/lit/ - Literature

I suppose I should've specified the book in my comment.

I'm planning on reading Finnegans Wake.

I tried once before to see if it was really that unreadable but now I'm genuinely curious and want to know what it's about.

>>8330

can't help you.

to me it looks as appealing as a rectal exam.

>>8332

> Proctology paradise ahoy!

Heh.

I admit I gave up on it. The problem for me being that it reads too much like the speech of a schizophrenic patient. That's not a valid criticism of the book, just an acknowledgement that I can't get past the echoing memory of dripping insanity it evokes of a late close relation.

Everything else of his I've read is awesome. I've yet to tackle Ulysses though, as I'm saving it as next in line after Against the Day by the P-meister we all know and love.

I started wondering if there might be a wiki dedicated to navigating it and I hit gold.

http://finnegansweb.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

>>8340

No

Yes and yes

Yes, yes and yes

Yes

I tried but it was like a list of directions on what chant to say when the eagles and crocodiles try to eat you in the Egyptian afterlife

I've read Susso and Augustine, Basil, Ambrose, Calvin, and so on.

>>8346

Read Vico

>>8340

Are those necessary for following The Dubliners?

I've had trouble attempting to tackle Finnegans Wake in the past. I love Joyce's work but god damn is Wake dense; it feels like an unrelenting torrent of consciousness.

Though I'm just a plebe who needs to step up my game.

>>8336

http://www.fweet.org/pages/fw_smap.php is a much better resource.

>>8328

I find http://finwake.com/ to be a useful tool for reading it. It really clarifies a lot for me. Not that I have any interest in attempting it at this point of my life, even with the extensive annotations there.

I read a bit of this while ago and it's terrible. Densely written books with flowery language is a bad excuse to writing a bland and boring novel.

>>8766

Actually it's a masterpiece.

DON'T DO IT OP TURN BACK WHILE YOU STILL CAN

>>8766

Agreed. Or rather I'll say I've only read Ulysses, for school, and we had one day where we took a peak at some of the literary devices used in Finnegan's Wake.

In a literary criticism sense, Ulysses is good, but not in the way that does the reader any benefit, or brings him any enjoyment. The talent Joyce demonstrates is like a knife at the throat in a hostage crisis: the reader may want to escape, but is forced to stay on.

Honestly, were I ruler Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake would get burned and driven unto the abodes of cp online, or have all copies sent to the country's foes. Intelligent subjects would have months of time freed up to read superior books that have better lessons at 1/100th the density, while our enemies academics embraced Joyce like the emperor's new clothes, and tormented thousands of students trying to complete their gen ed requirements every year, driving some to depression and suicide (has anything as depressing and banal been written?)

>>8957

How is good in a literary sense if the meaning of the text isn't clear?

I don't get this stream-of conciousness thing. It further obscures the non-concious processes. Your average character looks more like a person than one described in this way.