What is your meme trilogy?
>>25633530An older friend of mine insisted one read the Rosy Crucifixion before reading Tropic of Capricorn-Black Spring-Tropic of Cancer. A massive amount of Miller, but when you see his own self mythology as being (in modern parlance) a simp who knows the woman he's simping for is a lesbian arthoe who nevertheless gives his life meaning beyond his bitter wife and dead end job, you see how he'd be willing to bum it in the slums of Paris even after she ditches him. Can't speak for Pynchon or Bolano, but perhaps next year.
>>25633541I see it as basically artistic - you have to be an interesting person in order to write an interesting book about yourself. "Write what you know" + you can't choose to be a winner = the modernist tale of epic loserdom.Although Miller's story, insofar as there is a story, isn't a quest narrative. So it's more actually more cynical than the rest of the genre.
>>25633569I see him as the kind of man who forces himself to be optimistic but will bitch about it the entire time. He's not a cynic, if anything, he's someone who refuses to be cynical, but also won't lie by omitting how much depravity, filth and selfishness surround the rare bits of genuine beauty. When he finds something he loves, he won't stop praising it until he feels like he's exhausted it, as his books Remember to Remember and Time of the Assassins are sustained examples of, but can be found in passages of any of his works
>>25633582That's correct. I should have used pessimistic. Miller's quest doesn't have a quest, so the possibility of achieving something seems cut off.But yeah, Miller's affect has a lot of range unlike Celine or Kerouac... That may be what propels the book forward, creates a sense of surprise or something, the book never feels repetitive despite being repetitive.
>>25633530
>>25633530Ancient EveningsThe Garden of Seven Twilights...I'm not sure I've read another doorstopper, but in trying to check, I might want to read Blonde by Joyce Carol Oates.
>>25633530Volume 1Reading Capital PoliticallyVolume 3
>>25633530MarkThomasLuke
John Barth - LettersWilliam Gaddis - JRJoseph McElroy - Women and MenJohn Barth - The Sot-Weed FactorThomas Pynchon - Mason & DixonWilliam T. Vollmann - ArgallWendy S. Painting - Aberration in the Heartland of the RealDon Delillo - LibraJames Ellroy - American TabloidThomas Bernhard - The LoserMichel Houellebecq - The Map and the TerritoryJohn Williams - StonerLouis Ferdinand Celine - Journey to the End of NightHenry Miller - Tropic of CapricornWilliam S. Burroughs - JunkyHamletEndzoneInfinite Jest
the one and only
>>25633943I'd add The Executioner's Song to a the third trilogy to make it a quintet
>>25633946what does pikachu read
>>25633943>Wendy S. Painting - Aberration in the Heartland of the Real, Don Delillo - Libra, James Ellroy - American Tabloidlist is kino. gave up on aberration because of how long the section on ufos was but maybe should start it up again. anyway i'm reading end zone right after ij and am loving it, can see what dfw saw in it
>>25633530>The Pickwick Papers>Psmith in the City>Napoleon of Notting HillYah, I'm pretty hardcore
Dungeon Crawler CarlReady Player OneProject Hail Mary
>>25633530Unironically
>>25634278Catcher in the Rye.
>>25634358>UnironicallyGrim
>>25633541>An older friend of mine insisted one read the Rosy Crucifixion before reading Tropic of Capricorn-Black Spring-Tropic of Cancer.Why?
>>25634278Portnoy's Complaint
>>25633943Is Argall any good compared to the other 2?
>>25634846A lot more sexually charged (depraved) and far less "Romantic", but stylistically in the same vein as M&D and Sot-Weed, prose-wise and structure-wise. Vastly researched and committed to its approach to the subject. The weakest of the three but still great.
>>25634407probably for the reasons I stated in the post, that RC is relatively more linear and in depth in covering the time periods covered in Capricorn and Black Spring. The myth of Miller is basically about the metamorphosis from some guy with a dead-end job and an unhappy marriage writing crap for magazines in New York to THE Henry Miller, Paris expat and provocateur-poet-prophet, all because of "Mona" (June). In other words, the boomer fantasy archetype 30 years before boomers were even born and with more depth and discipline. You can see Lolita as a kind of black humor parody/subversion of the general plotline, some loser sees a woman that makes his eyes do the looney tunes routine and upends his life and reputation for her to go on a hero's journey; only in Lolita it's all rationalizations in a pedophile's head for him trafficking a minor.
>>25633719Why no Process of Circulation?
>>25635396Alright. I don't think linearity matters too much with Henry Miller. Anyway, I started with Tropic of Cancer, detoured into The Colossus of Maroussi afterwards, then read Tropic of Capricorn. Looking forward to starting RC. I need to get Black Spring
>>25635981>Why no Process of Circulation?Everyone skips Process of Circulation, and if you're reading Volume 3 you need an Autonomist to shit all over your face. If you can't get it in Length of the Working Day you're not going to torture a foreman to death with live 440 VAC
>>25634278Blood Meridian
Bolaño - 2666Coover - The Public BurningKosinski - Steps
