351–358 of 358 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the fact that "thick" can mean "dim-witted" is proof that the author did not in fact choose their words carefully.
I think it's made obvious that "thick" can mean many different things. Personally, I've never heard "thick" to mean "dimwitted" or it ever used as such.
Really loved this essay, loved the irreverent style. I had a similar literary journey as this guy. I think I would take it a step further though. It's not just that great literature has details and motifs that line up perfectly, it's not just that it took great effort to produce, or has some musicality or rhythm that is beautiful to take in experientially. It's that the thing that is communicated is truthful. Great f…
Yes. I really liked and enjoyed reading this post, but was a bit frustrated by the focus on "thickness". Great art is not great just because it has many layers that take some time and effort to discover, like great cooking doesn't need a large number of different ingredients. Great art, as you say, has something true, profound, and original to tell us about the human experience, and it touches us deeply in a way that…
As an old man I now think the art and humanities classes in school landed at the wrong time. You need context to really understand a book or a work of art. You want to know what kind of environment produced it, what it's talking to. But when you're in school, there isn't time for that. You aren't going to know a bunch of things about history to put things into context, because there simply isn't enough time for it. S…
> Like if you read Dickens, will you know enough about the industrial revolution, the condition of cities at the time, and such? We did talk about these things in English class in high school. The teachers would lay out the historical/social/cultural context of each book we read. Did your school not do that?
How would he have taught me economics anyway?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> But when you're in school, there isn't time for that. You aren't going to know a bunch of things about history to put things into context, because there simply isn't enough time for it. I think you just had bad teachers. Historical context was always part of the English language/literature curricula at my high school, and it definitely made a difference. I didn’t even go to a good school. Our district was the worst…
I really liked my teachers, and have always thought of them as good teachers, however it's also very clear to me as an adult that they didn't teach literature or art. We where taught to read and write, but not have an appreciation of the language, nor to see text as anything but text. I did have teachers that briefly touched on the subject of interpreting a text, I still view that subject as mostly bullshit as you ca…
Interestingly we had a couple of much more recent books about young people in my school.
But again, how would you know even about your own country without quite a lot of context? I just never thought I could place things until I was quite old.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is no correct way to read Shakespeare. There are many wrong ways, but don't let your friend's interpretation cloud you from the others. It is really magic when you see some other interpretation and understand both are right despite not being compatible.
Obligatory "To Be or Not to Be" https://youtu.be/iQULEW2JwHE
I hate to be that curmudgeon but sometimes i have to be
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I really liked my teachers, and have always thought of them as good teachers, however it's also very clear to me as an adult that they didn't teach literature or art. We where taught to read and write, but not have an appreciation of the language, nor to see text as anything but text. I did have teachers that briefly touched on the subject of interpreting a text, I still view that subject as mostly bullshit as you ca…
But you did read and maybe watch the movie of Det Forsømte Forår. Interestingly we had a couple of much more recent books about young people in my school. But again, how would you know even about your own country without quite a lot of context? I just never thought I could place things until I was quite old.
No, we did not. To be fair the movie came out two years before I left school, so maybe there wasn't time. For some reason we didn't read the book.
As an old man I now think the art and humanities classes in school landed at the wrong time. You need context to really understand a book or a work of art. You want to know what kind of environment produced it, what it's talking to. But when you're in school, there isn't time for that. You aren't going to know a bunch of things about history to put things into context, because there simply isn't enough time for it. S…
Because the book tells you? To my shame I've never read Dickens, but I did read the Romanian canonical authors (I am Romanian), and a lot of them, the ones I liked, gave you a very real sense of the life of the people at the time. Ion, for example, is basically a tragedy about the titular character scheming to marry a woman whom he doesn't love (but who loves him) because he's poor and she's "rich" (owns land). And t…
A publication also somewhat assumes what the reader knows, because it would take forever to explain things otherwise. With time passing, those assumptions are no longer valid.
I like hamburgers and beer and that is what I end up telling people but of course I tried to engage people and no one appreciated any higher level of depth besides burgers and beers.
I am going to scream inside my soul when I see a flat deadpan useless story telling like if someone hangs a gun over the fireplace, writes two paragraphs about it and then ... it never fires.
Of course never firing might be the point of the story, but it never is.
There are also ways to enjoy hamburgers and beers, not everything has to be elaborate and a lot of things being plain simple is celebration of life as it is. Can you enjoy your burger and beer? Then leaving room for being surprised by the cook who really took time to make something of the burger or just this twist in a beer that well is not an eye opening moment, but goes into your head and makes you think a little.