OS Book Club Pt II

[DieHardYankee26]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

The discussion of Harry Potter in the Off Topic thread brought me here. For those inclined toward fantasy stuff, whether Rowling or Tolkien, I'd recommend The Silmarllion by Tolkien. It sort of contextualizes the whole Lord of the Rings and Hobbit world a bit more completely. Sort of an alternative book of mythology that draws on Greco-Roman mythos.

I had heard of the Silmarillion but didn't have a great understanding of what it was, I thought it was like an encyclopedia kind of thing, or a reference book of lore. I'm kinda intrigued reading more and finding out it's more based in mythology. If I've never read anything by Tolkien, where in the series should I read it? Before the Hobbit? After but before LOTR? After the whole thing?

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

Watership Down by Richard Adams. Whoever thought a book about rabbits would be so good. Great, great novel.

For some reason I never realized this was a book, but have heard many things about the film.

I started up Fellowship of the Ring last night. I'm about 40 pages (read the first two chapters) and its crazy how much is already different from the movies.

That made me start thinking if we would ever see somebody like HBO or Netflix try and tackle Lord of The Rings as a series. The movies were great, but they leave a lot of details out. Hell, 17 years pass from the time Frodo inherits the ring to when he actually sets out for Mordor. In that time Gandalf (and Aragon) track down Gollum and "interview" him.

I love the casting of the movies so that will be a mountain of an obstacle to over come.

Personally, Game of Thrones should have gotten the movie-verse treatment and Lord of the Rings should have been given the extended TV series treatment. GoT is just lingering longer than it needs to.

[DieHardYankee26]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

Finished Blood Meridian. Really incredible piece of work. I like McCarthy's style a lot, at least in the novels I've read from him so far. He doesn't lose anything in describing the environment in such painstaking detail because it sets the scene so perfectly and the characters are just another part of the environment. It really gives off the vibe that the people are products of the world they live in. He paints the desolate western desert in such a way that you feel the loneliness and despair out there, it never seems like his characters are down, only that the world is down and they're trying to raise themselves above it. If someone doesn't like his style, it would all be moot though. And I could see it to an extent. Going into The Road I was warned about the lack of quotation marks and difficulty in attributing words to certain characters, but for BM moreso the rapid fire environmental description. Personally, I was into it.

I'd not cared to think much about that time period (mid-late 19th century) and all the cowboy, new frontier stuff going on. He brings that to an end. You really are forced to see in excruciating detail the brutality and depravity of the violence in the era. I'd also not read a super violent book so that was a cool experience. The way movies and TV desensitize you to violence over time is obvious, I'm not sure books will do the same. I'm not sure there will ever be a time when someone reads about a fist sized hole in a guy's head and his brains on the floor and not have a visceral reaction (especially the way McCarthy describes it).

Spoiler

Almost all are from one character, Judge Holden, a dope antagonist:

"Words are things. The words he is in possession of he cannot be deprived of. Their authority transcends his ignorance of their meaning."

"For this will to deceive that is in things luminous may manifest itself likewise in retrospect and so by sleight of some fixed part of a journey already accomplished may also post men to fraudulent destinies."

"Now this son whose fathers existence in this world is historical and speculative even before the son has entered it is in a bad way. All his life he carries before him the idol of a perfection to which he can never attain. The father dead has euchered the son out of his patrimony. For it is the death of the father to which the son is entitled and to which he is heir, more so than goods. He will not hear of the small mean ways that tempered the man in life. He will not see him struggling in follies of his own devising. No. The world which he inherits bears him a false witness. He is broken before a frozen god and he will never find his way."

" The man who believes that the secrets of the world are forever hidden lives in mystery and fear. Superstition will drag him down. The rain will erode the deeds of his life. But that man who sets himself the task of singling out the thread of order from the tapestry will by the decision alone have taken charge that he will effect a way to dictate the terms of his own fate."

"This is the nature of war, whose stake is at once the game and the authority and the justification. Seen so, war is the truest form of divination. It is the testing of one's will and the will of another within the larger will which because it binds them is therefore forced to select. War is the ultimate game because war is at last a forcing of the unity of existence. War is god."

"Mens memories are uncertain and the past that was differs little from the past that was not."

Another great one. I will say, to have been on the list for Great American novels, I was surprised because I had always understood the term to mean "book that captures the zeitgeist of America at a given time" as opposed to just "dope book by an American author". When people say Gatsby is the Great American novel, I'd think it's because it represents themes that are timeless in our society even if they were more prevalent in the Roaring Twenties. I loved Blood Meridian, but it doesn't really serve that purpose. It's not even really meant to. An argument could be made that it's supposed to represent the barren wastelands and inherent danger involved in expansion. I guess I'll see if Beloved (also on the list) is more on it for the reasons I expect, that's up next.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

You made me remember I have a third McCarthy book on my shelf that I actually haven't read; All The Pretty Horses which is the first book of a trilogy.

[DieHardYankee26]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

Yeah that was going to be my first McCarthy book, but once I saw it was part of a series I had to nope right the **** out of there. I hear great things about it though, I'll get to the trilogy when I've knocked more of my one and done authors out.

One thing I'm seeing in reading more about Blood Meridian is that McCarthy's favorite novel is Moby Dick, so that pushes that one up on my must read list, it's already on the GAN list. Also that David Foster Wallace wrote an article in 1999 saying Blood Meridian was underrated. The connections just keep on building.

[Qb]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

I am definitely adding American Nations to it, the Amazon reviews say the last part goes off the rails...

I can see why people would say that. I didn't think it was too polarizing, but I'm rather centrist in my views and usually don't get too worked up about that stuff. If I had a quibble, it'd be that Woodard did such a good job with the historical development of the regions and their impact on the country leading up to the Civil War and Reconstruction that his more contemporary analysis felt a bit light in comparison.

[WaitTilNextYear]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

I had heard of the Silmarillion but didn't have a great understanding of what it was, I thought it was like an encyclopedia kind of thing, or a reference book of lore. I'm kinda intrigued reading more and finding out it's more based in mythology. If I've never read anything by Tolkien, where in the series should I read it? Before the Hobbit? After but before LOTR? After the whole thing?

The book is very difficult to characterize. It could be seen as part encyclopedia for sure. It's part history/chronicle, part instruction manual for the machinations of Middle Earth, part tall tale. But it, as all of Tolkien's works, is based heavily on borrowing and creating mythology and language. It's certainly worth taking a look at--maybe read a few pages and see if you like it before buying.

Here is a preview of the e-book on Google: https://books.google.com/books/about...page&q&f=false

I think it would make sense to do Silmarillion first because it comes first chronologically--like in the way Clash of the Titans would come before anything about Greek Gods and Goddesses. The mythology part kind of sets up the rules and history of Middle Earth in a more complete way than the 'hey, this Sauron guy is pure evil was defeated 1000 years ago and is now back for more!!! argghhhhh' way that LOTR does it. Then Hobbit then LOTR is the way I would sequence.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

I'll probably pick that up after I'm done with Lord of The Rings but before I move onto The Hobbit.

It feels like it would deepen the world a lot and provide more context, but world building without a narrative bogs me down immensely.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

I've managed to read the first book of Fellowship (each novel consists of two "books."). Like I said after the first two chapters the book and movie are about as different as any book/movie combo I can think of. The main storyline is largely the same, but its all the small, inconsequential pieces that are changed or missing from the movie that adds to the world building and lore of the adventure. Not to mention how much more time the books gives to each characters in developing them and their moral codes.

I also read Book 1 (there are 4-5) of The Social Contract which I opted to read this weekend over Rights of Man. I think people misunderstand Rousseau in a lot of ways here. Following him from his infamous opening (Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains. One man thinks himself the master of others, but remains more of a slave than they are.) to implementing voluntary restrictions in order to build a functioning society based on equality isn't terribly difficult, but his society is based on one fundamental that cannot be forgotten while reading; the very hindrance of liberty is a freedom itself since it is self-imposed.

There's a lot to digest here in even 15 pages, but all fascinating to me. The main takeaway, thus far, is that an advantage for one man is the advantage of all. Once man enjoys a private advantage over others than the society fails as the contract is broken. From my modern perch it seems this society is fragile. Hence why there is no real society with a true social contract today.

[DieHardYankee26]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

I feel like I've already fallen down like 8 different rabbit holes, and now I'm going to be sent into the 9th reading the things the Founders read. Im trying to "theme" for lack of a better phrase my months, so after this month which is basically just runoff and other stuff, August I'm gonna read a bunch of sports stuff, November I'm gonna read a bunch of presidential biographies and whatnot, first week in October, which is Mental Health Awareness Week, I'm gonna try to get into Infinite Jest and that whole month I'll probably do mental health related stuff. Sagan goes on and on in his writing about Thomas Paine and Voltaire, I gotta hop the fence eventually. Most of the people I idolize are scientists so I'm gonna need them to show me who they idolize lol. Infinite books.

As for current reading, I just finished Beloved by Toni Morrison. I just finished it less than a half hour ago so I'm going to give it some time and to cool off, but I'm pretty sure this is my favorite fiction book ever. Worthy of the title, Great American Novel IMO for the same reasons Gatsby would be.

Spoiler

I had already gotten through The Bluest Eye, so the beautiful writing (and I really think that's the best word for it, it's just beautiful) was no surprise. I thought I had read enough of our history to have hardened my heart like the Pharaoh by now but NOPE, damn near burst into tears at my computer desk.

It's about a woman who tried to kill her children and herself instead of being captured by slave catchers. First, that is heartbreaking. I think the saddest choice I've ever thought of until now was the people in the Towers who saw that they were going to die a terrible death and opted for a less painful one. This shatters that. The idea that a mother was put in a situation where killing her child was preferable to allowing her to live is unbearable. Once again, even through fiction and maybe even better than via nonfiction, the realities of slavery are made apparent. I could go on and on, needless to say, it's another that'll make you wanna hug your mom.

"But maybe a man was nothing but a man, which is what Baby Suggs always said. They encouraged you to put some of your weight in your hands and soon as you felt how light and lovely that was, they studied your scars and tribulations, after which they did what he had done: ran her children out and tore up the house."

"What she called the nastiness of life was the shock she received upon learning that nobody stopped playing checkers just because the pieces included her children."

"The heart that pumped out love, the mouth that spoke the Word, didn't count. They came in her yard anyway and she could not approve or condemn Sethe's rough choice. One or the other might have saved her, but beaten up by the claims of both, she went to bed. The white folks had tired her out at last."

"The more colored people spent their strength trying to convince them how gentle they were, how clever and loving, how human, the more they used themselves up to persuade whites of something Negroes believed could not be questioned, the deeper and more tangled the jungle grew inside. But it wasn't the jungle Black's had brought with them to this place from the other (livable) place. It was the jungle whitefolks planted in them. And it grew. It spread. In, through and after life, it spread, until it invaded the whites who had made it. Touched them every one. Changed and altered them. Made them bloody, silly, worse than even they wanted to be, so scared were they of the jungle they had made."

"I'll explain to her, even though I don't have to. Why I did it. How if I hadn't killed her she would have died and that is something I could not bear to happen to her."

So yeah, loved it. Onto book 42 of the year, As I Lay Dying by Faulkner, this will be interesting. I had a dude tell me I'll love it because Faulkner is great at putting the feel of Southern life in words. That means nothing to me lol, but we'll see.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

I commend you for thinking you can keep to those themes man. I know what would happen to me if I tried that; I'd get through one or two books and either want to switch to something else or want to keep on the current theme when it came time to change up.

Heck, by the end of Goblet of Fire I was ready for a break from Harry Potter and fantasy in general. I'm halfway through Fellowship and I'm ready to dive back into the world of Hogwarts, but my interest in fantasy has fanned the flame. Now I have The Witcher back on my brain and a series of books I got for Christmas (The Grail Trilogy).

But I'm gonna stick to my stack. I just need to revolve back around to my non-fiction works. I feel like I can read the novels fairly quickly.

I also got the best reading accessory this weekend: a hammock stand for our hammock.

[DieHardYankee26]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

Sports will be easy, there's so much variation. I could see getting bogged down in the presidential biographies for sure, I hope the ones I pick are good. I've already read FDR, so the presidents I still want to do are Lincoln, JFK, Jefferson, Washington, and Eisenhower. It really will depend on how long it takes me to read them. It might take me all of October just to get through Infinite Jest, everything I've read about it says it'll be hard. DFW uses a bunch of footnotes in his essays and apparently still in his fiction. I've seen reading schedules for it that make it look like the Bible. There's just so much on my backlog that I can't imagine it getting smaller without attacking it in chunks lol.

Aside from my Kindle which I guess is unfair, my computer chair at home is probably my favorite reading accessory lol. I wish I could upgrade the one in my office.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

I like reading in our living room the most - especially in the mornings. There's no ceiling light so reading in the evening is only for the dedicated soldier. We have a floor lamp, but it buzzes so damn bad when all the lights are on that it fries your brain. Our living room chairs are the perfect balance of comfort and support. Comfortable enough to get into a good groove, but not so comfortable that you'll be lulling off after 30 minutes of reading.

If its early enough I can get some reading down in bed, but if its past 10:30 or so I'm gonna be out quick.

I get distracted too easily if I'm reading outside, but I will say there are certain books that just feel deeper and more magical when read outside. Lord of the Rings is definitely one.

[DieHardYankee26]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

Finished As I Lay Dying. It lived up to the hype. Everything I read about Faulkner (different character points of view, prose god, super Southern down to the dialect) was true. He's going on the list, I just like the style of a story told from so many different points of view. It's no Beloved, but I would definitely recommend it to people. It's the story of a poor family trying to get their deceased mother to the burial site where her family rests way out of the way. I have a real love for books like this that are less about the plot than the characters, it's like the Martian on steroids, you feel like the characters are real.

Spoiler

"I can remember how when I was young I believed death to be a phenomenon of the body; now I know it to be merely a function of the mind - and that of the minds of the ones who suffer bereavement. The nihilists say it is the end; the fundamentalists, the beginning; when in reality it is no more than a single tenant or family moving out of a tenement or town." Dr. Peabody

"And when I think about that, I think that if nothing but being married will help a man, he's durn nigh hopeless. But I reckon Cora's right when she says the reason the Lord had to create women is because man don't know his own good when he sees it." Vernon Tull

" I notice how it takes a lazy man, a man that hates moving, to get set on moving once he does get started off, the same as he was set on staying still, like it ain't the moving he hates so much as the starting and the stopping." Samson with the story of my life

" And so when Cora Tull would tell me I was not a true mother, I would think how words go straight up in a thin line, quick and harmless, and how terribly doing goes along the earth, clinging to it, so that after a while the two lines are too far apart for the same person to straddle from one to the other; and that sin and love and fear are just sounds that people who never sinned nor loved nor feared have for what they never had and cannot have until they forget the words." Addie

" Sometimes I ain't so sho who's got a right to say when a man is crazy and when he ain't. Sometimes I think it ain't none of us pure crazy, and ain't none of us pure sane until the balance of us talks to him that-a-way. Its like it ain't so much what a fellow does, but it's the way the majority of folks looking at him when he does it."

And another one bites the dust. Onto a few nonfiction books, starting with Founding Brothers.

Side note, I was looking for an article that listed the best writer from each state. A bunch of them list our rep as David Baldacci. I'm like who the **** is this guy, and who is ranking him above Thomas Jefferson? That and Miyazaki put out a list of his favorite 50 children's books so that's pretty cool.

[Fresh Tendrils]

Re: OS Book Club Pt II

Nearing the end of Fellowship and I can see why so many hold this series/world in such high esteem. I keep catching myself being completely in awe and mystified by Tolkien's world building and I know I haven't read anything else that comes close to what he did.

It is the small things in how he builds the world of Middle Earth to make it feel like its existing somewhere other than a shared imagination. Things like the subtle nuances and differences in characters' vernacular, having multiple names and explanations depending on the tribe speaking, or just simply by not explaining everything upon its introduction. Everything he does builds off of itself and works together to create a world that feels alive.

Its even more fascinating to think Tolkien did this 100 years ago.