[OC] Inspired by movie barcodes, I made some emotional barcodes for booksSubmitted by Campbell_MG t3_yz5pls in dataisbeautiful
fallllingman t1_ix24lps wrote
Reply to comment by err0rz in [OC] Inspired by movie barcodes, I made some emotional barcodes for books by Campbell_MG
I have read Moby Dick and I believe it is one of the most perfect novels to ever exist. I’m not writing a well organized essay defending its merits and I’m sure there are plenty of those around. Since you’re coming to it in a bad capacity of bad faith, you’ll probably reject a lot of what I say as trying to inject meaning into a work where there isn’t any. To that I raise you Nathaniel Hawthorne, famous for his incessant use of symbolism. He was Melville’s best friend.
If you’re looking for a plot or a rousing adventure story, it will definitely bore you. It’s deliberately slow-paced, deliberately plotless. I don’t expect many people will have the same appreciation for it that I do, but I found myself intrigued by the symbolism in it, the sort of mythicism it has and it’s religious references. I loved it’s almost surreal atmosphere (a good example is the squid chapter), and how it grows increasingly dark and mysterious until it crescendoes in its climax. Plus the prose is astonishingly evocative.
Since you’re positing it as a “boring book” I’ll address the main issue that most readers have with it, because it’s really not an accessible work. First and foremost, Moby Dick is about the unknowability of God in a world with seemingly no meaning. The book is therefore deliberately obsessive. Ishmael writes extensively about whales and about whaling, with an almost religious fervor. He writes about whales extensively and yet still their unknowable whiteness lingers on. The whale himself even seems to possess godly powers, with how it teases them before disappearing ahead of their ship. All of the crew try to interpret the coin, but none of them can truly know it’s nature. The quest itself is meaningless. There is no justice for Ahab, no Old Testament victory.
And most of the nonfiction chapters deal explicitly with the meaning of life, like in The Line where Ishmael likens whaling lines to mortality.
The book is also simply very funny to me. All of the weird gay undertones with Queequeg and Ishmael, the whale penis, and the chapter about squeezing sperm are so peculiar and distinctive I couldn’t help but love it. Name another gay whaling novel. The book feels more modern than even a lot of 20th Century works.
Melville was also ahead of his time in many ways. His description of Queequeg is wonderfully subversive among other texts at the time that portrayed the “noble savage.” Queequeg is one of my favorite characters in any book because of how sensitively Melville treats him. He treats him not as a native, but as a human. He is by far the most likeable character in the book, and he was introduced as a “cannibal.” And of course the famous line about his birthplace: “It is not down on any map. True places never are.” As a huge fan of experimental fiction, I was astounded by all of the techniques that he invented. I mean, he was using metafiction two centuries before it became popular.
Also, it’s hard to think of a better “sea” novel. One as evocative as Moby Dick. Many marine biologists list it as the reason they chose to enter the field. Think of the chapter in the whale breeding ground. How it’s instantly torn up by bloodshed, and the mother whale staring at its dying child. I felt like I was at sea for two weeks reading it. No other book has given me that feeling.
err0rz t1_ix2zf1s wrote
I like that you just wrote an essay acknowledging that it’s boring.
fallllingman t1_ix477rh wrote
It’s not boring to me. I acknowledge it’s boring as an adventure novel because it isn’t an adventure novel. That’s like saying Taxi Driver is boring because it’s not a good thriller. The book fascinates me because of its symbolism, postmodern techniques, evocative prose and it’s humor. It’s slow paced but it’s more intriguing to me than virtually any other American novel, exceptions being Invisible Man and The Recognitions. If you don’t like the things I’ve mentioned, then it’ll bore you. It’s not an intrinsically boring book however. I mean, I first read it in its entirety when I was fifteen. I loved it then and I love it now.
Character_Mushroom83 t1_ix4hy4j wrote
I’ve been meaning to read The Recognitions lately. I’m currently reading The Instructions by Adam Levin & Solenoid by Mircea Cartarescu (solenoid JUST got translated into english, brilliant romanian surreal novel, check it out if you haven’t).
The most detailed writing i’ve read about the experience of reading The Recognitions is from Franzen’s essay Mr. Difficult where he talks about feeling cool because he read it (which was unhelpful, and a little annoying hahahhaha). I love what you wrote about Moby Dick and would love to read a short rundown of what you enjoyed about The Recognitions. I would really appreciate if you would be kind enough to do so: i want to get hyped-up to read it but need a little motivation to push it to the top of my list.
fallllingman t1_ix4mrxg wrote
The Recognitions is a long, bloated mess of a book. Its underlying plot (and it does have one, and it's a good one) works in fits and starts. You follow about ten different characters concurrently, with the focus of the story being on a struggling artist who has abandoned his aspirations and become an expert forging. The characters are all very good and memorable, but they revolve around and orbit themes rather than a central story.
It's a book about fraud and forgery, about pretentious pseudo-intellectuals claiming to see the meaning of life in a used t-shirt, about drug addicts and alcoholics who think God is their Man, about crazed Christians turned cultists and about nihilistic capitalist pigs. It's about finding truth and meaning in a world of falsehoods and deception, not the truths espoused by ministers or Dale Carnegie or shitty artists, but real truth, real meaning, that Recognition.
The book was completely dismissed when it was published. 53 of the 55 reviews published about it were negative. It was doomed to obscurity because all anyone could say about it was that it was a piece of shit. What's funny is the book itself takes aim at critics and paints them as idiots who like only what's in trend. In The Recognitions, real art is neglected and ignored by critics who don't even bother to read what they review (likewise, most of the critics who reviewed this book wrote wildly inaccurate summaries of it, implying that they had not actually read it themselves).
Reading it now, it's hard to see why it was so dismissed. It's a perfect critique of pseudo-intellectualism and the capitalist art world. It's a hilarious roast of the modern era. Its language is beautiful and completely unusual, containing countless references to literature and history. He can describe an apartment room party as a hellish underworld, can find the bizarre in the ordinary, can make the deal between a capitalist and an artist as life-and-death important as a deal with the devil. And it's really, really funny, it's absurdly humorous. There's a grave robbery scene where they steal a corpse so they can make a forgery of it (long story) and they sit it up next to them on a train, Weekend at Bernie's style, and move it a little and talk to it try to make people think this decomposing corpse is their grandmother.
Anyway, before this gets too long (it already is), I'll leave you with two quotes. One of which is from Gaddis himself and disputes that arrogant prick Franzen's assertion (seriously, fuck Franzen), in explaining the necessary difficulty (which is really overhyped imo, I've read far more difficult works) of The Recognitions. The other is the first two sentences of the novel, which I think constitutes one of the most peculiar and intriguing openings to any book ever.
​
>"I do ask something of the reader and many reviewers say I ask too much ... and as I say, it's not reader-friendly. Though I think it is, and I think the reader gets satisfaction out of participating in, collaborating, if you will, with the writer, so that it ends up being between the reader and the page. ... Why did we invent the printing press? Why do we, why are we literate? Because the pleasure of being all alone, with a book, is one of the greatest pleasures."
​
>"Even Camilla had enjoyed masquerades, of the safe sort where the mask may be dropped at the critical moment it presumes itself as reality. But the procession up the foreign hill, bounded by cypress trees, impelled by the monotone chanting of the priest and retarded by hesitations at the fourteen stations of the Cross (not to speak of the funeral carriage in which she was riding, a white horse-drawn vehicle which resembled a baroque confectionery stand), might have ruffled the shy countenance of her soul, if it had been discernible."
By the way, thanks for the recommendation. I've been reading a lot of surrealism lately (I'm reading Maldoror now) and I'll check Solenoid out.
Character_Mushroom83 t1_ix50mw8 wrote
This is precisely the write-up i have been wanting about The Recognitions, thank you. This has me extremely excited to start it. I listened to Gass introduce Gaddis at some event and (if i remember correctly) he talked of the fun of Gaddis’ writing. To have it all laid out here like this (especially the weekend at bernie’s style scene) is encouraging. I just checked out Maladror from your mention of it: it looks awesome, added to my list.
I want to recommend you another author: Evan Dara. I’m not sure if you’ve heard of them but they are an anonymous author whose work gets compared to Gaddis. William T Vollmann judged and awarded their first novel The Lost Scrapbook. That book is fucking amazing. It’s almost all monologue, and anecdote. It’s like tuning through a radio. Pretty brilliant stuff.
fallllingman t1_ix51lln wrote
I've heard of Evan Dara but I haven't had a chance to read him. There's such a huge world of great neglected authors that never get their place in any bookstore.
Character_Mushroom83 t1_ix53fd9 wrote
So fucking true. Speaking of bookstore i recently found both Laura Warholic & An Adultery by Alexander Theroux in my local used bookstore. Both in great condition for super cheap. And i’m ALWAYS on the search for Joseph McElroy in a bookstore. No luck so far but one day.
fallllingman t1_ix4rhyw wrote
Also I looked through your account because I like your taste, it is absolutely imperative that you read The Tunnel. Personally I found it extremely difficult but reading it was like a revelation to me. I doubt there’s a better novel about human hatred, or a novel more philosophically disturbing. It’s one of my favorite books next to The Recognitions, Moby Dick, Ulysses, Under the Volcano, In Search of Lost Time, Darconville’s Cat, Dostoevsky’s Demons and the Divine Comedy.
Character_Mushroom83 t1_ix50umx wrote
Sounds amazing! I have been meaning to get to William Gass. I will absolutely be reading it i have a copy on my shelf. For some reason that book seems so opaque to me: i can’t for the life of me imagine what’s inside. But that’s not so important. When i read it i’ll see.
err0rz t1_ix4hi49 wrote
My initial point was that it’s boring.
You can’t refute this point by rephrasing my initial statement.
It’s boring, end of.
I didn’t say it’s unenjoyable or without merit.
fallllingman t1_ix4i2rf wrote
End of? Boringness is subjective.
err0rz t1_ix4k2aj wrote
What part of this long detailed response would you say claims it wasn’t boring?
Ahh the “unknowability of G-d” what a riveting subject.
fallllingman t1_ix4n7qk wrote
The humor. The sperm jokes. We find different things interesting but I think most people would find the sperm chapter of Moby Dick and constant innuendoes quite amusing. Also, you asked what aspects did I enjoy, not what aspects would you enjoy. I answered honestly and sincerely. I hope I've convinced you that I myself don't find this work boring, although others, looking for plot or whale battles or conditioned by the constant need for stimulus in the modern world may. I personally find it exciting, you don't. That's the only end of we have here.
JanitorKarl t1_ix4mcfi wrote
> It’s deliberately slow-paced, deliberately plotless. I don’t expect many people will have the same appreciation for it that I do, but I found myself intrigued by the symbolism in it,
That would be boring to me.
fallllingman t1_ix4nmmz wrote
Fair enough. I'd be more excited to watch a Tarkovsky film than a mindless action spectacle, but that's just my personal preference.
Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments