around.

>>7650004
I recommend reading The Tunnel ASAP. It's only a matter of time before it is hailed as the masterpiece.

>>7650169
*masterpiece it is.

>>7650169
>>7650174
"...sheer adipose verbosity and an unremitting condition of moral and intellectual flatulence."

>>7650237
if that's gass, what does that make nietzsche?

you know that isn't a real criticism. that's a judgmental surface analysis

>>7650244
I'm just quoting a review from The New Republic. Never actually read it myself.

>>7650252
the new republic has a massive chip on its shoulder, it sounds like

>>7650237
Boy is he gonna look stupid when, after a few decades pass, and everyone recognizes its importance, he is the only person to call it bad.

Our lord and savior DFW said it sucks canal water.

Just picked up a copy today at my university. Will start reading soon.

>>7650527
You're in for a wild ride, I'm sure. Good luck.

>>7647094
Deluded. No one thinks like that. No one experiences things like that. It's just masturbation and memery of the highest caliber.

>>7652049
It's not necessarily supposed to be a person's thoughts; it's supposed to mirror the way we experience things: just how our attention will switch from thing to thing, it is discursive; just how our experiences are flowing and without breaks, it is often uninterrupted by punctuation, and lacking in the composure of after-thought. That's how I see it, anyway. Think what you want, but I urge you to reconsider.