Classics thing: Or What I think of Famous Books

[Galactus]

Okay, so I've been taking a distance course in Literature, and that means reading a shitload of stuff. Unfoirtunately due to the format there's not much discussion going on. So I'll be using you guys as someone to get my thoughts on various stuff out (especially in a less... Formal manner)

Last segment we read, among other things, Candide and Frankenstein. Candide is always fun, and I hadn't actually read Shelley. Frankenstein is *incredibly* romantic. All the dramatic contrast, huge emotions, rugged landscapes etc.

This segment we read Oliver Twist, Old Goriot, Jane Eyre, Robinson Crusoe, and Gulliver's travels, you probably know all of them, less famous is probably Carl Jonas Love Almquists Det Går An (how to translate that? "It'll do" "S'ok"?) basically about a sergeant and a young woman craftsman travelling together in 19th century Sweden. They end up deciding to live together without getting married.

This absolutely shocked the fuck out of 19th century society. (the writer was later accused of poisoning someone and had to leave the country, in an unrelated tidbit) It's a fairly weirdly told story, and the interest in it is mainly historical (although there's some nice 19th century social tidbits)

Jane Eyre was... Interesting. Yeah, it feels very 19th century (again with the rugged landscapes, huge emotional stuff etc, and of course the scary half-black woman in the attic... Oh 19th century and your racism) Mr. Rochester is a complete dick, and the ending is creepy as fuck. But otherwise I rather like Jane as a character. She's not half as vapid as I was expecting her to be. The ending feels totally rushed though, it's like Charlotte decided "Oh shit I need to end this quickly! Supernatural voice! Dramatic fire and karmic maiming! GO!" There's some genuinely funny moments though, mainly from Jane's commentary (but then again I'm a sucker for narratives making witty comments about their own story)

Overall, in the "vaguely gothic creepy romance thing" genre I've read a lot worse. Even though it's the ancestor of Twilight.

Now Old Goriot I really like. Yeah, it's as sexist as anything else, but there's something about Balzac: He makes stereotypes come alive. His descriptions are great (you really get a feel for 19th century Paris) it's cynical and witty, in some ways it reminds me of ASOIAF. The way it's told makes it hard to see if he's poking fun at, condemning or endorsing all the varieties of fraud, debauchery and egoism you see in the book. But it's a fun read, and strangely relatable. (I especially love his panegyric to "The poor students who are subjec to all the world's temptations and occasionally doesen't succumb.")

[Lyanna Stark]

Oooh awesome. I love Jane Eyre, but 100% agreed on the ending. I loved her character too and felt the first 80% of the book made up for the WTF ending to a large degree. Don't taint it with Twilight though :( I feel Wuthering Heights is far more to blame for that one. Edward Cullen and Heathcliffe can rot on a pile somewhere for all I care.

Interesting that you liked Balzac. I could never stand him. Tried several times but his sexism and his unlikeable characters just put me right off. Maybe I should try again?

Haven't read Candide in ages, but you make me want to reread it again. I love Candide. :) Still remember the first time I read it and started giggling madly at page 11. It's just so hilarious.

Regarding Carl Jonas Love Almqvist, I've read some of his poetry and loved it but never his prose. How is "Det går An" to read? My benchmark is "Gösta Berlings saga" which I find borderline unreadable. If it's worse than that I am a lost cause I am afraid. (I think "It'll do" or maybe "It is acceptable" comes close as a translation for "Det går An", tenses between Swe-Eng are always hard to translate since you lose some of the meaning and purpose). Btw his poem about trousers and underpants are among my favourites ever.

Vad än man hava må emot Kalsonger,

så äro dock onekligt Byxor bra.

De första måste tvättas tusen, tusen ,tusen gånger:

De andra kan man alltid svarta ha.

[Galactus]

Interesting that you liked Balzac. I could never stand him. Tried several times but his sexism and his unlikeable characters just put me right off. Maybe I should try again?

I dunno, I guess it depends on what you read?

I mean, there's no doubt that he's sexist (extremely so) but I rather like his misanthropy and some of his observations are fun. (like how students will spend a ton of money buying a new coat but will save buying socks until they're all worn-out...)

Regarding Carl Jonas Love Almqvist, I've read some of his poetry and loved it but never his prose. How is "Det går An" to read?

It's fairly readable. We're reading Drottningens Juvelsmycke for the next segment (romanticism! And yeah, that means Werther! We were going to do Faust too but the professor changed his mind) and that one is a really tough read (mainly because of the constant french and generally weird syntax)

Det Går An is pretty easy on the prose (I mean, it's still distinctly 19th century, with all that means of piling adjective upon adjective).

It's also pretty short (142 pages in my version) so it's not that big a deal even if you have to plow through it.

It doesen't have much of a plot though, other than "two people travelling together while flirting in a 19th century way and having discussions about marriage")

Vad än man hava må emot Kalsonger,

så äro dock onekligt Byxor bra.

De första måste tvättas tusen, tusen ,tusen gånger:

De andra kan man alltid svarta ha.

Win :P

[felice]

Frankenstein is *incredibly* romantic. All the dramatic contrast, huge emotions, rugged landscapes etc.

I found a couple of things particularly interesting in reading Frankenstein: there's nothing about the creature being assembled from pieces of corpses; and Frankenstein is the monster after all.

[Galactus]

I found a couple of things particularly interesting in reading Frankenstein: there's nothing about the creature being assembled from pieces of corpses; and Frankenstein is the monster after all. ke This

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Depends, nothing outright is stated, but it is heavily implied that it is at least partially so: s "I collected bones from charnel-houses and disturbed, with profane fingers, the tremendous secrets of the human frame." although there's also this: "The dissecting-room and the slaughter-house furnished many of my materials"

[Nukelavee]

Lyanna - If you add in Kate Bush's "Wuthering Heights", and my buddy's mishearing of a line from "No Myth", by Micheal Penn, well...

You get an image of Heathcliffe chased by vampire Cathy across teh moors, while his snowpants go "wssht wssssht wsssht"

How in hell Tommybob heard "heathcliffe in snowpants", I have yet to figure out.

[Tears of Lys]

Lyanna - If you add in Kate Bush's "Wuthering Heights", and my buddy's mishearing of a line from "No Myth", by Micheal Penn, well...

You get an image of Heathcliffe chased by vampire Cathy across teh moors, while his snowpants go "wssht wssssht wsssht"

How in hell Tommybob heard "heathcliffe in snowpants", I have yet to figure out.

I have no idea what you're talking about, but I laughed nonetheless.

I loved Jane Eyre, couldn't and still can't stand Wuthering Heights, but my favorite Bronte book is "Villette."

Yeah, Mr. Rochester was pretty selfish and caddish for practically dragging Jane to the altar, knowing he was already married to a madwoman he had stashed in the attic, and yes, it ended rather abruptly, but there is such beauty and longing in the story that I can forgive it these small faults. The real dick of the story was, IMO, St. John. He wants to marry Jane, not loving her, just so she can help him in his missionary work? and she will be self-denying? Fuck that.

My education is sorely neglected in the area of other-than-English novels, unfortunately.

[Galactus]

The real dick of the story was, IMO, St. John. He wants to marry Jane, not loving her, just so she can help him in his missionary work? and she will be self-denying? Fuck that.

I think what mitigates it is that A) He's up-front about it. and B) He's not asking anything of her he isn't willing to do himself.

Or rather, he's being dickish, but he's not doing anything morally wrong, unlike Rochester. (whose moral wrong is of course hiding things from Jane, not the bigam itself)

[Verboten]

Wuthering Heights was a horror story about self-destructive emotionally manipulative dicks ruining their own and everybody elses lives. I don't see how people take it as romance.

Frankenstein is romantic and tragic and lovely.

[felice]

Depends, nothing outright is stated, but it is heavily implied that it is at least partially so: s "I collected bones from charnel-houses and disturbed, with profane fingers, the tremendous secrets of the human frame." although there's also this: "The dissecting-room and the slaughter-house furnished many of my materials"

The first sentence I read as meaning that he simply studied human corpses to figure out how they work. The latter is less clear, but certainly indicates that the materials in question included animal parts (and not necessarily human parts at all), but those could have been for research purposes rather than construction. Other parts strongly suggest the creature is built from scratch: "As the minuteness of the parts formed a great hindrance to my speed, I resolved, contrary to my first intention, to make the being of a gigantic stature", and "I thought that if I could bestow animation upon lifeless matter, I might in process of time (although I now found it impossible) renew life where death had apparently devoted the body to corruption" strongly implies non-biological construction materials. I suspect the clay mentioned in "I dabbled among the unhallowed damps of the grave or tortured the living animal to animate the lifeless clay" is literally clay. My guess is that if biological material was used at all, it would be in the unspecified process that brought the creature to life rather than in its construction.

[Tears of Lys]

I think what mitigates it is that A) He's up-front about it. and B) He's not asking anything of her he isn't willing to do himself.

Or rather, he's being dickish, but he's not doing anything morally wrong, unlike Rochester. (whose moral wrong is of course hiding things from Jane, not the bigam itself)

I guess, strictly speaking, St. John was the more "moral," but Rochester pays for his immorality and redeems himself by attempting to save his mad wife and seriously injuring himself in the process.

[Galactus]

So, the Sorrows of Young Werther, Lyanna's favourite book.

Young bloke falls in love, girl is already married and doesen't fancy him anyway, guy kills himself. The end.

The original emo-novel. Huge hit at the time. Probably the progenitor of well... YA in general. It's really quite a fascinating book (I wonder if it reads better in german though, the swedish version is terribly high-strung even for an epistolary novel)

It's fairly interesting. It's pretty clear that it's not just unrequited love that makes Werther kill himself, it's the entie situation he's in, dissatisfaction with his work, general feeling of alienation, etc. I can't quite bring myself to hate the book like Lyanna does, even if it's not that good it's fascinating to see the sheer impact of the thing: We're literally still being influenced by Werther in the way we think about youth.

[Lummel]

So, the Sorrows of Young Werther, Lyanna's favourite book...The original emo-novel. Huge hit at the time. Probably the progenitor of well... YA in general. It's really quite a fascinating book (I wonder if it reads better in german though, the swedish version is terribly high-strung even for an epistolary novel)...

Huge hit at the time, you mean like this?

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Okay, I'm very fond of A Tale of Two Cities. That said is Sydney Carton just a classical "White Night" when he sacrifices himself to save Charles Darnay so that Darnay can live a long and happy life with the woman Carton is in love with? Better yet was Carton a "class enemy" for denying the Paris Mob the pleasure of executing the aristocrat Darnay?

:P

[Lummel]

White Knight surely? (or is the upcoming daylight saving getting to you already ;) ?)

[Lyanna Stark]

Wuthering Heights was a horror story about self-destructive emotionally manipulative dicks ruining their own and everybody elses lives. I don't see how people take it as romance.

Frankenstein is romantic and tragic and lovely.

You know, we might rarely agree, but I think you could not be more right about Wuthering Heights.

So, the Sorrows of Young Werther, Lyanna's favourite book.

Oh Christ. Young Werther is like proto-Twilight but with better prose. Suicide glorification for an entire generation.

I think one of the reasons I hated it with such passion was because I was going through a pretty rough time when I read it and it just offended me so much that the novel's solution to that sort of thing was "just off yourself".

No thanks. "The Sorrows of Young Werther" should burn in a particularly nasty piece of hell.

[Galactus]

Suicide glorification for an entire generation.

To be fair, I don't think that bears out from the text. Sure, a lot of people interpreted it that way, but it's far from the only interpretation (the fact that Goethe was horrified by his fans kind of points to it)

It's pretty clearly spelled out that Werther is a bit of a dweeb, that spent too much time reading Ossian and too little time interacting with others. The bit were Werther's letters ends and the editor/narrator's takes over creates a pretty sharp disjunction between the two.

[Lyanna Stark]

Oh sure, it's not the only interpretation, but in this case I think Goethe did a Bakker (or should it be the other way around since Goethe was first?) in that he meant for it to be interpreted a certain way, but a sizeable chunk of his readership did not, in fact, cotton on to that, but interpreted it differently.

This may of course be due to the readership being dullards (as we apparently are with Bakker :P ) or because the author just didn't get his message through.

[Galactus]

I think in part it was because Goethe hit on a market/segment of the population that wasn't really there yet: Young readers. And they took his story and ran away with it.

I mean, it wasn't just Lotte or being in unrequieted love, it was the entire "being dissatisfied with your job, being treated badly by your social betters" thing. It's all very... Relatable, and there hadn't really been much like it before. So people latched on to it like limpets.

I think that in many ways Goethe kind of invented the teenager (or young adult at least) and that's fascinating.

EDIT: Basically the entie "dissatisfied with your current life/longing for something better" young person. I can't really recall an earlier version of this.

And it's become so... Integral to our culture and our literature.

[Horza]

And it's become so... Integral to our culture and our literature.

missing a 'like' there.