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Merits of mindless books?

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blamspam Since: Oct, 2010
#126: Jul 2nd 2011 at 7:42:31 AM

@Deboss: So entertainment is your main goal when reading anything?

Rottweiler Dog and Pony Show from Portland, Oregon Since: Dec, 2009
Dog and Pony Show
#127: Jul 2nd 2011 at 8:11:45 AM

[up] It also has to be asked whether being stripped of ideas and meaning makes a book more entertaining.

Just as adventure stories, I dare say The Iliad, The Odyssey and Orlando Furioso outshine any books of meaningless entertainment. Is the entertainment value of The Count Of Monte Cristo diminished by having complex psychological themes?

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard
DomaDoma Three-Puppet Saluter Since: Jan, 2001
Three-Puppet Saluter
#128: Jul 2nd 2011 at 9:51:54 AM

Hell no. But does Monster not have complex psychological themes because it's a Japanese cartoon? Does A Song Of Ice And Fire not have dragons, ice zombies, and a lot of thought on things like war and tyranny and whether it's better to stay in a loveless marriage?

Hail Martin Septim!
Deboss I see the Awesomeness. from Awesomeville Texas Since: Aug, 2009
I see the Awesomeness.
#129: Jul 2nd 2011 at 9:57:05 AM

Yes. Unless I'm reading something technical, but those don't count.

Fight smart, not fair.
DoktorvonEurotrash Lex et Veritas from Not a place of honour (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#130: Jul 2nd 2011 at 10:29:22 AM

The only reason I read fiction is for escapism. Well, I tell a lie. Wanting to improve my own writing technique is another reason. But other than that, I only read fiction for escapism and entertainment. Same reason that I listen to music, or watch a play, or look at art.

Tzetze DUMB from a converted church in Venice, Italy Since: Jan, 2001
DUMB
#131: Jul 2nd 2011 at 10:49:52 AM

(skimmed this thread)

I've read: Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Henry The Third, A Midsummers Night Dream, the Eodupus one and a few others.

"the Eodupus one"? Do you mean Oedipus Rex, by Sophocles?

[1] This facsimile operated in part by synAC.
Rottweiler Dog and Pony Show from Portland, Oregon Since: Dec, 2009
Dog and Pony Show
#132: Jul 2nd 2011 at 10:52:02 AM

[up][up] Where are you trying to escape to?

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard
FreezairForALimitedTime Responsible adult from Planet Claire Since: Jan, 2001
Responsible adult
#133: Jul 2nd 2011 at 1:58:56 PM

Why should it matter?

I think it's just as fallacious to claim that art must have some underlying meaning as it is to say that it should be only for entertainment. As much as some people would like it to be otherwise, art is not merely about being thoughtful and observant or being "fun." And being one or the other does not make you "better." Having a "theme" or "pithy observations" doesn't make you work good at all if it cannot in some way captivate its audience and make them listen.

And personally, I always thought The Odyssey was overflowing with Idiot Ball, not to mention Deus ex Machina. Which even the ancient Greeks, who more or less invented it, started decrying after a while.

"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
NLK Mo A Since: May, 2010
#134: Jul 2nd 2011 at 2:05:58 PM

I don't see why books have to be any deeper or more boring than, say, movies or videogames. If a book just entertains me, I'm cool with that. I think that part of the reason books are perceived as denser is because a book generally takes more time, and are more immersive, what with all the "create the reality yourself" thingie.

Likes many underrated webcomics
DoktorvonEurotrash Lex et Veritas from Not a place of honour (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#135: Jul 2nd 2011 at 2:07:25 PM

[up][up]I don't want to spend every waking second focused on things in my immediate vicinity. I'd suspect a lot of people feel the same.

Though "escape" is a lot stronger than what I'm doing, really, since I don't hate my surroundings enough to want to flee from them. I just want a break.

blamspam Since: Oct, 2010
#136: Jul 2nd 2011 at 7:16:37 PM

But why do people avoid the really good stuff altogether? They think it's snobby or too difficult or boring? It's really not going to kill you to just pick something old up.

And to the people that said there's less access to classical stuff, the fact that it's been in print a long time means there are lots of new and old editions to choose from, they're absolutely everywhere in secondhand stores, and they take up walls in Barnes and Noble. I live somewhere that the only store dedicated strictly to books is more than an hour away, but I've stocked up on tons of classics cheap.

I've never seen any popular entertainment series selling cheaper than a classic does. I'm seriously confused by someone saying they're more expensive/harder to find.

Tzetze DUMB from a converted church in Venice, Italy Since: Jan, 2001
DUMB
#137: Jul 2nd 2011 at 7:20:48 PM

Maybe people associate classics with school, and school with being boring and terrible.

Barnes & Noble as a buy two classics*

get one free deal going right now. I very nearly got about 2400 pages of small print books for a pittance.

edited 2nd Jul '11 7:21:37 PM by Tzetze

[1] This facsimile operated in part by synAC.
blamspam Since: Oct, 2010
#138: Jul 2nd 2011 at 7:30:46 PM

And Target has been selling classics unabridged and annotated for a whopping $1.50 in their little dollar section. Don't dismiss it because they're lying about everything being 1 dollar in it! tongue

I understand that, because an old English class of mine turned me off of Steinbeck for awhile because they overdosed on that author because he was from the United States. But since I was sick of him, I looked for American authors that were missed in the course and found some great stuff. High school classes introduce you to most anything, you don't really get enough immersion to judge on a full experience.

Tzetze DUMB from a converted church in Venice, Italy Since: Jan, 2001
DUMB
#139: Jul 2nd 2011 at 7:37:35 PM

And of course, many of them were originally published as serials in popular magazines. Not that they were classics yet.

[1] This facsimile operated in part by synAC.
Rottweiler Dog and Pony Show from Portland, Oregon Since: Dec, 2009
Dog and Pony Show
#140: Jul 2nd 2011 at 7:45:43 PM

[up] Which is why, say, Les Miserables has so many insane digressions. "Now I'll lecture you on the Paris sewers."

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard
MrShine Since: Jun, 2011 Relationship Status: Hoping Senpai notices me
#141: Jul 2nd 2011 at 9:01:39 PM

I like to go for a third option. I enjoy science fiction, but I want to read classic books. Solution? Read classic sci-fi! I've rarely been disappointed with either the entertainment value or the thought-provoking content of these books. They are a bit trickier to find though, sometimes.

DomaDoma Three-Puppet Saluter Since: Jan, 2001
Three-Puppet Saluter
#142: Jul 2nd 2011 at 10:57:53 PM

The problem with classic sci-fi is Science Marches On. My god, every Heinlein book involving Martians makes me wince like you wouldn't believe. Say what you will about fantasy, sci-fi aficionados, but it takes much longer to get dated.

Hail Martin Septim!
MrShine Since: Jun, 2011 Relationship Status: Hoping Senpai notices me
#143: Jul 2nd 2011 at 11:12:53 PM

I find it endearing. There is something entertaining about androids doing math problems with slide rules. Or worlds with nuclear powered wrist-watches and faster-than-light-travel with no cell phones or computers. A lot of the fun is looking at what the writers got right (a lot!) and what turned out to be much simpler (processing power, miniaturization) or much more difficult (AI) than they believed. Science Marches On has never ruined my enjoyment of a book.

FreezairForALimitedTime Responsible adult from Planet Claire Since: Jan, 2001
Responsible adult
#144: Jul 3rd 2011 at 11:04:51 AM

"Really good" is quite subjective, that's why. Ask any English major worth his or her salt, and I'm sure they'll tell you of at least one POS "classical" author who wouldn't deserve their fame if it had been vomitted on them by an ambling, homeless drunk.

"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
blamspam Since: Oct, 2010
#145: Jul 3rd 2011 at 12:54:36 PM

Is that a reason to altogether avoid classics though? It really seems like a lot of tropers do.

DomaDoma Three-Puppet Saluter Since: Jan, 2001
Three-Puppet Saluter
#146: Jul 3rd 2011 at 2:30:47 PM

Eh, well, I'm on a pimping spree for Valley of Fear at this very moment. It's not exactly the kind of thing that would get a postmodern critic's vote, but to hell with those people.

Hail Martin Septim!
brc2000 Thermonuclear Warrior from here Since: Jul, 2010
Thermonuclear Warrior
#147: Jul 3rd 2011 at 3:39:53 PM

I don't think that people have a problem with "classics", at least I certainly don't seeing that all my favorite books came out before the 60s. What I have a problem with is the insinuation that an "adventure" book is devoid of any value. Also, while "classics" and literary books can be entertaining (which is obvious), not all of them are. While a meaningful and entertaining "classic" is better than just pure entertainment, pure entertainment is better than a meaningful, but dull "classic".

And another thing, people who think that all fantasy and sci-fi is "mindless", obviously haven't read much of it. I'd say someone like Mervin Peake has just about as much credibility as anyone. Plus the last time I checked The Iliad, The Odyssey and several of Shakespeare's plays are fantastical. I lean towards spec. fiction, historical fiction, adventure, military fiction, and dramas with interesting concepts, but that's just personal preference (not just with literature, but all forms of media) and there are tons of books to keep me satisfied, both classic and contemporary, both literary and "escapist". Nobody should be forced to read something in a genre he has no interest in any more than he/she would, say, a book on neurosurgery or aeronautical engineering. We're not all art, language, media, or literature students. Some of us read for pleasure. I've read a lot of the "classics", but I'm not going to read Bleak House just for the sake of it. I don't care about form, language use, or literary technique. I want an engaging plot with interesting characters.

So entertainment is your main goal when reading anything?

A work of fiction should, at minimum, be entertaining or at least interesting (done through the plot and/or characters), not just technically well written.

edited 3rd Jul '11 4:47:11 PM by brc2000

blamspam Since: Oct, 2010
#148: Jul 3rd 2011 at 6:56:31 PM

I don't know, I try to keep an open mind. The stuff I like best makes you appreciate human experience and classics tend to do that best for me. Science fiction offers interesting ways to do that.

A bit of guilty pleasure/mindless entertainment is good. It's fun. Taking in only that is like eating only junk food.

I would not think that all science fiction/fantasy/adventure is trash, it's all in the presentation. There are plenty of well-written and meaningful books in those genres. It's the fact that I keep seeing people act like there isn't any difference between the flavor text on Magic The Gathering cards and the best prose there is. That's what bothers me.

[up] Finding the meaning isn't enough to keep attention to it? Yeah, there are some tough nuts to crack, but the truly dull ones are in the minority in my experience.

edited 3rd Jul '11 7:05:03 PM by blamspam

Tzetze DUMB from a converted church in Venice, Italy Since: Jan, 2001
DUMB
#149: Jul 3rd 2011 at 7:57:03 PM

The problem with classic sci-fi is Science Marches On. My god, every Heinlein book involving Martians makes me wince like you wouldn't believe. Say what you will about fantasy, sci-fi aficionados, but it takes much longer to get dated.

I don't read Speculative Fiction stories for realism, personally. That doesn't grate for me any more than a nineteenth century novel's characters' technology does. And it's a lesson in how to predict the future, too.

[1] This facsimile operated in part by synAC.
FreezairForALimitedTime Responsible adult from Planet Claire Since: Jan, 2001
Responsible adult
#150: Jul 3rd 2011 at 8:33:21 PM

A lot of classics were written to be the mindless fluff of their day. Shakespeare wrote for a mostly low-brow audience (the man certainly didn't screw around when it came to dick jokes and sexual innuendo), I think we already compared Charles Dickens to Stephenie Meyer in this thread (Dickens' sweeping sentimentalism earned him the same sort of detractors Twilight gets today), and the only reason Sir Arthur Conan Doyle kept writing Sherlock Holmes was Money, Dear Boy; his true calling (as he saw it) was to write fantasy. "Older" does not mean, by default, "more intellectually stimulating." It might mean "accustom yourself to a different style of writing because fiction standards were very different back then, meaning the text will take more brainpower to decipher," but that doesn't necessarily make them better.

I don't think books should be given a free pass just because they're older, or that a book should be scoffed at just because it's in a certain genre or more recent. Books should be evaluated on a case-to-case basis.

I think one of the only things I've ever seen that looks at a work of classic literature and doesn't immediately scream "pretention" to me is The Annotated Alice, which is, of course, an annotation of Alices Adventures In Wonderland. Although it points out the endless stream of pop culture references in the book and goes into detail about some of the wordplay, it's not overly metaphorical or anything. It explains, but it doesn't go crazy with the analyzing.

I don't think it's so much about "mindless" books as it is that many people tend to think of books—especially classics—as being a lot more mindful than they really are.

"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada

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