Hey /lit/, what's some good stuff to read about stoicism? Primary or secondary sources welcome.
I've ready Aurelius, Epictetus, Seneca's letters. Who else?
Also some book on εὐδαιμονία and what it meant to the different Greeks/Romans would be cool.
Epicurus
>>7591295
No, don't do that.
Chapter X of Spengler's Decline...
so i know you guys say theres really not anything to read as a preparation for infinite jest and that is the easiest one in the meme trilogy but seriously, for someone with a very small background in literature is there anything i can do beforehand to understand better these meme?
read D.H. lawrence
Yeah. A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again, his first book of essays. Listening to the radio interviews Wallace gave to promote the book will help too.
Just don't read it man. Go to college. Read books. Come back to it in five years if you're still curious what it is.
You're just going to waste your time and spoil a great deal of reading for yourself if you try to read Infinite Jest. It isn't complicated, but if you aren't well read it will probably be boring. I mean that honestly.
Go read Calvino, go read Chaucer, go read Cervantes...you should even read earlier DFW if you really must read Infinite Jest. Pick up Brief Interviews and read it next year. Then if you're really into it let 2018 be your year of Infinite Jest.
There are many, many writers you can choose who are both more complex and thought provoking while also being more accessible. I know that sounds paradoxical, but it takes a certain conditioning of mind to take on books like Infinite Jest that are essentially written for life-long readers.
My friend gave me a loan of the complete Ayn Rand. I didn't really ask for them and not only am I hostile to American culture in general, but I already know from what I've read about her that it's not my cup of tea (I'm a reactionary).
Generally, I would have made more progress, but I'm halfway through the second chapter of The Fountainhead and it's like pulling teeth. The guy who is supposed to be the hero, I guess, seems to have the same internal drive as someone in a Camus or Turganev. It's too early for me to say, but it just seems to be the same sort of existentialist tripe I would have enjoyed as a teenager. Also, this paragon of rightness seems to be designing gommieblocs?
The characters are perfect beyond any human degree and the writing is so stilted, it's actually a chore to read
So, does it get better?
Does her writing improve in subsequent works?
Should I just kill myself now so that I don't feel compelled to read the rest?
read the romantic manifesto and then give it to goodwill
>>7588414
>>>/killyourself/
Who else works at a bookstore here? Can't imagine a comfier experience.
Looking for a summer job at local bookstores now .. only problem is I'm a huge sperg with a very bad resume and very little experience - yipes
>>7581780
i wish! *giggles*
I'd love to but a locally owned one, not a Barnes and noble or something similar. Any good stories OP?
Hey /lit i read a short story in middle school about a man stuck on a small island with a rat who's eating all if his food. I remember it being a phenomenal story but i can't remember the name of it.. does this sound familiar to anyone?
Modern Immigration
>>7594976
"Side Bet", by Will F. Jenkins.
>>7595053
Thank you!
Did /lit/ enjoy The Pale King? How did it compare to Infinite Jest? Did its unfinished nature leave an empty feeling in your stomach when you read it?
>>7594851
the thing that got to me was that DFW must have been really frustrated when he realised he couldn't write an autobiography about his time in the IRS and also a piece of fiction and would have to do another yet fractured narrative. i truly believe this was the final straw for him
>>7594960
What do you mean his time with the IRS?
>>7594960
the pale king is fiction and he never worked for the irs. the whole narrative of dfw telling you the book is true is part of a fictional novel
Is there a strict private (or not doesn't really matter) tracker for books that's similar to What.CD?
I'm talking about a tracker that only allows one, definitive copy of a book on their site, and has strict rules and a strict reporting system to make sure everything is good? I find too often that when I download books from random websites, What.CD or Amazon they're riddled with errors. Whether it be reproduction errors (bad spelling, grammar, formatting) or no chapter markers, it's hard to find definitive copies of books in download form.
So, does this exist?
there used to be bibliotik, which is exactly what you have described, but it has closed down over the last few months and I'm getting less and less hopeful it will ever be back
Yes, it's bibliotik, it's down right now. Lurk more.
>>7582051
>>7594552
It was down for a month and a half due to DDoS, went up for a couple days after moving hosts, went down again yesterday, admin says they'll be back up again sooner than before, they just rushed their initial launch and need some more maintenance.
Does /lit/ like Raymond Carver?
He's the only short-story writer I can really relate to and I've been enjoying short stories lately. Joyce's short stories were actually pretty great also. What other short story authors are good?
>>7594409
>does /lit/ like Gordon Lish
Gordon Lish is a pretty cool guy.
Isn't this a guy from an H.P. Lovecraft story?
>>7594409
If you like Carver I'd recommend Breece DJ Pancake and Hemmingway. Alice Munro too, maybe
Any books on the confluence of these two?
>>7594369
Try Anti-Semite and Jew by Sartre.
>>7594369
Is that a Jaden?
>>7594389
pretty sure its Tyler the Creator.. some meme rapper
Thoughts on the Beat Generation? As much as I can appreciate them contextually/historically, and like some of them more than others (like Ginsberg), I'm not sure if I'm a huge fan of them in general, especially some of the stuff that came from Burroughs and Kerouac.
I dunno, as much as they broke away from the very traditionalist mold of their time, I think they seem to have given rise to this oxymoronically tired, pretentious, self-absorbed attitude toward literature. It's a similar sort of distasteful voice I observe in other movements like dirty realism or Gonzo journalism.
>>7594364
>Thoughts on the Beat Generation?
Talentless hacks
Kerouac and Ginsburg are ok. A bit naive and hit or miss.
Burroughs on the other hand is legitimately amazing. Great writer. His experiments with form are well complimented by his beautiful prose and immaculate sense of humor.
It's not hard to see his influence on Pynchon and other respected literary figures.
>>7594417
This tbhf. I kek hard whenever I see people who buy into /lit/ memes too much without understanding the background behind them who fervently praise and defend Ruggles while simultaneously acting like Bill is trash.
Are there any /lit/ recommended books about how to converse casually with people better? Ever since I started college I've realized that my conversation skills have really gone down the shitter for some reason. In High School I could talk to anyone without being awkward but now I struggle trying to find words to say.
I've already read How to Win Friends and Influence People (an archaic, unhelpful book which people should stop recommending) and How to Talk to Anyone.
>>7594280
just be yourself by a normie
>>7594296
Yeah I try to get as much real world practice in as I can but I'd also like some supplemental literature.
>>7594280
This may sound like really weird and unhelpful advice but reading about Buddhism has been one of the things in my life that has helped my conversational abilities the most. Even if you don't buy into the religious/belief aspects of it Buddhist teachings can help you get to the point where feelings of anxiety, embarrassment, anger and other emotions that can come up in conversation don't negatively effect you and impair your ability to effectively communicate what you want to.
Also its teachings about the false-sense of self and ego can help in conversations as well. Again, even if you don't buy into the teaching of no-self/no-soul, being aware of it and pondering it enough can help you avoid saying things for the wrong reasons. If I think back to all the cringey things I have said in my life I find that the vast majority of them were said because I wanted to impress people or to have people think I was funny, I was essentially doing it for self-validation and to make myself feel good. Once you internalize the idea that ever doing or saying anything for those reasons are counter-productive and almost psychologically unhealthy it can help you avoid ever saying anything cringey or stupid.
Say what you want about Bradbury or about this book, you can call it high school tier if you want, but that doesn't make it any less important or any less delicious to read.
>>7594213
I was assigned to read it in high school but never got past the first page. Still passed the tests we were given on it from listening to class discussion. It was probably shit anyway.
I honestly remember it being pretty dumb. I read it like 5 years ago so I can't really recall much. But robot hunting dogs or some shit. Teenage dream girl. The premise itself doesn't make much sense and is overly dramatic. I couldn't stop thinking how silly the whole thing was.
Nah man, it's a pretty shit fucking book.
What Historians from antiquity -> 1500s are worth reading? Aside from the Gs and Rs?
Lots of stuff. Check out any "History of Historical Writing." Something old like Barnes will probably be more here-is-a-list-of-names-y, while something recent like Burrow's History of Histories is more detailed but less comprehensive. Maybe check out Alan Megill's Historical Knowledge, Historical Error for a look at the evolution of historical epistemology in the West.
The Renaissance can be try because its neo-classical "rhetorical" historians don't really resonate much. They often get seen as a dead zone of stylized circlejerking before interesting guys like Machiavelli and the unusually precocious Giuccardini come along, and the Reformation is likewise seen sort of as "critical philology, but no great historical insight." A lot of medieval writers were great, surprisingly often simple chroniclers who were cut off from the kinds of self-consciousness and education that a Florentine rhetorical historian might have, but managed to be weirdly precocious and insightful. And of course a lot of stuff that is mostly interesting because it's our major source for a difficult or scarcely sourced period, which is another metric altogether, stuff like Gregory of Tours is far better known than more insightful later historians simply because of how important he is as a source.
Trying to remember who is a good read on Reformation and Enlightenment historians but I can only remember a sludge of Georg Iggers, who has good coverage (somewhere) of Reformation/Enlightenment historiography that is often ignored because it was submerged/tentative/conceptually too early.
Even the rhetorical historians can be good btw. There are some really great books out there on how to read rhetorical history (and classical/renaissance rhetoric in general) from the perspective of its contemporaries. It's a lot less artificial and "phony" than it seems, it just has different priorities. But honestly I still find it hard to get into.
Islam has some good ones too though rarely any titans t b h f a m. Good ethnologists though, al-Biruni i dunno
Just read some modern Barnes equivalent and check out what seems interesting.
Oh, church historians of later Rome are great. I can't remember if it was Eusebius or Lactantius saying that when Galerius died his rotting ass stunk up the whole town.
>>7594070
Gs and Rs?
>>7594110
Greek and Romans, desu senpai.
An OP, the Byzantines. Try Nicetas, tons of Greek and New Testament references and cool history too with Muslims and stuff about the 4th crusade. There was also a woman Byzantine historian who covered another crusade.
I looked a spanish thread in the catalog and couldn't find one.
I was trying to post my taco writing in the critique thread, but I feel it wouldn't be apropiate to put it there.
Asi que decidi hacer un hilo en español.
Por fa den puntines pls.
Disculpen las fallas de ortografia, mi open office no tiene el diccionario de español.
>que mierda es la imagen
estoy intentando hacer una pequeña historia tipo animoo para ponerme a dibujarla o algo asi.
>>7593769
Pues está aceptable pero tienes que mejorar tu gramática (tildes, comas).
>>7593973
gracias, hay algun buen recurso o manual para escribir bien en español aparte de leerse el manual de gramatica de la real academia española?
3/10
si corregís las faltas de ortografía y lo redactás mejor (por ej. en los primeros dos párrafos decís catalina 3 veces, eso es mala redacción)
asciende a 5/10
What are you writing, or have written? Share your work. Comments welcome.
I'll start off with this short story I just wrote. (1k words).
http://pastebin.com/DHUADAkR
>>7593670
Where did you write it? Typed or handwrote? What software?
Ending to a ss
Is it just painful purple prose?
p.s I liked your stuff OP, terse and lean, unlike...
On the walk back through nowhere in the UK, all of my senses are alive to Jacob’s description. I notice that the air, which doesn’t sit or hang in between the street lights, but is merely pitched there, calls forth nothing but it’s own cold, and when a midge dances through it, from one point of illumination to another, all but the cold air which it displaces will not be animated, and there is not metaphor to be had.
I look at the piebald canopy of pale glows and black, shimmering over the top of the Lindam, and as I had thought of them: the lights as little eyes or fairies, the jet and unseen roads as webs of tar, they slide off, and underneath is Lindam council estate, chock full with people patiently breathing, and flicking through their television channels; they are going nowhere.
And it is not without remembering Jacob’s crooked smile that I see the empty plaza, where Cecily is approaching 24 hours from now, through a dream she later tells me was full of harsh luminous water, which to touch felt like sand paper and to look at was to see bleak stone.
When I get to my house there is orange light mixing with orange light and ambulances out the reach of fire. My Uncle has sat down to T.V with the hob roaring and now most of his skin shines like wet cellophane. The ambulance crew and the firemen don’t speak a word but run, run, run in and out and around the flying flames and to the van and to the gurney.
By my Uncles side I walk on feet that feel like charged balls of nothing, up to the open mouth of the van and weightlessly onto it’s stiff lip.
I know he doesn’t know that the house is on fire, or that Jack’s brain caught it’s death on the steadfast pavement in 1972; and I am glad. And then we are going at the same speed, on our way to the heart of nowhere in the UK.
But then the ambulance man says that we are going to Waltham county general and we are 41219.
>>7594558
Don't use words like shimmering lad.