Good Literature
On Apr 29, 11:11*am, Boon wrote:
On Apr 28, 10:15*pm, "Shhhh! I'm Listening to Reason!"
wrote:
On Apr 28, 8:42*pm, Boon wrote:
On Apr 28, 7:11*pm, "Shhhh! I'm Listening to Reason!"
I read "No Country For Old Men" last fall. I found the style he used
in that book distracting.
How so? *(Big fan of the movie, BTW.)
How can you not like a Cohn Brothers movie?
To me a good author somehow fades into the background. Even
Shakespeare with the Olde English somehow fades away and the
characters come to life and take over.
"No Country for Old Men" had punctuation so screwed up and quotes
without quotation marks or any attribution so that to me it ended up
seeming to be an exercise in "how different can I write" versus "how
can I bring the story to life and fade into the background". The other
thing about McCarthy is that he seems to try to be as dark as he can
at all times. So I ended up never being able to forget about the
author. He was always center stage to me. So I wasn't too impressed
with him.
I liked "The Road" because the spare style, heavy on dialogue,
reminded me of Hemingway.
Could you tell who was talking without having to trace the
conversation back?
I don't know. He's gotten acclaim and all and who am I to criticize
but that book left me unimpressed. It could have just been my frame of
mind at the time.
Come to think of it, I did have to trace back the conversations more
than once. Again, this reminds me a little of Hemingway. In college,
we analyzed one of Hemingway's short stories (can't remember which
one, but it had something to do with two men meeting outside of a bar
or restaurant), and within the lengthy dialogue there's a place where
it gets switched. The trick was to find exactly where it was switched.
Apparently there's been a lot of debate over whether this was
intentional or not.
"A Clean, Well-Lighted Place" perhaps? I studied that in college too.
I enjoy books that make me think, just not in that way. IMO if I have
to keep going back over stuff just to figure out who said what I'm
wasting my time. It simply gives English professors something to talk
about. :-)
And perhaps that's one reason why Hemingway is not in my top ten list.
I also remember studying "Hills Like White Elephants" and being asked
to find the one single subjective word in the entire story. IIRC, the
word is "thoughtfully."
I'm still eager to explore more McCarthy since he does seem to inspire
such debate. I had no problem with "Suttree," but "The Road" did have
long passages with nothing but dialogue, and at times it was difficult
to follow. I've heard that "Blood Meridian" is equally perplexing, but
many consider it his masterpiece. I wonder what Scott and Bret think
about McCarthy.
I'm sure they both think he was a fine republican senator and they are
upset over the rough treatment history has given him..
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