Cool, thanks :up:

I have read my fair share of classics, and this was definitely the most tedious. It was beautiful but tiresome.
I can't forget the madeleines soaked in tea—they were a powerful element for unlocking emotions

Nice pick!

It would be pleasing to know what book or novel you are specifically referring to; I can't figure out any author or title in your post. :smile:

@Alonsoaceves is responding to my ten-year-old OP, which is about In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust.

Update: I never did get through the whole thing.

Ah, wow! Great. I never did get through the French writers. I know they are important, but for different reasons, I preferred to read other authors. For example, although Sartre is a reference of existentialism, I always focused my attention on Russian novelists.

Proust is great but I don't expect to go back to him to finish it. As Alonso said, it can be tedious.

I haven't read the big Frenchies either: Flaubert, Balzac, Zola, and Hugo all await me. But like you I'll choose Dostoevsky over Sartre.

A Theory of Semiotics: Umberto Eco.

Very good, but predominantly technical. Reads mostly like a textbook with lots of taxonomy, working through definitions and logical relations among terms, often involving problematizing other such work like that of Peirce etc. Anyway, if you are interested in semiotics, you should read it.

Just finished:

Cassius Dio - Books 60-70 (Claudius through Hadrian).

Currently Reading:

Josephus - Against Apion (my final Josephus work in Whiston's translation.)

On deck:

Marcus Aurelius - Meditations
Leviticus as Literature - Mary Douglas (a key work on Leviticus.)

The Village of Stepanchikovo by Fyodor Dostoevsky.

The Village of Stepanchikovo by Fyodor Dostoevsky. — javi2541997

As usual, you’re reading too much. You need to stop for a while and watch Benny Hill reruns.

I think the best I could do is put my jacket on, go to my local supermarket, buy a large jar of marmalade and enjoy a big toast for merienda.

The Lonely Man of Faith by Joseph Soloveithik. A dicussion of spiritual man versus obedient man. Interesting dichotomy.

Deuteronomy - The JPS Torah Commentary - by Yahweh Almighty. A retellling of a tale of a people. Questionable fact wise.

Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut. A war fucks everything and everyone sort of story. Point made.

The Art of Experience by John Dewey. A pragmatist"s essays on aesthetics to provide fodder in the Shoutbox. A bit boring.

Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut. A war fucks everything and everyone sort of story. Point made. — Hanover

Plus aliens.

And jokes.

The Art of Experience by John Dewey. A pragmatist"s essays on aesthetics to provide fodder in the Shoutbox. A bit boring. — Hanover

Yeah, I read some Dewey once and found it incredibly boring and didn't finish it. It's a shame because some of his ideas seem very congenial to me.

The Great Gatsby.

Beautifully rich writing though a little too rich for my pedestrian tastes, I guess.

The Great Gatsby.

Beautifully rich writing though a little too rich for my pedestrian tastes, I guess. — praxis

I place that book among the most over-rated books of all time.

The Lonely Man of Faith by Joseph Soloveithik. A dicussion of spiritual man versus obedient man. Interesting dichotomy.

Deuteronomy - The JPS Torah Commentary - by Yahweh Almighty. A retellling of a tale of a people. Questionable fact wise. — Hanover

Sounds interesting. I'd be interested to hear more about these, especially the JPS commentary. I take it that it draws from thinkers like Rashi and Nachmanides, as well as the Talmudic rabbis and others?

I place that book among the most over-rated books of all time. — Hanover

I saw it at number one on a "greatest books of all time" list recently, which did puzzle me.

The Pedagogy of Freedom - Paulo Freire. A book of integrity and heart. If you are interested in education, you should read it.

The Plague - Albert Camus. Good so far. The sparse style works.

Beautifully rich writing though a little too rich for my pedestrian tastes, I guess. — praxis

There are lots of good and great books that I really don’t get. “The Great Gatsby” is certainly one of those. It’s a book full of unpleasant people doing unpleasant things to other unpleasant people for unpleasant or indecipherable reasons.

My wife teaches it in High School English and can’t praise it enough. When I commented about the writing she began reciting some of her favorite lines from memory.

I saw it at number one on a "greatest books of all time" list recently, which did puzzle me. — Baden

I believe that "greatest books of all time" lists are dependent upon the language of the editor or publisher. I have never seen The Great Gatsby ranked number one here because our literary critics are likely to choose Cervantes or Borges. Sinchōsa (a very important Japanese editorial) usually ranks Tanizaki, Kawabata or Kenzaburo Oe as their number ones, and I hardly remember a Western author.

The list was by a well-known organization as far as I remember, but it was awful. Everything in the top 20 was English literature.

My wife teaches it in High School English and can’t praise it enough. When I commented about the writing she began reciting some of her favorite lines from memory. — praxis

As I said, it’s not that I know it’s not good, it’s just that I don’t get it. I wish I could talk with your wife about it.

I did not enjoy The Great Gatsby.

This part where Gatsby is found in the pool made a lasting impression. Rich like chocolate cheesecake.

“The laden mattress moved irregularly down the pool. A small gust of wind that scarcely corrugated the surface was enough to disturb its accidental course with its accidental burden. The touch of a cluster of leaves revolved it slowly, tracing, like the leg of compass, a thin red circle in the water.”

Yeah, but did you care he died, like were you at all invested in him as a character, or was it just pretty prose?

I'd be interested to hear more about these, especially the JPS commentary. I take it that it draws from thinkers like Rashi and Nachmanides, as well as the Talmudic rabbis and others? — BitconnectCarlos

I'd describe the commentary as scholarly and academic, with some references to traditional sources, but no expectation the reader is Orthodox or necessarily a believer. It's not like the Artscroll chumash.

How are you finding the commentary? Who are the major commentators? I've never read Artscrolls or JPS. My primary source on the Tanakh is Robert Alter's translation, which primarily draws on academic biblical scholarship.

I did not enjoy The Great Gatsby. — Jamal

I think it's my favourite novel, and every time I read it, it's a different, richer, more elegiac book. For me, the story's enchantment lies in how it's told; the characters and the plot are secondary. Nevertheless, I totally understand the man-child James Gatz, putting on wealth and class in order to catch his girl. FSF's writing for me is a blissful aesthetic experience. I sometimes just read a few paragraphs at random and marvel. Now, I find myself often doing the same with other writers like Bellow, Nabokov , Barth and TC Boyle.