Das Book: the very new reading thread

[Good Intentions]

Strange, the people I know who liked the original Gunslinger hated the self-conscious 'oh, my original stuff doesn't fit into my fevered visions anymore, lemme do something I've already done over, but with extra wink-wink!'rewrite.

[Andrew_TSKS]

eh, he wasn't as good a writer back then. it's my opinion that people who prefer the original text are people who generally prefer certain cliches of genre writing to writing that is better worded but not as easily placed within the tropes of the genre it belongs to. not trying to put anyone down, but that's honestly how i feel.

unrelated, and i'm not even sure this is the most appropriate place to post this, but here it is nonetheless: atlantic monthly's website is now free, so non-subscribers can read articles online. i found this out when i was linked by san francisco chronicle columnist mark morford to this essay about right wing talk radio by david foster wallace, which ran in the atlantic in 2005, and which i figured some of you would enjoy.

[slow west vultures]

dark tower was FLY, man. Personally I think the first one, the Gunslinger, is a fuckin broody post-apocalyptic masterpiece, and the rest are ok. Though the Wizard and Glass, wherein young Roland kicks ass and has sex, was pretty good.
fin.

i liked the gunslinger.  then i read all of the second one, the drawing of the three, and didn't really like it but my friend convinced me 'oh no, you've got to keep reading.  here's the third one', and i got to the point where king introduces 90 ft. nuclear powered bears, and i'm like fuck this.  i've never been tempted to read anything by steven king again, although admittedly i never was before either. 

[guanajuato]

eh, he wasn't as good a writer back then. it's my opinion that people who prefer the original text are people who generally prefer certain cliches of genre writing to writing that is better worded but not as easily placed within the tropes of the genre it belongs to. not trying to put anyone down, but that's honestly how i feel.

unrelated, and i'm not even sure this is the most appropriate place to post this, but here it is nonetheless: atlantic monthly's website is now free, so non-subscribers can read articles online. i found this out when i was linked by san francisco chronicle columnist mark morford to this essay about right wing talk radio by david foster wallace, which ran in the atlantic in 2005, and which i figured some of you would enjoy.

wow, but his early stuff, salem's lot, the stand, the shining, are pure storytellingl genius. i'd say the novella, the long walk, is probably his best work, and that's even before carrie. it started going downhill with 'it' {still very strong}.

that wayy organic language in his early stuff is very poetic and full of shine. it's wild. the first paragraph of the story 'trucks' blows my socks off every time i read it. there's echoes of the 40's detective pulps, the surreal language of bradbury, and a kind of raw gregory corso, all mixed together and playing in an empty motel room on a neon television.

i don't hate his later stuff, but it's like like the snake got his venom removed. the writing is like any one of the countless novels that crowd each other out in bookstores, except for brief moonlight stretches of the old, good stuff. it's also self conscious, and it's plain he'd like to have a 'legacy', be chandler instead of ross macdonald.

[Andrew_TSKS]

dude, the gunslinger was actually written in the mid to late 60s, years before even carrie (which i don't really like that much, honestly--the first book of his that i really dig is salem's lot).

and the long walk... mehhhh.

i can see your opinion on his later stuff, but i don't agree with it completely.

[guanajuato]

we agree to disagree!

[elpollodiablo]

I would say the Stand is def. the pinnacle of his career

[Andrew_TSKS]

it's in the top 3 of his books, definitely.

[guanajuato]

yeah stand has some of his best stuff, with such an iconic villain that i don't think king even knew how to retire him (flagg is the villain in the dragon fantasy and in the gunslinger books and there's references to him, in a dozen other king books.) but, man, the way it meanders, and the terrible confrontation in vegas involving the hand of god, is abysmal. salem's lot's where it's at. what an evil and perfect gothic horror novel. he doesn't depend just on vampires, but adds in a layer dealing with the haunted marsden house (gothic haunted castle) (sp) and all the layers of low evil taking place in the town (pre-vampire). it's like stoker + radcliffe + Charlotte Perkins Gilman.

[dieblucasdie]

jon speaking truth

If The Stand trimmed the fat it would be King's best novel, as is, I think I'd put Salem's Lot (and maybe 1 or 2 others) ahead of it.

[guanajuato]

yeah, special love for the stand, but, yeah.

in the mid eighties they used to have actual TV commercials for the complete and uncut the stand. it's crazy to think there was a tv commercial for a book--  and it would play on regular network tv. they had commercials for the hobbit too. i was a little kid at the time, and the voiceovers in the commercials were disconcerting. 

using tv to promote a book these days, unless it was an infomercial for a self-help book, or weight loss book, is unfathomable, much less a giant 8 lb book that could, if dropped from high enough, crush a child, and was an apocalyptic tolkenish christian fantasy.

[guanajuato]

hah, the internet. this isn't the commercial (this is from 91) but stilll...

"demon dogs...nasty creatures you wouldn't BELIEVE"

http://youtube.com/watch?v=DdEwlQ9Bzjg
(btw the book they are handing that guy is not the stand, it looks like needful things)

i wish i could find the hobbit and middle earth commercials.

[Good Intentions]

unrelated, and i'm not even sure this is the most appropriate place to post this, but here it is nonetheless: atlantic monthly's website is now free, so non-subscribers can read articles online. i found this out when i was linked by san francisco chronicle columnist mark morford to this essay about right wing talk radio by david foster wallace, which ran in the atlantic in 2005, and which i figured some of you would enjoy.

That's an excellent article. Thanks for putting it up, Andrew.

[milesofsparks]

so I just finished The Brothers Karmazov, setting a new personal record for longest time to read a book.  5 months I think?  which is no reflection on the book or my enjoyment of it, just how crazy my life has been and how little reading I've been doing.  also, it's a big heavy book so I don't carry it around much.

so, now I thought I'd switch to a little light reading.  so today I bought this:

Walter Benjamin--The Arcades Project

I've often read excerpts of it, but never the whole thing.  whole thing, here I come.  unfortunately,  the font sux.  I may expire from graphic design shock before I finish...

i've had my eye on that ever since i ran across it in the B&N philosophy section.  i couldn't quite justify using my gift card to buy it though.  i read the intro, but then i saw the rest of it is mostly epigrams, and held off.  i'm kinda jealous of you now though.  give us an update on how it goes. 

ah, I am having the hardest time reading this.  it's so big and heavy I actually hurt my hands when I tried to carry it around and read it on the subway, etc.  and every time I try to read it before bed I spend hours trying and failing to sleep because the combination of ideas I am interested in, intense academic writing, and fragmentary style sets my brain spinning and whirring.  those are pretty much my only reading times these days, so I'm not sure what I'm going to do...

[Greg Nog]

Oh man, I missed all the Stephen King talk.  Count me in for loving the Gunslinger, liking the subsequent two in the series, then getting bored enough to stop reading halfway through Wizard and Glass.  Which happened on all four of the occasions that I tried to read Wizard and Glass.

Anyway, I finished the Iliad (Fantastic!), then read Jesus' Son last week (pretty bad!), and now I'm reading Steve Martin's Born Standing Up, which is just lovely.

[nonotyet]

and now I'm reading Steve Martin's Born Standing Up, which is just lovely.

squee

[guanajuato]

blucas, i think i've said this on here before, but "lisey's story" was his best non-dark tower book since "gerald's game". it's one of my top 10 king books--and believe me, i was surprised too, but obviously he hasn't completely lost his talent.

milly, yeah, it's pretty good so far. only about 100 pages in, so i don't really know how it will fare as a whole, but so far i'm liking it.

and by the way, i read that bachman book from 1973 that he just finally put out, "blaze", just before i read this. although it wasn't as good as some of his early stuff, it was definitely a lot more like that stuff than anything he's done in a long time, so i would recommend it to people who dig the 70s-early 80s king stuff.

you're right. duma key is a return to form. i didn't like any of his books in the recent past. lisey's story was the best but not my cup of tea. i like this one, from the first page. his style which has in recent times seemed very self-conscious, very conscious of 'legacy' has stabilized into goodness.

though, i'm not so much into the constant recreations of his accident in his fiction. it gets a little tired.

[Andrew_TSKS]

eh, i'm sure it's had a major effect on his life. i know i keep writing about the same few big things in my life over and over again. that's just how writing works.

[guanajuato]

well, write what you know, and all, i guess.

[davy]

i've probably read half a dozen stephen king books and i think, from my point of view, misery probably comes closest to the shining in terms of pure literary worth.

[andronicus]

I just finished reading the 18th Brumaire of Louis Napoleon (read it several years ago, just bought a el cheapo copy from Borders so I read it again).  That is some breathtaking shit.  Speaking of which, I've managed a couple hundred pages of Infinite Jest, reading exclusively on the shitter.  I'll let you guys know how it goes. 

The reading, that is.

[elpollodiablo]

I just got a huge stack out of the library b/c I'm starting to work on the thesis in earnest again. Shelved the thing for all of winter break, essentially, but now it's time to justify them hours!

[guanajuato]

i've probably read half a dozen stephen king books and i think, from my point of view, misery probably comes closest to the shining in terms of pure literary worth.

this isn't snarky, but what do you mean by 'pure literary worth'? usually literary worth is blurb code for pretentious non-selling english major.

"a book that is stuffed with literary worth" - The NYT

"this book has the best binding ever made, it is gluey with literary worth" -- salon

"the page length is enthralling, and it has verbs: now this is literary worth!" -- playboy

okay...it's a little snarky.

[elpollodiablo]

He means it wasn't the gloomy pablum typical of so much of the King corpus

[guanajuato]

what, are you speaking engrish?