Tristram Shandy

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I can't wait to see what develops in this thread...

― Girolamo Savonarola, Sunday, 2 March 2003 00:43 (twenty-two years ago)

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― jack cole (jackcole), Sunday, 2 March 2003 02:34 (twenty-two years ago)

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― jack cole (jackcole), Sunday, 2 March 2003 02:36 (twenty-two years ago)

hi! my name is (what) my name is (who) my name is (wicka wicka) Tristram Shandy

― da pryme movah, Sunday, 2 March 2003 03:24 (twenty-two years ago)

It was one of those books I was supposed to read in college but never bothered.

― Aaron W (Aaron W), Sunday, 2 March 2003 03:51 (twenty-two years ago)

"Whatever thou hast to say, be it more
or less, forget not to utter it in a low soft
tone of voice. Silence, and whatever
approaches it, weaves dreams of mid-
night secrecy into the brain : For this
cause, if thou canst help it, never throw
down the tongs and poker."

Laurence Sterne, Tristam Shandy, Vol. 8, Ch. 35

― jack cole (jackcole), Sunday, 2 March 2003 04:29 (twenty-two years ago)

This was the book I was going to recommend in the "Classics or Dud" thread but never got around to it. Absolute classic (even if, like book 7 or 8 or wherever the travelogue book is -- even if that's kind of a dud).

Oh, wait, I think I mentioned this book on another thread a day or so ago. I've been busy at work. Maybe a whole beautiful thread blossomed and I missed it!

― Chris P (Chris P), Sunday, 2 March 2003 04:32 (twenty-two years ago)

Just checked. Nope! Ah well.

― Chris P (Chris P), Sunday, 2 March 2003 04:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Tristram Shandy is what Adaptation was trying to be, methinks.

Anyone wanna buy a Preface?

― Girolamo Savonarola, Sunday, 2 March 2003 05:05 (twenty-two years ago)

I think I did recommend it on the Classics thread. It's the book that proves that Postmodernism predates Modernism by centuries! More importantly, it's probably the most playful, fun book in the first couple of centuries of Western novels.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Sunday, 2 March 2003 10:31 (twenty-two years ago)

Indeed. Did this at university for an English module - mentioned it to a po/mo specialist and it turned his brain to mush.

― Nick Southall (Nick Southall), Sunday, 2 March 2003 11:55 (twenty-two years ago)

Read it in college and LOVED it. It was published originally two books at a time (except for the seventh and last, which came out on its own), and every time other people would publish a third or fifth or seventh book of their own and try to pass it off as Sterne's... I looked up some of them, and it's fascinating to see other writers trying to wrap their brains around what Sterne was up to.

― Douglas (Douglas), Sunday, 2 March 2003 14:45 (twenty-two years ago)

It's been sitting on my shelf for several years - this thread has made me more inclined to read it sooner rather than later. Thank you.

― I'm Passing Open Windows (Ms Laura), Sunday, 2 March 2003 20:50 (twenty-two years ago)

nine months pass...

is it really difficult to read?
i always imagine it to be really involved and confusing

― robin (robin), Monday, 15 December 2003 01:48 (twenty-two years ago)

it isnt, its quite a good read, and manages to envelop you/take you off.

― anthony easton (anthony), Monday, 15 December 2003 05:12 (twenty-two years ago)

I didn't read it in college. I had dropped out of college and was crashing in a friend's closet/attic space. I had a cheap paperback version I carried in the pocket of my coat as I wandered around the city of Portand, Oregon. Whenever I felt like reading, I pulled it out and read it. The book didn't feel any stranger than my life at the time felt.

― Aimless, Monday, 15 December 2003 05:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Robin, it's written in old fashioned prose and therefore isn't a bright and breezy read, but it's clever and fun most of the way through, and not at all like reading Fielding or Richardson or Defoe.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 13:53 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm going to have to take issue with the inclusion of Fielding in that list, Mr Skidmore.

Tristram Shandy has been sitting unopened on my bookshelf since university - I was supposed to have read it in my 18th Century class, but skipped it in favour of concentrating on Clarissa. I regret this decision.

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 14:01 (twenty-two years ago)

I dunno, I had no problems reading Defoe when I was much younger. Mind you, it may have been a bowdlerized edition, but Defoe isn't that bad reading-wise, really.

― , Tuesday, 16 December 2003 14:37 (twenty-two years ago)

GREAT book!

almost up there with rabelais/ voltaire/ don quixote in the "classic books that i have actually read more than once" category.

i love how these books all have similar structures, one shared by another classic, "pee wee's big adventure": bad shit happens, narrow escape, bad shit happens, narrow escape, rinse repeat, okay then you have a fucked-up ending of some sort, and voila!

― yetimike (McGonigal), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 14:43 (twenty-two years ago)

You think Fielding reads like TS, Matt? I can't see it myself at all.

― Martin Skidmore (Martin Skidmore), Tuesday, 16 December 2003 19:17 (twenty-two years ago)

It's a fantastic book -but the dashes -can make -you laugh -or get -on -your -tits -depending on what -mood you're in -

-i like them
-though

― pete s, Tuesday, 16 December 2003 19:24 (twenty-two years ago)

six years pass...

I am trying to read it at the moment. It is wrecking my head - such a struggle. I keep thinking of all the non-fiction books I could have read and enjoyed in the time it has taken to get through 50 pages.

― The New Dirty Vicar, Friday, 3 September 2010 10:34 (fifteen years ago)

try martin rowson's comic book version instead.

― joe, Friday, 3 September 2010 10:43 (fifteen years ago)

Ian, I was like you (struggled to get past the section about the midwife early on) then it suddenly clicked. Stick with it.

― Hey Jabulani! Pope of four four two. (aldo), Friday, 3 September 2010 10:57 (fifteen years ago)

Irene is a good bit ahead of me and she is both enjoying it and finding it heavy going. I must try harder.

― The New Dirty Vicar, Friday, 3 September 2010 11:18 (fifteen years ago)

Utterly classic. Also, provided the occasion for Dr. Samuel Johnson to make one of his biggest howlers, "Nothing odd will do long. Tristram Shandy did not last."

― Aimless, Friday, 3 September 2010 16:26 (fifteen years ago)

three years pass...

the H O M U N C U L U S

― j., Monday, 16 December 2013 02:02 (twelve years ago)

this is one of the greatest things ever conceived & created

― VENIET IMBER (imago), Monday, 16 December 2013 02:03 (twelve years ago)

I didn't finish it but one of my favorite professors once told me "there isn't really much of a point in finishing it," loved it for the few hundred pages I read

― combination hair (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Monday, 16 December 2013 02:36 (twelve years ago)

the extended fade-out of an ending is pretty lovely tbh

― wee knights of the round table (Noodle Vague), Monday, 16 December 2013 07:10 (twelve years ago)

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Tristram Shandy - C/D?