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Post by beanstalk on Jun 30, 2017 13:56:21 GMT
Thought it would be nice if we had such a thread. Tell the forum dwellers all about your current reading material, and while you're at it, add a few words of appreciation. Just so to keep the thread interesting and productive.
I'm a little more than halfway through The Sound of the Mountain by Yasunari Kawabata. This book is an absolute delight, poignant in a most understated way. It's highly concerned with mono no aware, or the sadness of things, which appears to be an important concept in Japanese literature from the little that I know of it. The language is simple but vibrant, often beautiful. One can only hope to experience such depth of feeling in old age.
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Post by beanstalk on Jul 14, 2017 11:27:48 GMT
This morning I finished reading The Final Martyrs, a collection of short stories by Shusaku Endo. Other than one story which I felt wasn't up to the high level of the others, it was a fantastic read. While he often reuses the same themes (Aging, illness, Catholicism in Japan), it never feels contrived and each story is its own thing. I had already read some of them in another shorter collection last year, and some passages have really stuck with me. He's a profoundly melancholy writer and I recommend you guys to check out his stuff if you have the occasion.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 14, 2017 14:33:08 GMT
reading is for NERDS
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Post by Jinxtengu on Jul 21, 2017 9:23:03 GMT
Being a nerd is cool dude. I'm reading: a day in the life of Ivan denisovich and les enfants terribles.
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Post by spiderwebhead on Jul 22, 2017 2:50:54 GMT
I've been reading soft machine by William Burroughs, really weird stuff, it feels like gibberish sometimes because he was really high on heroine when he wrote and then he cut up those writings and pasted them together to make them even more gibberish seeming, but if you just keep reading and let yourself feel confused you will find that you have become totally absorbed in his world, its really weird, there are some genius lines like "his face got an erection and turned purple." that made me laugh. There's also a part where somebody is being trapped in a basement by priests and they release a centipede on him as torture. Its fucking strange read it. Its also really interesting to just google and youtube william burroughs stuff and see how many people he influenced and his views on stuff from shamanism to dreams. I had two related dreams two nights in a row and in the morning i used burrough's cut up technique to collage the dreams together and the result was really weird. Bowie and burroughs say that the cut up technuiqe can tell the future.
I've also been reading the way of Tarot by alejandro jodorwosky and ive been studying the tarot, what ever you know about tarot cards is probably wrong. Whatever I know about tarot cards is probably wrong, they are whatever the hell you think they are. I'm a huge fan of alejandro jodorowsky and i prefer him to teach me about the tarot. The study of the tarot can teach you the power of symbolism in art, and it will teach you to put hide meaning in every minute detail of your art. It will freak you out and open up parts of your brain that have been mostly ignored by humanity for the last few centuries.
I've also been reading VALIS by phillip k dick. the first time I started reading this book it freaked me out so much that I threw it away because i thought it was driving me insane. I feel less fragile now and the book is fucking incredible.
Ive also been reading Cosmic Trigger by robert anton wilson. This book is really is about a bunch of stuff that the skeptic would probably raise their nose at, magic, aliens, psychadelics, egypt, and other stereotypical burnout talk. More than anything this book is a great introduction to the esoteric and it references ALOT of weird stuff, its a deep rabbit hole and can be really exciting if you just suspend dis belief and have fun with the ideas he poses. Can also make you feel like youre going crazy.
I just read the first two books in the carlos castenedas don juan series. Just a bunch of weird stories about mexican shamanism and magic, some good insights here and there. Its just really fun reading to me. Alot of people think all these books are pure bullshit, but my experiences with psychadelics, and some stories i heard from friend about dealing with brujos in peru make me think its real.
I really want to get into reading gurdjeffs stuff
I found all these books seperately of eachother and they are all connecting in these synchronicitous ways. Like I actually lost Cosmic Trigger halfway through reading it, and was really bummed out, a couple days later I went to the thrift store and found carlos castenedas don juan book on the shelf, I hadn't remembered where I heard about it but it seemed familiar and it looked interesting so i bought it. I got through the book and then found the copy of "Cosmic Trigger" that I lost, when I opened cosmic trigger, the place i had bookmarked when I lost it was referencing teachings of don juan.
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Post by jacques on Jul 22, 2017 5:02:03 GMT
the wisodom of no escape pema chodron
LEUNIG wayward book
and I was reading a book I think Imagnary beings which I haven't looked at for a while, but I like it
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Post by nl on Jul 22, 2017 23:08:59 GMT
Break point found at.\MemoryExceptionFilter.cpp41
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Post by Deleted on Jul 23, 2017 1:42:21 GMT
 currently illuminating my mind with this tome. From the very first page it captured my imagination with it's intrigue and splendour, and it captured my heart with it's beautiful prose. There is truly nothing negative to say about this book except that it does finally come to an end, and while the story is perfectly well rounded and ends wonderfully, you will still curse the god that made you live in a world in which MINECRAFT THE ISLAND can't just go on forever. That's interesting about Tarot, Spiderman. Just yesterday I was looking for symbolism about the place, and it's funny how many places it manifests itself when you look hard enough. Didn't manage to find any ethereal messages in the mould on my fruit yet though   |
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Post by Jinxtengu on Jul 23, 2017 11:37:00 GMT
I found Solzhenitsyn overrated. Poor me, im in a labor camp. boo hoo. The gadget infested, Orwellian nightmare that people live in now is 100times worse. At least the Russians had/have a proud culture with generations of intelligencia. Whats the culture here?
. there is virtually no culture, except football and whatever shit gets pumped through mainstream TV, forced onto an intellectally starved population. People consume reality TV shows and the vaule systems they endorse, like pig swill, its all some people have. So thier world view is shaped by such garbage.
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Post by Jinxtengu on Jul 23, 2017 13:54:13 GMT
Sounds like a similar situation to what goes on here. I've been fortunate enough to have some glimpses into the life of a few prominent Australians, don't ask me how. they all have one thing in common, which is crooked financial dealings, well generally speaking they do. Even if they technically do everything legal, the fact is they know how to work the system, ie doge tax, negative gear houses, earn from investments. They consider anyone who doesn't understand these things to be "idiots".. Thats a direct quote. I was raised in a milieu where the consensus was that the level of culture could be elevated by making art that spoke truth. Somehow these tny acts of rebellion were supposed to affect change and undrmine the status quo. In my eyes this method has failed and been proven useless. It was unrealisticly idealistic to begin with. My father grew up under stalalanism and hated it, from whst i gather because he had to queue for bread for an hour. Now he can barely afford bread.
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Post by Deleted on Jul 23, 2017 15:45:25 GMT
uh
im for anarchy
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Post by Deleted on Jan 17, 2018 13:01:59 GMT
just read Spring Snow by Yukio Mishima which I thought was a very good book. It was interesting that it was for me quite a gripping book despite the fact that materially there was not a massive amount that happened in the book
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Post by Deleted on Jan 17, 2018 21:54:37 GMT
i am reading armada at the moment, i'm almost at the middle of the book and all i can see is teenager wishfull thinking, i thought that this concept was going to be subverted after a while but it's still the same "wow the videogame that we used to play is real and wooow (insert 2015 reference here)"
i am still going to finish the book though, i have this rule in my mind that i am only going to buy another book after i finish the one i'm reading.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 2, 2018 5:56:54 GMT
I am reading Whistler's Bones by Greg Barron and also reading Ride the Tiger by JUlius Evola
Both are pretty nice yeea
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Post by Jinxtengu on Mar 7, 2018 4:29:50 GMT
Lenore  How gawth of you ah heh. :_+ I have a reference to a Poe story in my new game, an easter egg though. I wonder if anyone will find it. Im trying to read ecce homo atm |
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