Sven > Recent Status Updates

Confession: I loathe (most) musicals. I had forgotten how, for all Tolkien’s worldbuilding genius, his tendency to have characters constantly busting into song drives me utterly up the wall. But that’s not all: generations of fantasy authors have copied this, hoping to sound like Tolkien, and it is even more insufferable in their books. For the love of all that is holy, please stop the inane singing in fantasy!

“Before no. 35, the manuscript gives the heading, ‘Here begin good and tried experiments’.”
- skips ahead to no. 35 -

“Genuinely social people never ceased to amaze him. Their brains seemed to generate an inexhaustible fund of things to say, naturally, with no effort, out of nothing at all. It was a trick Quentin had never figured out.”
Same, Quentin. Same.

Barely made it through the introduction and preface and already breathlessly enamoured with everything Carson writes.

This book is definitely written by a semiotician. Its wordiness is not for the faint of heart.

Currently taking a break because reading this book is exhausting.

Vann’s Medea is in the running for one of the most (unintentionally?) psychopathic characters I’ve read thus far.

Present participles stitched together, rich in flowery language and metaphors. Usually enjoyable, yet irksome here, jarring. Reading, a labour of… well, what even? Masochism, perhaps. Continuing for now, against my better judgement. Hoping, against hope, story might become engrossing. The reading proceeds, spite steering the rudder. Either I finish the book, or it finishes me. Readerly pride, bane of my existence.

Half of the time I’m holding this book, it’s the cover art that utterly absorbs me. Magnificent artwork.

(I reserve my humble judgement on the writing for after I’ve finished the book).

I don’t usually like academics who contrive to conjure with their wording, but Barthes is a genius and I will hear no opposition.

Kind of wish I could retroactively give him a hug though, poor guy. In their poetry, his reflections convey a kaleidoscope of griefs.

I was gifted the Dutch translation, but sadly the Dutch vocabulary for epic, divine tales no longer really does it for me. Ordered the English version, started this morning, and whoosh! I have to remind myself to pause for lunch and other such mortal trifles. Miller’s prose is absolutely spellbinding so far.

Update: venturing deeper and deeper into the confounding dark chasms of this labyrinthine paper-pressed piece of headache. As my exasperation increases, I strangely find myself more and more intrigued and eager to continue. Send help.

This book is... wild.

“Does such a thing as 'the fatal flaw,' that showy dark crack running down the middle of a life, exist outside literature? I used to think it didn't. Now I think it does. And I think that mine is this: a morbid longing for the picturesque at all costs.”
BOOM. You've certainly got my undivided attention now, Ms. Tartt.

It got surprisingly feminist of a sudden. Amazing monologue that would be equally pertinent right now.

Incredibly entertaining read so far. Shrewd Sancho Panza makes for a funny sidekick to the adorably bonkers Don Quixote.

So far not impressed.

How foolish to believe sunset would free us.