Exactly! It's just BORING! It's not like it's even radical, it's just middling dull dross in which nothing happens and we're supposed to think that something really sad has happened. that bit near the end where (A) attacks (B)- good on (A)!Originally Posted by JBI
In terms of over-rated 'high-brow' authors, Fyodor Dostoevskii problably tops the list. His garrulous, sentimental proto-fascist, as well as tedentious garbage is vastly over-rated. Sartre is another one. Dostoevskii also really nees to omit those long-winded, totally irrelevant passages about characters with serial neuroses that inhabit the opening passages of all his books.
In terms of popularity-Dan Brown is another abysmal writer. And that A.S Byatt book, 'Possession' was terrible.
The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness.-Vladimir Nabokov
human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars-Flaubert
I was in a bookstore when a man came in with a girl, and as they passed a pile of Harry Potter books, the girl said "I like Harry Potter."
The girl was about 7 years old.
I think that just about sums it up.
If she is 7, and reading at that level, congratulations to her. Somehow though, I doubt she has read the full series. After all, keep in mind 7 years old is a grade two reading level, whereas those books place around a 5-6.
Why do say that you "try to avoid it"? Surely any person who understands
hype when they see it just ignores it.
The reason why "everyone is so obsessed over it" is because they are too gullible to see that they are being used.
In a world where the lowest common denominator has become the touchstone for excellence it is hardly surprising that so much juvenilia fills the bookstores.
Obviously, there are some childrens books that might be considered as literature but they were written before the advent of mass marketing and the band-wagon syndrome that has reduced publishing to an outlet for whatever people can be gulled into buying.
I like Harry Potter
It is heartening to see such a negative response to George Orwell.
Many years ago when I was idealistic (ah! the joys of youth) I read everything by Orwell and thought he was great. However, as I began to realise that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, my admiration for Orwell decreased accordingly.
Orwell was a strangely tortured man whose influnce on readers can be dangerously misleading and whose idealism, carried to its logical conclusion, would lead to anarchy.
When I realised this, I was compelled to write a novel as an antidote to Orwell, and on meeting someone who told me he could arrange an introduction to the late author's wife, I was able to decline, secure in the knowledge that, despite his readability, I no longer had anything in common with him.
Totally the woman who wrote Mary Poppins.
The movie was great, and the book is considered to be an all-times classic, but it really was the most boring thing I've read in my life and one of the two books that I never finished (the other one was The Sound of Music, again a successful film with Julie Andrews-coincidence?).
J.K. Rowling
Most overrated writer = J.K. Rowling and Stephenie Meyer and Meg Cabot (it's a three way tie)
Little one, Fate might miscarry.
Little one, why do you tarry?
Little one, When May I marry you?
My little one.
Who conceives Shakespeare is the dominant writer?
You really have a thing against Dostoevsky, don't you? I mean, seriously, at some point, a line must be drawn even with personal tastes... To say Tolstoy is better than Dostoevsky is one thing, but to call D. the most overrated writer is just...wow.
I don't like your inclusion of Sartre either
Noću, u intimnom, poluglasnom razgovoru sa samim sobom, nikako ne mogu zapravo logički opravdati zašto se u posljednje vrijeme toliko uzrujavam zbog ljudske gluposti.
Miroslav Krleža
I really hate Hemingway. I don't think he was a bad writer exactly, but that world weary pose, the boasting, lying and exaggerating in his personal life (especially the way he convinced everyone he was a war hero...I mean ffs, the guy drove an ambulance on the Italian front, it's not like he was an infantry officer at the Somme or Verdun), the macho posteuring etc- there is something obnoxiously adolescent and insincere about Hemingway that I find repellent. You only have to look at his most devoted fans!
Paolo Coehlo is awful. He belongs on a shelf with Californian, New Age garbage. I think all those Latin American 'magic realism' writers are overrated. Read Hermann Hesse instead!
As for Orwell, I think the criticism a bit harsh. He was absolutely spot on in his attacks on Stalin's Russia at a time when many British intellectuals were defending and forgiving Stalin anything just because he wasn't Hitler.
p.s J K Rowling is for kids, so give her a break. At least kids read her and learn positive lessons: about loyalty, love, comradeship etc. If it wasn't for her those same kids would prob. be playing soulless, violent video games. It's not like they'd be reading Keats and Dickens instead (though I must admit, as a kids writer she's not in the same league as Roald Dahl)
But he was one of the all time great creators of characters. In that respect he deserves to be compared with Chaucer, Shakespeare, Cervantes and Tosltoy. Secondly, he captured a period/ place like few writers I know. When you think of Victorian London/ England/ Britain you think of Dickens. Thirdly, he shook the conscience of a nation that was becoming ever richer yet ignoring the misery and suffering of so many of its inhabitants. Very few writers have ever had so much influence for good.
However, I do know what you mean. He can be long winded (though perhaps that's because people back then had more time- no TV, no radio, no CDs, no cars etc etc) and sentimental.
Last edited by WICKES; 08-23-2008 at 06:05 PM.
Oh, Dickens could do the characters. You have to give him that.
Whilst I enjoyed Twilight, the writing was that of a 13 year old with a thesaurus.
He really is one of the all time greatest creators of characters. Only Shakespeare, Chaucer, Cervantes and a handful of others can compare. Among novelists he is almost supreme in that respect. People like Micawber, Scrooge, Bill Sykes etc seem almost archetypal.
Sartre was a surprise appearance. Nausea is an incredible novel. Read a bit of Mysticism then read it - astonishing. It really reads like a wide eyed innocent undergoing the full mystic/ Zen experience only NOT enjoying it- finding it hellish rather than uplifting. Scary stuff.
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