Congrats to the many who’ve made it through or are on the verge of crossing the finish line! (oh math, from hell’s heart, we stab at thee. For hate’s sake, we spit our last breath at thee.)
If you haven’t already shouted out, or you have last thoughts to share that you were holding back for fear of spoiling endings and such, you’ve come to exactly the right spot. Thanks to all for an excellent ‘march and most especially thanks for your high patience with me, and my, well, let’s just say imprecise posting habits this time around. I should be much more on the dime when we tackle The Monster aka Thomas Pynchon’s brand-new book, Against the Day. Deathmarch to start in mid-January. And may God have mercy on our souls. Next week: Can you hear it? That sound? The whirring of machines, the gathering of magnetism? Watch this spot for…a magnet preview….
-Cecil
Sorry to sit out the Wooofl march then jump in with Pynchon talk, but…
I’ve read the first few pages of the Pynchon last night. I’m in awe of the size of this thing. I mean, I’ve read Ulysses, DQ and all of Pynchon’s other novels, but this just looks daunting on a great level (might be the hardcover – but my Mason & Dixon is hardcover). I’m pretty sure this will be the longest work of fiction I’ve ever undertaken (but that’s because I avoided Clarissa in grad. school).
I’m a little worried about committing the march too. I’m teaching Pale Fire next semester for the first time (the Death march strikes again!) and I will have to reread it to do so. I’m doubting that I can read Against the Day and Nabokov simultaneously without inducing insanity (although I may induce it in my students & family rather than myself).
a few things about “to the lighthouse” before we move on to the next march. “a psychological poemâ€? her first reader (leonard) called it….the layers and loops and rhythms, especially the prolonged note of lily’s painting, make the novel (the creative act) itself a character, as welty wrote in the foreword: “to an extraordinary degree the novel seems to partake of its own substance, to be itself a part of this world.” brevity, precision, deep yield–“poem” seems apt in many ways. i’ll miss this book.
Pynchon! Brings back some not so fond memories of The Crying of Lot 49 and my junior year in college. It’s the first and only of Pynchon’s books I’ve read. I won’t lie about missing Ms. Woolf. Towards the end I felt as if I were walking in thigh-deep quicksand each time I opened the book.
Minta: Have you found your brooch? Is it in the quicksand? I’ve finally finished Virginia, and found the last part much speedier. One does get used to the language, doesn’t one? Looking forward to the Pynchon.
I’ve started reading a book by Aldous Huxley and it’s remarkable how fast and easy the reading is. I’ll give Virginia credit for making just about anything this side of Chaucer seem like a walk in the park.
Don’t know about the Pynchon–looks like an overwhelming task from here.
I ended up liking TTL a lot. What interested me most was the minute, contradictory swirl of any given person’s thoughts–and what importance we put on all this mental activity–juxtaposed to the section where time passes. I found that description of the effects of time, war, disease, childbirth, etc. to be breathtaking. Woolf succeeded in portraying life and time from both the long view and the split-second fragment of thought, and I’m in awe. Will I pick up another any time soon? Probably not. But I’ve been glad for the company and the magno-motivation.
Well, now I’ve had enough family dysfunction; I think I can just skip the Christmas season altogether after this march of passive-aggressiveness, internal drama-queening, and inherited psychology.
I won’t be buying the new Pynchon; I have a long list of things that would be healthier for me to spend $40 on, let alone the half-year it would take to read it.
RaptorMage: I know it seems like a good idea right now, but in the long run, $40 worth of marshmallow peeps won’t be nearly as helpful to you as a brand new hardcover book.
-Cecil
Quicksand is so high-drama, I just love it. This book wore me out. Pynchon is going to wear me out. I barely survived The Crying of Lot 49 and that was when I was in school as a lit major so my homework was basically to read books. I have enjoyed him on the Simpsons.
A really bad deathmarch holiday tune:
Here we come a-deathmarching
Among the de-con-struct-ing,
Here we read about millions of characters
from an author never seen.
i’ve already pynchon book and look forward that pie eating contest.
my comment didn’t make any sense. meow.
Sorry to sit out the Wooofl march then jump in with Pynchon talk, but…
I’ve read the first few pages of the Pynchon last night. I’m in awe of the size of this thing. I mean, I’ve read Ulysses, DQ and all of Pynchon’s other novels, but this just looks daunting on a great level (might be the hardcover – but my Mason & Dixon is hardcover). I’m pretty sure this will be the longest work of fiction I’ve ever undertaken (but that’s because I avoided Clarissa in grad. school).
I’m a little worried about committing the march too. I’m teaching Pale Fire next semester for the first time (the Death march strikes again!) and I will have to reread it to do so. I’m doubting that I can read Against the Day and Nabokov simultaneously without inducing insanity (although I may induce it in my students & family rather than myself).
a few things about “to the lighthouse” before we move on to the next march. “a psychological poemâ€? her first reader (leonard) called it….the layers and loops and rhythms, especially the prolonged note of lily’s painting, make the novel (the creative act) itself a character, as welty wrote in the foreword: “to an extraordinary degree the novel seems to partake of its own substance, to be itself a part of this world.” brevity, precision, deep yield–“poem” seems apt in many ways. i’ll miss this book.
Pynchon! Brings back some not so fond memories of The Crying of Lot 49 and my junior year in college. It’s the first and only of Pynchon’s books I’ve read. I won’t lie about missing Ms. Woolf. Towards the end I felt as if I were walking in thigh-deep quicksand each time I opened the book.
Minta: Have you found your brooch? Is it in the quicksand? I’ve finally finished Virginia, and found the last part much speedier. One does get used to the language, doesn’t one? Looking forward to the Pynchon.
I’ve started reading a book by Aldous Huxley and it’s remarkable how fast and easy the reading is. I’ll give Virginia credit for making just about anything this side of Chaucer seem like a walk in the park.
Don’t know about the Pynchon–looks like an overwhelming task from here.
I ended up liking TTL a lot. What interested me most was the minute, contradictory swirl of any given person’s thoughts–and what importance we put on all this mental activity–juxtaposed to the section where time passes. I found that description of the effects of time, war, disease, childbirth, etc. to be breathtaking. Woolf succeeded in portraying life and time from both the long view and the split-second fragment of thought, and I’m in awe. Will I pick up another any time soon? Probably not. But I’ve been glad for the company and the magno-motivation.
Well, now I’ve had enough family dysfunction; I think I can just skip the Christmas season altogether after this march of passive-aggressiveness, internal drama-queening, and inherited psychology.
I won’t be buying the new Pynchon; I have a long list of things that would be healthier for me to spend $40 on, let alone the half-year it would take to read it.
RaptorMage: I know it seems like a good idea right now, but in the long run, $40 worth of marshmallow peeps won’t be nearly as helpful to you as a brand new hardcover book.
-Cecil
Quicksand is so high-drama, I just love it. This book wore me out. Pynchon is going to wear me out. I barely survived The Crying of Lot 49 and that was when I was in school as a lit major so my homework was basically to read books. I have enjoyed him on the Simpsons.
A really bad deathmarch holiday tune:
Here we come a-deathmarching
Among the de-con-struct-ing,
Here we read about millions of characters
from an author never seen.