Know any novels were you can tell that the author was clearly insane/mentally ill when they wrote it?
>>8304171
El Túnel by Ernesto Sábato.
>>8304171my diary
Now that /pol/s all fine, whats up /lit/?
Just finished my PhD thesis on this. is it good?
>>8304134
have you flown across the Atlantic in a boat yet?
>>8304172
What's it to ya lad?
>>8304134
Is what good? Your PhD thesis? - how would we know? Or the book? - surely you've read it?
Everywhere I have been in my life, in every situation, wherever I’ve lived and worked alongside people, I’ve always been considered by everyone to be an intruder or, at the least, a stranger. Amongst my relatives as amongst acquaintances, I’ve always been considered an outsider. Not that even once have I been treated like that consciously, but the spontaneous response of others to me ensured that I was.
Everyone everywhere has always treated me kindly. Very few people, I think, have had so few raise their voice against them, or been so little frowned at, so infrequently the object of someone else’s arrogance or irritability. But the kindness with which I was treated was always devoid of affection. For those who would naturally be closest to me, I was always a guest who, as such, was well treated but only with the attentiveness due to a stranger and the lack of affection which is the lot of the intruder.
I’m sure that all this, I mean other people’s attitudes towards me, lies principally in some obscure intrinsic flaw in my own temperament. Perhaps I communicate a coldness that unwittingly obliges others to reflect back my own lack of feeling.
I get to know people quickly. It doesn’t take long for people to grow to like me. But I never gain their affection. I’ve never experienced devotion. To be loved has always seemed to me an impossibility, as unlikely as a complete stranger suddenly addressing me as familiarly as ‘tu’.
I don’t know if this makes me suffer or if I simply accept it as my indifferent fate, and to which questions of suffering or acceptance do not enter.
I always wanted to please. It always hurt me that people should be indifferent towards me. As an orphan of Fortune I have, like all orphans, a need to be the object of someone’s affection. I’ve always been starved of the realization of that need. I’ve grown so accustomed to this vain hunger that, at times, I’m not even sure I still feel the need to eat.
With or without it life still hurts me.
Others have someone who is devoted to them. I’ve never had anyone who even considered devoting themselves to me. That is for others: me, they just treat decently.
I recognize in myself the capacity to arouse respect but not affection. Unfortunately I’ve done nothing that in itself justifies that initial respect and so no one has ever managed fully to respect me either.
I sometimes think that I enjoy suffering. But the truth is I would prefer something else.
I don’t have the right qualities to be either leader or follower. I don’t even have the merit of being contented which, if all else fails, is all that remains.
Other people of lesser intelligence are in fact much stronger than me. They are better than I am at carving out their lives amongst other people, more skilled at administering their intelligence. I have all the necessary qualities to influence others but not the art with which to do so, nor even the will to want to do so.
>>8304106
...
(continues)
...
If one day I were to love someone, I would not be loved in return.
It’s enough for me to want something for that thing to die. My destiny, however, is not powerful enough to prove deadly to just anything. It has the unfortunate disadvantage of being deadly only to those things I want.
Reading Pessoa in english is so diferent. In portuguese it's so much better, you guys wouldn't believe.
What is the best way to properly "express" the concept of immortality? What would be a general feel after years, centuries of being alive? The few that come to mind would be the boredom, seeing those you love age and die around you and the feelings that would bring, a sense of apathy which would be express through reckless behavior, and those are the only ones I can think of atm. Any other, specifically negative ones? I plan on constructing a narrative concerning an ambitious character who makes a deal with a manipulative deity, granting the mortal immortality. I understand the biggest negative would be the price the protag would have to pay nearing the end of his deal (which would throw him into an endless void of nightmarish, distorted creations beyond human understanding), but I require a few more that would be more prevalent. Pic unrelated btw, and thanks for the help.
>>8304103
I think extreme apathy after being jaded by decades/centuries of extreme hedonism and extreme torture. There could be a wise/zen aspect to his extreme apathy as well. That kind of feeling you get after you've beaten/done everything in a free roam video game like GTA Vice City or San Andreas and there's like nothing to do, something extreme like stealing a fucking tank from a military base and terrorizing the city is underwhelming for you (in the videogame). I guess that's the general mood in the game.
You have to consider aspects such as aging. Will the immortal man continue to age for eternity and be a husk of a vegetable in a couple of centuries while still techincally being alive? Or will he stop aging all together and be in the prime of his life for all eternity?
A truly immortal man would with time transcend humanity and enter godhood.
>>8304103
Tuck Everlasting (it's middle grade fiction, deal with it) does a good job with this.
What are some novels with smart but lazy (such as myself) protagonists
>>8304081
At Swim-Two-Birds
I understand that this board is essentially worthless for constructive discussion or learning, but as the rest of the internet is at least doubly so, i thought i'd ask;
I'm interested in reading nietzsche, but would like some recommendations before starting. As it seems his education and turns of phrase are a little obtuse to someone without a university level education.
However, by all means, feel free to continue your un-examined shitposting about fifty shades of grey.
>>8303933
You're so blatantly a newfag and your patronising tone is so misguided as to the realities of this shitty board that you should honestly kill yourself because with that narcissism its no wonder youre unhappy in life and looking on fucking 4chan to learn how to get started with nietzsche
>>8303933
he's easy to read and if you cant understand him you're a bonehead. start with birth of tragedy and genealogy of morals.
>>8303933
You're clearly either a neckbeard from /pol/ or a teenager from /b/ so maybe you should stick to the wiki summaries
Where's the best place to find philo reading lists/downloads?
>>8303871
>Democritus
>not really a philosopher
This is what happens if you start with Russels fucking History of Philosophy.
>>8303871
>must read
>Diogenes
>>8303984
not so intuitive is it?
>from whence
>for lack of a better word
>>8303864
And but so
>peoples
how do i write a screenplay
the greeks
>>8303852
Nu Know Brow ?
>>8303859
pixelated
How do I get into reading? I don't like reading at all. Nothing interests me.
Read something that interests you.
don't read
Start with the Greeks
When you read a book you are literally becoming the person you're reading through empathy.
>>8303742
did it really take a meme philosopher to find that out?
>>8303752
No, it took Don Quixote, but it just blows my mind, now I know why people read the bible/koran so seriously, and understand paranoid schizophrenics.
Not so much anon. Remember there's agency, so the interpretation of the novel, the core ideas, depends on you and you alone.
Then comes the discussions with other people who have read it too, and that's how you build up a character, a leit motiv for an author and their novel. It's more of a construction.
How do I become "well-read"? I'm new to literature and have never picked up a book since uni.
how 'well read' do you want to be?
do you know what kinds of books you like?
Go to your local library and look for interesting reads, discover your tastes, what you like and such, from then on you'll know what books you want to read.
If you mean 'well-read' as in being a smartboi then go look up the list of books in the Western Canon or something lol
>>8303722
dont care about being well-read, just read what you find interesting and look for similar authors
In the first entry of "The New Sun" series, a character talks about how a new sun is coming. What does this mean, did I miss something? What is this new sun? Also Severian talks about "I spent two watches looking for books" how long is a watch? 8 hours?
>>8303627
>What does this mean, did I miss something? What is this new sun?
It isn't made clear for a while, as it's an inherent part of Severian's world and he's not writing for people completely unfamiliar with it. In general with the series, I think it adds to the experience to connect the dots yourself. Here it is if you want to spoil yourself, but I encourage you not to:the new sun is literally a new sun. The old sun is dying because a black hole has been placed in its center. Severian is attempting to convince outside powers to remove this black hole and rejuvenate the sun.
A watch is 3 hours.
>>8303637
not OP, but isn't this something you only really discover in Urth of the New Sun?
btw I thought that book was fantastic, odd that it's never mentioned with BoTNS
"Hey we are going to sleep. You take first watch - we'll trade in about four hours"
Is it okay to absorb philosophy from secondary sources if you are too dumb to read the original texts? I just mean as a way to make sense of your life and not anhero.
>I just mean as a way to make sense of your life and not anhero.
Why would you read philosophy for this?
You have to have the patience to read the original, or else you're just a fag
>>8303541
What the hell else are you supposed to do?
Hey Everyone! Stack thread. Post your stacks, rate other peoples stacks. Maybe talk about books you like. Maybe be nice to people.
>>8303480
only ones ppl are gonna recognize are recognitions and tunnel my dude
nice mcelroy tho
>>8303480
Stop being such an insecure narcissist in need of validation from /lit/