Hotel Irrealismo discussion
Irrealismo Reception - the place for comments and enquiries
Mod
Hello. I've just joined. Thank you, Paul, for starting this group. Irrealism is a big interest of mine. Looking forward to reading/discussing with other people. I also write and have occasionally used this label on myself. So I'm eager to interact with any other writers who have checked into the hotel.
Hi! I just joined too, cause I saw Nathanimal had joined :) I'm not sure what irrealism is.
Jimmy wrote: "Hi! I just joined too, cause I saw Nathanimal had joined :) I'm not sure what irrealism is."There's a bit of discussion about this sprinkled around the group describing irrealism, but maybe we should start a thread on the topic, you know, to really get it sorted out.
This group is pretty quiet, though. I'm feeling weird about making any loud noises. It's kind of like that hotel from The Unconsoled in here with its eerily empty lobby and sagging ceiling. . . .
Mod
By turns, it's intermittently quiet and noisy here, Nathanimal. If you read my intro, I started it because anything similar on the site is stone cold dead. We're a hive of activity by comparison.
I think the intro is pretty clear about the sorts of works/writers I had in mind, Jimmy. In the opening thread, I explained my interpretation of the term "irrealism":
What is irrealism? A phenomenon that hasn't been clearly defined or thought about too much, is the honest answer. I was casting around for a term to describe much of the literature I enjoy when I found a reference to it.
I wanted a term that captured a sense of otherworldliness in writing. The writing is playful and/or experimental, eschewing realist narratives and scenarios. The setting is also sometimes but not always in a country or countries that do not exist in reality. That was my starting point.
Wiktionary has this to say: "a style that features an estrangement from our generally accepted sense of reality."
Wikipedia has a few hundred words on irrealism in literature. I've picked out the following. Irrealism is a "peculiar mode of postmodern allegory". "Irreal works such as Italo Calvino's Cosmicomics and Jorge Luis Borges' Ficciones can be seen as an attempt to find a new allegorical language to explain our changed perceptions of the world that have been brought about by our scientific and technical culture". "The paradox of a finite consciousness in an infinite universe creates a zone of irreality ('that which is beyond the real') that offsets, opposes, or threatens the real world of the human subject." In other words, it's impossible for us to truly order and make sense of the reality in which we exist and irrealist literature reflects this dilemma.
Don't you think there's something rather apposite about having a term that can't really be pinned down to describe works of this nature? More than anything, the term leads us towards a collection of brilliant authors - Borges, Calvino, Kafka, Perec and so on - whose writing has rejected the dominant realist mode.
Paul, thanks for setting up the group and getting the ball rolling. What's your vision for how you'd like the group to develop? E.g. do you envisage doing group/buddy reads, or do you want to focus more on general discussion and recommendations?
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Paul wrote: "Certainly, the idea was to read books at the same time as each other and then discuss them. In practice, it's proven a little difficult as people have read at such different speeds."Yes, different reading speeds are always a problem with group reads, I have found. Rolling discussions like those on the other thread look like a promising alternative. Thanks.
Maybe short stories offer a better opportunity for close reading and discussion?
Street of Crocodiles by Bruno Schulz could be a good irrealist short story collection choice
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I love Street of Crocodiles and I'm game to talk about it. Is there a story in the collection you're interested in taking on, Thomas? Any other willing crocodile hunters out there?
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Street of Crocodiles is available as an ebook, if that helps.
I'm new here. But I'd like to suggest Unwitting Street by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky, or perhaps just the first story "Comrade Punt".It was just published in English in August 2020. On the kindle page for the book, you can use the "look inside" feature to read the first short story in it's entirety. It is about a pair of pants that go on with life after their owner dies.
Eighteen strange, whimsical, and philosophical tales by the Russian master of the weird, all now in English for the very first time.
When Comrade Punt does not wake up one Moscow morning--he has died--his pants dash off to work without him. The ambitious pants soon have their own office and secretary. So begins the first of eighteen superb examples of Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky's philosophical and phantasmagorical stories. Where the stories included in two earlier NYRB collections (Memories of the Future and Autobiography of a Corpse) are denser and darker, the creations in Unwitting Street are on the lighter side: an ancient goblet brimful of self-replenishing wine drives its owner into the drink; a hypnotist's attempt to turn a fly into an elephant backfires; a philosopher's free-floating thought struggles against being "enlettered" in type and entombed in a book; the soul of a politician turned chess master winds up in one of his pawns; an unsentimental parrot journeys from prewar Austria to Soviet Russia.
When I read another Krzhizhanovsky book last year, it made me think of Street of Crocodiles, as well as many other things. Here is a review which compares it to Borges, Bolaño, Kafka, P.K. Dick, Flan O'Brien, etc., etc. Link to Biblioklept.
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Thanks for the tip, Bill. Personally, I don't buy e-books, preferring physical print. What was good enough for Ben Jonson is good enough for me...
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Welcome, Ed. I'll have a look into that. I'm not aware of it. Animated underpants sound more surreal than irreal.
Ed wrote: "I'm new here. But I'd like to suggest Unwitting Street by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky, or perhaps just the first story "Comrade Punt"."Hi, Ed. I'd be willing to check out a story or two from this collection and chat about it. I've enjoyed the other Krzhaivoajivobrykovsky that I've read. You'd have to give me a day or two to pop down to the bookstore and look for it.
Paul wrote: "Animated underpants sound more surreal than irreal."
Ha! Like 'The Nose' but with underwear. I hope it's boxers not briefs.
Paul wrote: "Welcome, Ed.:Thanks!
Animated underpants sound more surreal ..."
I'm using "pants" in the American way. Here, they are not an undergarment as I believe they are in the UK.
Ugh! I've been in several groups where one or more people have very narrow definitions of what some specific genre is and those discussions get so very, very tiresome.
I do like what you said above: Don't you think there's something rather apposite about having a term that can't really be pinned down to describe works of this nature? More than anything, the term leads us towards a collection of brilliant authors - Borges, Calvino, Kafka, Perec and so on - whose writing has rejected the dominant realist mode.
I'm interested in various literature that "rejects the dominant realist mode" and don't particularly care much about narrow definitions. "Pinning things down" and enforcing such boundaries is just as limiting as is mainstream fiction insisting on "realism".
So, anyway, Krzhizhanovsky was a brilliant author working outside the realist mold. The specific story that I've read that most closely matches what I understand of "irreal" is "The Branch Line" in the collection Memories of the Future. In it, a guy gets on the wrong train and ends up in a place near a factory where nightmares are created. They advertise "Our nightmares, weighing as they do on the brain, gradually form a sort of moral ceiling that is always about to come crashing down on one’s head: some of our customers call this 'world history.'" That story feels very much like "Street of Crocodiles". Other stories in the book are un-real in different ways.
The more recent collection which I haven't read yet is said to have "lighter" stories so maybe they won't mesh as well with this group.
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Well, you've put me in my place, haven't you, Ed? If you don't like the remit of the group, it's not obligatory to partake. No need to read those tiresome conversations! I just set up a group to discuss the sort of literature I like to read, Ed. "Hotel Discuss Anything You Like If It's Not Mainstreamismo" would have quite a different remit.
Where is the short story collection list Nathanimal?
Hi, Thomas. Do you mean the story list from Street of Crocodiles? If so, here you are:- August
- Visitation
- Birds
- Tailors' Dummies
- Treatise on Tailors' Dummies or the Second Book of Genesis
- Treatise on Tailors' Dummies: Continuation
- Treatise on Tailors' Dummies: Conclusion
- Nimrod
- Pan
- Mr. Charles
- Cinnamon Shops
- The Street of Crocodiles
- Cockroaches
- The Gale
- The Night of the Great Season
- The Comet
Many of these are brief, so we could do a few, if people were up for it. It's been a long time since I've read the book, but I recall liking 'Birds' and the Tailor's Dummy pieces and 'Cinnamon Shops' (originally the title piece of the collection).
Are you familiar with any of these, Thomas, or have any preferences?
Paul wrote: "Well, you've put me in my place, haven't you, Ed?I definitely wasn't trying to do anything of the sort. Why would I? How would that benefit me to insult a stranger who runs a discussion group I'm joining? I've been in other groups, and my comments are far more often trying to avoid controversy than cause it. Maybe I expressed myself badly, but I wasn't trying to insult you.
If you don't like the remit of the group, it's not obligatory to partake. No need to read those tiresome conversations! I just set up a group to discuss the sort of literature I like to read, Ed. "Hotel Discuss Anything You Like If It's Not Mainstreamismo" would have quite a different remit."
But I do think I like the "remit", as I understand it. (Though as a non-Brit, I don't use that term.)
I've looked at your shelves, and we seem to read similar stuff. I'm also friends with 2 of the other 20 members and we read similar stuff, so it looks like the right place for me.
I read the whole set of existing discussions before posting anything myself, and it all sounded like you were looking for discussions of things that feel like "Borges, Calvino, Kafka, Perec and so on ..." but which "... can't be pinned down ...." and that you have interest in "Cafe Irreal" but don't necessarily subscribe to all their opinions. Sounds perfect for me.
(I was unfamiliar with "Cafe Irreal" before seeing this group, and haven't formed much opinion about it yet.)
I was in a group recently where the moderator felt he was the one and only reliable reference for whether a work was "Weird", "Fantasy", "Science Fiction", or whatever particular term he was interested in that day. Nobody else's opinion mattered. It was tiresome. The group died because he scared everyone off. That is what was on my mind.
I just read The Box Man by Kōbō Abe. It was interesting. Not quite my cup of tea, but very close. Do you consider that "irreal"? I notice Abe was mentioned several times on Cafe Irreal, so they seem to accept him.
Nathanimal wrote: "Hi, Thomas. Do you mean the story list from Street of Crocodiles? If so, here you are: ..."I had coincidentally recently decided to read some more Shulz. But since I've already read "Street of Crocodiles" I was planning on "Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass" which is in the collection The Street of Crocodiles and Other Stories which my library has.
Ed wrote: "I just read The Box Man by Kōbō Abe. It was interesting. Not quite my cup of tea, but very close. Do you consider that "irreal"? I notice Abe was mentioned several times o..."I would cast a big yea vote for Kobo Abe being irrealist. If Irrealism means something like "dream-like" or "allegorical but ambiguous" then he's right in the sweet spot.
He's been a bit hit or miss for me. I loved Secret Rendezvous .
Ed wrote: "I had coincidentally recently decided to read some more Shulz. But since I've already read "Street of Crocodiles" I was planning on "Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass" which is in the collection The Street of Crocodiles and Other Stories which my library has."I could certainly be talked into reading those instead, if there's some consensus around that. If folks are coming to Schulz for the first time, then I'd probably vote for sticking to something(s) from Street of Crocodiles.
Mod
Nathanimal wrote: "[Abe]'s been a bit hit or miss for me. I loved Secret Rendezvous ."I've also had mixed feelings about Abe. Really enjoyed Secret Rendezvous, and The Face of Another.
Was wondering if you guys would be interested in starting a discord server for this group in addition to this goodreads one
I might be. What's a discord server?
Discord is basically a free to use chatroom style platform where users make and join “servers”, which are invite only groups such as this for whatever subjects they wish. They can also have channels, which is where different areas of discussion is divided up, such as the ones here
I guess I thought it could be a possibility because I find it easier to catch up on what has been posted on somewhere like discord than goodreads
Oh, right. Well that sounds interesting, Thomas, though I do wonder if that would get confusing or tedious to have this conversation happening in two different places, with some people left out of one but not the other.But if you do decide to start some sort of community away from here, I see no problem in you recruiting members from here and if the focus is irrealism or something like it, then I'd definitely like to be invited to something like that.
How's that for a yes-no namby-pamby answer?
Yeah I totally get what you're saying Nathanimal, and it tends to be millennials and people around my age who primarily use it, even though there is quite a range in the servers created. But I'll let you know if I start something nonetheless.
I had coincidentally recently decided to read some more Shulz. But since I've already read "Street of Crocodiles" I was planning on "Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass" which is in the collection The Street of Crocodiles and Other Stories which my library has.Have you seen the movie based on that short story? Quite elaborate.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070628/...
Bill wrote: "I've also had mixed feelings about Abe. Really enjoyed Secret Rendezvous, and The Face of Another."I loved Face of Another, but only saw the film version. The book must be quite a different experience. The book, as I understand, consists of the notebooks of the 3 characters. The film gives an single viewpoint, and is thus probably easier to understand. Also great visuals.
Klowey: No, I've not seen the film of "Sanatorium....". I check whether I can find it somewhere. I have seen the animated film of "Street of Crocodiles".
If the group reads one of the crocodillian tales, I'll probably play along since it will be right there in the same book as "Sanatorium...".
Sorry to be MIA for so long. I'm still dealing with the long-haul covid fatigue and illness. Sigh.However, today I watched this youtube video (for the Borges topic) and around 5:04 minutes in, he mentions Borges' writing as describing a world of Irreality "as some critics say." Have you come across others mentioning irreality and Borges?
https://youtu.be/f-GGALlLkIw
Mod
In the the intro to the group page, I wrote:
"This page is dedicated to the memory of the Argentinian literary critic, Ana María Barrenechea, who first used the term "irreality" in connection with Borges's works."
That's the main reference of which I'm aware. I suspect the term gets bandied around from time to time...
Thanks for the link. I'll take a look at that clip.
We were speaking of Bruno Schulz. A previously unknown story from 1922 was recently discovered and published in English as Undula. "It must’ve been weeks now, months, since I’ve been locked up in isolation."
Yeah, me too, buddy!
https://blog.sublunaryeditions.com/20...
Hello, everyone...thanks for the room key!My friend Klowey and I were discussing our mutual interest in reading W.G. Sebald and Bruno Schulz on facebook (and mutual appreciation for Borges and Kafka) and she kindly pointed me in the direction of this group. I look forward to discussing some great fiction with you all and getting some new irrealist recommendations!
Blaine wrote: "Hello, everyone...thanks for the room key!My friend Klowey and I were discussing our mutual interest in reading W.G. Sebald and Bruno Schulz on facebook (and mutual appreciation for Borges and Ka..."
And, I mentioned LAUM and when I told him that "The last chapter made my heart cry," he said that did it. He's adding Perec to his lists.
I am thrilled to have you in the group Blaine!
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Welcome to the hotel! It's always good to meet other readers with reading interests in common.
We have sporadic bursts of activity here but I'm always happy to talk Sebald and Perec and Kafka and Borges and others.
Blaine, from one rabbit to another hello! There is something irreal about a warren, no?
Now my thoughts are thumping along subterranean paths and coming up with examples. For instance:The crammed law offices in Kafka's The Trial or, really, any of the strange geography of that book, like the secret tunnel that connects an artist's garret to the offices of the court. Or, another obvious example from Kafka, "The Burrow."
Or Borges' labyrinths. Or the cities that often feature in irrealist fiction, which often seem like warrens.
I've only read Sebald's Rings of Saturn, but I seem to recall history being a kind of warren in that book.
Any other warrens? What's irreal about warrens?
(Oh no, the word 'warren' is sounding weird and dissociated to me now. . . . warren . . . . warren.)
Mod
Paul wrote: "I don't think Watership Down is a contender for inclusion on The List."Ha! Probably not. I might make a case for the White Rabbit's home in Alice in Wonderland, though, if we wanted to go down that rabbit hole.
A random question, but how would you guys define irrealist?
Hotel Irrealismo
Books mentioned in this topic
If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler (other topics)If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler (other topics)
Pedro Páramo (other topics)
Ficciones (other topics)
Cosmicomics (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Samuel Beckett (other topics)Jorge Luis Borges (other topics)
Ben Marcus (other topics)
Michal Ajvaz (other topics)
Edmund White (other topics)
More...
Welcome to the Hotel. Thanks for your comments and for moving them over here. It's always good to meet like-minded readers.
You may not be surprised to learn that I am aware both of Cafe Irreal and of the lack of similar sites on the internet. The name of this group is in part a doffing of the cap to that site, with tongue in cheek. The site hasn't been mentioned because the primary remit of the group is to discuss books by leading irrealist writers. As the intro says: "Think Borges, Kafka, Calvino and Perec. Think Sebald, Ishiguro, Cortazar and Karinthy." It's not about promoting individual journals/enterprises or, as the rules state, writers promoting their own work. I suspect there might already be enough such activity elsewhere on the internet.
I wouldn't want lovers of irreal fiction to come to these pages and be put off because it seems to be just another group where writers push their own work. Consequently, it wouldn't be the right place for an irrealist writing group. I do write but I have no wish to discuss that here since it's not the purpose of the group. If you do set up your own group, I'd be interested to take a look at what you're proposing.
I'm sorry and also surprised to learn about your writing group experience. I run a writing group that has been active for over five years now. The members write in a variety of styles but are open-minded and highly supportive of each other and egos are kept well in check (those who can't go along with this don't remain members).
Where people should drop you a line, Ali?
All the best
Paul