Proust v Joyce v Tolstoy

Gene Wolfe

He'll have to die before people take this seriously though.

Intriguing answer. I've read "The Book of the New Sun" and "The Book of the Long Sun." It's good stuff, and isn't there another sequel cycle after them now?

My answer is Gaddis' The Recognitions.

Shit. Turns out Wolfe is an Aggie! Plus, look at the guy.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a9/Genewolf1.png

war and peace seems like the only sensible answer.

if you only caught 5-10% of ulysses you will catch less than a tenth of a percent of finnegan's wake. its like a black hole.

Yeah, that's the one that really puts the fear in me.

A fairer comparison would be the bildungsroman of each:

Portrait of the Artist > Childhood/Boyhood/Youth > Du côté de chez Swann / À l'ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs

It's Finnegans Wake, no apostrophe.

Also, the way FW and Remembrance are heavy reads are entirely different! For instance, one has intricately drawn characters and dialogues, and the other is built out of polyglot puns and has archetypes for characters so it can make dirty jokes.

Why not read Dante's Commedia instead?

Furthermore, one is in French and one is kindasorta in English.

Would you be reading it in French? I've only read the first 50-page section in French, and after I'd read it in English, but it wasn't nearly as difficult as I expected it to be.

Heh - no. I am, sadly, a wretched monoglot.

most importantly, proust will get you the most babes

You'll get as many babes as Proust himself got!

Those aren't my kind of babes!

men?

War & Peace--if you can get through the parts where Tolstoy goes on and on about his philosophy on the inhumanity of war and the course of human events (he has some neat ideas, dude just repeats himself a lot) there is actually a lot of funny, moving, action-packed, or otherwise really enjoyable stuff to be had, especially if you really let yourself get into the main characters' development.

I love all the Gene Wolfe that I've read (which is a considerable amount), but I would rate the majority of his other novels as more important than any sequels he's written to The Book of the New Sun. Those first four are what I was stacking up against your epics though. It's all good.

My answer is Gaddis' The Recognitions.

Seriously. You're gonna fuck up yr brain if you try for FW, you'll never finish the Proust, and I've never heard of this Tolstoy guy. What else did he write?

Finished Proust about three years ago. I read Anthony Powell this summer -- not quite as rewarding.

Proust but only because Ulysses isn't on the list. FW is just too much, I think I get even less than oilyrags. But Ulysses is genius. Proust is lovely though. W&P isn't my cuppa tea at all. Now, how about 'A Man Without Qualities'?

> You're gonna fuck up yr brain if you try for FW

Lucky for me, I'm already a basketcase.

sweet valley high v garfield v judy bloome

Gravity's Rainbow? Dhalgren? Making of Americans? Tale of Genji? The Sound and the Fury? The Waves? Pamela? Tristram Shandy?

Yes, no, no, no, yes, yes, yes, yes

Finnegans Wake is better lived with than assaulted like the north face of the Eiger. And a few crib sheets are a good thing early on.

That would be my third or fourth time through GR - I'm looking for something new. Gaddis is probably a really good idea.

(The only ones mentioned so far that I've actually finished are Dhalgren and Tristram Shandy.)

(Also I don't know what Que's yeses mean exactly but no one should yes Pamela.)

Pamela's good for (indirectly) allowing Tom Jones to exist tho.

Nate - Have you read Wolfe's newest "Soldier" book? I'd totally forgotten about those, and now I'm kind of excited to reread them as a trilogy. Also, that fucking Memento guy totally ripped him off! (I rather like that fucking "Memento" guy, actually. Batman Continues should KICK ASS.)

Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann. That's yr hefty reading assignment. Charming, funny, gripping and as you require...epic.

Or, if you want even larger and funnier: The Man without Qualities by Robert Musil...that's moving into Proust territory.

Man Without Qualities obviously is my answer.

If you want to go after Gaddis but want something a bit more (formally) challenging than The Recognitions you could try always try JR, which is way funnier and probably a bit less anachronistic-feeling and doesn't play quite as many Spot The Reference games.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

PAMELA is the worst fucking book ever, but there are some amusing moments, like when her master is spying on her in her closet and jumps out in her clothes, or when she is trying to run away but she sees some cows she thinks look like her parents.

I don't know that a good epistolary novel exists. One more amusing thing about Pamela is that at one point she sews her letters into her skirts!

http://www.outlar.com/images/artists/Joyce1.jpg

Steve Stapleton got a sex change???

the answer to this question is Proust's work.

Finnegan's Wake is a chaos, and ulysess is much better.
war and peace is great and timeless but in terms of new forms in litreture, and uniqueness of modern art,it doesnt compre to "lost time".
reading all those books is a special experience, that is not similiar to anything in the hisory of prose.
(while in tolsty's case, there are similiar experience,like even reading "anna karenina"(

"reading all those books" - proust ones i mean.
i've been reading 4 of them myself, but i plan to read it all before i die..

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

no one should yes Pamela

pamela is awesome and full of good stuff. like the list of rules that mr b gives her so that she will make a proper wife.

I don't know that a good epistolary novel exists

evelina! and lots other. but mainly evelina.

Evelina was pretty decent, but:

Pamela
Dear Mr. Henshaw

...
+ many more!

Okay adam you are making me want to reread Pamela and that is a desire I never thought I wld have.

I keep meaning to read Tom Jones bcz I loved Joseph Andrews SO MUCH. I have a copy but have still never cracked it open. wtf me

tom jones is fucking great

It's probably going to be War and Peace after all, but thanks for everyone's input! Anyway, I got some other shit to get to first, but I think January is Russian Epic month at Chez Oilyrags.

First impressions of "War and Peace" as of page sixty or thereabouts:

I didn't realize it would be so funny!

many of you have probably seen...

http://www.france24.com/en/20170215-france-literature-marcel-proust-footage-wedding-clip

Tolstoi is fantastic but more classic 19th century epic roman.
Proust is the most beautiful french written oeuvre, for me. Actually it's so intrinsically french (I mean the language) that I don't really see how it could be as good once translated.
As for Joyce, I tried to read Ulysses (in english) but never got into it. I guess it's impossible to really understand it if english is not your mother tongue...