I'm a big nerd and I've read a lot of books of all different kinds, and I'm an English teacher.

Tell me what you like or what you're looking for and I'll recommend something I think is good

Also, fun history fact, this comm used to be called c/books until I started posting poetry on main every day in protest of there not being a literature comm. Direct action gets the goods comrades

  • Pisha [she/her, they/them]
    ·
    1 year ago

    Do me! I like novels/narratives about marginalized outsiders having strong emotions and/or solving academic mysteries (like LOTE, Little Fish, or anything by Porpentine). Even better if it moves away from realism in service of a more truthful depiction of social reality.

    Or, when it comes to poetry, I like high modernist avant-garde stuff like Ezra Pound or Paul Celan, something that really challenges your feeling and knowledge of language.

    • Wertheimer [any]
      ·
      1 year ago

      Academic mysteries - maybe the work of Javier Marias, like All Souls and Your Face Tomorrow?

      We have the same taste in poetry. Check out Louis Zukovsky if you haven't already. For novels that challenge your feeling and knowledge of language, Raymond Queneau and the rest of the Oulipo crowd, or Arno Schmidt.

      • Pisha [she/her, they/them]
        ·
        1 year ago

        That's the second time in my life someone has recommended Arno Schmidt to me, so I guess I finally have to set aside the time to read Zettels Traum.

        • Wertheimer [any]
          ·
          1 year ago

          It doubles as a fitness program! (I have it but have very much not finished it.)

          Schmidt's hard enough to find in English so I'd say start wherever you can. @thethirdgracchi@hexbear.net is another Schmidtite but last we discussed it I think we'd read completely different sections of his oeuvre. I've since caught up on The Stony Heart, though, and it might be my favorite so far. Still need to devote some attention to his later, larger works.

          • thethirdgracchi [he/him, they/them]
            ·
            1 year ago

            Glad you enjoyed The Stony Heart! It might be my favorite of Schmidt's as well; I go back and forth between so many of his works.

            @Pisha@hexbear.net Dalkey Archive is reprinting Nobodaddy's Children this autumn, which is a wonderful place to start. (I would recommend against starting with Zettels Traum at all costs) It's a collection of three loosely connected novellas that are easy to jump into, but give you a crash course in Schmidt's particular type of language and concerns. The /r/Arno_Schmidt subreddit is doing a reading group for the book if you're interested: https://old.reddit.com/r/Arno_Schmidt/comments/1654e6y/announcing_rarno_schmidts_nobodaddys_children/

            • Pisha [she/her, they/them]
              ·
              1 year ago

              I'll check it out! I'd be reading it in the original though; hopefully, that's not a problem. I've ordered the book from the library and if it shows up on time, I'll probably be there at the reading group.

              • thethirdgracchi [he/him, they/them]
                ·
                1 year ago

                Can't imagine reading it in the original is a problem; in fact, more of an asset. Jealous that you know German; virtually all of my favorite writers write in German.

                • Pisha [she/her, they/them]
                  ·
                  1 year ago

                  German is such a useless language for traveling anywhere in the world or interacting with other cultures, but it does give access to some great literature and philosophy, so I try to make the best of it.

    • PM_ME_YOUR_FOUCAULTS [he/him, they/them]M
      ·
      1 year ago

      Ooh these are some good ones, but I'll leave aside the poetry because I'm much more a prose guy

      The first thing that comes to mind is to combine your love of modernism and of outsiders with gigantic emotions and recommend some D.H. Lawrence like Sons and lovers or Women in Love

      I'd also recommend They by Kay Dick. This one blew my face off when I read it recently.

      Maybe If on a winter's night a traveller by Italo Calvino

      Maybe Rent Boy by Gary Indiana

      Maybe Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

      Maybe Babel by R.F. Kuang

      Idk if any of these have everything you're looking for, maybe there's something here you could vibe with

      Also I played And Those We Love Alive by Porpentine a while back and loved it btw