Most pointless book you have read

[thomas212]

Yeah, but books are so 'trendy' now. It just seems so...either you get chick lit, book-set-in-foreign-country-and-you-will-look-clever-if-you-read-it, the 10 billionth new thriller, the 'philosophical' or 'political' book, etc...

No one look clever by reading books and i don't read chick lit.As for foreign countries settings,if only local literature sound genuine to you,fair enough.Every on choose his own borders.
There is many moderne novels that have the construction of classic.I mention Fitzgerald and Andrei Makine,but i could add many more Richard Yates,Amin Maalouf,Cormac Mccarthy,....that i would not call trendy.

Back to pointlessness with Jonathan Coe -the closed circle that i finished few days ago.It felt like watching a British sitcom.

[Drkshadow03]

I agree with you totally on The Great Gatsby, it's a good read, but i don't know why everyone goes on about it's value?

I wrote a blog entry last year on my re-read of the Great Gatsby that you may or may not find helpful in making sense of the novel. Many of the comments here seem spot-on.

How bout the harry potter books?
Kinda fun to read, but pretty pointless.

Harry Potter recasts world myths into the framework of a boarding school coming-of-age story. The main characters are really Voldemort and Harry Potter who are mirror reflections of each other, but who ultimately take very different paths because of different choices in how they will respond to their life situations. The story is mainly about "Choice." Love and friendship (caring for others) are shown to be superior choices to controlling others fear and obedience (selfish acts). Some have pointed out that Harry always survives because of some deus ex machina, pointing this out as a flaw. However, I would argue this is partially the point. Harry isn't an overly talented wizard. He relies on his friends to survive, to solve his problems; he relies on others and that is his strength. Voldemort relies only himself, but is in fact one of the most talented wizard to have ever lived.

You also have a critique of racism, fascism, school life, and government bureacracy. It brings these issues to life again through the fantasy world that parallels our own.

I'm not trying to start another "Harry Potter - teh awesumz/Harry Potter = teh sux" thread, but I did think it was worth addressing what I think some of the point was of Harry Potter.

[Pensive]

None.

Every seemed to have a point even if it was never to read any book by the same author again!

[kiki1982]

m Hugo's point of view I would have to say Les Misérables, because it was supposed to come out of dust and fade away in it (the verses on Valjean's grave at the end)... Although, there he missed his own point, because it makes a point about the underclass.

But at the end you do feel like, 'what was the point of those lives anyway'...

I suppose that is to the point and pointless?

[Emil Miller]

I wrote a blog entry last year on my re-read of the Great Gatsby that you may or may not find helpful in making sense of the novel. Many of the comments here seem spot-on.

Thanks for the Blog entry on Gatsby. It is laid out in a way that makes it particularly pertinent to this thread: ie. First a synopsis that asks "But what does it all mean?" and then a brilliant exposition of the novel itself. For anyone who doesn't understand what all the fuss is about,a reading of the Blog will tell them.

[PabloQ]

I extremely enjoyed The Sun Also Rises but at the end of it I found myself asking why Hemingway felt the need to write it. It's been a long time since I've read anything by Hemingway, but I find his narrative powerful and compelling. I can also see why some may find his style not to their liking. However, I just couldn't see the point. I'm not sure I needed one to enjoy it, but I couldn't help reflecting on what the heck I was supposed to take away from it.

Another candidate would be The Wings of the Dove by Henry James. That novel I hated on so many levels, but at the end of it I wondered what was the point? The depths that a human being could stoop to swindle someone else out of their money? And get away with it? So what?

And while y'all are picking on poor Scott Fitzgerald, I have the similar reaction to This Side of Paradise. I loved the book and found Fitzgerald's writing to be lyrical. But in the end I couldn't see the point in the story of a young man who missed the point of his entire history as told throughout the book.

Dark Muse, thank you for this spin on the "negative" reading experience. I'd read the Hemingway and the Fitzgerald works again despite my finding them pointless.

[Dark Muse]

I also found The Case of Benjamin Button to be a pretty pointless story. I just did not get the whole point of the character reliving his life backward when it did not seem as if he learned anything from the experience of gained any insight from it.

[greenfroggsplat]

I love Jane Austen but I found Love and Freindship a little pointless. I like her style and all. So it's probably because I found it raw...

[Emil Miller]

I extremely enjoyed The Sun Also Rises but at the end of it I found myself asking why Hemingway felt the need to write it. It's been a long time since I've read anything by Hemingway, but I find his narrative powerful and compelling. I can also see why some may find his style not to their liking. However, I just couldn't see the point. I'm not sure I needed one to enjoy it, but I couldn't help reflecting on what the heck I was supposed to take away from it.

And while y'all are picking on poor Scott Fitzgerald, I have the similar reaction to This Side of Paradise. I loved the book and found Fitzgerald's writing to be lyrical. But in the end I couldn't see the point in the story of a young man who missed the point of his entire history as told throughout the book.

As a novel concerning American expats in post WW1 Europe, The Sun Also Rises has an authentic ring to the writing, but then it should do considering the author's background. I do agree with PabloQ, however, about the seemingly pointless plotline. It has been suggested on other entries to this forum that the story has a subtext relating to Eliot's The Wasteland and I couldn't see any direct connection to the poem, but perhaps that is the point of the story; ie. that life with all of its various experiences is ultimately pointless.

Similarly with This Side of Paradise, although beautifully written, the story followed the protagonist's deveopment from adolescence to adulthod without coming to a satisfactory conclusion. If he had got married or run over by a bus, at least there would have been a falling of the curtain, but the curtain just stayed up; leaving the reader to wonder what the point of the story was. Then again, perhaps point is that there wasn't one.

[MissScarlett]

The Shadow of the Wind was recommended to be as a "good mystery." After reading more than half if it, though, it just wasn't going anywhere or doing anything, so I gave up trying.

[Emil Miller]

Waiting for Godot.

What was that all about?

If you thought that Godot was pointless, what about Endgame. I attach an extract from Wickipedia's summation of the play.

The implication in the play is that the characters live in an unchanging, static state. Each day contains the actions and reactions of the day before, until each event takes on an almost ritualistic quality. It is made clear, through the text, that the characters have a past (most notably through Nagg and Nell who conjure up memories of tandem rides in the Ardennes).


Tandem rides in the Ardennes ? He had to be kidding.

[higley]

Agreed in regards to Waiting for Godot. I know I'm supposed to say I found it meaningful and emotionally tragic; I just thought the written play was boring and the stage version even more so. As far as existentialism goes I prefer Camus.

[Vicarious]

I've never found any book "pointless." I usually take something away from every novel I read, even if it just the knowledge that I will NEVER read it again because I hated it for :insert reason:

[kelby_lake]

Endgame was....weird. But I think Waiting for Godot would be more boring. The stage is not a place for your own musings.

[grotto]

Big Sur by Kerouak and The Trial by Kafka. I read both with no distaste but when they were over, I went, Hmmmm, And??

I love existentialist type novels, but I must be the only person who doesn't like Kafka. I've tried, read a few but he does nothing for me. Oh well, you can't please every one.