Do You Even Lit?

Starting the year off right by signing on for an epic voyage with Herman Melville's MOBY DICK; OR, THE WHALE, published in 1851, and widely considered to be the great American novel.

It's quite the beast so we're dividing it into three parts, with this first convo covering chapters 1-40.

Call me Ishmael: Dissecting the iconic opening line, why we love Ishmael as a narrator, on the optimal strategy for getting snuggly in bed, the precise nature of his relationship with (we claim) our fellow New Zealand native Queequeg, and the question of race and class politics onboard a whaling ship.

The mysterious Captain Ahab: various ominous warnings, initial thoughts on Ahab's motivations, punching through the pasteboard mask, and a climactic ritual atop the Quarter-deck.

Infamous infodumps: Benny's eyes glazed over at times, Cam skimmed the Cetology chapter, but Rich makes the case for soldiering through. Plus we look at some of the interesting formal choices Melville makes, the early seeds of modernism, and can't help but make some comparisons to Blood Meridian and Butcher's Crossing.

CHAPTERS:

(00:00:00) Ahoy shipmates

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??

Yeah fuck this book. After much blood, sweat, tears, and other unspeakable bodily excretions, we've had enough.

This is our first ever DNF after 50+ titles, so we thought we should do a postmortem of what went wrong.

Did we not try hard enough? Is Pynchon basically an asshole? Do we have a problem with postmodernism as a tradition? Or the maximalist writing style? How is that we (mostly) love David Foster Wallace, who copied so much of his schtick from Pynchon, but not the master himself?

And several other theories for why this book ultimately defeated us:

(00:00:00) Theory 1: we chose the wrong Pynchon to start out with

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Moby Dick — Herman Melville

Some festive chit-chat and navel gazing on the year that was. 

CHAPTERS:

(00:00:00) big tiddy goth gfs and rival podcast recs

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Moby Dick by Herman Melville

We've been making eyes at the postmodernists for a while, but up until this point have lacked the stones to go take a ride on daddy Pynchon's rocket ship.

Now that we have a little experience we thought we were ready for a mature and sophisticated lover like Gravity's Rainbow (1973): 800 pages long, and widely considered to be one of the greatest novels of all time.

...we were not ready.

It's right back to clumsy virginal fumblings as we attempt to decipher the first 100 pages. A shameful and frankly demoralising experience for the boys.

Does it get easier?

Please dear god let it get easier.

CHAPTERS:

(00:00:00) introductory fumblings

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???

In 1987, Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami set himself a challenge: to set aside his magical realism schtick and try to write one 'straight' novel in the realist tradition.

The result was Norwegian Wood, in which the author-insert protagonist is transported back to his college days, breaking free of ennui and depression just long enough to sleep with a string of hot but crazy chicks (and giving each of them the greatest sexual experience of their life).

Naturally it was a smash hit among the youth. Murakami was propelled to fame and had to move to Italy, hounded from his home country by a mob of shrieking Japanese girls intrigued by his magical but sad penis.

But is the book actually any good?

The boys are divided on this. We talk about Murakami's treatment of suicide, his portrayal of female characters, use of memory and nostalgia as a writing device, in which ways we relate to Toru Watanabe, which demographic this book aimed at, and in general whether this is a work of great art or should be relegated to r/iam14andthisisdeep.

If you're a Murakami fan, please write in and tell us what we got wrong, and especially which other book of his you'd most recommend we read.

CHAPTERS:

(00:00:00) blather

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Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein

Gravity's Rainbow — Thomas Pynchon

This week we're reading James Joyce's semi-autobiographical novel A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, published in 1916.

Moments of adolescent significance: on heated dinner-time conversations, a child's keen sense of injustice,  the fear of burning in Hellfire, contemplating eternity, sexual guilt, and teenage rebellion. Which did we relate to the most? 

Theory of aesthetics: why are evo psych explanations distasteful? Do Aquinas' three criteria give us an objective description of art? How about Stephen's 'impelled action' theory? can we tell propaganda, pornography and sermonising apart from the real deal? Does Joyce's novel kinda fail by its own lights?

(00:00:00) intro

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This week we're discussing C.P. Snow's influential 1959 lecture 'The Two Cultures', on the growing division between literary and scientific intellectuals:

"So the great edifice of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in the western world have about as much insight into it as their neolithic ancestors would have had."

Why do literary types tend to be Luddites? Is it kinda good that hubristic tech bros refuse to read the classics? Has the gap narrowed or widened in recent decades? How closely does The Two Cultures map onto the stemcels vs shape rotators meme? And of course Cam analyses the various status dynamics at play.

Trickling out episodes atm while Rich is on paternity leave. Normal service will resume shortly

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Back to the novels. This week, the DYEL boys decide to try Butcher's Crossing, the first novel from John Williams, the author famous for writing the so-underrated-it-might-be-overrated-but-probably-is-now-just-correctly-rated novel Stoner.

Decline of the buffalo: Rich reminds Cam that we already had this discussion in our episode of Blood Meridian but Cam forgot it and found himself in new disbelief on the staggering decline of the North American Bison. 

Emerson and finding yourself: It turns out Rich went through an Emerson phase. Well, actually more of a Thoreau phase but the both had three names and wrote around the same time so it counts. We discuss Emerson's idea of transcendence and whether this novel is meant as a refutation or embodiment of it. 

Miller: Not on the level of the Judge in Blood Meridian but a memorable character in his own right. Rich has some small gripes with his characterisation.

CHAPTERS

(00:00:01) Intro

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The Do You Even Lit boys put down the heavy tomes and choose a short story. Well, we're not sure if it counts as a story. Maybe a thought experiment?

Nonsense: Not to complain about pLoT hOlEz, but we take slight issue with the fact that it's no feasible for a librarian to find any coherent passages, even if the library contains everything collectively.

How would you know? We worry about the metaphysical horror of not being able to know you found the book with all the codes in it even if you found it. We're reassured by reminding ourselves that we won't stumble across

The library: How are the hexagons actually connected? Can you piss off the railing? Was it designed to be pissed off? And if you jumped, which book would you bring on the way down?

CHAPTERS

(0:11) Banter and boners

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What an absolutely dogshit ending to an otherwise incredible book. We made it through 800 pages for this?? I still love you Tolstoy but seriously wtf bro.

This discussion covers parts 6, 7, and 8 of Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. 

Anna's unhappy ending: Look how they massacred my girl. Is this a tale of a wanton harlot who got what was coming to her, or a good woman driven mad by society's strictures? What is it exactly that Tolstoy disapproves of about Anna's actions? How much would he hate her revival as a feminist icon? Is Aella the modern Anna K?

Levin's leap of faith: Is there any way this isn't totally unredeemable bullshit that ruins the end of the book? Sadly, no. Nevertheless we explore Levin's 'undefined but significant ideas'. Should we turn our brains off, and disregard reason and philosophy in favour of tradition? Is Christianity the final word in moral progress? Cam is more sympathetic to the leap of faith: if we replace religion, what do we replace it with?

Final thoughts: Jordan Peterson has a line about Dostoevsky being the great psychologist of the 20th century and Tolstoy being the great sociologist. Is he right? Where do we land on this book overall? Would we recommend it wholeheartedly? What are our favourite things about Tolstoy? Do we have to read War and Peace now? 

...and, if you can believe it, more

CHAPTERS

(00:00:00) hot takes

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