How do I get on the same level as the more knowledgeable Yea Forums posters? I turned to books in my mid 20s after running out of tv and movies to consume and now I wish I had studied eng lit and the like and trained my brain muscles more from an earlier age instead of watching mind cancer during my formative years. I'm enjoying going through the classics but I just find myself envious of people with mastery of the english language and its many rules. I feel like I'm lacking the tools to express my interpretations sometimes, and when I consider writing myself I stop because I don't know what the difference between a noun and pronoun is, where to use commas correctly, semicolons etc. Help an inferior pleb out.
Also to help you gauge my literary powerlevel: >Favourite book was blood meridian but now its probably sir gawain and the green knight >Recently started reading LotR and holy shit it's good, I thought it was gonna be tacky drivel like the movies, I remember saying 5 years ago that GRR Martin is a better writer than Tolkein because I preferred the GoT tv show to the LotR movies and I want to jump off a bridge when I think what the other person must have thought of me >Recent fan of Arthurian romances after discovering the green knight last year >I use audible exclusively because I can only concentrate on comic books when it comes to eye reading >I tried listening to the illiad but I couldnt concentrate, I just remember my mind drifting at a part where they all dock their ships and its describing like 20 different character or armies or something
just an honest pleb looking to better himself, you dont need to be such a smugger.
Oliver Collins
Just read books you fucking idiot, fuck your retarded blog thread. You think a bunch of 19 year old marxist redditors have any advice for you? No one cares about your typical faggot life. If you've been fooled into thinking Yea Forums is smart because muh eloquence you're doomed >studying english >2019 Holy fuck lmao
Sebastian Reed
You're not alone, user. I would encourage you to read some supplementary works, such as critical analysis on your favorite books/stories/poems. Scholarly research on literature can be best understood as an expansive conversation in which many people voice many opinions touching on numerous concerns related to that literature. Silly as it might seem, reading this literature is a good way to also expand your vocab because people publishing appreciate unique words. I would also encourage you to purchase C.E. Cirlot's dictionary of symbols and maybe read a Jung book--these will be beneficial in understanding what an author might be trying to say when it's not explicit.
Honestly if you can't concentrate enough to actually read a book you are hopeless. Why bother going through the classics or trying to develop a well-rounded understanding of literature if you can't even read and just want to listen to nice stories? Sounds like you just don't have the mind or attention-span and should just give up.
Lincoln Murphy
Read whatever you enjoy. This board is full of pseudo intellectual faggots, ignore them.
Ryder Fisher
you dont have to be such a meanie
good advice, thanks. funnily enough i ordered the green knight untranslated with annotations yesterday, i read a sample of it out loud to myself and it was beautiful so I just ordered it then and there, first non audible book purchase in a long while. will also look in to your other suggestions, cheers.
Dylan Roberts
im still reading the book, mr smarty pants, the words are still going in my head and being digested by my brain belly yum yum
Jeremiah Mitchell
>I turned to books in my mid 20s after running out of tv and movies to consume
m8, i bet you haven't even exhausted entry level arthouse
Oliver Stewart
try me, movies are shit and the only good ones are from the 70s
Juan Taylor
Why would anyone take this shit seriously?
Anthony Bell
I'm one of the more knowledgeable lit dilettantes You need to be curious to learn
You think New Hollywood is the only cinema? Absolutely plebeian
Austin Rivera
I'm not here to talk about a shit medium the depth ceiling for movies is too low to enjoy anything that isnt trying to be entertaining
i watched rome open city the other month and i wouldnt wipe my ass with it im a people pleaser so ill list some movies i like for you to make fun of though
Get Carter (1970) Barry Lyndon The Thing Rififi Wages of Fear Point Blank Hari Kari Throne of Blood Eleven Samurai Good the Bad and the Ugly Once Upon a Time in America
come to think of it, rififi and wages of fear might be the only good movies that didnt come out of america, japan or uk
Jason Robinson
OP is a faggot
Oliver Cruz
no im a retard you idiot
Brandon Taylor
It's like watching someone dig their own grave then bury themselves in it
Adam Harris
very curious for you to name a top 5
Austin Powell
lul tldr
Just read what makes you happy. A good chunk of this board wants to feel all smart and cool because they read some book with some far out ideas and it's just fucking lame. Reading a book is so low brow and it's such a silly thing to be super proud of.
Charles Moore
whats high brow?
Carter Powell
Never feel inferior to some anonymous people online you'll never meet. Keep reading what interests you. I've just gotten into Arthurian romances myself, I'm loving Le Morte Darthur.
Josiah Taylor
Something like running a marathon. Things that take time and you should feel rather proud of.
I'm not saying that being proud of the fact that you finished a book is bad. I just don't understand how you can be an edgy redditor with a middle school nhilism complex because you read one or two books, no matter the scope
Does that clear it up at all?
Caleb Cruz
I don't understand where nhilism comes in to play, I don't care that nothing means anything, I'm happy just doing things I enjoy until I die and maybe leaving something behind if I can make something worth leaving behind be it a creative work, a family etc I now enjoy books and I wanted advice on how to enjoy them more, I do feel inferior to people with academic intelligence but I don't see the connection with nihilism
Adam Cooper
Hunting, dancing, climbing a tree >Running a marathon Lol no, running should be either practical or spiritual you pleb
William Turner
Yeah sorry, I forgot picking up a book and reading words was a rare skill in your part of the world. I'll leave it to you.
Mason Kelly
>Devolved western urbanite thinks only being able to read linguistic signs makes them superior
Bentley Powell
Try reading books.
Carter Perez
Sir Gawain is SO GOOD. Don’t stress out too much OP, I actually have a degree in English and trust me many of the graduates don’t even read books. A lot of posters here are full of shit, however it’s more important to engage with posts and people in general because that’s how you sharper your knowledge. Just like you love to read, you’re engaging with the ideas in the texts and the internet is extremely helpful in analysis and historical context etc. so you shouldn’t be too hard on yourself. Just keep reading on man! Also you might like some of the pre-lotr fantasy books as all of them after are basically influence by Tolkien, Elric and Conan are gritty fantasy adventure type stories which is what GRR Martin basically repackaged for modern readers. I might also recommend the complete fictions of Borges if you want something that will make you feel like you’re going to the next level while not being able to put his work down.
Asher Perez
This. The cognitive nuance shown by a master tracker following the spoor of his game makes reading the most difficult of books look like child's play.
Adrian Murphy
Honestly just enjoy it, but dont become a psued who uses his interest in difficult and unconventional things as a reason to feel superior to others, obviously
No one who deserves to be taken seriously would ever belittle you for an interest in something they have spent more time in. They obviously used reading as an escape from people if they actually go REEEEEEEE when someone makes a post such as yours. They are the ultimate incel.
Enjoy it, enjoy thinking, enjoy the horrors, enjoy life. Philosophy and literature is just meant as another carnival ride. A very useful carnival ride, but beware of taking it seriously, that will be detrimental.
You will learn all you need to with time. looking up what other people think, any video essays or typed out reviews will help you. Research the author, the time period the book was written in and why it was written. What exactly was the author trying to argue for and against with his book? You can look up online any other questions, but dont think I'm discouraging you from posting here. I hope you outlive the psueds!
It's left over from the more intellectual times of oral tradition
Ethan Kelly
One pre-LotR fantasy book I bought is Phantastes, dunno if its good or not, just that some consider it the first modern fantasy written for adults instead of children. Very interested in folklore and mythology. Semi-related: Is there any good Druid lit? I'd like to read about them but I'm afraid any books I do find from the last 50 years are going to be D&D tier and not authentic. Ordered fiction by Borges btw, thanks for the suggestion, already got Canterbury Tales in my audible collection
Thanks for the counter perspective to the Yea Forums gatekeepers itt, and I'll try not be a pseud if I ascend.
Jeremiah Sanchez
It's primitive storytelling. This was before people realised there were better ways to develop stories. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
Evan Garcia
OP here forgot to add have any of yall niggas read Cadfael? That's the series that got me started on my medieval literature kick even though its from the 50s iirc, really great characters and fun murder mysteries in a very authentic feeling depiction of 1100s british isles usually framed around real history
Robert Thompson
>How do I get on the same level as the more knowledgeable Yea Forums posters? Just bash your head on the wall every day until you lose conscience. One day you might reach the average intelligence of the board.
Cooper Evans
have sex
Mason Turner
Sex having isnt my highest priority, I've bedded about 6 or 7 women some of whom were kind of attractive and now I don't feel the need to prove anything in that field and am happy to wank and play videogames until I'm 35 at which point if I haven't met anyone naturally I might put more effort in to finding someone.
Michael Harris
cope
Jack Scott
thanks zhuangzi
Dylan Hughes
Sorry boomer, cut off point for growth of intelligence is age 24.
Jayden Bennett
It's not that hard to get with low to medium quality women dude. Well, I'm 6'2 with 6/10 looks so I'm not playing on the same difficulty as some people, but yeah the average woman is kind of dogshit on the inside and videogames have gotten pretty good.
Jacob Baker
>video games >Yea Forums is so smrat guize >I wish I had studied a hobby in school ;_; AAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. I'm so glad that you're this much of a dumb frustrated fucking retard. It really is great knowing that your life is shit because you're such a fucking stupid faggot. Have fun dying alone retard
I consider my life quite far from shit, I just want to get in to literature and wish I had started sooner. Dunno where you're pulling the rest of your assumptions from but enjoy the hahahaing I guess.
Bentley Taylor
Start with the Greeks and study some books on grammar, linguistics, and rhetoric
>How do I get on the same level as the more knowledgeable Yea Forums posters? Leave Yea Forums, none of the more knowledgable posters regular this place. It's full of pseuds.
Thomas Myers
Penguin book of spelling and grammar. It's for kids, but will make you better than most adults. And reading, like language or any practical skill, doesn't reach a final plateau of complete competence, it's always a matter of furthering finesse. If you're having trouble with the Iliad and Odyssey, get Butler's translation: he cut out a lot of the lists and rearranged the storyline in prose so modern readers can understand it more easily. Once you have a basic grasp of it you can get a lot more out of the more poetic translations, and if you want to keep getting better you can eventually learn Greek. Like anything good, it's a matter of grinding for it.
Nolan Allen
>the same level
You're human with a capacity for rational thinking and experiencing emotion. Just read what you like reading, and you're good. There isn't some baseline standard you have to meet, no matter how much the late capitalist fags might've drilled that into your brain. Just do your best, that's all.
Jaxson Jenkins
Read, think, talk, repeat. Reading without consideration of what you've read is no different from watching TV. Thinking without exchanging your ideas and defending them is no different from daydreaming.
Read as much as you please, so long as you THINK and TALK about what you've read. Don't mindlessly consume.
Try to read stuff that genuninely interests you, but try to read some stuff that might conflict with your interests or what you think you wouldnt normally read if you chose too. Build some perspective and really refine what you truly want and believe
Couldn't find that book so got this instead amazon.co.uk/dp/0857830805/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_PDFYCbFZAK22X Might try to just stick it out with the iliad instead of getting the pleb version though, it's been half a year and I've read some pretty old shit since, cheers for the advice
Owen Brooks
i've been here for over 4 years. no one knows what the fuck is going on.
Nicholas Ortiz
What do you mean 'knowledgeable' Yea Forums posters? Philosophy and English Literature posters are probably art students with a major or minor in those fields. Mastery is not achievable unless you're a true autodidact, but then you wouldn't be posting on Yea Forums.
Charles Phillips
No. You're wrong. I AM a true autodidact. I've read Discipline and Punish, I've read the Critique of Pure Reason, I've read Empedocles. I know what I'm doing.
Benjamin Lopez
>knowledgeable Yea Forums posters now this is epic
Owen Sullivan
In the Iliad, that is a part of the oral epic convention, "the catalogue" (basically listing many things without a story - this technique was also observed in the tales of Yugoslavian folk singers, listing the riches accumulated by a character, for example). It's also (and moreso in the Bible) a part of the truth-communicating function of literature. I'm drunk and may be rambling, but essentially art in the past wasn't some pretty or entraining thing divorced from the external world - it was deeply connected with it, so it is wholly unsurprising that it might (try to) incorporate the most literally correct data. It was a vector of conserving truth across the ages. Today we live in a post-mythological age, have the Internet, and the art is much more aestheticist, so we have a quite different perspective on this.
>when I consider writing myself I stop because I don't know what the difference between a noun and pronoun is, where to use commas correctly, semicolons etc Completely irrelevant to actually writing. Just the most banal technicalities that aren't even a matter of literature but grammar and language in general. Yea Forums is not knowledgeable. Even some professors of literature (particularly if you live in some flyover US state) are not really knowledgeable. Literature is a series of positions, misunderstandings and dialectics. Above everything, keep reading and learning. Being in the state of learning is more important than being well-read and learned (because you never really are). Just keep reading, and don't shy away from literary theory and history (which are fields that 95% of Yea Forums is utterly clueless about).
Joseph Mitchell
If you want to learn more about proper use of the English language try reading through the books instead of audible if you just can’t focus just follow along through the book with it playing in the background also if you need encouragement from strangers to pursue a dream maybe that dream ain’t for you but don’t let me stop you
Landon Bailey
*Serbian folk singers
Evan Ross
>Tacky drivel like the movies
You take that back
John Martin
I’m a total pseud. You ought to find better role models.
Colton Howard
Read Homer and Plato.
Then read them again.
Then write out their complete works by hand.
Then learn Ancient Greek.
This sounds autistic as fuck, and it is, but this is the kind of fucking weird shit I like to do. My technique is OCD and psychopathic. but I think it will help get their ideas ingrained in your mind.
