Book Nerd’s Comments (group member since Dec 20, 2018)

Book Nerd’s comments from the Never too Late to Read Classics group.

Heather wrote: "As if I needed an excuse to read this for the millionth time! Do you guys know which translation(s) emphasize(s) the possible bisexual subtext the most?"
Hm, I guess there was bisexual subtext. I read this version: Gilgamesh: A New English Version. That didn't emphasize it much.

I mean this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exotic_...
The negative mass part.

It is kind of unrealistic. I guess the substance could be exotic matter.

Me too but it's Poe.

This was the first Poe story I read a long time ago. Don't remember how old I was but it was before high school.

Canavan wrote: "Lesle said (in part):


Was the person already insane?


Yes, I believe this is exactly what Poe wants us to think."
I don't know. I think he was asking if obsessing on something like that eye could really drive someone insane.

Oh cool, I've been pretty busy and just noticed this. Yeah, I love this book. I really identify with the alienated narrator.

The incident with the officer is just one part of the story. It's filled with the inner thoughts and ranting and raving of someone who "thinks too much". I think most people could stand to think a lot more but whatever.

Here are some of my favorite quotes(in English):

I tell you solemnly I have tried many times to become an insect. But I was not equal even to that. I swear, gentlemen, that to be too conscious is an illness - a real through-going illness.

I will explain, the enjoyment was just from the too intense consciousness of one’s own degradation; it was from feeling oneself that one had reached the last barrier, that it was horrible, but that it could not be otherwise; that there was no escape for you; that you could never become a different man; that even if time and faith were still left to you to change into something different, you would most likely not wish to change; or if you did wish to, even then you would do nothing; because perhaps to reality there was nothing for you to change into.

but in despair there are the most intense enjoyments, especially when one is acutely conscious of the hopelessness of one’s position

Merciful Heavens! What do I care for the laws of nature and arithmetic, when, for some reason I dislike those laws and the fact that twice two makes four? Of course I cannot break through the wall by battering my head against it if I really have not the strength to knock it down, but I am not going to be reconciled to it simply because it is a stone wall and I have not the strength.

Can a man of perception respect himself at all?

And what if it so happens that a man’s advantage, sometimes, not only may, but even must, consist to his desiring in certain cases what is harmful to himself and not advantageous?

that is that man everywhere and at all time, who ever he may be, has preferred to act as he chose and not in the least as his reason and advantage dictated. And one may choose what is contrary to one’s own interests, and sometimes one positively ought (that is my idea).

I never have been a coward at heart, though I have always been a coward in action.

Anything but the foremost place I could not conceive for myself, and for that very reason I quite contentedly occupied the lowest reality. Either to be a hero or to grovel in the mud - there was nothing between.

which is better-cheap happiness or exalted suffering?

Come, try, give any one of us, for instance, a little more independence, untie our hands, widen the sphere of our activity, relax the control and we…yes, I assure you…we should be begging to be under control again.

I finished tonight. It really gets bogged down in too much meaningless chatter but picks up at the end. Gets a little melodramatic but still a pretty great story.

Trisha wrote: "the author never wrote a single sentence if he could replace it by several pages"

My god all that blather about slang!

I read this last night. Didn't really love it but I was immediately amused when it started out with a big fight between old guys going to pieces over nothing and making up just as quickly,
Like that article said I noticed that the first lie was told by Geppetto and the morality of the story seems wildly inconsistent just like the intelligence of the animals.
I do like stories that don't shelter kids from violence and the real world. There's way too much of that these days.

A couple things toward the end of Volume 3 Book 8 confuse me.

(view spoiler)[It says Valjean has a sou(coin) that usnscrews and contains a saw. I read it a couple of times, thinking it was just a sharpened coin he used to cut the ropes but the book said it can cut through iron bars. A tool like that in a coin makes no sense.

One of the kidnappers uses a "key"as a weapon. I assume that's some kind of club?

And then there's: "I only ask one thing," Bigrenaille remarked, "that my baccy maynt be stopped while I'm in solitary confinement."
Now that I typed that, I'm thinking "baccy" is tobacco, right?
(hide spoiler)]

Inkspill wrote: "I surprised myself by enjoying it, I didn't struggle as much as I thought I would with the mixture of fact and fiction, and when I finished I was already thinking of how to fit it in this year to read again.

Seriously ??? like this book isn't long enough :) "
Wow. A thick book I'd like to reread is The Count of Monte Cristo. I haven't read that since high school. Maybe this year or next...

Yeah, he goes off on a whole lot of unnecessary tangents. Still enjoying it though. I wanted a hefty classic :)

I'm about half way through.

I'm finally getting caught up.
The style of this reminds me of The Brothers Karamazov in a lot of ways.

I like how there's an entire chapter explaining merde. lol.

Patrick wrote: "Many people (I've noticed) didn't like the part with the bishop"
A lot of the characters are really exaggerated. I know they're meant to be symbolic. The bishop is an almost perfect selfless person.

I haven't read I am a Cat yet but it is pretty long. Kokoro might be a good choice. I'd like to read it.

Chin Ping Mei is actually the same as The Plum in the Golden Vase. Most of these Chinese books have a bunch of different names. The one you missed is Dream of the Red Chamber.

Thanks for putting these up.

Book Nerd wrote: "Patrick wrote: "I tried one or two of the later prequels written by Brian Herbert but could not even finish them. :-( "
Yeah, I wasted way too much time reading them.

Bernard wrote: "It was a clever plan to establish an author dynasty for Dune, but I could not get through the original."
It was never planned. Brian Herbert just started making money on his father's name, claiming to work from his notes.

Patrick wrote: "I just read Dune but I have the whole series."
They're great. Enjoy.

Jess wrote: "Book Nerd wrote: "Reading about Fantine, I cringed when she [spoilers removed]"

I couldn't watch that scene in the BBC series. I hid behind a pillow!"

I haven't seen it but I can imagine. (view spoiler)[What the hell did the quack dentist do with them? Implant them in somebody else? (hide spoiler)]

Patrick wrote: "I love Dune and the Foundation Series!! I still need to finish the Dune series. Hopefully I’ll get to them this year!"
Which books do you have left?

Sci-fi, now that's even harder.
Dead Girls, Dead Boys, Dead Things, I really love this trilogy and the author in general.
All of Dune(written by FRANK Herbert). A lot of people hate Dune Messiah for some reason, but it's my favorite.
The Foundation Trilogy
Stephen Baxter's Xeelee universe books. Transcendent, Ring, Xeelee: Endurance, etc.
And I'm a big fan of Star Wars books BEFORE Disney. I think they just make up a great long epic.