So Melville was gonna write Moby Dick as another adventure book

>>9230199
Because writing being a "skill" is a lie sold by fraudsters. All you need to be is intelligent and write in the spirit

>>9230213
Why would fraudsters exist in this regard?

>>9230225
Creative writing degrees can cost a shit ton of money

>>9230234
But not all writers do creative writing degrees and they cannot write like Melville.

>>9230225
it then becomes an academic pursuit with 4 year degrees and mfa programs
it becomes a whole industry

Anglo literature is so shitty that 99% of it is just Bible regurgitation

>>9230199
Depth > Breadth

Most of the greatest writers obsessively studied a handful of geniuses and discarded the rest.

>>9230249
What is the better alternative?

>>9230249
There is literally no deeper well to draw from
that isn't Egyptian

>>9230213
You're an idiot. Melville was already good at writing before Moby Dick, Hawthorne persuaded him to stylize it, which is a choice and not something that just happens to good writers

>>9230757
If all it takes to transfer from writing pulp fiction to literary fiction is just "stylysing" then the point stands

>>9230761
Not if you're a good writer beforehand. Believe it or not, not every writer in the world dreams of being the next James Joyce, some prefer the storytelling side of literature. I know some genre fiction authors that can write circles around """"""""""literary"""""""""" authors. All the quote means is that Moby Dick probably would have been more like Stendhal before Melville added all the biblical intertextuality and cetology chapters

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>>9230258
Are you pic related

>>9230807
This is so stupid it hurts to read.

>>9230801
>not every writer in the world dreams of being the next James Joyce

Yes but I wouldn't exactly consider them to be writers

>>9230801
>before Melville added all the biblical intertextuality and cetology chapters

If thats all that seperates a text from being literary rather than standard genre fiction you're FAR too weak of a reader to be claiming any legitimate opinion here

>>9230826
its not totally wrong imo. a good geological survey will help you locate the best reserve to start drilling.

>>9230932
It's wrong on the basis of assuming Melville was only influenced by Shakespeare.

Reality is he was influenced by just as many writers as any other writer is.

Shakespeare and KJV might have been his main influences, but he had multitudes of others to draw from as well.

>>9230999
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfVmNlvGlL0

>>9230999
No, if you want to be a great writer all you have to do is study Shakespeare and the KJV. Study them for at least 10,000 hours each, then write something. It will be great. This is a known fact.

>>9231026
ok cool thanks

>>9231032
Maybe you will be in the

PANTHEON OF THE GREATS

one day.

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>>9231038
This is my Shakespeare edition

>>9230241
Of course not, why is this even an issue.

>>9230829
James Joyce is overrated.

>>9231043
That is sufficient for writing a great YA novel!

>>9230999
Trips for truth. If you actually read Moby-Dick you will find a fuckton of literary and philosophical references, along with lots of history. Plato crops up a lot, for example. Melville read extremely widely. Shakespeare and the Bible are only the most obvious influences because they directly influence the prose style of the book.

>>9231026
You joking, but if you actually put 10,000 hours into studying those texts you would almost certainly be capable of producing something incredible,

>>9231050
I disagree, I think he's quite underrated, to think many people place him below Shakespeare

>>9231264
Shakespeare is far above Joyce. Joyce knows that himself

>>9231576
Joyce was wrong

>>9230199
>How the fuck does he just read a couple of literary works and then create something so masterful?
Years of experience beforehand.
>>9230829
xD
>>9231576
>Joyce knows that himself
Confirmed for never reading Joyce.

>>9230258
This.

Wittgenstein wrote the Tractatus having only read Russell, Frege and some Schopenhauer

>>9231026
>>9231038
hi sheep[le]

>>9231220
no shit faggot, nobody denied that

>>9231588
Tracatus is a reference to Spinoza are you retarded

>>9231588
fucking retarded dipshit assfaggot retard

>>9231588
Wittgenstein had read Heidegger, Kierkegaard, a lot of Tolstoy, Dostoevsky etc.
So a lot more than you will ever read.

>>9230234
While yes that is true, the only ones that matter are basically free

Wow, something I just learned: Melville stopped writing prose when he was 38. He spent the next thirty years writing only poetry, and only took up prose again near the end of his life, when he started Billy Budd. I didn't realize Melville's writing career was so starkly divided, and that he put prose behind him so early.

>>9230249
Herman Melville isn't Anglo, he's American.

>>9232856
Not until long after writing the Tractatus.

>>9233600
...no.

>>9233063
does it indicate why his late work is so rarely mentioned?

>>9233063
He took up poetry because nobody appreciated his prose

bump for Melville discussion

>>9233076
lol

He also read spinoza

>>9231220
>Refrences most important, most famous philosopher
Look how well read this guy is!

>>9235980
You havent read him

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How do I write good prose? How do I learn to write good prose?

>>9231254
Every English Major puts 10k hours into Shakespeare, every aspiring clergyman puts 10k hours (actually way more than that) into the Bible.

You will become a scholar, but that does not cut it when it comes to creative writing.

>>9230807
>>9230826
It's basically what Bloom was talking about in the anxiety of influence

>>9236476
No, English majors do not spend over 2 years reading nothing but Shakespeare for 12 hours a day

>>9236325
Copy the whole of Gibbon ten times over. By the end of it, you will at least be able to become a famous journalist or something.

>>9236585
Same for clergymen. The majority doesn't know the Bible all the well.

Many do, however, so it's not surprising that an absolutely disproportionate number of great writers and scholars have been clergymen. This is specially true for English literature.