BitterStatus9

BitterStatus9 t1_jecfl7j wrote

Reply to Just started In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust by NotBorris

It took me about 20 years to finish Proust, and it did change my life. For the better. Some thoughts:

- Despite what others here have said, it's not "a series." It's one book, with many volumes.

- He didn't write it because he was bed ridden and "had a lot of free time on his hands."

- Alain de Botton's book (to paraphrase some comments here about Proust) "goes downhill" after the title page. It's shallow and condescending, imho, and a much better read is the recent book by Christopher Prendergast called (I think) Living and Dying with Marcel Proust. But it has "spoilers."

- About spoilers. I think the two main things that make Proust most worthy and possible to finish (other than the writing itself, which can be tough to navigate at times) are:

  1. It's not about the plot. "What happens" almost doesn't really matter at all, because it's a novel of ideas and concepts, and things "happen" to serve a single purpose: to convey the author's observations about these ideas. Not to tell a conventional story with a 3-act structure or something normal.

  2. Foremost among these ideas of Proust is that there are two kinds of memories: voluntary memories, where we try to recall something, intentionally; and involuntary memories, where something from the past comes flooding back to you unexpectedly, triggered by some stimulus (that's the madeleine thing in Swann's Way).

- There is a comment in this thread about how the last volumes must have been rushed because he was ill, so they don't hold together as well. He actually wrote most of the last volumes FIRST, and then went back and wrote Swann's Way in full and published it, before continuing, jumping around to fill in the gaps in the other volumes (but the whole thing was not quite fully "done" when he died, and much of it was put together by his editors from his notebooks and typescripts).

- If you want some amazing descriptions of how he lived and worked, read M. Proust by Celeste Albaret, his longtime house maid.

Finally, someone said below that volumes 5 and 6 were a "slog" because of "too much obsessing about Albertine." This is really interesting, because on one level, the entire 3,000 page, 2,000 character, seven volume book is a rumination on the causes and results of exactly that obsessing. That's kind of the whole point, I think.

Anyway, take your time, and remember one last thing: Every single thing in the book, every detail, every painfully extensive description of the color of the leaves on a hawthorn tree at a certain time of day, is there for a reason. There is not one wasted word. Not one. It's one of the great artistic accomplishments of all time.

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BitterStatus9 t1_je6fy9d wrote

Reply to comment by therealDrA in Breeze Airways opens base of operations in Rhode Island by therealDrA

It's not that different: a commercial carrier markets its trips on a regular schedule between two under-served (they think) airports. The requisite number of pax never shows up, and they fold. The only difference is the size of the plane. Providence is never going to generate enough non-stop traffic at prevailing prices to keep a carrier afloat, and the bigger the plane, the steeper the wall they need to climb to stay solvent.

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BitterStatus9 t1_je3auvr wrote

Reply to Reviving Rhode Island's Sporting Legacy: A New Era With Rhode Island FC by 101955Bennu

OP mentions "my tax dollars going to something that I want and I care about."

On one hand, I get this. I don't want my tax dollars to go to something I don't want and don't care about. It's my money, so it should benefit me.

But that's not primarily what tax dollars are for. They're not for me, they're for the public good, and it's "better" (by some public definition) for tax dollars to fund things that the public needs and will use. I don't think a soccer stadium in Pawtucket does as much good as infrastructure or investment in community benefits that directly help citizens generally.

You could have both – say, a stadium AND adequate law enforcement, good roads, public transportation, etc. But the latter group of things benefits everyone, and the stadium is of direct benefit only to the users (and a few vendors who sell stuff there).

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BitterStatus9 t1_jddrj2u wrote

Reply to comment by zephyr220 in I picked up Wool, and couldn’t put it down. by fn0000rd

Who knows, you might like the series overall. As for me, I can't remember everything, as I read some of it quickly and then moved on. But off the top of my head, here's what I recall. Some are "holes," some are just weak storytelling, you can interpret as you like.

- The whole massive 100+ level underground city was evidently run entirely by 4 or 5 people. No bureaucracy, no hierarchy beyond the top two people, no economics, no politics (though there is policy). This reminded me of the way TV shows depict government. There's an international diplomatic crisis and it's being solved by the President, their aide, and this one spy (Tom Cruise, Kiefer Sutherland, whomever). Very cartoonish and simplistic.

- The city has the ability to self-sustain, somehow. They extract and refine crude oil, they are producing, water, food, they have an IT division that sounds like it's pretty advance...and they don't have an elevator, or a ramp? (I was told this is explained later, but it made me not really interested in finding out.)

- I am pretty sure the gimmick/big shocker is about the outside being habitable after all, and someone, for some reason using technology to pull the "wool" over the citizens' eyes (I see what he did there). That's not a new narrative construct. That doesn't mean it can't be used, and maybe I am completely wrong. But again, I didn't feel like it was compelling enough to stick around for and find out.

Kudos to Howey for self-promoting and writing his way to success. I think that's good, and inspiring! But when I heard about the TV series being made from it, I thought, "Oh wow, next is the video game: a stair simulator!"

My 2 cents.

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BitterStatus9 t1_jdba806 wrote

Reply to comment by pilotinspektor_ in I picked up Wool, and couldn’t put it down. by fn0000rd

Not everyone. I thought it was bad.

I found the plot riddled with inconsistent nonsensical holes, and found the writing pretty poor, and the characters cartoonish and uncompelling and I stopped reading after like 100 pages. (I also didn't feel like waiting around for volume 2, which other folks told me explained all the nonsense in volume 1.)

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BitterStatus9 t1_jd0j0k1 wrote

Reply to What do you do? by Loveroffinerthings

I work part-time as a strategy consultant. I get paid only for the hours I bill to a client, and I work for a big firm based in another state. I am a specialist in a really narrow, obscure area of expertise, so I don't have that much competition for clients. Random, lucky way my career has played out.

As long a I work a certain number of hours (including hours I don't get paid for, like when I'm on an internal training call or, or posting on LinkedIn to make people realize how fucking brilliant and indispensable I am), I get full benefits from the firm – which is what makes all the difference in the world.

We rent a very small house in a rural area of RI.

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BitterStatus9 t1_ja5azqz wrote

Reply to Thoughts? by United_Perception299

Was just reading about how there was an electric trolley line (built in the 1890s) that ran from Newport up to Fall River. They charged riders 5 cents per town (so, Newport to Portsmouth = 10 cents). I bet it was faster than RIPTA!

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