Pet Book Peeves

[livius drusus]

I've been reading this (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060931809/qid=1093965039/sr=ka-1/ref=pd_ka_1/104-0468532-8150307) for the past few days, but I'm afraid I'll never be able to finish without very liberal skimming. The story of William Smith and how he made the first map of geological strata is a fascinating one, but Winchester does this thing I absolutely can't stand: he peppers the story with pompous, hyperbolic, entirely pointless rhetorical questions.

Here's an example. He's talking about mid to late 18th century science; a "new mood of questioning" he calls it. Okay. A little pedestrian and blunt, a little high school textbook timeline cliche, but I can take it. Then he writes this:

A febrile fluttering of questioning began -- about what exactly was the world? How had it, and all that was in it, really come about? Was it sacrilege to wonder such a thing? Was it blasphemy to ask? Would lightening strike down anyone who questioned the likelihood of James Ussher's numbers being correct? Would plague and boils tear at the vitals of anyone who asked out loud just what story might it be that lay buried in the stones beneath our feet?

First of all, febrile fluttering of questioning? I mean really. Where is this man's editor?

Secondly, if our new and exciting scienticians had really been asking such retarded questions, I doubt I'd be typing on this here keyboard. Winchester quotes from Smith's diaries all the time, and I have yet to see Smith asking himself a single question about scrotal boils qua divine retaliation. The questions he actually asked were, well, pertinent to his studies: Are there layers like the ones in these coal mining pits that go from the ground up, like in a hill? Do these particular ammonites appear in any other layer or are they exclusive to this one? Is debtor's prison always this drafty? That kind of thing.

Anyway, it's not quite a total dealbreaker for me yet - William Smith is cool enough to keep me going (and to deserve a really good biographer) - but it's getting there. Does anyone else get really annoyed at certain stylistic choices? Am I crazy for being bothered by this kind of stuff? Will I get rectal polyps and head lice for even daring to mention it?

[maddog]

#2


Oooh, you're a better reader than I am. Most of the stuff I've read lately is pretty trashy by comparison. The rhetorical question gimmick doesn't bother me especially, but it's a symptom of other things that do. It's hard for me to articulate exactly what I don't like about a book, movie, picture, etc., but I am fairly hypercritical about all of these things.

For instance, I read Don Quixote (in translation -- I've taken Spanish, but I'm not good enough to read the original) and, for the life of me, I can't fathom why it's regarded as important literature. For one thing, the most famous episodes, such as tilting at the windmills, was hardly recognizable. It's been lifted from its context and embellished upon in the popular imagination (re-written, IOW), but in its original milieu it was indistinguishable from anything else. For another, there was simply repetitive episode after repetitive episode of this old idiot getting himself beaten to a bloody pulp. You know what? It isn't funny. Not even a little bit. (Rats! did you see that? I've just [twice now] done that same stupid rhetorical question thing in this very post!) The story, such as it was, ended up being just sort of disgusting. In fact, I got partway through the second book, and I just stopped. And I'm one of these people that forces themselves to read through to the end. It was the first book I ever stopped reading. It wasn't interesting, it wasn't funny.

I didn't like Crime and Punishment either, but for very different reasons. That book isn't badly written; it's written entirely too well. The physical, moral and psychological decay and squalor depicted are so palpable, that I felt I had to take a shower, or at least wash my hands, every time I read part of that book. It gave me the creeps.

I didn't care for the V.I.Warzawski (sp?) mystery novels by Sara Paretsky because they are inauthentic. The mystery story part of these books is actually engaging, at least at first, but for some reason it seems transparent to me that this author has been to "the formula for writing a mystery" school, because there are these little hiccups where she decides suddenly, Oh, I have to add something to make my character more realistic now, so let's describe what she's wearing. Ooh, it's been too long since we had a little "color," so now I should describe what she's eating. Oops, it's time to "fill in the scene," so I should describe some detail in her apartment. These little interruptions are exceedingly annoying. Just tell the story, already! With someone like a Dickens, those kinds of details are part of the pacing and character development. Paretsky has "heard of" scene and character development and thinks these details advance something in a fast-paced, modern, hardboiled-female-urban-detective type of story. Believe me, they don't, at least not the way she does it.

I find a lot of modern mystery writers pretty lame. David Baldacci is supposed to be pretty good -- at least the publishers thought enough of him to pay for more than one book. I couldn't really stomach the one I read. I only finished it out of a sort of horrified fascination to find out what the bombshell secret was that would cause murder in the Supreme Court -- the "surprise" was idiotic. Nobody in their right mind would have thought twice about it.

I suppose the rhetorical questions -- particularly the ones you were describing -- are a specific instance of a couple of the things I find annoying: jarring interruptions that spoil the continuity, and are just plain stupid besides.

Sigh! I always wanted to be Roger Ebert (likes too much), but I ended up being Gene Siskel (doesn't like enough) instead. There's no accounting for taste, is there? :P

[livius drusus]

Thanks for the great response, maddog.

Oooh, you're a better reader than I am. Most of the stuff I've read lately is pretty trashy by comparison.

Naw... It's just a matter of which topics appeal, I think. I love Steven King's Gunslinger series, for example, and have devoured those books as soon as they come out. I also really like history - including the historical fiction some nabobs might consider trashy - so if I see a new book on a period that interests me, I pick it up.

I assure you I haven't read Cervantes on my own, and probably never would have had it not been on a syllabus somewhere.

For instance, I read Don Quixote (in translation -- I've taken Spanish, but I'm not good enough to read the original) and, for the life of me, I can't fathom why it's regarded as important literature.

It's been way too long for me to respond intelligently, but I definitely agree with you on the beatings. It must be hard to sing soaring melodies about dreaming impossible dreams when people keep kicking your ribs in.

You know what? It isn't funny. Not even a little bit. (Rats! did you see that? I've just [twice now] done that same stupid rhetorical question thing in this very post!)

I agree that it isn't funny, but I disagree that your rhetorical questions are the same as Winchester's. He was going off on a hyperbolic ramble to pulp up the story. I have nothing against rhetorical questions per se; it's when they skew perspective and masquerade as substance that they make me crazy. Particularly in non-fic history.

I didn't like Crime and Punishment either, but for very different reasons. That book isn't badly written; it's written entirely too well. The physical, moral and psychological decay and squalor depicted are so palpable, that I felt I had to take a shower, or at least wash my hands, every time I read part of that book. It gave me the creeps.

Wow. That sounds excellent. I can see I'm finally going to have to come to terms with my fear and desire and read it all. :)

Do you think that's a pet peeve, though? It sounds less like a niggling irritant and more like a real state of mind issue for you.


<snip>
With someone like a Dickens, those kinds of details are part of the pacing and character development. Paretsky has "heard of" scene and character development and thinks these details advance something in a fast-paced, modern, hardboiled-female-urban-detective type of story. Believe me, they don't, at least not the way she does it.


I've never read any of the V.I. Warshawski novels (I looked up the spelling ;)), but I know exactly what you're talking about and it bugs the hell out of me too. I love hardboiled detective fiction - I once did a final project on Batman as hardboiled detective - and the classic noir descriptions of a Hammet or Chandler are crucial at building that unique atmosphere. A floating laundry list of adjectives doesn't even begin to qualify.

I suppose the rhetorical questions -- particularly the ones you were describing -- are a specific instance of a couple of the things I find annoying: jarring interruptions that spoil the continuity, and are just plain stupid besides.

That's it exactly. Winchester comes by it honestly: he later spends an entire chapter talking about a day he spent at the beach when he was 5. I'm still stuck there.

Sigh! I always wanted to be Roger Ebert (likes too much), but I ended up being Gene Siskel (doesn't like enough) instead. There's no accounting for taste, is there? :P

You've read Crime & Punishment, woman! Don't be so down on yourself. Besides, I'm sure there are plenty of books you
adore. <--new thread hint :)

[Clutch Munny]

Strings of rhetorical questions: Yuck. In fact, Yuck Ptooii.

Even when my dear, much-adored older sister (kids grown up, going back to school to do her PhD) sent me a fellowship application to proof-read, it was all I could do to find politic ways of telling her to drop the several paragraphs of nothing but rhetorical questions.

She claimed it was an acceptable stylistic device in her field. Postmodern history, since you ask. So much the worse...

[livius drusus]

She claimed it was an acceptable stylistic device in her field.

Yes, but was it febrile?

Postmodern history, since you ask. So much the worse...

Ah, that brings me back to the halcyon days of my History 301-C seminar, whiling away the hours reading The Cheese and the Worms (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0801843871/qid=1094081491/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/104-0468532-8150307?v=glance&s=books) and giggling over von Ranke's obsession with penetrating the causal nexus.

Good times... Good times...

[freemonkey]

Most of the time, if I'm not enjoying a book, I'll just stop reading it so I don't have many specific titles to show my pet peeves.

My mom sent me a science fiction novel about a year ago, Octavia Butler's "Wild Seed". Because she raved about it, saying, "it gets better and better as it goes", I thought I'd give it a go. It was not a very long book, but it took me several weeks to slog through it. I kept at it because she promised me it would get better, but, IMO, it did not. One of the worst things about it was that the author would have something (sci-fi-entifically explainable) happen to a character, but instead of explaining it she would write "...somehow....." I get what the author was saying, I just think it could've been a much better story in different hands/as a different genre. :qsigh: maybe its because I'm not a big sci-fi fan.

I also hate big fat books with big fat sequals. Usually I like the first book, then I waste my time reading the sequals that more often than not get crappier & crappier. All because I want to know what happens to the characters.

I've read a lot of books printed in recent years that have printing and/or editing errors!
:eek: Things like typos, grammar mistakes, repeated lines, even a character's name mis-spelled or changed! That really bugs me.

[SharonDee]

I also hate big fat books with big fat sequals. Usually I like the first book, then I waste my time reading the sequals that more often than not get crappier & crappier. All because I want to know what happens to the characters.
Hmmm... Anne Rice? Jean Auel?
:chin:

[The Lone Ranger]

For instance, I read Don Quixote (in translation -- I've taken Spanish, but I'm not good enough to read the original) and, for the life of me, I can't fathom why it's regarded as important literature. For one thing, the most famous episodes, such as tilting at the windmills, was hardly recognizable. It's been lifted from its context and embellished upon in the popular imagination (re-written, IOW), but in its original milieu it was indistinguishable from anything else. For another, there was simply repetitive episode after repetitive episode of this old idiot getting himself beaten to a bloody pulp. You know what? It isn't funny. Not even a little bit. (Rats! did you see that? I've just [twice now] done that same stupid rhetorical question thing in this very post!) The story, such as it was, ended up being just sort of disgusting. In fact, I got partway through the second book, and I just stopped. And I'm one of these people that forces themselves to read through to the end. It was the first book I ever stopped reading. It wasn't interesting, it wasn't funny.


It's my belief that Don Quixote is the most misunderstood book ever written. What I don't understand is why, given that Cervantes makes his point pretty clear in the prologue. Still, millions of innocent people have been duped into thinking that it's a celebration of Don Quixote's courage and nobility. It's nothing of the sort, and that's Cervantes' point.

Don Quixote is an insane idiot who does some truly awful things during the course of the novel, including numerous violent assaults upon perfectly innocent people.

Cervantes wrote Don Quixote as a rant against all the trashy "romance novels" of his time that presented knights as completely noble figures, always ready to rush into battle against hopeless odds in order to preserve their "honour," and in defense of the "honour" of their "Lady Fair" and so forth. The deliberately flowery and overwrought language that Cervantes used was a quite conscious parody of then-contemporary literary convention.

Don Quixote could be viewed as the first great novel to celebrate a rationalist view of the world around us, while condemning the tendency to believe that what we want to be true is true. Far from making him noble and heroic, Don Quixote's unwillingness to face reality causes him to do some truly horrible things, and he suffers quite a bit for it. In the end, he dies a bitter, broken man, cursing the madness that made him a laughing-stock and brought such shame to his family.

"Man of La Mancha" and other such things that treated Don Quixote as a heroic figure were missing Cervantes' point entirely, in my opinion.

Cheers,

Michael

[maddog]

It's my belief that Don Quixote is the most misunderstood book ever written. What I don't understand is why, given that Cervantes makes his point pretty clear in the prologue. Still, millions of innocent people have been duped into thinking that it's a celebration of Don Quixote's courage and nobility. It's nothing of the sort, and that's Cervantes' point.Oh, I quite understood that Cervantes was making fun of the romances; it's just that I had been led to expect that the "making fun" was supposed to be "funny." It isn't. As you quite rightly say, Quixote himself does a number of insane and atrocious things -- he's a perp as well as a victim -- but the numbers and graphic descriptions of these episodes are just sadistic.

Don Quixote is an insane idiot who does some truly awful things during the course of the novel, including numerous violent assaults upon perfectly innocent people.

Cervantes wrote Don Quixote as a rant against all the trashy "romance novels" of his time that presented knights as completely noble figures, always ready to rush into battle against hopeless odds in order to preserve their "honour," and in defense of the "honour" of their "Lady Fair" and so forth. The deliberately flowery and overwrought language that Cervantes used was a quite conscious parody of then-contemporary literary convention.

Don Quixote could be viewed as the first great novel to celebrate a rationalist view of the world around us, while condemning the tendency to believe that what we want to be true is true. Far from making him noble and heroic, Don Quixote's unwillingness to face reality causes him to do some truly horrible things, and he suffers quite a bit for it. In the end, he dies a bitter, broken man, cursing the madness that made him a laughing-stock and brought such shame to his family.

"Man of La Mancha" and other such things that treated Don Quixote as a heroic figure were missing Cervantes' point entirely, in my opinion. Agreed. It's just that the "episodes" that they lifted to emphasize can hardly be gleaned from the text. Even if you want to put a perverse (from the POV of the author's purpose) spin on something, at least you should be able to find the spun material in the book.

#3

[Talulah]

I find I like books that are straightford and easy to read, with a minimum of "flowerly" language. Oh, descriptions are ok, but I like them in phrases, rather than paragraphs or chapters.

Another thing I can't stand, it people who really, can't write. I just read a book by Alice Randall. The book is "The Wind Done Gone," and is a parody of Gone with the Wind. There was a huge to do over the book when it came out and the names have been switched to initials to avoid copyright issues and the like, but it is still obviously what it is. I honestly expected a real story that would put a blight on the romanticism on GWTW. What is, is a story in diary form of the slave half-sister of Scarlett. She boinks Rhett before and after Scarlett and gets him in the end. But the story is just...like cardboard. There is nothing to it at all. At first I thought she was trying to send use a literary device to show how the woman couldn't write very well because she was uneducated and while it DID seem the book got ever so slightly better towards the end, ie..there was an actual point, the book still sucked so bad I am embarrassed to own it. The woman simply can't write. It seems her goal was to heap as much shit on the story as possible so she has characters be gay, sleep with relatives, rape slaves, etc. Actually the whole theme is sex. What was supposed to be a portrayal of "real antebellum life" is in reality just a woman with a vendetta.

[The Lone Ranger]

Oh, I quite understood that Cervantes was making fun of the romances; it's just that I had been led to expect that the "making fun" was supposed to be "funny." It isn't. As you quite rightly say, Quixote himself does a number of insane and atrocious things -- he's a perp as well as a victim -- but the numbers and graphic descriptions of these episodes are just sadistic.

Agreed. It's just that the "episodes" that they lifted to emphasize can hardly be gleaned from the text. Even if you want to put a perverse (from the POV of the author's purpose) spin on something, at least you should be able to find the spun material in the book.


I have to agree, actually. I first read Don Quixote years and years ago, and thought at the time that it wasn't at all what I expected (having been taught that Don Quixote was an admirable and heroic individual), and frankly, I didn't enjoy it all that much.

Recently, I decided to read it again, figuring that I'd have a much better appreciation for it the second time around. I finally gave up about halfway through it, though, because it became so tedious. Talk about beating your point to death!

It's perhaps worth keeping in mind that it originally came out in installments. Maybe it's better to read it a little at a time, rather than all at once.


That still doesn't explain why it has been so popular for all these years. Still, I get the distinct impression that it's a book that almost everyone is familiar with, but that almost no one has ever actually read. Wasn't it Mark Twain who said that "a classic is a book that everyone wants to have read, but that no one actually wants to read"?


What I sometimes wonder about is why it seems as if so many people have almost deliberately misinterpreted Cervantes' very clear message throughout the centuries. Why is that? Cervantes makes it very clear that "Don Quixote" is most definitely not an admirable character. He's incompetent, vain, arrogant, foolish, and completely incapable of seeing the world around him as it really is. He may be a pitiable creature, but he is most definitely not an admirable one, and Cervantes goes to considerable lengths to make that point.

Yet, almost every interpretation of Don Quixote that I've ever read or seen takes precisely the opposite tack and presents "Don Quixote" as an admirable and heroic figure. "Man of La Mancha" is perhaps the worst offender, because so very many people have seen it, but haven't read Cervantes' novel -- and so they think they know what Don Quixote is about. They're quite wrong.

For example, in "Man of La Mancha", Don Quixote's relatives and neighbors are represented as scheming and concerned only with themselves. In Don Quixote, they're genuinely concerned for Don Quixote's well-being, and go to quite extraordinary lengths to try to save him from his own madness. In "Man of La Mancha", many of those who encounter Don Quixote wind up being impressed by his "nobility," and are inspired to become better people because of his example. In Don Quixote, everyone sees Don Quixote for exactly what he is -- a raving lunatic -- and they treat him as an object of scorn and ridicule. In "Man of La Mancha", Don Quixote is portrayed as an idealistic dreamer who only wants to make the world a better place. In Don Quixote, Don Quixote is a pompous ass who only wants to achieve "fame and glory."

I can only conclude that the apparent determination of so many to mis-interpret Cervantes' very clear message is symptomatic of the very thing that Cervantes was warning against -- the tendency of people to believe that what they want to be true is true.

Cheers,

Michael

[viscousmemories]

Oh, I quite understood that Cervantes was making fun of the romances; it's just that I had been led to expect that the "making fun" was supposed to be "funny." It isn't. As you quite rightly say, Quixote himself does a number of insane and atrocious things -- he's a perp as well as a victim -- but the numbers and graphic descriptions of these episodes are just sadistic.
That's how I felt about that "important" book American Psycho. After the first gruesome scene where the main character brutalizes a homeless person I put the book down and never looked at it again. It's not that I don't appreciate the point I think he was trying to make, I just really thought the graphic detail was gratuitous. I remember thinking If Ellis got no pleasure from writing that book I don't know why he thought I'd get pleasure from reading it, and if he did derive pleasure from it he's a sick puppy. In either case I just lost interest.

[Scotty]

<sigh> better not read my last journal entry...


:D
-Scott

[livius drusus]

Hmmm... Anne Rice? Jean Auel?
:chin:

Oh yes. Oh my yes. And speaking of pet peeves and Anne Rice, how many fucking times can you say "preternatural"? No, really. It's ridiculous.

[SharonDee]

And speaking of pet peeves and Anne Rice, how many fucking times can you say "preternatural"? No, really. It's ridiculous.
Oh yeah, I'm with ya on that one! Both my friend and I hate to see the word used anywhere else, thanks to that hack.

Was it a good word? Back in the day? Tell me a story.

[Corona688]

Over-wordiness. Some writers/editors seem to think they're being clever by using far more words than needed to convey something, but it really softens the impact of what they're trying to say.

Take these two chapter-ending sentences from the same chapter of one James Herriot book: "I'd had more of learning, but he'd had more of wisdom." versus "He knew more than I did." I'm not sure which is original, but a lot of chapters end like the second and I like it that way. It's abrupt, makes you blink, and you often get the sense he's getting a small dig in on himself or the reader. The flowery overwordy ending conveys nothing but the raw greeting-card sentiment.

I'm also guilty of this from time to time; half my posts say they're edited by me, and I'm just as likely to be weeding excess words as adding more.

[livius drusus]

Was it a good word? Back in the day? Tell me a story.

It was rare, in those days. Blessedly, wonderfully rare. It was never good, I don't think. Always within it glowed a lurid green core of pretension.

[livius drusus]

Over-wordiness.

Apologies now and for my many future offenses.

[Adora]

Uber peeves:

Nostalgia. Makes me want to kick puppies. Like burnination. Hurt things and kick puppies and go "HULK SMASH!". Unfortunately, it seems to be one of the most common problems with modern literature.

And then on the flipside, you have books that think they're being deep by just simply describing really boring objects and passing it off as existential angst or some shit. The worst perpetrator of this awful fucking literary trope is Margaret Atwood. I fucking hate that bitch. It can be done well, if said objects do actually have important meanings behind them. But when they don't, and they think they're being postmodern or something (which they're not, since in pomo the objects have to have referencing or purposiveness) then it shits me. Haruki Murakami's work walks a very fine line. I understand the references to a certain degree in his work, even though they may seem pointless, because I've studied the books and such. But if it's badly done - as with Atwood - it makes me spork puppies then kick them like burnination.

And numbah won!!1one on the list is *drumroll please* Deus Ex Machina. GRAH! Of course, the whole fucking problem with this is that it's only when you get to the end that it all happens, and you're like "Well fuck. This might've been a good book if not for that shit". There can occasionally be some good excuses for it, like if the environment the story was being acted out in was one contrived by something that can change the minds of people etc. And I will accept that to a point. But just "and then the fucker woke up" will just about make me pop a blood vessel.

[Farren]

Fuck yeah! Someone else who can't stand Atwood. God she's awful. She's not bad like shit grammar, cliched subject, contrived plot bad. She's just profoundly boring. She maintains a distance from her subject matter that comes across as clinical, not borne of any great writing ability but the simple inability to create engaging subjects. I also get the feeling Atwood enthusiasts are being suckered into thinking her work is something it's not.

I must admit I like a lot of overly complicated writing. Can we list positives on this thread? I really like the density and poetry of Rushdie's writing although, like rich foods I enjoy it only in moderation. I also like Umberto Eco for his floral touch and dense writing. Completely on the flip side, Bukowski's brutal directness is appealing, as is Steinbeck's deceptively simple language. Steinbeck is sublime. He somehow manages to convey so much in so few words.

Interestingly enough Bukowski discusses his influences by proxy of Henry Chinaski (Hemingway) in one of his novels and one of his pet dislikes (Fitzgerald). I went looking for both after reading that and found I disliked both. The Old Man and the Sea is the work of a master but the ugliness of Hemingway overwhelmed me in a lot of his other writing, rather than the style putting me off. Strange because Bukowski's brutally honest ugliness didn't. I think its because Bukowski simply narrates it, while Hemingway boasts. Fitzgerald's jazz-era stuff really was the kind of poncey, contrived writing Bukowski labelled it.

[Farren]

Other specific stylistic peeves:

Fantasy/Sci Fi Authors who feel obligated to assign their characters unpronounceable names like F'sht-al-burr'r.

Any and all fantasy with characters named "Pug", "Silvius Greensword" and so on, goblins, elves, fairies and just about any other done-to-death themes and species. OK this is more thematic than stylistic but I hate it. Hate it hate it hate it.

China Miéville's incredible Perdido Street Station demonstrated that it is possible to write fantasy that is entirely a work of imagination rather than stringing together bits and pieces of stuff that's as common as muck and equally as boring. Similarly Clive Barker's Imagica is an entire fantasy novel without a single occurance of the words "spell", "magic", "wizard" and so on, even though magic and wonder saturates the novel.

Looooong paragraphs. They're horrible.

[freemonkey]

Pet Book Peeves

Most of my pet books just lay around the house all day long. Bugs the hell out of me!

[freemonkey]

Pet Book Peeves :yup: :fuming:

[livius drusus]

I must admit I like a lot of overly complicated writing. Can we list positives on this thread?

Sure, and I very much agree with many of your choices, but you should so start a new thread to balance out my grumpiness. :yup:

Any and all fantasy with characters named "Pug", "Silvius Greensword" and so on, goblins, elves, fairies and just about any other done-to-death themes and species. OK this is more thematic than stylistic but I hate it. Hate it hate it hate it.

Themes count. Besides, I totally agree on the name thing. I hate cheesy names and expect fantasy to at least offer quality made-up names, both for people and places.

Looooong paragraphs. They're horrible.

What do you do about stream of consciousness novels?

Oh, and freemonkey: nyuk nyuk nyuk.

[Farren]

What do you do about stream of consciousness novels?


You mean like Virginia Wolfe's To the Lighthouse? They knock me unconscious, I'm afraid.

[livius drusus]

You mean like Virginia Wolfe's To the Lighthouse? They knock me unconscious, I'm afraid.
He he... Yes, that's what I meant. Have you tried Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man? In my experience, even people who normally can't stand soc get a lot out of Portrait.

[Adam]

And then on the flipside, you have books that think they're being deep by just simply describing really boring objects and passing it off as existential angst or some shit...Haruki Murakami's work walks a very fine line.

I think Murakami usually avoids falling into the pointless-descriptive-passages-masquerading-as-existentialism trap because his long detail laden digressions more often than not serve to create a mood that's necessary to the experience of his novels. For example, he devotes an inordinate amount of time in The Wind Up Bird Chronicle to describing the protagonist lying about in the sun with {can't remember her name} in excruciating detail, but it doesn't cross the line into fake angsty bullshit for me, simply because I think he does a good job evoking the experience of long hot pointless afternoons, of which I have wasted quite a few myself. I will admit, however, that I get sick and tired of Murakami's habit of detailing the particulars of the preparation and consumption of every meal his characters eat. Dude, I really don't need to know how many slices he's cutting his cucumbers into.

And numbah won!!1one on the list is *drumroll please* Deus Ex Machina. GRAH! Of course, the whole fucking problem with this is that it's only when you get to the end that it all happens, and you're like "Well fuck. This might've been a good book if not for that shit". There can occasionally be some good excuses for it, like if the environment the story was being acted out in was one contrived by something that can change the minds of people etc. And I will accept that to a point. But just "and then the fucker woke up" will just about make me pop a blood vessel.

Tell me about it. On of my favorite sci-fi series ever. Peter Hamilton's Night's Dawn trilogy (which is actually 6 books in America, due to the large volumes being split in two), ends with one of the main characters being given virtual omnipotence with which to resolve the majority of the crises encountered over the course of the series. It did make a degree of sense in the context of the story (references to a "sleeping god" which could help resolve the conflict first cropped up early in the series), but it still felt like a cop out, as though Hamilton got to the end of the series and couldn't come up with any better way to end it.

I must admit I like a lot of overly complicated writing. Can we list positives on this thread? I really like the density and poetry of Rushdie's writing although, like rich foods I enjoy it only in moderation.

I agree completely. Rushdie's style does a great job filling in enough atmospheric details to draw me into the time and place he's describing, and always puts me in the mind of traditional oral narrative, where numerous seemingly insignificant digressions occur simply because, relevant to the plot or not, they're part of the story. He can definitely be dense and difficult to read, though. I've started The Moor's Last Sigh three times and never managed to finish it, although I love the parts I have read. I simply get tired of the slow reading and distracted by an easier book before I finish. I guess it doesn't help that I normally read very quickly, and any work that requires me to slow down and process detail tends to frustrate me.

[Adora]

China Miéville's incredible Perdido Street Station demonstrated that it is possible to write fantasy that is entirely a work of imagination rather than stringing together bits and pieces of stuff that's as common as muck and equally as boring.
Well, eh, kinda yes and kinda no. Mieville used very obscure referencing in his stuff- garudas, grindylow, Lovecraftian monsters etc etc. which a lot of people wouldn't know, and so it would seem more original (a little like JKR using her knowledge of Old-English and such when picking character names). Which is original and good in itself. But a lot of the stuff in his works are very original re-workings on the subjects he nicked. I completely fell in love with his Grindylow and The Weaver in PSS and the Scar, even though they were things I knew about/had read about a lot before. This was mostly because of his masterful description that gave me shivvers and tinglings all over my body.

I think Murakami usually avoids falling into the pointless-descriptive-passages-masquerading-as-existentialism trap because his long detail laden digressions more often than not serve to create a mood that's necessary to the experience of his novels. For example, he devotes an inordinate amount of time in The Wind Up Bird Chronicle to describing the protagonist lying about in the sun with {can't remember her name} in excruciating detail, but it doesn't cross the line into fake angsty bullshit for me, simply because I think he does a good job evoking the experience of long hot pointless afternoons, of which I have wasted quite a few myself. I will admit, however, that I get sick and tired of Murakami's habit of detailing the particulars of the preparation and consumption of every meal his characters eat. Dude, I really don't need to know how many slices he's cutting his cucumbers into.
See, this is what I mean by a fine line: I know both of these things you mention here are influences from the cultural structures he grew up in. The description or depiction of environments to create moods is a common characteristic of Japanese media, and so I can easily justify that. The food thing is also Japanese, but a more modern issue. Back in the old days, food was either ceremonial or unspoken of. You ate, but you didn't talk about it, because it was part of the "defiling" of the body under Shinto beliefs. Post War food became a symbol of class, and so was equally unspoken of in case you offended someone. Then in the 80's all this changed. The "Guumei" (Gourmet) culture took off and suddenly food was good. This is where you get shows like Iron Chef from and such. A lot of modern Japanese literature does it because of this, because they don't have a literary history that has ever had any focus on food, they want to make up for lost time.

And yes, I do like Baudolino too.

One of the literary tropes I have a real love/hate relationship with is lists. Lists of things, places, objects, people etc. At the same time as I know lists are important and they can be interesting sometimes to read, other times they're just too fucking long and make my brain go *snore*, even if they are important. Borges stuff sometimes gets like this.

As for long paragraphs, I say, if they're done well, they can be excellent. As with long sentences. Let me give you one of my favourites:

'By God brother it's like the eighties in here.'
'Sure it's a grey and airless wasteland of banality suffused with the impossibility of imagination or trye creativity and anyone trying to grow in this'll have a time getting out with a living heart and soul and those who claim to be the way-out-and-wacky ones are as drab as the rest thus lowering the threshold of individuality to somewhere below the knee and in an atmosphere like that is it a wonder the bastards who voted for death took a decade and a half to realise the fucking obvious and who were all the cunts who thought it was a fine old time and now won't even admit they were there and for those of us with the wit to see in all its horror what we were living through it was like being awake during bloody surgery and no wonder we were offing ourselves left right and centre and now it's all retrospective and no one's responsible and what a surprise and we're all wise now well let me tell you Sonny Jim apart from a but of music the only difference now is there's fuck-all money to be had anywhere and the song's all caring-and-sharing because after all people like to pretend they're in control of their withered lives and that they're poor and ineffectual by their own free will but I can feel the sterility of those times around the edges of my vision brother and it never goes away.'
'Exactly. Is that Eddie I hear?'
Oh, how I do adore Steve Aylett. The first weird-fictionist I ever read. *dances*

[Ymir's blood]

#2
I didn't like Crime and Punishment either, but for very different reasons. That book isn't badly written; it's written entirely too well. The physical, moral and psychological decay and squalor depicted are so palpable, that I felt I had to take a shower, or at least wash my hands, every time I read part of that book. It gave me the creeps.

I've never read it, but your experience sounds similiar to my attempt at reading his (Dostoyevsky) Notes From The Underground. The alienation of the protagonist was just too painful. Someday it might get picked up again but not anytime in the near future.

[livius drusus]

I've never read Notes, but from what I've heard, I'd probably feel much the same way you do about it, Ymir's blood.

P.S. - Your avatar is gorgeous. :)

[viscousmemories]

I read Notes From Underground when I was in my early 20's. I probably didn't understand most of it, but as a chronic depressive who had at that time just begun the existential crisis that still plagues me today, I could really relate to the protagonist. I do think it would be more painful for me to read today, though.

[Ymir's blood]

I've never read Notes, but from what I've heard, I'd probably feel much the same way you do about it, Ymir's blood.

P.S. - Your avatar is gorgeous. :)

Thank you. :blush3: I made it last night in Photoshop.

Guess I should mention it, some of you may remember me as Pitshade from IIDB.

[Ymir's blood]

I read Notes From Underground when I was in my early 20's. I probably didn't understand most of it, but as a chronic depressive who had at that time just begun the existential crisis that still plagues me today, I could really relate to the protagonist. I do think it would be more painful for me to read today, though.
My identification with the protagonist was what made it painful. I was in my late twenties at the time and pretty far along into a crisis of my own.

[livius drusus]

Thank you. :blush3: I made it last night in Photoshop.

Another artist in our midst... You did a mighty fine job. :yup:

Guess I should mention it, some of you may remember me as Pitshade from IIDB.

Yes, some of us just may. It's so nice to talk to you again. :glomp2:

[Adam]

Guess I should mention it, some of you may remember me as Pitshade from IIDB.

Huh? Pit who, now?
:P

[Petra]

Pet Book Peeves

Most of my pet books just lay around the house all day long. Bugs the hell out of me!

Great minds think alike, freemonkey - only my pet book peeve is that they all assume that one actually has a pet.