10 most difficult books to finish (from The guardian)

Started by Josephus, November 09, 2012, 09:52:15 AM

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MadImmortalMan

#45
November 09, 2012, 12:15:18 PM
I never understood the James Joyce hate.


The Bronte sisters are insufferable though.
"Stability is destabilizing." --Hyman Minsky

"Complacency can be a self-denying prophecy."
"We have nothing to fear but lack of fear itself." --Larry Summers

Gups

#46
November 09, 2012, 12:22:55 PM
Critique by Kant. Couldn't get past the fifth chapter and I really tried multiple times.

A Brief History of Time. First half is no problem but gets progressively more difficult.

Not really had any trouble with novels, although Blood Meridan was so depressing I nealy killed myself before finishing it.

celedhring

#47
November 09, 2012, 12:29:15 PM
Quote from: MadImmortalMan on November 09, 2012, 12:15:18 PM
I never understood the James Joyce hate.


The Bronte sisters are insufferable though.

I loved Ulysses, but to this day I still don't get what one has to gain by reading Finnegan's Wake. Lots of other avantgarde literature managed to break new ground while at the same time managing to still being compelling to the reader.

The Brain

#48
November 09, 2012, 01:41:02 PM
I finish maybe 95 % of books I start. The rest are very poorly written with editors asleep at the wheel. Usually takes me 10-20 pages or so to give up on a book.
Women want me. Men want to be with me.

mongers

#49
November 09, 2012, 02:33:14 PM
I'm 'wise' enough not to have started any of those.  :P


Well I've an ebook of Das Capital, but I'm fairly sure I never made it out of the introduction.
"We have it in our power to begin the world over again"

Barrister

#50
November 09, 2012, 03:12:28 PM
Quote from: Brazen on November 09, 2012, 11:35:59 AM
I haven't read any of those, but I've never understood the appeal of literary books or classics for the sake of it. I'm the girl who ditched English Lit for Film Studies. Well given the choice...

I struggled with Moby Dick, but made it through.

15 years ago I was working in the bush in northern Manitoba.  I stocked up on classics.

I found it was really valuable.  Mostly because you don't realize how often those classics get picked up and referenced in other subsequent works.

Take Moby Dick (which I read that summer).  Reading Moby Dick took my enjoyment of Wrath of Khan to another level. :nerd:
Posts here are my own private opinions.  I do not speak for my employer.

Josephus

#51
November 09, 2012, 03:18:54 PM
I read Moby Dick, but am surprised you could finish that and not Crime & Punishment. Moby Dick was pretty boring. I vaguely recall one chapter which was all about a bucket.
Civis Romanus Sum<br /><br />"My friends, love is better than anger. Hope is better than fear. Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we'll change the world." Jack Layton 1950-2011

The Brain

#52
November 09, 2012, 03:20:51 PM
Moby Dick is awesome. I bet you hate Joseph Conrad too.
Women want me. Men want to be with me.

Eddie Teach

#53
November 09, 2012, 03:31:51 PM
Conrad didn't replace every third chapter with an encyclopedia article.
To sleep, perchance to dream. But in that sleep of death, what dreams may come?

The Brain

#54
November 09, 2012, 03:34:46 PM
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on November 09, 2012, 03:31:51 PM
Conrad didn't replace every third chapter with an encyclopedia article.

Why do you hate Conrad?
Women want me. Men want to be with me.

Razgovory

#55
November 09, 2012, 04:01:20 PM
I found Gravity's Rainbow deliberately opaque.  I have that book on the 30 years war, that I tried to read twice but never finished.
I've given it serious thought. I must scorn the ways of my family, and seek a Japanese woman to yield me my progeny. He shall live in the lands of the east, and be well tutored in his sacred trust to weave the best traditions of Japan and the Sacred South together, until such time as he (or, indeed his house, which will periodically require infusion of both Southern and Japanese bloodlines of note) can deliver to the South it's independence, either in this world or in space.  -Lettow April of 2011

Raz is right. -MadImmortalMan March of 2017

garbon

#56
November 09, 2012, 06:56:35 PM
Quote from: MadImmortalMan on November 09, 2012, 12:15:18 PM
I never understood the James Joyce hate.


The Bronte sisters are insufferable though.

Anne is lovely!
"I've never been quite sure what the point of a eunuch is, if truth be told. It seems to me they're only men with the useful bits cut off."
I drank because I wanted to drown my sorrows, but now the damned things have learned to swim.

PDH

#57
November 09, 2012, 08:26:19 PM
I always hated slogging through Foucault.
I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma, a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth.
-Umberto Eco

-------
"I'm pretty sure my level of depression has nothing to do with how much of a fucking asshole you are."

-CdM

Capetan Mihali

#58
November 10, 2012, 12:59:32 AM
"Under The Volcano" is one of my favorite books.  The rest, I haven't attempted I don't think.  Some of Celine's post-war books could be hard-going, it depends on whether you're locked-in to the rhythm of his ranting or not.

"Being And Time" required a lot of effort, but was well worth it.  The same with any other big philosophical volumes I've read.
"The internet's completely over. [...] The internet's like MTV. At one time MTV was hip and suddenly it became outdated. Anyway, all these computers and digital gadgets are no good. They just fill your head with numbers and that can't be good for you."
-- Prince, 2010. (R.I.P.)
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