Gaddis thread

Shameless self bump

>>9735636
recognitions obviously

>>9736150
Why obviously ?

The Recognitions is among the top five novels of the twentieth century INMHO.

I would say you start with that. Why would you wait.

Seriously it made my life worthwhile just bearing witness with such mastery. I've published in literary journals for whatever
that's worth.

Gaddis' dialogue is the best I've ever read. This is from reading Carpenter's Gothic and being 200 pages from finishing JR, my potential favorite book

I think reading Gaddis in order, or at least reading The Recognitions first, is pretty essential to get a feel for the sheer powerlevel of his rage. Franzen is absolutely correct that his work just got angrier and angrier.

Reading The Recognitions first is also good because you get to see how amazingly his prose handles action. His later stuff is almost pure dialogue, only switching to action oriented paragraphs for exhibition and transition. He kind of threw away a major strength of his writing when he altered his style, but all in all the style was really well suited to The Recognitions. It's coiling, constricting prose that layers itself up with an economy of breath. Imo it's incredibly effective for the themes he's dealing with and communicates psychology in such an effortless way that everyone could learn a thing or two about joining form and content in writing just by studying his syntax.

It's a real life changing book and should be your first impression of the man.

The ending of The Recognitions, whose avowal of authenticity in the character of Steven is given second-thought-schrift when he plays his composition he's been working on for years, and it destroys the church of his hopes, dreams, and fears.

The way Gaddis weds characters to the way they speak make you wonder if you have not met them before, but it was always on target to have met this person at this time, if that makes any sense.

>>9736408
Spoilers bro. You mixed up two characters anyway, but I won't correct it so OP can still read the book.

>>9736377
Jesus I just read Mr. Difficult and feel mildly depressed

>>9736342
Carpenter's Gothic is so incredible @___@

>>9737077
I need to read it again. It's nice that it's so short, compared to his other works