Weird books

[Kidijs]

Besides being perverted like Marquis de Sade, some books can really shake your views on the world. Some are just plain weird, some of the books present groundbreaking thoughts, but you can easily recognize a weird book. You just inevitably catch yourself thinking about the author: 'Did he really have mental health problems when he wrote that?'

Asides from keeping a blog (which can't be put out here, because it has foul language in its name :D) about weird books, I really like to read books that put me into an emotional state which makes me think - maybe I'm not crazy, but it's the world, and maybe I shouldn't be seeing spherical horses in vacuum when I'm bored, or listen to the ceiling... hear you me, it's cracking again!

So tell us, what have you read - and considered it f---ed in the head?

My little list is as follows:


Almost Transparent Blue by Ryu Murakami
The Wasp Factory by Ian Banks
A child called 'it' by Dave Pelzer
Maskeblomstfamilien (The Figwort Family) by Lars Saabye Christensen
Lolita (somewhat)
The people's act of love by James Meek
everything by Chuck Palahniuk

..and so on.

[Nemo Neem]

The Song of Maldoror by Comte de Lautreamont

[dfloyd]

I'm too busy reading the forty-eight romances of Alexandre Dumas.

[OrphanPip]

The Story of the Eye by George Batailles, or anything else by George Batailles.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Story_of_the_Eye

[Kidijs]

Wow, The Story of the Eye looks kind of extreme.

[glover7]

I read Mishima's Confessions of a Mask back when I was a sophomore in high school. At the time, I was closeted and privately engaged in regular bondage-oriented masturbatory activity. Moving right along, I thought that his writing was perhaps the most natural thing for a person.

My junior year of college, I read the book again for the class, and everyone in the class thought that it was bizarre and disturbing. There's a lesson in subjectivity for you.

As for disturbing books...I haven't really found a book that disturbed me. The only play that has ever pushed me into a rage was Larry Kramer's "The Normal Heart," which made me want to be an activist, but that was short-lived.

Dennis Cooper writes a number of books that deal with "disturbing" activity (rape, snuff, pedophilia), but even as I was reading them, I didn't really think they were disturbing. Maybe it's just that I'm desensitized by my own psyche (that makes me sound like a badass), but more than likely I'm just a freak. I'm more disturbed by movies than anything else.

[OrphanPip]

Speaking of Larry Kramer, Faggots isn't quite disturbing either, but it pulls no punches in its graphically honest portrayal of 1970s gay culture in New York City.

[glover7]

That's actually my favorite book of all time, Pip!

[FoghornBellows]

Check out "The Torture Garden" by Octave Mirbeau. Haha.

[Kidijs]

Every single one of those is pretty weird, thank you guys! I'll have ****tons to read:-)

glover7, : D
To top it off, you should also watch hentai (namely, shokushu goukan) or extra violent anime! haha, high five!

Also: just re-read Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk, and shall I say, it was a rather enjoyable experience. Especially with the story 'Guts', which supposedly fainted about 72 people while Palahniuk read the story publicly :D

[Veva]

CHOKE by Chuck Palahniuk perverted my own means of perception in ways I couldn't possibly imagine.... :nod:

[Dinkleberry2010]

A pretty weird work is James Joyce's "Finnegans Wake." William Faulkner also wrote some weird stuff.

[Old Crow]

Read "Infinite Jest" by David Foster Wallace. You really can't get weirder than that.

[glover7]

Every single one of those is pretty weird, thank you guys! I'll have ****tons to read:-)

glover7, : D
To top it off, you should also watch hentai (namely, shokushu goukan) or extra violent anime! haha, high five!

Also: just re-read Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk, and shall I say, it was a rather enjoyable experience. Especially with the story 'Guts', which supposedly fainted about 72 people while Palahniuk read the story publicly :D


I've watched Bible Black before, more for general laughter than for any sort of sexual pleasure, haha.

[Onikeflava]

Naked Lunch and Being There.

[Veva]

I think you should try the youtube. There is one video, something called Chuck Palahniuk's advice on stealing in bookshops.... it is just what he recommends of the contemporary authors. I read some of that stuff and it was quite as twisted as Chuck.... :thumbs_up

[Kidijs]

^, Looks like it was this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZPx8APsX30). Thanks!
I've never really read anything that's newer than 2 years, except for The People's Act Of Love by James Meek (hehe, another weird book!). Maybe Chucks video will cure that.

[Helga]

It may not be as weird as you are thinking but I'm still gonna mention Side effects, short story collection by Woody Allen... one is about a box you can go into with your favourite book and wake up in it, the main character changes ALOT in Madame Bovary... a strange idea I think....

[Lads of E3]

I read Mishima's Confessions of a Mask back when I was a sophomore in high school. At the time, I was closeted and privately engaged in regular bondage-oriented masturbatory activity. Moving right along, I thought that his writing was perhaps the most natural thing for a person.

My junior year of college, I read the book again for the class, and everyone in the class thought that it was bizarre and disturbing. There's a lesson in subjectivity for you.

As for disturbing books...I haven't really found a book that disturbed me. The only play that has ever pushed me into a rage was Larry Kramer's "The Normal Heart," which made me want to be an activist, but that was short-lived.

Dennis Cooper writes a number of books that deal with "disturbing" activity (rape, snuff, pedophilia), but even as I was reading them, I didn't really think they were disturbing. Maybe it's just that I'm desensitized by my own psyche (that makes me sound like a badass), but more than likely I'm just a freak. I'm more disturbed by movies than anything else.

Are you really that much of a freak?

[Jazz_]

I found "Snail" (Richard Miller) pretty weird when I first read it...

[parisp]

I found The Life of Pi to have a unique concept - i wont spoil it, but i had no idea when i got to the end which direction it was heading in.