The Catcher in the Rye
discussion
The Most Overrated Books
Monty J wrote: "No cake because I eat low/no carb, but I'm working on the candle thing. My family sang HB over the phone. Here's a link to my blog on Orphanage Birthdays: http://www.wattpad.com/62499579-orphanag..."
Your birthdays sound a lot better now, Monty; that's good. Flour-less cake can be great you know, but it tastes too good to be low cal.
Monty J wrote: "Hey everyone, thanks for the lovely birthday wishes. :)"Monty please accept my belated wish for you to have a wonderful birthday and may your wish come true (you only get one per birthday right? That's the way I was taught. (Giggles) Who needs rules?) Most of all have fun!
Cosmic
Happy birthday Monty! Good to hear from you again Mark ;)
Monty J wrote: "No cake because I eat low/no carb, but I'm working on the candle thing. My family sang HB over the phone. Here's a link to my blog on Orphanage Birthdays: http://www.wattpad.com/62499579-orphanag..."
I am really touched by your story. Thank you for sharing. I am sorry that my first message may have been too flippant but I hadn't read your link yet. I was just being funny but in light of your link it may have been taken wrong.
Glad I was here to celebrate with you. Hope it was the best!
It is pretty quiet around here today. Just thought I would let you know about one of my latest post on Breaking The Code To The Catcher In The Rye.It is about the money that Phoebe loans Holden.
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Edward wrote: "...The general public is the jury. If one is a good writer that one will reach the public and the ANALysts. TCITR still has 250,000 sales annually, while mysteries produced by long term editors and reviewers bog down in critical half-acclaim and public disdain..."So if a book doesn't sell, it doesn't matter if it's a good piece of literature or not?
Up to a point you may be right, but on the other hand there have been numerous great works that were only discovered after their author's death (e.g. Confederacy of Dunces). Then there are the hundreds or maybe thousands of bestsellers that have come out in the past century. How many of them will stand the test of time? Will anyone be reading them 100 or more years from now?
Matthew wrote: "...there have been numerous great works that were only discovered after their author's death (e.g. Confederacy of Dunces). Then there are the hundreds or maybe thousands of bestsellers that have come out in the past century. How many of them will stand the test of time? Will anyone be reading them 100 or more years from now?"Excellent point, not to mention that the average reading level of the "general public" hovers around 8th grade. Not that a book has to be written at a higher level than that to be considered great, but the average reader isn't going to be plunking down for an intellectual challenge, so I don't consider the "general public" to be the demographic of great judgement.
Edward wrote: "Sorry, you're mistaken this time. The general public is the jury. If one is a good writer that one will reach the public and the ANALysts. TCITR still has 250,000 sales annually, while mysteries produced by long term editors and reviewers bog down in critical half-acclaim and public disdain. Value judgments aside what is the relevance of a falling tree no one cares to hear? ..."I would agree with you except for the book The House of the Seven Gables
In it Nathaniel Hawthorne makes a case for the fact that our politicians are not elected till they are picked. The books are censored by editors and publishers. The media plays a big part in the game as well. The Catcher seems to be a big hit because supposedly Holden is supposed to be mentally ill because he won't adhere to the "program". I would not be surprised that this book is popular because it is required reading for high schoolers. If it wasn't assigned would it be getting this much attention? If it was read like an allegory of World War 2 as I have proposed that it actually is (see
https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/...) then I don't know how much it would be promoted. I think it would be a great history book for kids to learn from. Much more interesting than the Times they passed off as history when I was in school.
Leslie wrote: "...but the average reader isn't going to be plunking down for an intellectual challenge, so I don't consider the "general public" to be the demographic of great judgement. "
I have hopes for the average reader. At some point, with all the fantasy and Harry Potter imitations that a saturation point will be reached and an appetite rediscovered for something real and meaningful.
The general public? Do they even read? Aren't they the ones glued to television and swarming to action flicks? Is there any way, short of gas prices and the threat of starvation, to reach them with a complicated social issue?
Monty J wrote: "The general public? Do they even read?"Good one. Just take them out of the equation.
Just a guess here, and we'll all be dead before I can prove it, but I'd say Cormac McCarthy endures a hundred or two hundred years from now, along with Toni Morrison, as the representative "great" American writer of the late Twentieth Century. Oh, there'll be a handful more, but it won't be a big handful.Anyone else want to play this game with me? Pynchon? (Not the Seven Gables one!) Too obscure... Not Roth or Updike, christ I hope not.
(Maybe I can flush Mark out again with this one...)
Edward wrote: "...Frankly, I can't sell mine to any level, so I don't think I am very biased...? "What sort of literature have you written so far?
You might appreciate The Sorrows of Satan by Marie Corelli.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7...
It's the story of a starving writer who has had no success with his work. He ends up selling his soul to the devil who not only makes him rich, but also promises give him success with his literary works. All the devil does is show him how to market his work with money, power, and influence, but does nothing to improve the quality of his work. Needless to say, his work doesn't do all that well anyway.
Monty J wrote: "Leslie wrote: "...but the average reader isn't going to be plunking down for an intellectual challenge, so I don't consider the "general public" to be the demographic of great judgement. "
I have..."
I agree. I remember being jealous of a friend because reading and answer questions on test came easy for him. One year I moved to the town he was living in. I hadn't been in touch with him but thought I would see him at the bookstore. We always went to the book store on Friday. So I got his phone number and invited him and his wife over. I told him that I kept thinking that we would run into him at the book store. He said he stopped reading after college. His wife said that he knew all the NFL statistics however. I had high hopes.
Petergiaquinta wrote: "Just a guess here, and we'll all be dead before I can prove it, but I'd say Cormac McCarthy endures a hundred or two hundred years from now, along with Toni Morrison, as the representative "great" ..."Richard Russo (Pulitzer for Empires Falls) also wrote Nobody's Fool. His best work may still be in him, for he shows a depth of perception and concern for the working class that I have not seen matched in another contemporary writer (not that I have read them all by any stretch.)
Jane Smiley?
Monty J wrote: "Jane Smiley?"You're killing me, Monty.
Russell Banks and Paula Fox, if this is about American writers still at work. I'm not sure whether they are well-known or how relevant fame is to quality and survival, but prefer them over anyone mentioned so far. I've already said Updike seems to me overrated and agree that Roth is, too.
Edward wrote: "I would nominate Wallace and to a lesser extent Saunders. I don't like Roth either, but my wife finds him hilarious. When you say McCarthy, do you mean inclusive of or despite "The Road?" "Irving Wallace? Not a chance. Why would you name him out of all the choices? Or you got another Wallace in mind? Wallace Stevens will probably endure, but 200 years from now they won't understand his poetry any better than they do now. But he's out of contention for late 20th Century consideration.
If you mean George Saunders, he's great. But no one will read him 200 years from now. I'd say he's going to be pretty ephemeral when you consider the other short story writers the editors of future anthologies will be considering him against for inclusion. Actually Updike and Roth will probably be there before him as far as that stuff goes.
And The Road's a great book. I don't know why you'd dismiss it like that. McCarthy has written better, but it's part of a lifetime of outstanding work, and when we look back 200 years and think about the authors we still read today from then, they all have a body of compelling work that's brilliantly written and representation of culture, movements, etc.
Kallie wrote: "Russell Banks and Paula Fox, if this is about American writers still at work. I'm not sure whether they are well-known or how relevant fame is to quality and survival, but prefer them over anyone ..."Remember, this game isn't about who we prefer, it's trying to prognosticate (is that a word) who endures and is read/anthologized/studied in the future.
Russell Banks is a great pick. Big body of work, and it's a diverse range of material; it's very well written; and it's representative, I think, of some of our collective important concerns and themes, of what it means to live and write in America at the end of the 20th Century. What's your favorite?
And tell me about Paula Fox!
Two hundred years ago Walter Scott was the world's most famous prose writer of English. Today, we might know his name; some of us have read his books, but not many of them. He's no longer studied in college campuses (unless you're taking a seminar on Scott, and I'm not sure where you'd find a college with that class, lololo). He is absent from the high school curriculum. Jane Austen was far less popular at the time. She published anonymously and didn't have much readership. Today she's the person we read. And I think most of us would agree she deserves to be remembered and read over Scott.
Two hundred years ago Byron was the widest read poet on the face of the earth. We still study him today, and he's still great. I like him, but in general I don't know how many folks really know his work compared to knowing his persona. John Keats was unknown. Today, professors would probably say Keats was the better writer. Either way, they're both still read and studied today.Fame is a fickle fruit says Emily Dickinson. Poor Walter Scott...
I dunno, maybe this gives some insight to what might endure 200 years from now?
Edward wrote: "I meant David Foster Wallace."Ah, good...I was hoping it wasn't Lew Wallace.
I'm not qualified to comment on DFW. It will be interesting to see what happens to his star. Is it already on the decline? I dunno. But you're right. His is a name with a great deal of literary cachet. Will it endure? Was it all just a flash in the pan?
Edward wrote: ""The Road" is the only McCarthy book I have seen...It has received many poor reviews on GR; one calling it the worst book ever written. "And it also won the Pulitzer, so I guess those two opinions cancel each other out.
I'll check out this Glenn Russell guy; thanks for the tip.
Petergiaquinta wrote: "Kallie wrote: "Russell Banks and Paula Fox, if this is about American writers still at work. I'm not sure whether they are well-known or how relevant fame is to quality and survival, but prefer th..."Continental Drift, The Sweet Hereafter and Rule of the Bone are my favorites by Russell Banks so far, in that order. But I want to read Cloudsplitter and I think from what I've heard that will be known as the 'great' Banks novel. Vintage brought Paula Fox back into print with introductions by Franzen and others; The Servant, Desperate Characters (much admired), The God of Nightmares and The Western Coast; but she is a more 'microcosmic' writer, probably not on the scale you describe. I've read all her novels more than once (ditto Joy Williams, but many would see her as too 'strange'). I like George Saunders too, especially Pastoralia.
You guys are adding to my exponentially expanding To-Read list. David Foster Wallace and George Saunders. And I've still got more Gabriel Garcia Marquez and digging deeper into the Latin/South American magical realists to go. *headdesk*
Renee wrote: "You guys are adding to my exponentially expanding To-Read list. David Foster Wallace and George Saunders. And I've still got more Gabriel Garcia Marquez and digging deeper into the Latin/South Am..."
I haven't read Marquez yet but I would like to. It's exciting to have all these new reading experiences ahead of us! I need to read more american authors, but right now I'm reading Milan Kundera and I think I'm in love.
To offer more about Banks and Fox, both write about characters set adrift, searching for some meaning and purpose in the modern, apparently meaningless (in any satisfactory sense) world. This is a basic theme for many contemporary writers, but too often comes across as an aesthetic exercise and leaves me cold. In Banks and Fox, the writing is imbued with the energy of these 'Desperate Characters.' Marilynne Robinson (Housekeeping, Gilead, Mother Country) is another writer of this sort whose work may survive.
@Karen: Marquez is, to me, so far, distant. It's difficult for me to become engaged with the characters and much (at least in One Hundred Years of Solitude) goes by, caught in the current. It is beautiful, but I've also supposed that some of that has been lost in translation and can only imagine what it must be in the original Spanish.
Renee wrote: "@Karen: Marquez is, to me, so far, distant. It's difficult for me to become engaged with the characters and much (at least in One Hundred Years of Solitude) goes by, caught in the current. It is be..."I've often thought about that in translated works. But I'd like to think it can be done quite well, the book I'm reading is translated from Czech. Maybe it all depends on the translator, or the author just isn't connecting with you.
I like character driven works and Marquez seems, to me, to touch on his characters like a dragonfly hovering and darting over a pool of water.
Renee wrote: "I like character driven works and Marquez seems, to me, to touch on his characters like a dragonfly hovering and darting over a pool of water."Oh I understand now. I like to read character driven novels also- Faulkner. I also like to read novels of ideas, social commentary-Dellilo's White Noise comes to mind, quite funny.
Kallie wrote: "Continental Drift, The Sweet Hereafter and Rule of the Bone are my favorites by Russell Banks so far, in that order."Maybe my favorite Russell Banks is is Affliction, although I recall not being entirely satisfied with the ending. I haven't read Continental Drift yet, and I only made it about a quarter through Cloudsplitter before it was due at the library. I'll be getting back to that one day; John Brown may be the most fascinating figure of all in American history.
Here's an interesting thought while we're on the subject of Banks. For all the talk we've all had about Catcher, I don't recall anyone making any connections to Rule of the Bone, especially in terms of finding a more contemporary novel that might speak to today's youth better than Catcher. (Mochaexpresso has raised this issue lately on another thread, but we've discussed it here as well.) Bone has a great voice, and readers might be reminded of Holden, although the novel is actually more of a retelling of Huck Finn's story than Holden Caulfield's. For me, though, Bone left me a little cold. I never warmed up to him the way I did with Holden, but they share a lot of common ground.
Edward wrote: "Petergiaquinta wrote: "Edward wrote: ""The Road" is the only McCarthy book I have seen...It has received many poor reviews on GR; one calling it the worst book ever written. "And it also won the ..."
And the short list for the Nobel in Lit.
And then there's the physics :D
No, really . . . http://www.cormacmccarthy.com/2012/04...
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2012...
(gotta check both for it to make sense).
Edward wrote: "Thanks for the implied compliment in looking at Glenn Russell. Let me know what you think. "Glenn Russell and I have an 87% ratings compatibility (or whatever they call that number when you compare books), which is the highest percentage I've come across, so I am even more grateful.
I first read a very interesting review of No Country for Old Men by Glenn Russell, and then I read a review he seems to have recently written on Epicurus and that was brilliant, too, despite the dusty subject matter (sadly I'm not much of a reader of the Greeks once we get past Plato, but maybe I could learn).
So, I agree with you. He's easily in my top ten favorite reviewers here at GoodReads.
Renee wrote: "And then there's the physics :D"That's some funny stuff! (Uh, oh...)
And makes me even more interested in McCarthy. My back yard is a stone's throw from the Fermi Lab! (Whoops, sorry again, Cormac! And again...)
I bet he really hates your emoticon, too. And my ellipses...
He might well, and my usage of m-dashes and ellipsis in my writing. Or not.
I suspect what he really despises is slavery to convention and tradition, but embraces breaking with them only as long as it's broken with purpose.
His brother and sister-in-law were in a writing group I belonged to before they moved to the southwest. I count them as friends. The home he grew up in in Knoxville burned to the ground not too long ago.
Emoticons . . . meh. They serve a purpose when communicating online, avoiding miscommunications. I daresay I've done reams more online communicating than Cormac so he'd have to bow to my expertise there ;-)
Cormac (becomes corkscrew on my frickin stupid iPad autocorrect and gives credence to his use of the typewriter) bows to no man (or wo-man) in matters of grammar and technology.Did you follow that link on the Physics Nobel page that led to the "interview" from the Parisian Review? That's a hilarious must-read for the McCarthy fan. (I restrained myself from the exclamation point there.)
No, I haven't . . . yet! (There's your exclamation point!)
Renee wrote: "The home he grew up in in Knoxville burned to the ground not too long ago."Were there suspicious circumstances?
Renee wrote: "Edward wrote: "Petergiaquinta wrote: "Edward wrote: ""The Road" is the only McCarthy book I have seen...It has received many poor reviews on GR; one calling it the worst book ever written. "And i..."
Funny, thanks. I am so guilty of semicolons; that's a lazy habit I'll blame on trying to avoid citing every damn statement in a term paper.
No, Monty, although his brother and sister-in-law did remark, jokingly, that Cormac was probably relieved it was gone before it could be stuck on the historic register (which was already being brought up), and that it was a good thing he had a solid alibi and well over a thousand miles of buffer.
Oh, and I assume McCarthy was joking about not having read a novel in years.
With Cormac, who knows?
Whuh? Huh?
Drinking while typing?
Petergiaquinta wrote: "Drinking while typing?"Yep. Frequently.
Edward wrote: "Whatever the "sophisticated" inside commentary implies if anything escapes me and I have no desire to be found. Cormac and his group of followers, who probably write a lot of his brilliance for him..."Well, I see what you mean Edward. I'm not saying it's the case with McCarthy, but a lot of people are always looking for a guru of some sort.
Leslie wrote: "got jelly?"Hahaha! Had to think about that for a minute.
It took me awhile, too.I sincerely doubt anyone's writing McCarthy's material for him. He isn't exactly what you'd call prolific.
all discussions on this book
|
post a new topic
High Fidelity (other topics)
Less Than Zero (other topics)
Adam Bede (other topics)
The Scarlet Letter (other topics)
More...
George R.R. Martin (other topics)
Allan Bloom (other topics)
Richard Dawkins (other topics)
Richard Dawkins (other topics)
More...
Books mentioned in this topic
War and Peace (other topics)High Fidelity (other topics)
Less Than Zero (other topics)
Adam Bede (other topics)
The Scarlet Letter (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Leo Tolstoy (other topics)George R.R. Martin (other topics)
Allan Bloom (other topics)
Richard Dawkins (other topics)
Richard Dawkins (other topics)
More...
Here's a link to my blog on Orphanage Birthdays: http://www.wattpad.com/62499579-orphanag..."
I was wondering about this-thanks for sharing it; even though I get teary. :)