>80 pages into Finnigans Wake >there is no plot >it's

Looks like you haven't started with the Greeks

It's literally written in an Irish dialect, if you haven't picked that up and looked past it yet there's no hope.

>>9339533
Correct

>>9339539
No shit, that is wildly obvious. That doesn't take away from the fact that it is page after page of describing things. NO STORY

No one is going anywhere, no one is talking to anyone. Any action is vague third persom about having gone to a bar.

I have read Ulysses, THERE IS AT LEAST DIALOGUE.

There is nothing here.

>>9339562

git gd

>>9339609
Top notch conversation there.

So no one can refute my claim?

>>9340338

Not really, Finnegans Wake is a meme.

>>9339523

Maybe I can help you out, OP. Two years ago I was entering a prestigious PhD program and focusing on Joyce because I loved Dubliners, Portrait, and Ulysses. To my shame, though, I'd never read the Wake. I'd never even tried, as hard as that was to admit. It was this huge blind spot and area of vulnerability for me. Whenever it'd come up with my colleagues I'd just smile and nod, smile and nod, hoping they wouldn't ask me anything specific about it. "The musicality of it," somebody would say, and I'd say, "Oh God, yes, it's like Beethoven." Finally, though, I had to dive into it, and let me tell you it was tough going. Joseph Campbell's guide helped a lot. Reading it out loud helped. I listened to other people read it, read online commentaries. Eventually it started to make some sort of sense. It was like I was learning to read for the first time again, and in a way this was enjoyable. I got better at reading the book. Soon I was reading entire paragraphs without trouble, getting the puns, laughing at the jokes. I could sort of follow the story, it was like a blurry picture resolving into clarity, or like I was drunk and I was sobering up, I could actually understand it. As I became more and more adept at reading the Wake, I began putting myself to the test, initiating conversations with my colleagues about it, but specific passages this time, specific parts of the book. You can probably guess what happened. After a number of these conversations it became blindingly obvious that I understood the book a lot better than they did, they who I thought were the experts. It eventually became sort of embarrassing for them and I stopped trying to talk about it. And at the end of the day I would pack my things, catch the bus home, and settle into my apartment to read the Wake. It had surpassed all of Joyce's other works in my estimation. Ulysses, the book months earlier I would've named as my favorite of all time, the best book ever written, was now #2 to the Wake. So majestic, so ambitious, so wide-ranging, erudite, glorious, incredible was it that I couldn't believe that it was the work of one man. Best of all, the heart of it isn't complicated at all. What did I get from the Wake, what are its lessons? First of all, be yourself. Second of all, put one foot in front of the other. And lastly, just do it for crying out loud, time's a wastin'!

>>9340338
It's a book James Joyce wrote for his daughter who had a mental illness. I forgot which mental illness she had, I thought she was a schizoid. Of course it is fucking retarded and you would become insane trying to decipher it.

>>9339523
>reading for the plot

LOL, what a faggot!

>>9340351
>the Wake
>

>>9340399

Brékkek Kékkek Kékkek Kékkek! Kóax Kóax Kóax! Ualu Ualu Ualu! Quaouauh!

>>9340399
It's a meme copypasta faggot

>>9340431
I figured

File: joyce.jpg (33KB, 600x336px) Image search: [Google]

33KB, 600x336px

>>9339523

I'm not sure there are any out there who sincerely believe Finnegan's Wake has literary merit beyond its experimental style. You knew what you were getting into, OP.

>>9340486
I actually did not. I thought it would be more readable from descriptions. Boy was I wrong.

>>9340503
At least you looked impressive buying it at the book store. Were you served by a qt?

>>9340512
That was not my goal. And no.

>>9340338
There is nothing to refute. Are you talking about the claim that you can't appreciate the book because you don't see plot or dialogue?

It was all just a dream

>>9340557
>tfw to intellegent for plot and dialogue

>>9340631
How did I imply that exactly?

>>9339523
pleb

>>9339523
Read it out loud in an irish accent. It all makes sense.

>>9340775
J-Joyce??

>>9340557
Yes

>>9339523
the edition i got from my library literally has a table of contents-type deal that lays out the plot for you

the plot is there, it's just insanely nebulous

>>9339523
i dont understand OP, is this thread a joke? or is this another one of your juvenile make believe games?

these threads are utterly worthless. i am merely seeking a forum of elucidated discourse on intellectual matters but am instead plagued by your incessant howling which you attempt to pass off as humor

is there no hope?

>>9340842
How did you interpret this as a joke? I am stating my point of view on the book thus far. Disagree with me if you think I am wrong. Agree if you don't.

You are the only one complaining here.

>>9340863
some people are just born worse than others. one would hope that life and education would undo what nature had originally fucked up--but society can only offer so much.

there is nothing left with them save for ash and dust.

>>9340878
Woah... Fucking awesome truth dude!
*worships*

Recently I read Altazor and Tremor of Heaven, which (if I recall correctly) was originally published with the transcription of a discourse given in a poetry conference. In it, it described that words serve first to list everything in the observable universe, and second, to understand the truth of that universe and the relationship of everything within it with itself.

Altazor begins as a poem, but then it dismantles the language to try to get at something beyond that is still somehow understandable by those who read it.

Maybe try something like that?

Also, anybody care to share a good version of Finnegan's Wake?

>>9340878
>>9340842
I don't know if the edge and mediocrity is a troll or not and it fucks me up

Fack Joytse end fack Airish peeple

Wake is Antoino Banderas favourite book, huh.

>>9340937
: What the fuck did you just fucking say about me, you undergrad? I’ll have you know I graduated at the top of my class from every single Ivy League university, and I’ve been involved in numerous tech, consulting, financial, and law firms, and I have over 300 books on my Amazon wishlist at any one time. I am trained in library science and I’m the top archivist in the entire US Library of Congress system. You are nothing to me but just another philistine. I will wipe you the fuck out with dialectics the likes of which has never been seen before on this board, mark my fucking words. You think you can get away with saying that shit to me over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As we speak I am contacting my secret network of rare book dealers across the USA and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the intellectual storm, maggot. The storm that wipes out the pathetic little thing you call your collection. You’re fucking dead, kid. I can be anywhere, anytime, and I can scan and share PDFs in over seven hundred ways, and that’s just with the stack of hardbacks I carry around at all times. Not only am I extensively trained in book-trading, but I have access to the entire inventory of every top colleges' library in the US and I will use it to its full extent to wipe your miserable ass off the face of /lit/, you little shit. If only you could have known what unholy retribution your little “clever” comment was about to bring down upon you, maybe you would have held your fucking tongue. But you couldn’t, you didn’t, and now you’re paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit shelfies all over you and you will drown in it. You’re fucking dead, kiddo.