Could you make a video on your reading habits, your reading pace, maybe some advice to keep in mind while reading. Would be interesting. Love your channel btw
Thanks to you, my Amazon wishlist just got a lot longer. I've never been much interested in modernist novels before, and I have a copy of Ulysses I've never read. But you've managed to kindle my interest. (I have Proust, too, which I haven't finished yet, although I'm well into Swanns Way).
I agree, Mattthew, that Diderot's Jacques, the Fatalist is a modernist novel. I remember when I first read it in the 60's it seemed to me it could have been written yesterday-by an avant-garde writer. It was dramatized by Michalel Kundera, I believe. They wanted him to dramatize Dostoevski, but he was so angry with the Russians for invading his country(Czechslovakia) that he chose Diderot instead. Diderot revels in ambiguity and a quirky unstable universe. Just the reverse of Voltaire who was aghast and wrote Candide castigating optimism. As for Sterne's Tristam Shandy, I never really thought of it as modernist. Rather, wildly eccentric and lots of fun. His pen ran away with him. I think you are on the right track with V. Wolf. She achieved without much ballyhoo, and almost effortlessly, what Joyce tried to do, without his pretentious posturing.
Thanks East Coast copain! That Flann O'Brien book sounds great. Here am I fifteen miles due South of Mt. Airy (Mayberry) off HW 52. No bookshops in this neocon enclave!
Thank you. The O'Brien looks good I will have to try that and Ducks too. I read 10 pages of that before someone said 'are you going to buy that' and got spooked! I read a few Woolf's and yes Mrs Dalloway is my fav, but also loved To the Lighthouse. Her non-fiction is authoritiatve. I read Ulysses when I was younger and I can honestly say it got more out of me than I did it. It was probably the wrong time but I just can't bring myself to try it again. I'm six volumes into In Search of Lost Time and really am enjoying it. It would be my top choice.
This was a really helpful video for me, Matthew. Thank you for your insights! Modernist literature has always been somewhat daunting to me, so this gave me some really good ideas of starting places.
Most interesting selection, many interesting choices. Off the top is the obvious propensity of Irish /Anglo-Irish authors: Stern, Dean Swift, Joyce, Beckett, O’Brien, must be something in the water. I wish I shared your admiration for Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway. Possibly if I wasn’t familiar with Joyce’s writing I would be more impressed reading it. Joyce’s internalising seems more realistic and more natural. Woolf reads like someone wishing to write a stream of consciousness, the mental stammering, the diversions are too obvious and unlike the seamlessness of either Dedalus or Bloom as they too go about contemplating their morning. It is a decent novel and admirable in its own right but I do often wonder she shouldn’t have been so vocal in her distain for Joyce when obviously flattering him by emulation! Your placement of it ahead of Ulysses is something we can agree to strongly disagree on. Good work!
I’m not sure why I should read a modernist work. I hate out side forces to manipulate my mind/thoughts just because they can. Your description of these works says I should lend myself to mental gymnastics. I find I value the average person too strongly. I’m adverse to reading tales of odd and contrived human interactions for the purpose of messing with social standards and general morality.
Could you make a video on your reading habits, your reading pace, maybe some advice to keep in mind while reading. Would be interesting. Love your channel btw
Great suggestion!
Thanks to you, my Amazon wishlist just got a lot longer. I've never been much interested in modernist novels before, and I have a copy of Ulysses I've never read. But you've managed to kindle my interest. (I have Proust, too, which I haven't finished yet, although I'm well into Swanns Way).
Your videos are very calming
Glad you like them!
I was very caught off guard when I tried to read Tristram Shandy. I can't imagine what it was like to read when it came out.
I think about that too!
I agree, Mattthew, that Diderot's Jacques, the Fatalist is a modernist novel. I remember when I first read it in the 60's it seemed to me it could have been written yesterday-by an avant-garde writer. It was dramatized by Michalel Kundera, I believe. They wanted him to dramatize Dostoevski, but he was so angry with the Russians for invading his country(Czechslovakia) that he chose Diderot instead. Diderot revels in ambiguity and a quirky unstable universe. Just the reverse of Voltaire who was aghast and wrote Candide
castigating optimism.
As for Sterne's Tristam Shandy, I never really thought of it as modernist. Rather, wildly eccentric and lots of fun. His pen ran away with him.
I think you are on the right track with V. Wolf. She achieved without much ballyhoo, and almost effortlessly, what Joyce tried to do, without his pretentious posturing.
Thanks East Coast copain! That Flann O'Brien book sounds great. Here am I fifteen miles due South of Mt. Airy (Mayberry) off HW 52. No bookshops in this neocon enclave!
Thank you. The O'Brien looks good I will have to try that and Ducks too. I read 10 pages of that before someone said 'are you going to buy that' and got spooked! I read a few Woolf's and yes Mrs Dalloway is my fav, but also loved To the Lighthouse. Her non-fiction is authoritiatve. I read Ulysses when I was younger and I can honestly say it got more out of me than I did it. It was probably the wrong time but I just can't bring myself to try it again. I'm six volumes into In Search of Lost Time and really am enjoying it. It would be my top choice.
This was a really helpful video for me, Matthew. Thank you for your insights! Modernist literature has always been somewhat daunting to me, so this gave me some really good ideas of starting places.
Oh good, I'm glad to be of some help!
o'brien is a great writer - so excited to read the third policeman
Most interesting selection, many interesting choices. Off the top is the obvious propensity of Irish /Anglo-Irish authors: Stern, Dean Swift, Joyce, Beckett, O’Brien, must be something in the water.
I wish I shared your admiration for Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway. Possibly if I wasn’t familiar with Joyce’s writing I would be more impressed reading it. Joyce’s internalising seems more realistic and more natural. Woolf reads like someone wishing to write a stream of consciousness, the mental stammering, the diversions are too obvious and unlike the seamlessness of either Dedalus or Bloom as they too go about contemplating their morning. It is a decent novel and admirable in its own right but I do often wonder she shouldn’t have been so vocal in her distain for Joyce when obviously flattering him by emulation! Your placement of it ahead of Ulysses is something we can agree to strongly disagree on. Good work!
I’m not sure why I should read a modernist work. I hate out side forces to manipulate my mind/thoughts just because they can. Your description of these works says I should lend myself to mental gymnastics. I find I value the average person too strongly. I’m adverse to reading tales of odd and contrived human interactions for the purpose of messing with social standards and general morality.