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Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

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Re: Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

#41

Post by senthil_rajasek »

suzzer99 wrote: post #17

I used to do standup comedy at the mostly amateur level. One woman who was always at the same shows was so unfunny, she could suck the life out of any room. I always tried to study her, thinking that if I could understand the essence of why she was so deeply unfunny, I could understand the secret to being funny. Sadly I could never figure it out. Her unfunniness was inscrutable.

The OP is about writing. Stand Up Comedy != Writing, stand up comedy is mostly a performance (art) with a little bit of writing.

I realized this after doing stand up comedy for over 12 years.

I don't know what makes good writing but I know that if it gets a laugh then it's a good joke.

No one has figured out the rules of what is good stand up comedy which is probably why studying comedy using "via negativa" or any other logical approach may not work.

Steve Martin touched upon this a little bit in his book "Born Standing Up" and there is a mention of his Philosophy background on his wikipedia page

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Martin#Early_life_and_ed...

Re: Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

#42

Post by Cthulhu_ »

senthil_rajasek wrote: post #41
suzzer99 wrote: post #17

I used to do standup comedy at the mostly amateur level. One woman who was always at the same shows was so unfunny, she could suck the life out of any room. I always tried to study her, thinking that if I could understand the essence of why she was so deeply unfunny, I could understand the secret to being funny. Sadly I could never figure it out. Her unfunniness was inscrutable.

The OP is about writing. Stand Up Comedy != Writing, stand up comedy is mostly a performance (art) with a little bit of writing. I realized this after doing stand up comedy for over 12 years. I don't know what makes good writing but I know that if it gets a laugh then it's a good joke. No one has figured out the rules of what is good stand up comedy which is probably why studying comedy using "via negativa" or any ot…

Some of the best stand-up comedy I enjoy isn's some guy cracking jokes, it's someone telling a story. The story is as common as can be, just something that happened in their childhood or on the way to the shops, something banale. But then it's the presentation and the absurdity of something relatable that makes it funny.

Re: Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

#43

Post by Cthulhu_ »

circlefavshape wrote: post #39

I guy I know self-published a book, and it was obvious more or less from the first page that he'd never actually read more than a handful of books in his life Right at the start there's a scene with a bunch of people in a nightclub, and when describing someone he uses the phrase "with a face like a bulldog licking piss off a nettle" - a colloquial phrase in Ireland meaning someone looks sour (see https://www.urbandic…

One other issue is that a lot of people don't proofread or have someone proofread their self-published book / story, and that's still at the amateur level; anything beyond that, you need an editor.

Editors have read a lot of books. More than most authors will have. They have also read and improved on terrible books. They get everything, literally raw and unedited.

Re: Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

#44

Post by runeofdoom »

oreally wrote: post #3
fumeux_fume wrote: post #2

The man is an absolute treasure. A group of friends and I used to have a terrible book club. We read a lot of crap but it made me better understand what I valued in good writing. It was fun and surprisingly insightful.

am interested, do you have a listing of terrible books?

The Eye of of Argon by Jim Theis is legendarily awful in SF circles.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eye_of_Argon

Re: Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

#45

Post by westcoast49 »

suzzer99 wrote: post #17

I used to do standup comedy at the mostly amateur level. One woman who was always at the same shows was so unfunny, she could suck the life out of any room. I always tried to study her, thinking that if I could understand the essence of why she was so deeply unfunny, I could understand the secret to being funny. Sadly I could never figure it out. Her unfunniness was inscrutable.

Scott Adams has tried to describe it. He says that a good recipe for a joke is something that almost makes sense, but not quite. In other words, it has to be slightly absurd, but also slightly sensible, at the same time. A lot of Seinfeld jokes are along those lines.

Re: Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

#46

Post by dagw »

bexsella wrote: post #10
thx wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

fav ones (?) beyond Watchmen

Not who you were asking, but I'm a big Moore fan as well: * From Hell (Some might be put off by the original comic's black and white art, but there was a recent release that colourised them by the original illustrator) * Providence * Jerusalem * V for Vendetta

Illuminations, his latest short story collection, is a fantastic introduction to his prose writing for people who only know his comic book work.

Re: Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

#47

Post by dagw »

silvester23 wrote: post #18
fumeux_fume wrote: post #2

The man is an absolute treasure. A group of friends and I used to have a terrible book club. We read a lot of crap but it made me better understand what I valued in good writing. It was fun and surprisingly insightful.

You might enjoy the podcast "372 pages we'll never get back". It's basically a bad book club. The title is a reference to the first book they cover which is Ready Player One. They are on Book 23 or so at the moment, more or less alternating between books by "big" authors like Dan Brown or Sean Penn and super obscure stuff like Harry Potter-Twilight-crossover fan fiction.

The interesting question that often gets overlooked when lumping all these together as 'bad books' is why do some of these 'bad books' turn their authors into multi-millionaires, and not others. For that matter why is it almost only 'bad books' that turn their authors into multi-millionaires.

Ready Player One is no doubt badly written and Bad Art (full disclosure, I didn't manage to finish it), but it is also one of the more successful and beloved sci-fi books from the last 15 years and shouldn't that in a way make it a Very Good Book.

Re: Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

#48

Post by chris_wot »

dagw wrote: post #47
silvester23 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might enjoy the podcast "372 pages we'll never get back". It's basically a bad book club. The title is a reference to the first book they cover which is Ready Player One. They are on Book 23 or so at the moment, more or less alternating between books by "big" authors like Dan Brown or Sean Penn and super obscure stuff like Harry Potter-Twilight-crossover fan fiction.

The interesting question that often gets overlooked when lumping all these together as 'bad books' is why do some of these 'bad books' turn their authors into multi-millionaires, and not others. For that matter why is it almost only 'bad books' that turn their authors into multi-millionaires. Ready Player One is no doubt badly written and Bad Art (full disclosure, I didn't manage to finish it), but it is also one of…

What’s wrong with it?

Re: Every aspiring writer should read terrible books (2022) [video]

#50

Post by chaps »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #35
suzzer99 wrote: post #17

I used to do standup comedy at the mostly amateur level. One woman who was always at the same shows was so unfunny, she could suck the life out of any room. I always tried to study her, thinking that if I could understand the essence of why she was so deeply unfunny, I could understand the secret to being funny. Sadly I could never figure it out. Her unfunniness was inscrutable.

Can you post some examples of her unfunny jokes?

Sure, it's a knock-knock joke though. You start.
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