Encyclopaedia Metallum: The Metal Archives

Message board

* FAQ    * Register   * Login 



Reply to topic
Author Message Previous topic | Next topic
Abominatrix
Harbinger of Metal

Joined: Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:15 pm
Posts: 9311
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Wed Apr 09, 2008 12:46 pm 
 

Peregrin wrote:
Abominatrix wrote:
I had to chuckle at your commetns about Stephen King because I was telling a friend of mine some weeks ago about how preposterous any summary of a Stephen King book always appears. I even wrote two-line preposterous plot summaries for a bunch of King books .. maybe I'll find them and post them here. :lol:


You should.

However, when I think about it, "silly" starts looking like a very subjective word. One man's goofy is another's awesome, and both can often make each their case so it's not that valid a complaint as long as you have no problems suspending disbelief as all fiction basically requires.

Oh, it's not really a complaint .. I even like King to a degree. He makes those preposterous ideas that seem so "b-movie-esque" when condensed into a brief description come alive somewhat in a novelistic format, and he is able to do this by mastering character and placing the reader in the position where he can't help but empathise with the people he writes about. It helps that he has a fairly distinctive writing voice, too.
Quote:

Quote:
DOes anybody else think that King owes a debt to Fritz Leiber?


I haven't read any of Fritz Leiber's stories and I'm too lazy to search the internet for interviews with Stephen King ;), so I can't answer that question.


Ah, my veneration of Fritz Leiberr seems something few people share nowadays. I think he was a true master. You like sword and sorcery, obviously, so starting with Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser's tales wouldnt' be a bad idea. Plus, they represent Leiber at his most playful and exuberant much of the time. The tone is very different from Howard's, but some similar horrific elements are definitely present. In general though, they're a lot more fun .. and that's not meant as a slag against Howard at all .. just that there isn't as much blood and thunder, the characters have time to drink and wench and frolic and there are loads of commical parts.

You'd probably also enjoy "Our Lady of Darkness", which is an unbelievably cool merging of Lovecraftian horror,, Jamesian ghostliness, urban nightmare and existential angst.

Top
 Profile  
Peregrin
Cricket Bat of Longinus

Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2004 3:09 am
Posts: 178
Location: Denmark
PostPosted: Wed Apr 09, 2008 1:47 pm 
 

Abominatrix wrote:
He makes those preposterous ideas that seem so "b-movie-esque" when condensed into a brief description come alive somewhat in a novelistic format, and he is able to do this by mastering character and placing the reader in the position where he can't help but empathise with the people he writes about. It helps that he has a fairly distinctive writing voice, too.


King'd probably take "B-movie-esque" as a compliment since he describes his books as "the literary equivalent of a Big Mac and fries". Like many other horror fans, though, I find that King was a bit hard of himself when he said that. As fashionable as it's been to jump on the post-Dreamcatcher backlash bandwagon of bashing him as a bumbling boob, there's far worse hacks to achieve his level of popularity. Dan Brown, for example, even at his best he makes Stephen King look like Albert Camus in comparison.

Also, thanks for the Leiber recommendations. I should look for them on Wikisource when I'm out of books to read.
_________________
Very funny, Scotty. Now beam back my pants.

Top
 Profile  
Abominatrix
Harbinger of Metal

Joined: Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:15 pm
Posts: 9311
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 10:09 am 
 

Peregrin wrote:
Abominatrix wrote:
He makes those preposterous ideas that seem so "b-movie-esque" when condensed into a brief description come alive somewhat in a novelistic format, and he is able to do this by mastering character and placing the reader in the position where he can't help but empathise with the people he writes about. It helps that he has a fairly distinctive writing voice, too.


King'd probably take "B-movie-esque" as a compliment since he describes his books as "the literary equivalent of a Big Mac and fries". Like many other horror fans, though, I find that King was a bit hard of himself when he said that. As fashionable as it's been to jump on the post-Dreamcatcher backlash bandwagon of bashing him as a bumbling boob, there's far worse hacks to achieve his level of popularity. Dan Brown, for example, even at his best he makes Stephen King look like Albert Camus in comparison.

Oh, that's definitely true .. and Dean Koontz, often mentioned in the same breath as King nowadays, is by far a worse writer in every conceivable way who plays with similar conventions, just withoutt the charming stylism and knowledge of horror conventions that King has.. I think it's still a nice paralel to the metal discussion in the other thread .. King is an insider, and he really got lucky with his popularity, and though he's probably one of the bestselling authors of the past three decades he doesn't seem to let it get to his head too much and still writes fondly of the "old days", his pulp inspirations, etc. I'd actually like to get my hands on the "Dance Macabre" book he wrote, where he talks about writers like howard, etc, and the growth of the horror genre.

As for Dan Brown, I really don't want to comment or I'll just start spewing vitriol .. hate, hate, hate that man's writing. My mum was really trying to get me to read "The Da Vinci COde", saying, "oh, it's an adventure story, but it'll make you think!" .. so I went and bought her "FOucal'ts Pendulum", which I'm pretty sure she'll never read now. Ah well..

Leiber's Nehwon series (the world in which Fafhrd and the Mouser ply their trade most of the time!) begins with teh compilation "Swords and Deviltry". I know they've been anthologised in a few larger omnibus books as well. There are seven books in the series in all, usually consisting of several short pieces and one longer one each, with one of the books being an entire novel-length work. I've had trouble recommending these books to other fans of, say, Howard, because I think people expect sword and sorcery in a similar tone, whereas as I said, it's quite different ... in fact at times the stories get positively postmodern .. kind of the literary equivalent of Slough Feg almost! :lol

Top
 Profile  
Peregrin
Cricket Bat of Longinus

Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2004 3:09 am
Posts: 178
Location: Denmark
PostPosted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 11:53 am 
 

Abominatrix wrote:
I think it's still a nice paralel to the metal discussion in the other thread .. King is an insider, and he really got lucky with his popularity, and though he's probably one of the bestselling authors of the past three decades he doesn't seem to let it get to his head too much and still writes fondly of the "old days", his pulp inspirations, etc. I'd actually like to get my hands on the "Dance Macabre" book he wrote, where he talks about writers like howard, etc, and the growth of the horror genre.


I understand what you mean. From what I've read the Dark Tower series appears to be even more "kitchen sink mythology" than the most lyrically eclectic Manilla Road albums.

And just like you brought up in that thread, I think one of the reasons Stephen King receives more hate than he deserves on his own is how many think he's the be-all, end-all of horror fiction.

But, hey, better they think that about King than they think that about R. L. Stine. :lol:

Quote:
As for Dan Brown, I really don't want to comment or I'll just start spewing vitriol .. hate, hate, hate that man's writing. My mum was really trying to get me to read "The Da Vinci COde", saying, "oh, it's an adventure story, but it'll make you think!" .. so I went and bought her "FOucal'ts Pendulum", which I'm pretty sure she'll never read now. Ah well..


Heh. Back during the DaVinci Code fad I tried to hook my mom on... The Illuminatus Trilogy. (which is one of the funniest things I've ever read) She had to give up after a few hundred pages, though, it's not that she didn't find it interesting but the writing style totally threw her off.

Quote:
Leiber's Nehwon series (the world in which Fafhrd and the Mouser ply their trade most of the time!) begins with teh compilation "Swords and Deviltry". I know they've been anthologised in a few larger omnibus books as well. There are seven books in the series in all, usually consisting of several short pieces and one longer one each, with one of the books being an entire novel-length work.


Are the omnibus editions illustrated in a similar way as the recent Conan the Cimmerian anthologies from Del Rey?

Quote:
I've had trouble recommending these books to other fans of, say, Howard, because I think people expect sword and sorcery in a similar tone, whereas as I said, it's quite different ... in fact at times the stories get positively postmodern .. kind of the literary equivalent of Slough Feg almost! :lol


How similar is Leiber to Michael Moorcock? Both liked playing around with genre conventions, but when you say "postmodern" I begin thinking of the whole meta-fiction thing Paul Auster popularized with City of Glass.
_________________
Very funny, Scotty. Now beam back my pants.

Top
 Profile  
Abominatrix
Harbinger of Metal

Joined: Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:15 pm
Posts: 9311
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 12:31 pm 
 

AH, I like the "Illuminatus!" quite a lot .. now there's a "kitchen sink" book if there ever was one.. I'd never dream of giving it to my mother, though. :lol:

I don't think the omnibus books are illustrated ... there is a comic series, but it doesn't continue all the way to the end unfortunately. It'd be cool if someone did some really outlandish pictorial work for some of the later stories. APparently the comics are quite good, but I don't really know much about them ..

I haven't gotten around to reading Paul Oster yet, but I should say that Leiber's sword and sorcery is really only post-modern in the context of sword and sorcery .. there are some definite nudges and winks at the reader, a self-awareness that isn't really present in other stuff I've read and which I actually wouldn't normally like that much, but somehow he is able to make it work. THere are some metafictional elements, for sure .. these elements come to a peak in a story in which the twain have left Nehwon and actually ended up in a medieval Earth setting, and forgotten all about their past lives ... in the end the adventure they have on Earth is really no different from the type of adventures they would have on Nehwon, and he goes from deliberately underscoring the fact that this takes place on the Earth that we know to almost completely dropping it halfway through the tale, to illustrate, I suppose, this sort of similitude between worlds, or universsses. There are also some pretty humorous incursions from "our world" in some of the later stuff too, but I don't want to spoil it for you as the effect doesn't really work unless it's transmitted by Leiber's own hand as it were. So yes, that does remind me of Moorcock and the Elric books, and as Moorcock himself said: "Fritz Leiber is the father of us all" ("us all", in this case, meaning sword and sorcery authors, I think, or at least the post-Howardian ones). Personally, I think Leiber is a much stronger writer most of the time, although Moorcock definitely has his gems.

Top
 Profile  
Peregrin
Cricket Bat of Longinus

Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2004 3:09 am
Posts: 178
Location: Denmark
PostPosted: Sat Apr 12, 2008 4:51 am 
 

After having started Mason & Dixon, I'm not sure I'm in the mood for reading something that long and complex right now. I sometimes need to take breaks between reading rather long books.
_________________
Very funny, Scotty. Now beam back my pants.

Top
 Profile  
incarcerated_demon
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2007 3:21 pm
Posts: 147
PostPosted: Sat Apr 12, 2008 7:07 am 
 

Abominatrix wrote:
As for Dan Brown, I really don't want to comment or I'll just start spewing vitriol .. hate, hate, hate that man's writing. My mum was really trying to get me to read "The Da Vinci COde", saying, "oh, it's an adventure story, but it'll make you think!" .. so I went and bought her "FOucal'ts Pendulum", which I'm pretty sure she'll never read now. Ah well..



I've actually just finished Foucault's Pendulum actually, great book :) Much better than that Dan Brown crap. Dan Brown couldn't write with flair if his life depended on it.

Top
 Profile  
BM_DM
Metal newbie

Joined: Fri Mar 31, 2006 12:47 am
Posts: 61
PostPosted: Sat Apr 12, 2008 11:29 am 
 

Peregrin wrote:
After having started Mason & Dixon ...

Are you enjoying it?

A number of M&D's elements live on in my mind, but the Learnèd English Dog is high on the list.

Talking dogs in novels are always a good thing.
_________________
Gerhilde wrote:
Hojotoho! Hojotoho! Heiaha! Heiaha!

Top
 Profile  
Peregrin
Cricket Bat of Longinus

Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2004 3:09 am
Posts: 178
Location: Denmark
PostPosted: Sat Apr 12, 2008 11:31 am 
 

incarcerated_demon wrote:
Dan Brown couldn't write with flair if his life depended on it.


No shit, if he didn't claim his crappy novels were unravelling real-life conspiracies they wouldn't even get published.
_________________
Very funny, Scotty. Now beam back my pants.

Top
 Profile  
BM_DM
Metal newbie

Joined: Fri Mar 31, 2006 12:47 am
Posts: 61
PostPosted: Sat Apr 12, 2008 11:32 am 
 

incarcerated_demon wrote:
Dan Brown couldn't write with flair if his life depended on it.

Pity poor Dan Brown.

Think of the shed-load of money he must have accrued from the worthless piece of toss that is tDVC, then ponder the fact that he continues to write.

Why does he put himself through it?
_________________
Gerhilde wrote:
Hojotoho! Hojotoho! Heiaha! Heiaha!

Top
 Profile  
Peregrin
Cricket Bat of Longinus

Joined: Wed Jul 07, 2004 3:09 am
Posts: 178
Location: Denmark
PostPosted: Sat Apr 12, 2008 12:06 pm 
 

BM_DM wrote:
Why does he put himself through it?


Apparently writing a bestseller has given him a bit of a big head about himself... I guess.
_________________
Very funny, Scotty. Now beam back my pants.

Top
 Profile  
Lychgate
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Jun 22, 2003 8:20 am
Posts: 87
Location: United Kingdom
PostPosted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 5:25 am 
 

I have been reading Douglas Coupland. Specifically JPod and Microserfs. Both really, really ace books, and I am going to have to get to work on the rest of his stuff asap starting with Generation X.

Peregrin wrote:
incarcerated_demon wrote:
Dan Brown couldn't write with flair if his life depended on it.


No shit, if he didn't claim his crappy novels were unravelling real-life conspiracies they wouldn't even get published.


Where does he say this?
_________________
Dungeon of Horror | Drear

Top
 Profile  
alexanderthegreat
Metal Barbarian Dinosaur

Joined: Wed Apr 09, 2003 5:34 pm
Posts: 429
Location: United Kingdom
PostPosted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 8:22 am 
 

Quote:
Pity poor Dan Brown.


NEVAR.

Lychgate wrote:
Peregrin wrote:
incarcerated_demon wrote:
Dan Brown couldn't write with flair if his life depended on it.


No shit, if he didn't claim his crappy novels were unravelling real-life conspiracies they wouldn't even get published.


Where does he say this?


A couple of interviews are mentioned here.
_________________
Hitherto known as... The SEXUAL TYRANNOSAURUS.
The Cimmerian
The Blog That Time Forgot

Top
 Profile  
oneyoudontknow
Cum insantientibus furere necesse est.

Joined: Sun May 21, 2006 6:25 pm
Posts: 5343
Location: Germany
PostPosted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 12:16 pm 
 

I have just completed The Plague written by Camus and it is a brilliant piece of literature. Stunning in its own way and how he describes the scenery and how the people in the town have to deal with this illness. I read a translation of the fiftees and there were some errors though, yet the quality was still good.

The story deal with the way a town deal with the plague and how the citizens change their behaviour as the illness spreads further and further until finally the whole town is affected. The scenery is written from the point of view of several persons and therefore always different aspects are emphasized, whereas the whole story is told a 'unknown' person, who reveals his/her identity later. The depth of the description, how the feelings of the person are described, how everything if put together is just amazing. It is a very intense reading and if someone reads it, it is very easy to feel at least to some the graveness of the situation and to try to imagine what it would have been like, would this really have taken place.

A highly recommended books.
_________________

My website which contains reviews as well as interviews:
https://adsol.oneyoudontknow.com
My podcast:
https://adsolmag.bandcamp.com/

Top
 Profile  
yogibear
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Dec 19, 2004 9:22 pm
Posts: 377
Location: United States of America
PostPosted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 12:43 pm 
 

"the plague" was an excelent read.

anyone read "the painted bird" by jersy kosinski? very cool stuff if a bit strange here and there.

Top
 Profile  
incarcerated_demon
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2007 3:21 pm
Posts: 147
PostPosted: Sun Apr 13, 2008 1:59 pm 
 

BM_DM wrote:
incarcerated_demon wrote:
Dan Brown couldn't write with flair if his life depended on it.

Pity poor Dan Brown.

Think of the shed-load of money he must have accrued from the worthless piece of toss that is tDVC, then ponder the fact that he continues to write.

Why does he put himself through it?


Ouch, sarcasm.

Have just started The Zahir by Paulo Coelho, managed to tug a couple of my old heartstrings in the first 50 pages. Very well written too.

Top
 Profile  
BM_DM
Metal newbie

Joined: Fri Mar 31, 2006 12:47 am
Posts: 61
PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 12:48 pm 
 

I've picked up Dune again having abandoned it a couple of months ago, and am enjoying it a lot more now for some reason. I read two thirds of it over the weekend.

I'm reading the Gollancz SF Collectors' edition of John Varley's The Ophiuchi Hotline on my commute.

If the bile-yellow binding isn't enough to make you think twice about collecting this series, then the publisher's decision to put a recommendation from Tom Clancy on the cover definitely should, but I'm glad I overcame my initial revulsion.

Varley is a writer so profligate with his ideas that it almost makes you want to dislike him for his teeming creativity rather than admire him for it. I'll reserve judgement until I've finished it, but I'm really impressed thus far, structurally and creatively. The characterisation is a little flat, but the brimming ideas more than make up for it.
_________________
Gerhilde wrote:
Hojotoho! Hojotoho! Heiaha! Heiaha!

Top
 Profile  
Abominatrix
Harbinger of Metal

Joined: Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:15 pm
Posts: 9311
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 2:48 pm 
 

incarcerated_demon wrote:
Abominatrix wrote:
As for Dan Brown, I really don't want to comment or I'll just start spewing vitriol .. hate, hate, hate that man's writing. My mum was really trying to get me to read "The Da Vinci COde", saying, "oh, it's an adventure story, but it'll make you think!" .. so I went and bought her "FOucal'ts Pendulum", which I'm pretty sure she'll never read now. Ah well..



I've actually just finished Foucault's Pendulum actually, great book :) Much better than that Dan Brown crap. Dan Brown couldn't write with flair if his life depended on it.


"The secret is that there is no secret."
...or is it?
;)

Top
 Profile  
Abominatrix
Harbinger of Metal

Joined: Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:15 pm
Posts: 9311
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 2:51 pm 
 

Lychgate wrote:
I have been reading Douglas Coupland. Specifically JPod and Microserfs. Both really, really ace books, and I am going to have to get to work on the rest of his stuff asap starting with Generation X.

Haha, oh man .. Douglas Coupland .. Despite enjoying "JPod" with reservations, I want to give him a stout punch in the nose. Who the hell let him get away with filling up space in a novel with pages and pages of random numbers, letters, etc? It's worse when you have to edit some of this stuff as I do.. Bastard. But, he makes a good enough point I suppose about the obsessive nature of many computer programmers.

Top
 Profile  
Abominatrix
Harbinger of Metal

Joined: Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:15 pm
Posts: 9311
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 2:55 pm 
 

BM_DM wrote:
I've picked up Dune again having abandoned it a couple of months ago, and am enjoying it a lot more now for some reason. I read two thirds of it over the weekend.

I'm reading the Gollancz SF Collectors' edition of John Varley's The Ophiuchi Hotline on my commute.

If the bile-yellow binding isn't enough to make you think twice about collecting this series, then the publisher's decision to put a recommendation from Tom Clancy on the cover definitely should, but I'm glad I overcame my initial revulsion.

Varley is a writer so profligate with his ideas that it almost makes you want to dislike him for his teeming creativity rather than admire him for it. I'll reserve judgement until I've finished it, but I'm really impressed thus far, structurally and creatively. The characterisation is a little flat, but the brimming ideas more than make up for it.


Hm, I borrowed that Varley book many years ago but never actuallyy ended up reading it for some reason or other. Since then though, I've read some Varley short pieces that really impressed me. This (the short story) is often how I get turned on to reading longer works. The same goes for Ian Watson actually, whom you mentioned earlier ... I've been thinking about reading a novel of his for a while because I remember enjoying a lot of his shorter work. DId that one ever improve for you?

Top
 Profile  
LestWeForget
Mallcore Kid

Joined: Sat Dec 01, 2007 4:21 pm
Posts: 16
Location: United States of America
PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 10:30 pm 
 

There should be a thread entirely dedicated to Lovecraft.
_________________
"Perhaps I know why it is man alone who laughs: He alone suffers so deeply that he had to invent laughter."
- Friedrich Nietzsche

Purple in the morning, blue in the afternoon, and orange in the evening. Just like that, one, two, three, four.

Top
 Profile  
Morrigan
Crone of War

Joined: Sat Aug 10, 2002 7:27 am
Posts: 10528
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 10:32 pm 
 

There has been one. If it's gone, feel free to make another one. ;)

Top
 Profile  
LestWeForget
Mallcore Kid

Joined: Sat Dec 01, 2007 4:21 pm
Posts: 16
Location: United States of America
PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 10:39 pm 
 

I don't know...how long did the last one hold out for and why is it gone?
_________________
"Perhaps I know why it is man alone who laughs: He alone suffers so deeply that he had to invent laughter."
- Friedrich Nietzsche

Purple in the morning, blue in the afternoon, and orange in the evening. Just like that, one, two, three, four.

Top
 Profile  
Kruel
Metalhead

Joined: Mon Nov 19, 2007 9:56 pm
Posts: 2142
PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 10:41 pm 
 

LestWeForget wrote:
I don't know...how long did the last one hold out for and why is it gone?


http://www.metal-archives.com/board/vie ... =lovecraft
_________________
Quote:
So, Manes > Samael?
Quote:
yeah, it's ironic, they are so pretentious, yet one can say that at least they don't pretend. They don't release some techno-rap-whatever album and say "on this record we tried to sound like in our old days"

Top
 Profile  
LestWeForget
Mallcore Kid

Joined: Sat Dec 01, 2007 4:21 pm
Posts: 16
Location: United States of America
PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2008 10:45 pm 
 

Right on, I'll just move over there.
_________________
"Perhaps I know why it is man alone who laughs: He alone suffers so deeply that he had to invent laughter."
- Friedrich Nietzsche

Purple in the morning, blue in the afternoon, and orange in the evening. Just like that, one, two, three, four.

Top
 Profile  
incarcerated_demon
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2007 3:21 pm
Posts: 147
PostPosted: Tue Apr 15, 2008 1:03 am 
 

Abominatrix wrote:
incarcerated_demon wrote:
Abominatrix wrote:
As for Dan Brown, I really don't want to comment or I'll just start spewing vitriol .. hate, hate, hate that man's writing. My mum was really trying to get me to read "The Da Vinci COde", saying, "oh, it's an adventure story, but it'll make you think!" .. so I went and bought her "FOucal'ts Pendulum", which I'm pretty sure she'll never read now. Ah well..



I've actually just finished Foucault's Pendulum actually, great book :) Much better than that Dan Brown crap. Dan Brown couldn't write with flair if his life depended on it.


"The secret is that there is no secret."
...or is it?
;)


Postmodern irony and all that jazz. Anthony Burgess described as that, essentially. I just think it's taking the piss out of the conspiracy theorists who latch onto anything and everything to create some outlandish secret society theory (are you listening Mr Brown?)

Top
 Profile  
Abominatrix
Harbinger of Metal

Joined: Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:15 pm
Posts: 9311
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Tue Apr 15, 2008 10:17 am 
 

incarcerated_demon wrote:
Abominatrix wrote:
incarcerated_demon wrote:
Abominatrix wrote:
As for Dan Brown, I really don't want to comment or I'll just start spewing vitriol .. hate, hate, hate that man's writing. My mum was really trying to get me to read "The Da Vinci COde", saying, "oh, it's an adventure story, but it'll make you think!" .. so I went and bought her "FOucal'ts Pendulum", which I'm pretty sure she'll never read now. Ah well..



I've actually just finished Foucault's Pendulum actually, great book :) Much better than that Dan Brown crap. Dan Brown couldn't write with flair if his life depended on it.


"The secret is that there is no secret."
...or is it?
;)


Postmodern irony and all that jazz. Anthony Burgess described as that, essentially. I just think it's taking the piss out of the conspiracy theorists who latch onto anything and everything to create some outlandish secret society theory (are you listening Mr Brown?)


It is taking the piss to an extent, yeah, but I think it's much more than that. Casaubon's life is basically ruined by the end of the book, or so it seems. My thought is that it likens the whole idea of interconnectedness to a virus, similar to the way some sociologists describe ideas that spread across cultures as being "viral". The Garamond folks start out as outsiders, definitely taking the piss, as you say, but by the end they're completely enmeshed and as much a part of the conspiracy as the people they were attempting to dupe. maybe the same was true for the so-called Saint Germain?

There's some pretty fantastic stuff undeer the surface going on, too. What the hell was that semi-Lovecraftian bit at the end of the ceremony, with the strange amorphous creature and so on? Just theatrics, or something more? The enigma is what keeps us coming back!

Top
 Profile  
incarcerated_demon
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2007 3:21 pm
Posts: 147
PostPosted: Tue Apr 15, 2008 5:28 pm 
 

Abominatrix wrote:
It is taking the piss to an extent, yeah, but I think it's much more than that. Casaubon's life is basically ruined by the end of the book, or so it seems. My thought is that it likens the whole idea of interconnectedness to a virus, similar to the way some sociologists describe ideas that spread across cultures as being "viral". The Garamond folks start out as outsiders, definitely taking the piss, as you say, but by the end they're completely enmeshed and as much a part of the conspiracy as the people they were attempting to dupe. maybe the same was true for the so-called Saint Germain?

There's some pretty fantastic stuff undeer the surface going on, too. What the hell was that semi-Lovecraftian bit at the end of the ceremony, with the strange amorphous creature and so on? Just theatrics, or something more? The enigma is what keeps us coming back!


A meme of sorts? That's an interesting way of seeing FP, certainly a bit deeper than my initial reading :) I just sort of saw it as an extended version of "get a life man, living in the past won't get you anywhere". The meaning of their life was to fool others by constructing this elaborate plot, essentially doing what the other nutjobs were doing, except that their quest wasn't even genuine. And at the end, Casaubon realises that the things in life that matter are his kid and wife, the real things, the ones worth living for. Diotallevi, died of cancer; Belbo, probably killed by nutters; Casaubon himself, he will be found or so he says. Connected to that is the notion of "let loose, live life" sort of thing. Remember those ceremonies with his Brazilian girlfriend, the hardheaded, empiricist revolutionary, where she became entranced?

I'm not making sense, will probably have to read it again. And I haven't read Lovecraft (shock horror! :)) so I don't really know which bit you're talking about...

Top
 Profile  
BM_DM
Metal newbie

Joined: Fri Mar 31, 2006 12:47 am
Posts: 61
PostPosted: Wed Apr 16, 2008 6:46 am 
 

Abominatrix wrote:
The same goes for Ian Watson actually, whom you mentioned earlier (The Miracle Visitors) ... I've been thinking about reading a novel of his for a while because I remember enjoying a lot of his shorter work. DId that one ever improve for you?

Downhill all the way, and one of the worst novels I've struggled through for a while. A nasty melange of preposterous concept (psychic influence precipitating the manifestation of UFOs), crappy science (modifying cars to make them capable of space-flight), some open-book, by-the-numbers cannibalisation of near-eastern mysticism, terrible characterization (all four of the protagonists are 100% mahogany), etc.

Being generous, the book could be read through a number of lenses in order to ask whether the experiences described are actually supposed to have happened (there are a lot of regression therapy sequences in the work), but the whole book implodes if you start thinking along these lines and extrapolate out from them. I bought Watson's The Jonah Kit at the same time, and am dreading reading it.

There is a whale on the cover. I don't think this augurs well.

Edit: everyone has to earn a crust, but the above has slid further down the slush pile since I discovered Watson has two 'Warhammer 40,000' novels to his name. Especially seeing as Zola's Germinal is up next.
_________________
Gerhilde wrote:
Hojotoho! Hojotoho! Heiaha! Heiaha!

Top
 Profile  
mikeabo123
Mallcore Kid

Joined: Tue Feb 05, 2008 11:40 pm
Posts: 17
Location: United States of America
PostPosted: Wed Apr 16, 2008 10:35 pm 
 

Right now I am reading Dante's legendary Divine Comedy. Anyone a fan? So far, I have to say, it is one of the greatest things ive ever read.


Last edited by mikeabo123 on Fri Apr 18, 2008 12:02 am, edited 1 time in total.
Top
 Profile  
incarcerated_demon
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2007 3:21 pm
Posts: 147
PostPosted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 4:21 am 
 

mikeabo123 wrote:
Right now I am reading Dante's legendary Diving Comedy. Anyone a fan? So far, I have to say, it is one of the greatest things ive ever read.


No water in the pool? :lol:

Seriously, I tried reading it and it did my head in. I never had much patience for poetry, to the despair of my Lit teacher who had to literally force us through Blake.

Top
 Profile  
AnimalBones
Metal newbie

Joined: Fri Oct 15, 2004 9:03 am
Posts: 51
Location: United Kingdom
PostPosted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 5:18 am 
 

incarcerated_demon wrote:
mikeabo123 wrote:
Right now I am reading Dante's legendary Diving Comedy. Anyone a fan? So far, I have to say, it is one of the greatest things ive ever read.


No water in the pool? :lol:

Seriously, I tried reading it and it did my head in. I never had much patience for poetry, to the despair of my Lit teacher who had to literally force us through Blake.


I have to concur with incarcerated_demon, I read the Divine Comedy in a day and felt it was a day wasted. The book is thick with metaphor and allegory and I didn't feel like investing a significant portion of my life in trying to decipher it. I'm not denying it's significant place in the Western canon, I just couldn't be bothered with it as, whether I fully understood it or not, it did not "speak" to me on a first read and make me want to delve deeper

Top
 Profile  
Oukranos
Mallcore Kid

Joined: Thu Mar 27, 2008 12:32 pm
Posts: 2
Location: United States of America
PostPosted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 7:50 pm 
 

I quite liked "Inferno," but the other two were very boring. The version I had had brief descriptions of each canto before the actual translation, and I ended up just reading those to get through "Paradiso." Maybe it was all the cool torture scenes in "Inferno" that made it so much better.

Top
 Profile  
woeoftyrants
Metal newbie

Joined: Tue Aug 08, 2006 12:08 pm
Posts: 119
Location: United States of America
PostPosted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 8:45 pm 
 

Heh, I'm actually reading Dante's Inferno right now for one of my Honors classes; I read a wild, postmodern translation of it a few years ago, so reading a more traditional and academic translation is gay, but it's cool.

Last week I finished J.G. Ballard's The Atrocity Exhibition, which is probably one of the most downright disturbing and mind-blowing books I've ever read. I'll probably go back and read it again since a few things went over my head, but enjoyed it.

As of right now, I'm reading W.S. Burroughs' Junky. I'm pretty impressed. It's a totally raw documentary of his drug addictions, much different than his other stuff... but still awesome.

Top
 Profile  
metalomaniac
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Apr 08, 2007 11:06 pm
Posts: 47
PostPosted: Thu Apr 17, 2008 11:02 pm 
 

I'm currently reading Dostoevsky's Demons, but it's taking forever because of school and work.

Top
 Profile  
incarcerated_demon
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Apr 22, 2007 3:21 pm
Posts: 147
PostPosted: Sat Apr 19, 2008 3:48 am 
 

AnimalBones wrote:
incarcerated_demon wrote:
mikeabo123 wrote:
Right now I am reading Dante's legendary Diving Comedy. Anyone a fan? So far, I have to say, it is one of the greatest things ive ever read.


No water in the pool? :lol:

Seriously, I tried reading it and it did my head in. I never had much patience for poetry, to the despair of my Lit teacher who had to literally force us through Blake.


I have to concur with incarcerated_demon, I read the Divine Comedy in a day and felt it was a day wasted. The book is thick with metaphor and allegory and I didn't feel like investing a significant portion of my life in trying to decipher it. I'm not denying it's significant place in the Western canon, I just couldn't be bothered with it as, whether I fully understood it or not, it did not "speak" to me on a first read and make me want to delve deeper


You read it in a day??? Fucking hell....I took a couple of hours to struggle through about 10 pages.

Top
 Profile  
ReigningChaos
Metal newbie

Joined: Thu May 13, 2004 7:36 pm
Posts: 152
Location: United States of America
PostPosted: Sat Apr 19, 2008 4:10 pm 
 

I recently finished a book about LSD called Storming Heaven: LSD and the American Dream by Jay Stevens. It was a great read, especially since I'm very interested in the psychedelic movement. It's an excellent history of LSD, from its creation to the Summer of Love and the end of the psychedelic movement. It brilliantly shows the evolution of the movement, from Huxley's elitist stance to Leary's and Ginsberg's egalitarian one--and eventually to the lack of any 'grand theory of psychedelics,' where hedonism became the goal, rather than enlightenment. It's full of entertaining anecdotes and it delves into tangential subjects just enough to whet one's appetite. While this book will probably be enjoyed most by those who have an interest in the drug culture, there's plenty to be had for those who don't. The disintegration of the movement, and the increased radicalization (similar to what happened during the French Revolution only without the violence) make for great reading. As does the excellent treatment of writers such as Huxley, Kesey, and Ginsberg. There's also a lot about how the beat culture transformed into the hippie culture. Once I really got into this book, I couldn't put it down.

I'm currently reading Herman Hesse's Beneath the Wheeland will soon begin James P. Hogan's Inherit the Stars.
_________________
droneriot wrote:
the meek shall FUCKING LEAVE THE HALL.

Top
 Profile  
Abominatrix
Harbinger of Metal

Joined: Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:15 pm
Posts: 9311
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:00 pm 
 

incarcerated_demon wrote:
Abominatrix wrote:
It is taking the piss to an extent, yeah, but I think it's much more than that. Casaubon's life is basically ruined by the end of the book, or so it seems. My thought is that it likens the whole idea of interconnectedness to a virus, similar to the way some sociologists describe ideas that spread across cultures as being "viral". The Garamond folks start out as outsiders, definitely taking the piss, as you say, but by the end they're completely enmeshed and as much a part of the conspiracy as the people they were attempting to dupe. maybe the same was true for the so-called Saint Germain?

There's some pretty fantastic stuff undeer the surface going on, too. What the hell was that semi-Lovecraftian bit at the end of the ceremony, with the strange amorphous creature and so on? Just theatrics, or something more? The enigma is what keeps us coming back!


A meme of sorts? That's an interesting way of seeing FP, certainly a bit deeper than my initial reading :) I just sort of saw it as an extended version of "get a life man, living in the past won't get you anywhere". The meaning of their life was to fool others by constructing this elaborate plot, essentially doing what the other nutjobs were doing, except that their quest wasn't even genuine. And at the end, Casaubon realises that the things in life that matter are his kid and wife, the real things, the ones worth living for. Diotallevi, died of cancer; Belbo, probably killed by nutters; Casaubon himself, he will be found or so he says. Connected to that is the notion of "let loose, live life" sort of thing. Remember those ceremonies with his Brazilian girlfriend, the hardheaded, empiricist revolutionary, where she became entranced?

I'm not making sense, will probably have to read it again. And I haven't read Lovecraft (shock horror! :)) so I don't really know which bit you're talking about...


The ending almost makes you weep, because Casaubon, despite knowing what these "real" things are, is still enmeshed, and can't escape ... his decision to never see his wife and kid again (that is what I got from the ending, at least .. ) seems like utter madness and folly, but somehow nothing fits better. It is actually a pretty dispiriting book in a lot of ways. The Lovecraftian bit near the end takes place when the media are apparently channeling the spirits of dead templars, but something goes wrong and one of them seems to dissolve into an amorphous blob of flesh and die horribly. I even think that Mr. Bramanti invokes Cthulhu at this point! It's interesting because I was talking to a girl who was all confused because she thought that the Pendulum was inspired by "real" occult stuff and didn't understand why he would drop in a reference to a pulp writer such as Lovecraft. I had to snicker. I think Eco and Lovecraft actually read a lot of the same stuff.

Well, it seems popular to read DOstoevsky nowadays, but I have no issue with that; he really is a phenomenal writer. I recently started "The Idiot" and I am quite engrossed. There's a real ability to empathise with his characters and situations, a lot of pathos, if that's the right word. like much of Dostoevsky that I've read, this is *extremely* talky, and rather melodramatic I guess, but the dialogues are very engaging and the drama is, well, typically Russian.

Top
 Profile  
Abominatrix
Harbinger of Metal

Joined: Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:15 pm
Posts: 9311
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 1:04 pm 
 

AnimalBones wrote:
incarcerated_demon wrote:
mikeabo123 wrote:
Right now I am reading Dante's legendary Diving Comedy. Anyone a fan? So far, I have to say, it is one of the greatest things ive ever read.


No water in the pool? :lol:

Seriously, I tried reading it and it did my head in. I never had much patience for poetry, to the despair of my Lit teacher who had to literally force us through Blake.


I have to concur with incarcerated_demon, I read the Divine Comedy in a day and felt it was a day wasted. The book is thick with metaphor and allegory and I didn't feel like investing a significant portion of my life in trying to decipher it. I'm not denying it's significant place in the Western canon, I just couldn't be bothered with it as, whether I fully understood it or not, it did not "speak" to me on a first read and make me want to delve deeper


it shouldn't really speak to you. It's a moralistic work, or rather, that's what I could glean from it .. I admit to lacking the patience to really give it a full reading. Some worthy strange atmosphere but well, it's got many of the typical obsessions that would form the religious iconography of the Renaissance. Important, yes, definitely .. but I don't know if it goes further than that.

Top
 Profile  
AnimalBones
Metal newbie

Joined: Fri Oct 15, 2004 9:03 am
Posts: 51
Location: United Kingdom
PostPosted: Wed Apr 23, 2008 4:27 am 
 

Currently reading "The Rest is Noise" by Alex Ross.

Basically the book is a history of 20th century "classical" music from Strauss' 'Salome' and Mahler to the present day. Interestingly, the book treats the main protagonists, musical geniuses like Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Gershwin, Stockhausen, Bartok etc as products of their time and place and does a great job of dispelling any myth that these individuals were lone giants of music whose great innovations came from a period of prolonged navel gazing. The subtext is that these things were going to happen anyway, it was a matter of who would get there first e.g. the early great experiments in atonality could have been Schoenberg or Ives.

Highly recommended to anyone who has an interest in any kind of 20th century music.

Top
 Profile  
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
Reply to topic Go to page Previous  1 ... 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 ... 158  Next


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 32 guests


You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum

 
Jump to:  

Back to the Encyclopaedia Metallum


Powered by phpBB © 2000, 2002, 2005, 2007 phpBB Group