Dude what the fuck

He wrote mostly in French - and that was translated into English. His French was rubbished by Nabokov, but he rubbished nearly everyone. Beckett's writing as I've read it is unusual - but distinct, which is important. I won't say he's the greatest thing ever - but Beckett was original and his vision, though bleak and depressing - was characteristic of his times.

>He wrote mostly in French - and that was translated into English
By himself. He considered the English version to be different works of art from the French ones but thought both equal.

Edit: and that was translated into English
by himself.

Man, read the three novels aloud. There is a simple, demented rhythm to it. If you are reading something, and ithe text ain't working for you, change your reading strategy.

Jesus Christ, why is this board so obsessed with aethetics?

It's fucking embarrassing.

> If you're not seeing the nuanced flavor when eating a dog turd, try changing your eating strategy. Perhaps season the turd with some brown sugar?

>Jesus Christ, why is this board so obsessed with aethetics?
It's full of fags. Aesthetes are all fags.

why wouldnt one want to sensually experience beauty, when the world is so full of beauty, natural, man made, and people sensually experiencing it

Never liked Beckett

Aesthetics are no substitute for substance but they're very important. I don't want to waste hours of my time reading writing that myself or anyone with a semi-high IQ could mimic with ease in order to obtain an outdated or unsatisfying message. I want both, though I understand that's rare. But aesthetics matter.

youtube.com/watch?v=D7zXy57O7bc
Yes you do

ya i know, just fucking kill me

AND he wasnt a pompous pretentious piece of shit about either of those facts

That's all fine and good, but when that becomes the sole purpose of reading it's both superficial and inhibiting. One reason authors like Alice Munro and Samuel Beckett are good is because they avoid(ed) style when possible, because then it puts more urgency on how the story looks/feels than how it works.

It's not a necessity, though. Very few authors are/have been talented enough to make it function. Again, there's nothing wrong with aethetics/flowery prose, but it's hardly anything more than cosmetics. It should be subtle and adapt itself to the voice of the narrator. Otherwise it's contrived.

aesthetic IS the substance you fuckboys

Not only are you pointing out how poorly you read, your post is the equivalent of diabetes.

"The artists and writers of Aesthetic style tended to profess that the Arts should provide refined sensuous pleasure, rather than convey moral or sentimental messages. As a consequence, they did not accept John Ruskin, Matthew Arnold, and George MacDonald's conception of art as something moral or useful, "Art for truth's sake".[4] Instead, they believed that Art did not have any didactic purpose; it only needed to be beautiful. The Aesthetes developed a cult of beauty, which they considered the basic factor of art. Life should copy Art, they asserted. They considered nature as crude and lacking in design when compared to art. The main characteristics of the style were: suggestion rather than statement, sensuality, great use of symbols, and synaesthetic/ Ideasthetic effects—that is, correspondence between words, colours and music."

"Predecessors of the Aesthetics included John Keats and Percy Bysshe Shelley, and some of the Pre-Raphaelites who themselves were a legacy of the Romantic spirit. There are a few significant continuities between the Pre-Raphaelite philosophy and that of the Aesthetes: Dedication to the idea of ‘Art for Art’s Sake’; admiration of, and constant striving for, beauty; escapism through visual and literary arts; craftsmanship that is both careful and self-conscious; mutual interest in merging the arts of various media. This final idea is promoted in the poem L’Art by Théophile Gautier, who compared the poet to the sculptor and painter.[5] Dante Gabriel Rossetti and Edward Burne-Jones are most strongly associated with Aestheticism. However, their approach to Aestheticism did not share the creed of ‘Art for Art’s Sake’ but rather “a spirited reassertion of those principles of colour, beauty, love, and cleanness that the drab, agitated, discouraging world of the mid-nineteenth century needed so much.”[6] This reassertion of beauty in a drab world also connects to Pre-Raphaelite escapism in art and poetry."

It need not be purely Dionysian in nature. I come out on the side of aesthetics because I want to read unique and creative writing and arrangements that would be difficult for me to do, but I understand that this can also end up hollow and without a deeper message. The issue seems to be that it's extremely rare for a writer to be able to accomplish both. Word for word I think Pynchon is the best writer around, but he doesn't ultimately seem to have anything deeper to convey. I'm sure there are more examples of the reverse, but I'm still on the elusive search for writers with both. Not sure where Beckett stands though, I'm the one who said he tried and gave up.

>but he doesn't ultimately seem to have anything deeper to convey.
This is extremely surprising for me to see said. I think Pynchon says, and maybe heres the catch, alludes to many 'deeper' things.

Can you give some examples of possible deep things that can be conveyed in writing? (from other authors)?

Shakespeare, Milton, the Bible...anything thats counted as great I suppose

Or, you know, maybe, whom he's quoting?

He does make some interesting allusions. I'm currently reading Against the a Day and think the Aether theme, among others, is cool. What it is, though, is the boomer childishness and the general environment it informs, which inhibits the deeper message I believe is lacking. But that's across the board among contemporary writers, not just Pynchon.

To the second part, the above is what I think the problem is, or why there is a dearth of deeper messages, and why I expressed my own frustration with it, is that before this childish boomer era there were a lot of pre-modern and Christian themes that also don't really resonate in the postmodern/post-Christian era. Though I think there is far more meaning and value in previous eras than this feel-good boomer one. Also, I don't really like DFW but I think he was successful in picking up on this void, even if he seemed to wallow in it, or in the consumer misery he felt it represented. But what I'm saying is that the fully rounded aesthetic writing I enjoy the most is a feature of a period where the deeper messages I desire don't exist. And I think there is room for both now but I just don't think anyone's really done it yet. That's a lot to ask though.

Shakespeare, yes, but that's why he's Shakespeare.

I still don't know if you stated what you think qualifies as 'deep' things to convey
"he doesn't ultimately seem to have anything deeper to convey"

I think, which maybe you agreed with in this last reply, his main focus is deep things, deep problems of history and the modern world; 'V' although I have not read it seems quite deep, and Gravitys Rainbow, about war, secrecy, hidden agenda, power, morals/sex slave, like I think he touches on pretty much everything, he doesn't maybe put it in plain words "and so the moral is" "and so you can see in conclusion, that child sex slaves are bad", but everything he is presenting is what he thinks is 'depth' of the world, is beyond the average and normal experiences of everyday people.

So again, what, vaguely, or specifically do you mean by my quoted quote of yours, regarding pynchon and lack of anything deeper to convey.

So by depth, do you mean: esoteric spirituality?
Dense flowery poetry?

I was referring more to his work with contemporary themes. I agree there is a lot of great historical stuff and deeper messages related to such things, but reading Vineland or IV showcases the vapid boomer feel-good idiocy that has no deeper message to contribute. It doesn't matter what I think the message should be, it's these cultural stewards who either felt there wasn't one or that it was tethered to this hippie utopian bullshit that has failed their society that I have a problem with.

You're about to get a lot more cynical

ok, interesting, now I see what you mean. So in a sense you are disappointed, someone as smart as Pynchon, and as good a writer, pretty much is not a political activist, on the cutting edge of social issues, and organizing and enlightening the masses to move forward toward a brighter future?

Not necessarily, just a vision that strives for higher ideals and isn't based on degenerate bullshit and new-age poofery. That's what is lacking.

He's very political and clear on how he feels about social issues. He adopted the politics of his age. I don't fault him for that or think it makes him any less of a writer, but the vision or higher ideals within that has panned out to be nonexistent or lofty nonsense that was actually rather harmful. Nearly all boomers adopted those ideas though, so it's a general thing I'm taking issue with regarding the writer as a cultural icon or steward using this medium to better his society.

ok, and because now I feel I am bothering you, or getting repetitive, or about to ask too tough a question, I will ask this one last one: Can you vaguely describe some things that he could do, or a writer could do, theoretically, actually, practically, to qualify as this depth, higher ideals, into practice, not just for himself, not just for maybe a small group of readers (though maybe that would qualify for you?), but for a large audience?

So do we come to, what you meant by 'his lack of depth', was his lack of tangible power to shape the world? So I am asking, if that is what we come to by distilling your intention of the use of that earlier quoted phrase, what are some themes Pynchon might write about to qualify as 'depth', what are some results of his writing and actions that would qualify? You say he is clear and political and social issues, but your suggestion is he is not deep enough, with them, with political, social, economic theory and the world? What are some tangible changes to the world you would like to see him try to make? (or would merely writing about them be sufficient?).

Lets say a /pol/ member had pynchons intellect and writing ability, and lets say a leftypol member had pynchons intellect and writing ability, is this what you are getting at? And lets say the president had pynchons intellect and writing ability, and the chairmen of the economy and all supreme court members? And everyone in the senate and house?

don't project on him, user

To be clear, I really don't blame Pynchon, as I don't blame my own boomer parents; everyone fell into that and they all felt they *were* providing not only a deeper message but one that was going to change the world for the better, and most will go to their graves believing it/they did. I accept it for what it is, so I can't say what he could have done because he can't be expected to have interpreted the world in any other way given the information he was privy to and the programming he was subjected to.

The deeper message I've been referring to isn't something general and timeless, it's tailored to the times. The deeper literary boomer hippie message, in all its variations, was the message of that previous time and it was effective as such. Many writers found success tapping into it. But that time is over and we can view it in hindsight now, and it's not the deeper message of the future, which is why I'm lamenting how there isn't one, literarily speaking.

But if you're asking me what I think it could/should be ... I think it's obviously the combination of Pynchon's unrivaled aesthetics/complex sentence structure and the new deeper message of these times or those to come. Plenty think they know what that is, including myself, but I think it's just starting now and time decides anyway. Can you see where this is all going? Can you capture the zeitgeist of this globo techno 3rd world invasion internet age, but instead of making it into some GR-like iconoclastic deconstruction, undo the failed leftist vision of before of life as taking bong hits at Gordita Beach and offer a new one while building upon the revamped postmodern prose style which was one of the few positive developments to come out of that previous age? That's what wins here, imo.

Afaik, Pynchons political views were relatively middle-of-the-road and uninteresting.

Well, your middle of the road is likely not my own or history's, but Pynchon is quite obviously a devoted 60s leftist.

>quite obviously a devoted 60s leftist.
I don't think so. And if so its only because of the negative things he outlines in gravities rainbow. And those negative things he outlines in gravities rainbow, is probably the reason why he is not 'as deep' as you wish he was. Because what can the depth you think he is lacking accomplish?

Have you read Vineland, Inherent Vice, or his essay on Watts? If you have you should realize why my characterization is not controversial.

cool, interesting. Now I am sensing, parsing, what you do not dig, is pessimism and cynicism? The bleakness and hopelessness and crummyness of some of it?

May I ask if you are a writer yourself? If so, are you working on anything in particular?

No I have not read vineland or inherent vice, but maybe they are a bit more laid back, and him winding down and taking some weight off, being more comic and loose and fun, in between his more serious works? Not that he didnt take them serious. But you just seem upset that he appears to be a sort of atlas shrugging, that he is dedicating himself to creating works of art (though yes, with socio, political economic factors) become successful, and he is satisfied with just that, you seem upset that he did not choose to dedicate himself to becoming the leader of a radical nationwide intellectual movement, you seem disappointed he did not strive to become a major historical figure more closer to hitler, stalin, putin, ghandi, jesus, than david foster wallace or joyce.

I'm not important, but those are symptoms of the postmodern zeitgeist, though the problem is much deeper.

you'll need a bigger bait

>a devoted 60s leftist.

Which is the mainstream political view of today.

Those works and BE comprise everything he's ever written about the post WW2 age. Didn't I say he's the best writer alive and that I don't put any blame on him for anything, though? Thought the below was pretty clear.

> I accept it for what it is, so I can't say what he could have done because he can't be expected to have interpreted the world in any other way given the information he was privy to and the programming he was subjected to.

Yes you did say that. But you are also cutting him short, and I am also trying to pry deeper in your analysis, understanding, and desires. You are being vague and cryptic, causing me to have to ask many questions, and then you dont even answer them. I am not baiting or anything, being purely open and honest to how you perceive the world. What is, and what should be done, and where you see Pynchons role could and should be in that.

Hence the issues with "deeper messages."

anywern

what a creep

Seriously
Such shitty work
Sparse a few paragraphs here and there

explain

>rubbished

>people here actually think Pynchon is better than DeLillo

big set pieces and fireworks will always win out I guess

How the story looks/feels is aesthetics. Aesthetics doesn't equal flowery prose. Aesthetics is form. Form is basically everything. Yeah you might prefer on topic to another, but once you've chosen something to read, what matters is how it is presented, ie aesthetics.