Anyone else think the starter kit could use an update?

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yeah. pic related

No "Electric Sheep..."
The movie was better, honestly.

>>7653381
just stop posting it. I think the top 100 list we made last year is a good enough starter kit. you just have to look around for what book sounds best to you

Isn't that the highschool reading list we made and underageb&s got annoyed we called highschool so we called starter? I shudder to think what more pandering to the age group would do. Probably HP

>>7653381
the only books that are still relevant to /lit/ culture here are Catcher and Lolita.

>>7653440
a lot of stuff on the top 100 isn't right for beginners, especially near the top of the list (Ulysses, Gravity's Rainbow, Infinite Jest, Dostoyevsky, etc) which is where people would probably want to start

>>7653447
Lolita's only relevant as a joke

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>>7653447
>still relevant to /lit/ culture
oh wow my sides were already in orbit before i realised you are deadly serious and you think you're on the road to progress.

What do you guys think should be put in a new starter pack surrounding /lit/ culture more? Any of these?

The Stranger
Dubliners
Lolita
Catcher in the Rye
100 Years of Solitude
Siddartha
Hamlet
Gatsby
The Metamorphosis
Crying of Lot 49
Notes from Underground
Iliad and Odyssey

Heart of Darkness?
Dorian Gray?
Invisible Cities?
Divine Comedy? (too hard to starter?)
Blood Meridian?

>>7653479
We should put some different books on it. I'm getting tired of threads made by "begginers" asking what these books are about.
Put some easy literature that isn't currently talked about on here so we can get some fresh discussion.

>>7653440
The top 100 is awful.

>>7653447
We're not /mu/. The Starter Kit isn't supposed to turn people into "/lit/-core" drones but introduce them to literature.

>>7653381
It's too American Highschool.

*Add* some works that aren't American Highschool (by American Highschool I don't mean any book on the curriculum, just the stereotypical ones), but still accessible and introductory.

For example:

The Saga of the Volsungs
The Iliad & Odyssey - Homer (a bit Highschool, but we need some Classic classics)
About Love & Other Stories - Anton Chekhov
Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, and Phaedo - Plato
The Golden Ass - Apuleius
Typhoon - Joseph Conrad
The Dhammapada
Melmoth the Wanderer - Maturin


But really a Starter Kit could have a plethora of different books, maybe we should just compile a list of accessible works and tell newcomers to pick the one they like the look of most and start with that.

>>7653457
Infinite Jest and Dostoevsky are fine for beginners as long as they don't mind the length

>>7653513
IJ before Ulysses isn't the best idea, but yeah

>picture of dorian gay
Redpill me the reason why I should read that

>>7653479
I like some of the suggestions, but we DO NOT want a chart that introduces people to /lit/-core, WE DO want a chart that introduces them to *literature*.

>>7653512
>We're not /mu/. The Starter Kit isn't supposed to turn people into "/lit/-core" drones but introduce them to literature.

But no one here is going to want it in the starter pack if none of us agrees with it. /lit/core whatever the collective of /lit/ users thinks is good reading. There is no reason to attach some stigma to it.

>>7653525
no, these idiots do want /lit/core. their tastes might not have the resounding consensus and comfort of an echochamber otherwise. we should make them read the Great Books course like the special snowflake college education they claim to want. more of them might kill themselves.

>>7653531
You can definitely attach stigma to the memes caused by /lit/core being discussed ad infinitum, but there isn't anything wrong with those books, really. If the person who reads them doesn't like them, so be it

>>7653540
go fuck yourself bud

>>7653479
This is literally the other starter kit we made.

>>7653549
>go fuck yourself bud
hey if you read the Great Books course and don't like it, so be it. i'll be being in my gf

>>7653531
Why would you disagree with the inclusion of a books because it's not /lit/-core?

Do you see if people have mentioned books on /lit/ before you read them?

I'm not arguing against /lit/-core being included, but trying to make an introduction to literature, more of an introduction to a board, is a bit silly.

>>7653540
It would be a pity if the "Starter Kit" became more of a guide to fit in on a website, than an introduction to a range of literature.

>>7653556
go fuck yourself

>>7653558
are we not buds now you might have to read boole?

>>7653512
If I had read 1984 while in highschool, I would have bored the fuck out of me. Today it's one of my favourite books.

>>7653381
I think these are good starter books
A few of them are dogshit but when you're just starting out it's hard to differentiate shit from actual good lit

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>>7653381
There is: pic related.

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it's been done already

>>7653381
>>7653611
>>7653619

So much I have not read.

Also fuck the Great Gatsby.
I was forced to read that in high school and got pretty much turned away from reading thanks to this and To KIll a Mockingbird.

Are they actually worth reading? If so I might give them another try and see if I was just being a shitheaded high schooler.

>>7653627
You probably are still a pleb senpai. Try again in ten years

>>7653619
Ew, Gatsby

>>7653627
Nope, neither are very good

>>7653627
TKaM is more of a cultural relevance thing, but Gatsby is great by prose alone.

>>7653619
>Slouching Towards Bethlehem
Why

Everything else looks good. Although I feel like the Iliad should be up there, too.

>>7653627
I was joking, anon. Women and Men or The Tunnel would kill you.

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>>7653646
Won't lie, you got me then. I'm bad at recognizing shitposting.

I'm just looking for stuff to get me back into reading.

>>7653653
if you're new lurk, don't post.

>>7653658
Okay.

>>7653653
What interests you senpai? Any ideas or themes? Any historical periods?

>>7653653
To answer seriously, I recommend looking into, if you'd like, Blood Meridian: it's written well and easy to follow, and the allegory isn't hard to pick up on.

>>7653668
Breaking the lurk stuff.
I'll keep it fast. Fan of Greco-Roman, pretty much anything military.

To be honest I know I have shit taste, take note that my favorite book is Brave New World by Huxley.
Really just looking for starter books.
>>7653672
If you're serious, then I'll take a look at it.

>>7653696
The Gallic War - Julius Caesar
The Peloponnesian War - Thucydides
Storm of Steel - Ernst Junger
The Iliad - Homer

>>7653696
I am. A little heads up, though: it's fairly violent; but it's not, to mention it again, anywhere as discomforting as The Tunnel.

>>7653711
Thanks.

One last question. The 'Recommended Reading' on the /lit/ wikia, actually worth looking at?

>>7653722
Thanks then. As for violence, might make for an interesting read.

>>7653696
>>7653711
Augustus - John Williams

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>>7653725
They're good for finding new literature, look into the books first though, and read the ones you want.

Thanks you all for the help then.
Now I have to just dust off my e-book and start reading something.

>>7653381
>>7653619
Can we get an amalgamation of these two that can be agreed on?

>>7653750
>agree
>/lit/

"Now even bookish pharmacists are afraid to take on the great, imperfect, torrential works, books that blaze paths into the unknown. They choose the perfect exercises of the great masters... They want to watch the great masters spar, but they have no interest in real combat."

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>>7653800

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>>7653381

>>7653870
I like this chart apart from Androids. I don't know how that got on there.

It needs more philosophy such as Sophie's World and Descarte's Meditations

>>7653870
that fucking C&P cover

I need an updated /r9k/-core featuring Houellebecq et al.

>>7653881
Decent entry read, one Sci-Fi novel for diversity. I was thinking of putting One Hundred Years or Ficciones over it though.

>>7653525
can you recommend some

>>7653557
>Why would you disagree with the inclusion of a books because it's not /lit/-core?

it would be weird to include books that are never brought up here yes.

>>7653905
Well you've got two Americans and Russians. One Hundred Years would be good, but Ficciones is probably too big for a beginner's list.

Maybe something Greek? Plato's dialogues might be stretch. Calvino would be good, but I'm not familiar with what would be most accessible.

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>>7653619
this is the less confusing version

>>7653525
/lit/-core is essentially just the western-canon, though.

>>7653870
I agree with >>7653881

Its a good chart though. Lets step away from black backgrounds though.

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>>7653924
I actually didn't think of nationality at all when making that, I just happened to have a decent spread I guess. Gonna go with Marquez because I like it and it has a good contrast to the other stuff there.

Grendel

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>no poetry

>>7654113
beginners think poetry is for fags anyway

>>7653925
>removing plato and mishima

>>7653457
Notes from Underground is fine for beginners.

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>>7654113
>poetry

>>7653523
It's a good book

>>7654433
same with The Crying of Lot 49? Just cause the author wrote difficult books doesn't mean all of them are, yeah?

>>7653924
>Ficciones too big for beginners
It's like 150 pages. C&P is like 500.

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>>7654436

>he hasn't read dante or homer

>>7654433
Do you know what a beginner is?

>>7654529
A newfag? An illiterate?

>>7654529
Yes, and????? Dostoevsky isn't hard. In America, we read A Midsummer Night's Dream in the 8th grade. An 18 year old CAN handle Notes in translation.

>>7654531
but think of the children

>>7654557
you have to be 18 to post on 4chan

>>7653433
wrong.

>>7653433
The movie is infinitely worse.

>>7654547
You read it with the help of a teacher bud
I really don't think 8th graders are able to full understand Shakespeare

>>7654602
I don't think anyone is able to fully understand Shakespeare, especially not shitposters

>>7653433
I agree. Probably my least favorite of Dick's works.

>>7654656
But is it his easiest?

>>7654443
Crying of Lot 49 is great beginner Pynchon.

>>7653523
>"redpill me"

Retard detected

>>7654666
and Dubliners is great beginner Joyce?

>>7654664
No. I mean, it bored me and I found it tough to get through. But I know some people the amount of action in the novel. I tend to recommend A Scanner Darkly for starting with Dick.

>>7654711
yes, though it wouldn't be too big a deal to start with Portrait of the Artist

>>7654711
I haven't read it.

>>7653555
which one?

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its been made

My local library has a couple Haruka Murakami books, should I give it a shot or save him for later?

>>7653619
LIT only shits on Vonnegut and the most I've seen Raymond Carver discussed on here is in a rare fleeting bash of Lish.

But, otherwise this list is pretty /lit/

>>7654750
You should read him now before you get more well read so you wont think he's fucking awful

>>7654744
What is that Odysseus Weeps? I've sought for in online and can't find anything yet!

>>7654602
That was just an example. You have to be 18 to post on this site and I was saying we were taught difficult texts in school and taught hhowto understand them. Compared to some of what we learned, Notes is easy and I think most 18 yr. olds if they tried could understand a translation of it

>>7653619
Joan Didion. my man

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>>7654826
there was a link to it in the archive if it ever comes back up

>>7654826
Easily the best book in the original meme trilogy, I'll see if I can find my copy with the alt cover

>>7654826
a red herring, it doesn't exist

>>7653967
This is good

>>7653619
>TCoL49
I love Pynchon but ouch. I can't imagine that book generates a whole lot of "new" readers.

>>7653586
both those sentences out you as a huge plen

>>7654744
>Statius
now that's a deep cut

>>7653967
reminder that kazuo ishiguro is considered british, in case you didn't know this. either way, you got japan covered.

good list all in all

>>7653619
I love seeing Mishima on this starter kit. The Sailor who fell from grace with the sea was the book that introduced me to my love of reading.

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>>7653405
i like that one better than the one in the wiki

>>7654859
>4ch.be

>>7653627

The Great Gatsby is a good book. Read it again its short.

>>7653619
>>7655980
only read confession of mask from him, is this any similliar? Any new themes?

>>7653381
Throw some DFW just for the keks

>>7654113
>translations

this thread lacks some proust

>>7654522
Not him, but i started the Divine Comedy and barely made it to the end of Inferno, shit is dense as fuck, i don't think in these days that shit is for anybody

>>7658104
cause you are plen and missed best parts of book anyway. Also
>What is footnotes

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>>7658098
Proust is for beginners? really nigga? are we thinking of the same guy?

>>7653523
provide your own motivation to do things you useless piece of shit

>>7658135
I did read the footnotes tho.
I actually read it in a very old translation, and in verse. It was unbearable.

>>7658185
>thinking literature is supposed to be "bearable"

You're exactly as unintelligent as you deserve to be

>>7653663
Don't let him bully you, anon. You can post. You may just look like an idiot. That's okay though, cause no one knows who you are.

Is there a contemporary literature chart

How do I get through the Illiad? I find it incredibly dry. I end up losing focus and day dreaming, only to snap out of it when I've gone through the entire page.

>>7653381
I think it's great for the anglosphere and in general, but some variations made by foreigners for their fellows could be made, because even if the wikia charts can be really nice, they also can be total shit.

>Nothing but English lit or maybe 1-2 russian-french books
rly+

>>7653619
>Fagles
Isn't this the shit translation that makes everything overly purple and poem like?

>>7661114
Go ahead Anon.

>>7653967
How do you guys feel about No Longer Human > Kokoro?

>>7661119
>purple and poem like
You may want to look into what the original Odyssey is.

>>7661159
I know but people here have said it goes way overboard with that?

>>7653433
No really, you're right. The book was too much like genre fiction, but, I guess, some people actually like that shit. The movie made the story real, without effort and useless tropes.

>>7661114
>on an english speaking board
gee anon I wonder

>>7661166
how about form your own opinions instead of parroting someone else's?

>>7661279
It costs a lot to form that opinion as I have to buy it

>>7661285
library
online samples

>>7654744
Are those two Korean books any good? If so, what are they called? I've been looking for some good gook books to get into.

>>7658197
I think that nigga was a pleb or whatever but you're a big ass faggot!

>>7653967
Only those bottom three covers are any good.

>>7661119
No. It's the one that uses contemporary words and slang. It's not full ebonics but pretty close.