I just finished Ulysses. Is it all downhill from here ?

If you read it backwards you go uphill.

>>8605558
I'm honestly ready to go back and read it again already. That was the best reading experience I've had since A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.

Seriously, where do I go from here ? Finnegans Wake ?

Yes, if you mean finding anything that can surpass it.

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No it's rolling in the long grass,

>>8605563
In Search of Lost Time, desu

>>8605563
>That was the best reading experience I've had since A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.
Sorry for the fallacious phrasing. It actually surpassed any other reading experience I've had, with that novel being the only one that's come close.

>>8605564
Fuck. Even if I read Wake ?

>>8605566
Looks sexy

>>8605563
Sure. It's of course very different, but if you're wanting stay on an uphill course - go for Finnegans Wake.

>>8605567
I've attempted it but it got old very quickly. It's probably the comfiest thing I've read but it's more comfy than I can handle.

>>8605569
Portrait and Ulysses both made me lose interest at first due to how different they were from the previous works, but I've ended up enjoying each one more than the last.

>>8605563
reaD it 19=more times!

>>8605632
I have no problem with that

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Would Samuel Beckett be a good author to read after Joyce ?

>>8605571
>implying something can be TOO comfy
feel bad for you d e s u

Shakespeare is far better, you misguided contrarian undergraduates. Don't you realize how cliche it is to go throw a Joyce / Beckett phase as an English major? You might be the only person you know who reads them, but that doesn't change the fact that you're just another token in the department.

>>8605768
joyce and beckett aren't contrarian.

i like the idea of reading ulysses, but i would want to appreciate it as much as possible, which is seemingly impossible without what seems like a lifetime of experience in a certain culture/familiarity with a ton of books in a certain genre. probably won't ever actually read it because of that.

>>8605796
Trust me, lad, I've read it 2-3 times and feel as if my life was not remarkably improved except for during the period of my life when I was convinced James Joyce "got life" better than me (teenage years). You've pretty much got it.

>>8605768
OP here. I'm not an English major, I'm a Computer Engineering major. Non-STEM majors are an incredible waste of time and money.

>>8605571
It gets less comfy as Marcel grows older

>>8605952
Enjoy getting outsourced by poopjeets and Chinese slaves

>>8605952
>falling for the STEM meme
shameful Tbh

>>8605556
Try the other high modernists in English, Woolf and Faulkner.

>>8605796
I don't get this attitude. You won't appreciate *any* famous book as much as is possible unless you do a phd on it. By that standard one shouldn't read anything. Besides, Ulysses is first and foremost a book about form.

>>8605974
This.
Joyce, Woolf, and Faulkner are three sides of the same...three-sided thing, idk.

>>8605974
i don't consider getting 100% appreciation realistic, but i don't think ulysses is comparable to your run of the mill noteworthy book. i just meant to say i want to have some level of appreciation above minimal, which seemingly requires a lot in this case vs. other books

>>8605986
you mean... a triangle?

>>8605566
i want to have a copy like this someday

>>8605964
It probably has less to do with stem being good and much more with humanities being dogshit.

>>8605563
look there are three things lit discusses

basic philosophy over and over and over again
how do I xxx
and the about 12 - 13 authors most of us have read or at least have memes associated with them so those who haven't read have something to spam, among them Joyce, Pynchon, Gaddis, McCarthy, Gass, Mann, Proust, etc
In my opinion none of those authors save Pynchon in GR is going to give you anything comparable to Ulysses but they are all top shelf reads

Ulysses gives you that bittersweet melancholy feeling that you get after reading a good piece, for sure, but there's more where that came from. One thing not to do is just throw yourself into another deep work, one will not have the patience and attention needed for it, so just stay with something light, and then go into complexity again.

I found works just as fulfilling in Shakespere, Tolkien, Flaubert, Huysmans, Virgil, Dante, and plenty of others that I've forgotten to mention. The thing is, to get something out of them, you need to dedicate time and will to them. Like Joyce, they're easily dismissed when approached with wrong attitude often found in learning facilities. I'm slowly combing through Shakespeare, few works a year top, but I dedicate myself completely to them, and at a side I read plenty of popular fluff just to keep my mind going . I know I could skimp through all of Shakespeare's opus in a fortnight, and get nothing out of it.

>>8606047
it would have to occupy 3D space so you can lok at one side while obscurring the others.

A three sided pyramid like.

>>8605563
Don't listen to people recommending Proust, Woo, Faulkner, or Mann they are good but they have very limited ambitions compared to Joyce. Read Women and Men by McElroy if you want something that will challenge your conception of what a novel can try to do, and succeed in doing so, like Ulysses did.

>>8605742
No, he's a polar opposite to Joyce

>>8606423
durr i cant make teh monies so is bad

>>8607005
I'm almost certain he meant to allude to the >muh degeneracy argument.

>>8606450
A cylinder satisfies your requirements.

>>8606739
>No, he's a polar opposite to Joyce
But that would make him a good read after Joyce.

>>8607032
>>8607032
I appreciate it.

>>8606443
I already read Gravity's Rainbow before starting Ulysses. Am I fucked ?

>>8606445
Reading short and simple books is boring to me, though. I'm kind of split between Finnegans Wake and Mason & Dixon for my next book.

>>8606739
I want to read Women and Men but I'm a poorfag.

>>8607005
>spending tens of thousands of dollars on education
>choosing a major that doesn't get any of it back
>seriously justifying this

>>8607296
The Recognitions gives me that Ulysses feeling. At least in scope and depth; Gaddis can concoct some spooky, vertiginous passages,but ultimately he just can't write as relentlessly so as Joyce and Pynchon can. With him it's more like once every 20-50 pages you get a sense of free-fall that is both terrifying and sublime, instead of every other page as with the others.

>>8606739
If you can find a copy of Women and Men.

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>>8606450
>a three sided pyramid

>>8605556
>>8605563
Moby-Dick
Anna Karenina
The Waves
Paradise Lost

>>8607452
kek

>>8607316
>seriously justifying this
hurr durr teh monies is only important thing if U cant make teh monies ur dumb

>>8606739
OP, Ulysses is my favorite book bar-none. Nothing else tops it in terms of enjoyability but some come mighty close including Gravity's Rainbow and Ficciones...

If I can make a couple of recommendation -- I've got a copy of Women and Men -- wonderful book if you can find it. Might I suggest Ada by Nabokov or perhaps spend some time in the classics with Hesiod, Homer or Shakes?

>>8607316
>>8607368

I downloaded the epub and I've been reading on my tiny pocketbook lmao. It's a fucking incredible book and I'd recommend doing whatever you can, overcoming any prejudices against ereaders you might have, just to read it.

>>8605768
Fuck off, Bloom. We only like you ironically.

>>8607316
>spending tens of thousands of dollars

What should I read to prepare myself for Uylsses?

>>8607005
>>8607743
Running out of arguments champ?

>>8605952
So why Joyce then, bub? Do you want people to think you're smart and not just a full-time textbook reader? There are much easier ways to appear intelligent and cultivated to other people. I recommend building a collection to show visitors to your house or developing a taste for a certain kind of cuisine or drink ordinary people know nothing about.

I'm about to take a course on Ulysses. Is this a good or bad idea?
I always wanted to read it on my own but I registered for a class on modernism this semester, which said we would be reading a selection of modernist writers, but my professor said fuck it let's read the Odyssey and Ulysses.
I'm hyped but concerned it will alter how I experience the book. Kind of wanted to read it alone like I did A Portrait

>>8605974

>Besides, Ulysses is first and foremost a book about form

>>le mème postmoderniste

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OP please read this. absolutely amazing and no body talks about it

>>8607762
>Ficciones
What ? No. I've read about half of Ficciones and it definitely is nothing like Pynchon or Joyce. But I'm not fluent in Spanish so maybe I don't pick up on the intricacies of his writing style.

I'd like to read Women and Men but I'm too poor. I've read Pale Fire and was so disappointed that I never want to read Nabokov again. I don't want to read any Greeks until I've actually learned the language ; as Buck Mulligan said, you must read them in the original. Shakespeare I could do since I love Hamlet, but I'm not in the right mindset for him at the moment. I think I'll go with Winnegans Fake.

>>8608689
Dubliners, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and Ulysses.

Yes, now that you have digested the universes greatest, you can no longer find joy in anything.

All will come second to Ulysses, and the only glimmer of joy you'll find in you faggot-ridden life will be the constantly distancing memory of the novel.

>>8609023
Well I'm going to read it again sometime soon and probably again after that. It isn't gone forever just because I've read it once.

>>8608947
Maybe, but it was written by a woman so that repulses me already.

>>8609032
ugh

>>8609003
>I don't want to read any Greeks until I've actually learned the language

Don't be a retard. Just read them.

>>8609055
But Buck Mulligan

>>8609083
More like Fuck Mulligan because fuck that guy.

>>8609087
Well I'm a bullockbefriending bard so I'll take his advice. I'm strongly against translated poetry.