The book I have enjoyed the most this year has been The Unbearable Lightness of Being. In it, the author seeks to describe what it means for an individual to accept or reject the responsibilities that arise in their life.Specifically, it describes two lifestyles. On the one hand, there is a life that accepts responsibility. This life is more grounded, connected to the earth, and experiences life in its fullness, since many of its actions have an impact on the world—to the point that the weight of those actions can end up crushing the individual to the ground. On the other hand, a life of lightness enjoys its own existence by avoiding any responsibility in order to focus on oneself, even though this life ultimately feels a sense of unease when realizing that all its actions end up being insignificant in the face of the world.In summary, the idea that responsibilities make us more or less connected to the world around us has surprised me greatly.What book have you enjoyed the most this year?
Gravity's Rainbow. All the dicksucking it gets is fully deserved, might be my new all-time favourite.
>>24984219noted, I didn't know about it. what topics does it cover, more or less?
I seriously haven't enjoyed any books at all. I have read a ton of classics and I can't remember any of them. It feels like a 2nd job or chore. I absorb nothing from these books. But I have nothing else to do to pass the time
I didn't read a book this year. Wait, maybe some religious stuff during my manic episode. A silly little book about hell by a 19th century priest might have been it. Holy brainrot
1. R. C. Sherriff - The Fortnight in September2. Miguel de Cervantes - Don Quixote3. Gerald Murnane - Collected Short Fiction4. Knut Hamsun - Mysteries5. Fernando Pessoa - The Complete Works of Álvaro de Campos/Alberto Caeiro6. Bruno Schulz - Street of Crocodiles7. Oisín Fagan - Hostages8. Yasunari Kawabata - The Sound of the Mountain9. Friedo Lampe - At the Edge of the Night10. Jon Fosse - Boathousei can't be bothered to write out a whole thing for all of them but of the top three:fortnight in september: a simple, beautiful english book about a modest normal english family going on a normal english seaside holiday in the 30s. it's so well balanced and judged, a deep nuanced exploration of the joys and pains we all feel that's funny and moving, dripping with pathosdon quixote: actually funny. not "haha shakespeare is technically referencing a penis here!" type humour but genuinely fucking hilarious. a great fun imaginative adventure full of ideas and jokes and some of the greatest characters ever written.murnane short fiction: he is the most autistic dude i've ever read
>>24984129Tom's Crossing by Mark Danielewski. This book is destined to be a great American novel, within the pantheon. It's going to take some time for this recognition to spread.
>>24984355Hmm, in this day and age, there are many more things to do that are easier to digest than reading (watching TV series, playing games, etc.). That's why I think that if you've read so many books this year, it's because you've really gotten something out of them.Can you remember anything from any of them that stands out?
>>24984358The book sounds quite interesting. Do you know what it's called?
>>24984420No not really. I can't even remember titles. >tv, gamesI just don't like it. Never got into either
>>24984129Honestly probably A Christmas Carol. I've reread it several times in the last week. It's the perfect novella. Dickens created a cultural myth which usually requires several generations of communal editing. The psychological integration Scrooge undergoes is so well-executed and his epiphany feels real and earned. The concrete details and inevitability of the story and characters, the fantastical elements, the panorama of life he presents, the snowy settings, all tick the exact right boxes for me. I've read and enjoyed a lot of denser or more obscure works this year but ACC takes the cake.
>>24984361Thank you very much for the recommendations. I'll go with Fortnight in September and Murname Short Fictions. With any luck, I'll find them second-hand somewhere.On the other hand, about Don Quixote. I was also surprised by it. It has its moments where you genuinely laugh, and the fact that the characters themselves find fragments of their story is very impressive (given the time on which it was writen).What I found a bit tedious is that there are several stories that stray from the plot (such as the part about the cave in the Montesinos mountains or when those people from Mexico come to one of the inns looking for a random person) that don't lead anywhere. It is true that they give substance to the protagonists, but in other cases...Apart from Sancho Panza and Don Quixote himself, are there any characters you particularly like?I was surprised by the humility of Sancho's wife (Teresa). In one of the chapters where she talks to Sancho (I think it was in the second book), Sancho talks about getting rich working with Quixote, but Teresa says that's not necessary, praising her own humility saying something that goes like ... “hunger is the best sauce for food.”I find that quote sublime.
>>24984447honestly whenever it wasn't about don quixote and sancho panza i just wanted to read more about don quixote and sancho panza. i didn't care that much for any of the other characters lol. definitely feeling you on the tedious nature of the side stories and it's a testament to how strong the main stuff is that it's still my second favourite thing i read despite that
Solenoid - CartarescuThe morning star - KnausgaardJulius Caesar - ShakespeareRosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead - StoppardUnder the volcano
>>24984219Are you saying that because it's the perfect bait? There's no way you found anything redeeming there.
>>24984481yeah, i can't imagine anyone finding this widely regarded and acclaimed book enjoyable, must just be lying
>>24984349There is a vague relationship between sex acts and geographic locations, but the correlation is never explained. It's mostly the author's discomfort with his own whiteness, so he takes on the persona of his villain as a way of dealing with his own self-hatred. It's mostly a therapy session for the author to express his hatred of Europe, Europeans, and general whiteness. There's a lot of inane filler betwixt and the author answers too much of the filler, removing the few solvable mysteries along the way.
>>24984485I noticed you didn't actually explain a reason so you resorted to a lame, vacuous deflection. Do you like it because it's as lame and vacuous as you are? Or will you manage to rise above and render a substantial answer? Do you even have any answer at all? This is a common occurrence with Pynchon readers by the way.
>>24984129The Accursed Share Vol 1, completely changed how I view economics
>>24984498i'm not the guy who chose it, just a bystander, but i personally like it because it's as lame and vacuous as i am
>>24984504That's about as much as I expected out of you. You're not beating the allegations here.
"The Practice of the Presence of God" by Brother Lawrence, and Beowulf.
>>24984437Noted. It's true that I've heard the story more than once, but I've never actually read it. With any luck, I might be able to come up with a few thoughts.
>>24984475Do you recommend any of them?
>>24984532Interesting
>>24984129I've read a great quantity of books this year, as I consciously tried to give my life a more "productive" direction. Ultimately, I ended up treating every book as a merchandise to be consumed, "done with". I enslaved myself to the numbers in a spreadsheet; as a result, I can't say I've authentically enjoyed a book in this year of Our Lord (most of the time it felt like a duty I had to fulfill). However, I think I'm happy to have read and, to some extent, learnt, from the following books:War Without Mercy by Dower: A thorough exposition of the notions of the Other in American and Japanese thought during the Pacific theather in the Second World War. Dower's claim is, if I understood its work properly, that this conflcit was essentially racial in nature. I particularly liked his exposition of the ways in which the Japanese government and society viewed Americans (double-natured demons) and other Asian peoples (relationship based in the principle of "proper place", linchpin of a familial structure). (1/2)
>>24984706Soldados de Perón: Los Montoneros by Gillespie: Perhaps the best work on this rather specific topic. Besides providing a comprehensive chronological history of the group, it asserts that its ultimate "failure" resided in its inflexible hierarchical organization (Pablo Giussani thinks this is due to the "arrogance" and one could say the "revolutionary posing" of its upper echelons) and a fundamental inapprehension of Perón's true "strategy", mistaking it for his "tactics" amidst his "juego pendular" while in exile. Salò, l'agonie du fascisme by Aycard & Vallaud: Describes the "treason" of the Fascist Grand Council in July 1943, followed by the liberation of Mussolini (already in a defeatist state of mind, apparently) and the establishment of the puppet-state that was the ISR, marked by radicalisation (an attempted return to the more "revolutionary" fascism of 1919), unending conflicts with external and internal adversaries and tensions with Germany. I felt it sometimes tends to romanticise excessively certain figures (a great example of it being the Verona trial).(2/2)
>>24984447>>24984464I don't like that book at all. I'm just incapable of liking comedy. I also hate Spanish too much in general
>>24984715who would have ever imagined that there would be any humorless fags on /lit/
The Chrysalids (John Wyndham)Ruined City (Nevil Shute)Blindness (José Saramago)Flowers for Mrs Harris (Paul Gallico)The Little World of Don Camillo (Giovanni Guareschi)
>>24984219>All the dicksucking it gets is fully deservedof course homosexuals enjoy this novel.
>>24984717Can you give me a break man. Its not like I insulted the book. Why do you have to give me a hard time
>>24984733i'm sorry and i hope you have a nice new year
