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[roasty]

^tl;dr

[hello spiral]

lol

[Bechuga]

I have this longing to find and read some mysterious book that's never been read before, or only by a very small amount of people.

 

[Lane Visitor]

^tl;dr

 

 

lol

i should get banned from this thread for my comment ... is that even possible to ban someone from just a particular thread? lol

[spratters]

I don't always read an hour at a time, maybe try and shorten the periods you're using to read. Split it up a bit.

[Boxus]

Favorite book I've read in the past couple years was Dhalgren, and I'm kinda itching to give it second read. There's so much to unravel in there.

[Lane Visitor]

I don't always read an hour at a time, maybe try and shorten the periods you're using to read. Split it up a bit.

 

That's actually not a bad idea at all.. thanks for the tip.

 

 

Favorite book I've read in the past couple years was Dhalgren, and I'm kinda itching to give it second read. There's so much to unravel in there.

 

 

Just wikipedia'd this.. sounds really amazing. Sounds like a lot of mystery and weirdness?

[keanu reeves]

dhalgren is basically impenetrable. if you aren't already reading a lot of experimental fiction it's going to be a difficult slog.

[hello spiral]

Good reminder! I've had dhalgren sitting in the bottom of my work locker for about a year. Spotted it in a charity shop and had been on the lookout for more Delaney after reading The Star Pit (highly recommended).

But yeah, there's a quote on the back that pretty much calls it "scifi's Ulysses" so I haven't quite gotten around to it yet.

 

Speaking of near impenetrable books, bunch of people in chatmm have by chance all started reading Gravity's Rainbow at the same time so I've decided to read it again.

 

CHATMM BOOK CLUB.

[Bechuga]

Gravity's Painbow

 

410 pages into Against the Day, 660 to go...

Edited July 29, 2016 by Bechuga

[hello spiral]

Yeah I read V recently and Vineland a year or so ago. GR was the first Pynchon I read about 5 years ago and this reread is def going a lot smoother.

After this I may skip Vineland but continue chronologically. I've had Inherent Vice and Bleeding Edge on the shelf for ages but want to read Mason & Dixon and Against the Day first.

[Bechuga]

You'll have a good time! Mason & Dixon are a regular pair of knuckleheads.

 

I still think Vineland is super underrated. All the talk I hear of it is that it's bad but it's just as well made as anything else he's done.

[tec]

Just finished The Vegetarian by Han Kang, weren't bad but was a bit weird and didn't really do much. It's won loads of prizes so typically I feel either they are wrong or I am too dumb to see its merits.

[misc]

Yeah I read V recently and Vineland a year or so ago. GR was the first Pynchon I read about 5 years ago and this reread is def going a lot smoother.

After this I may skip Vineland but continue chronologically. I've had Inherent Vice and Bleeding Edge on the shelf for ages but want to read Mason & Dixon and Against the Day first.

Ah yes! Pynchon is my absolute favourite. What did you think of Vineland? When I read people's opinions online, it seems the general consensus is that it's underwhelming compared to his others, but I loved it. I found it to be a really sentimental, beautiful read, with Pynchon's usual silky smooth writing but just with the quirkiness turned down a bit. A lot more rooted in reality (but still with Godzilla and a load of female ninjas).

 

Also interesting the similarities of the dynamic between Zoyd and Brock Vond in Vineland, and Doc Sportello and Bigfoot in Inherent Vice. I read Vineland after seeing the film of IV and a just couldn't help but picture Brock Vond as Josh Brolin.

 

Anyway I've still got Mason & Dixon, V, Bleeding Edge and Against the Day to go. I'm almost saving them because I don't wanna finish all his work. Think the man's an absolute genius.

[Bechuga]

Vineland to me is summed up thus: it's a three hundred page flashback with a sixty page conclusion. And the section where he compared the states of being alive and dead to that of binary codes, and 'what kind of programme was the government creating out of the ones and zeroes of all the dead' was a highlight for me. Definitely underrated and misunderstood.

 

Hope he publishes one more before he passes on!

[tec]

Dunno whether to read something on the solar system or Dennis Nilsen, it's so easy to feel spoilt by books.

[misc]

Vineland to me is summed up thus: it's a three hundred page flashback with a sixty page conclusion. And the section where he compared the states of being alive and dead to that of binary codes, and 'what kind of programme was the government creating out of the ones and zeroes of all the dead' was a highlight for me. Definitely underrated and misunderstood.

 

Hope he publishes one more before he passes on!

 

Funny that you mention that passage as it's probably the first that comes in to my mind when i think of Vineland. 

 

'If patterns of ones and zeros were "like" patterns of human lives and deaths, if everything about an individual could be represented in a computer record by a long string of ones and zeros, then what kind of creature would be represented by a long string of lives and deaths?'

 

Goddamn. 

Edited August 1, 2016 by misc

[Bechuga]

Broke 50% of Against the Day or, as I call it, Against the Pages. Also Darkmans is very...odd. Nicola Barker might end up my favourite English novelist.

 

 

Vineland to me is summed up thus: it's a three hundred page flashback with a sixty page conclusion. And the section where he compared the states of being alive and dead to that of binary codes, and 'what kind of programme was the government creating out of the ones and zeroes of all the dead' was a highlight for me. Definitely underrated and misunderstood.

 

Hope he publishes one more before he passes on!

 

Funny that you mention that passage as it's probably the first that comes in to my mind when i think of Vineland. 

 

'If patterns of ones and zeros were "like" patterns of human lives and deaths, if everything about an individual could be represented in a computer record by a long string of ones and zeros, then what kind of creature would be represented by a long string of lives and deaths?'

 

Goddamn. 

 

Good shit.

[Hugh Mughnus]

Just finishing Doug Stanhopes - Digging up Mother

 

Great book, almost reads like his standup but it's deeply personal. Really recommend it if you're a fan of his standup.

 

 

Starting "One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest" by Ken Kesey next. 

 

Happy to be reading for pleasure again. 

[cwmbrancity]

Vineland to me is summed up thus: it's a three hundred page flashback with a sixty page conclusion. And the section where he compared the states of being alive and dead to that of binary codes, and 'what kind of programme was the government creating out of the ones and zeroes of all the dead' was a highlight for me. Definitely underrated and misunderstood.

 

Hope he publishes one more before he passes on!

 

ta for this, its been on the list of unrequited literature for far too long & has served as the nudge to finally pick it up, always curious about themes on the long-60's, anthropologically how cultural influences permeate/fade & identity

 

Just finishing Doug Stanhopes - Digging up Mother

 

Great book, almost reads like his standup but it's deeply personal. Really recommend it if you're a fan of his standup.

 

 

Starting "One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest" by Ken Kesey next.

 

Happy to be reading for pleasure again.

 

Another ta very much, curious to see how Doug writes having seen how his mind works through performances. After Jerry Sadowitz, 1 of the funniest gigs bar none.

 

 

Guided Imagery & Music (GIM) and Music Imagery Methods for Individual and Group Therapy by Denise Grocke. Highly recommended & a staggering array of therapeutic twists on the range of techniques & responses to trauma-focused music "medicine". Touches on drones, with the central thread being classical, but opens up so much potential for more recent electronica. Possible career change influencing/10

 

Music, Music Therapy and Trauma: International Perspectives by Julie Sutton.... see above. A tougher, drier read, with utterly shattering case studies, but hope breaks through in the most surprising manner some times. Be worth drafting a playlist of compositions used in these approaches to see how an electronic music community, with all manner of tastes, might interpret/offer alternatives to specific associated music recommendations & case studies. Daring challeging work indeed, although youtube @ hand def helps/10

 

Derek Jarman's Angelic Conversations by Jim Ellis.... wicked in-depth interviews & interpretations from the man with into his methods of subverting historical constructs, bravery in the face of tragedy & lots on his own favourite experimental super-8mm shorts which are the real gold. Theres a compendium vid 'In the Shadow of the Sun' (complete with mint TG soundtrack) available that gives an edited feature of all these. Truly transcendental & inspiring to grip a super-8 & re-indulge creatively/10

 

Traces of the Spirit: The Religious Dimensions of Popular Music by Robin Sylvan. Had for months but been nibbling. Absorbing mix of sublime & clunky interdisciplinary research that teases out and works through the emotionality of music. Academically rigorous, but also funny, punchy & the Grateful Dead/House music companion chapters are outstanding. 8/10

 

The Book Of Lies (New Edition): The Disinformation Guide to Magick and the Occult........guilty pleasure for an archaeologist but concise, Grant Morrison's discussion prob shine the most, lots of angles, funny, good at deconstructing arcane & contemporary bs & the Austin Osman Spare aspects are v illuminating. Slightly skewed by Genesis P-Orridge over-reaching in 1 of the initial chapters and the print is a bit small even for these eyes, but as an analysis of dramatized psychology/forces of nature/poetic metaphor traditions, its smashing/10

Edited August 4, 2016 by cwmbrancity

[doublename]

Finally getting around to Zero K by Don Delillo.

[misc]

I finished Ulysses cause I'm a stereotypical angsty 20 year old male. Thoroughly enjoyed it overall but due to the way it's written, with the style changing each chapter, certain chapters have definitely remained in my mind more. Absolutely loved the Cyclops and Circe chapters especially, hilarious stuff. Kinda wish I knew more about English lit theory to understand more of the clever wordplays and puns he put in, but it was still easy to see how smart it is without any academic knowledge.

 

Now started Pynchon's Bleeding Edge. It's weird, like if I didn't know it was Pynchon I definitely wouldn't have been able to guess. That's a good thing I suppose.

[baph]

It goes Full Pynchon in a pretty thematically effective way IMO.

 

I musta missed the memo/a bit of this thread, but I've also been re-reading that Gravity's Rainbow for a little while. About halfway in.

Edited August 7, 2016 by baph

[misc]

It goes Full Pynchon in a pretty thematically effective way IMO.

 

I musta missed the memo/a bit of this thread, but I've also been re-reading that Gravity's Rainbow for a little while. About halfway in.

Yeah dunno what I was thinking. I'm further in now and it's pretty unmistakably him. Loving it at the moment.

[Guest bitroast]

 

Starting "One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest" by Ken Kesey next. 

 

Happy to be reading for pleasure again. 

 

loooove that book. 

 

finished LOTR ~ Fellowship of the ring. spent about ~10 minutes thinking of what to read next, thinking maybe a comic or something short to freshen up the senses a little ... but decided on .. ( believe it or not ) LOTR ~ The Two Towers. 

Really. good books. who'da thought ???