Books & Literature@4-ch

Books & Literature@4-ch

Fiction, non-fiction and fan-fiction is all welcomed.
  • Warning: Discussion or links about acquiring illegal downloads will be removed, and you may be banned.
  • Remember to put in '[SPOILERS]' in the title of your thread if you're planning to talk about them!
Rules · 規則
基本的には英語の使用を強く希望します。ただ日本語板の場合は日本語か英語。
Board look: Amber Blue Moon Buun Channel4 Futaba Headline Mercury Mittens Pseud0ch Tanasinn Toothpaste

[Applause]Everytime we finish a book we post here[Praise] (135)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2008-06-11 06:20 ID:CwXuimoY

http://4-ch.net/games/kareha.pl/1206548566/
This is a nice thread. Let's have a book edition.

I just read my first book by Haruki Murakami, "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle". Murakami gets a lot of praise in these parts, and after reading this book, I can confirm that it isn't unfounded. The book to me felt a bit weaker towards the end, but I really liked hearing the stories of Nomonhan, Siberia, and such.

126 Name: Bookworm : 2024-02-14 07:07 ID:8o1kbTIV

Steelworkers in America: The Nonunion Era by David Brody
Probably my first serious history book(though the posters here would not be impressed) and I wasn't disappointed. Brody has a focus on the community of an immigrant neighborhood and how steel men slowly dug their paws into it in order to disrupt any future strikes. It exposes their interest in "culture" as an attempt to portray the union men as ungrateful. So many truths in one read. Will dig deeper into the topic.

127 Name: Bookworm : 2024-02-27 17:24 ID:hSiE4Upp

This month I read all three books in the Southern Reach trilogy (Annihilation, Authority, Acceptance). I enjoyed book 2 the most. Interesting premise and engaging setting though it eventually becomes apparent that the setting is more of a vehicle for the author's environmentalism than a puzzle to be solved (at least in my interpretation). Despite this I think it remains a good read and is somewhat comparable to Roadside Picnic in a few areas.

I might read the new interquel novel releasing later this year, Absolution.

128 Name: Bookworm : 2024-03-16 18:37 ID:8o1kbTIV

They Closed Their Schools: Prince Edward County, Virginia, 1951-1964 by Bob Smith.

It's a very personal read due to the amount of interview sourcing Smith relies upon, and his use of differing stories to show how suffocating Southern civility was in determining the truth of any event is...okay? I noticed it but didn't think much about it.

I struggle to say anything substantial about it that wouldn't just be a summary of the events like my last post, but I do like the air of futility given at the end. The "Uncle Tom" of this story not viewing the children as ungrateful or too brash but rather doomed to fail, simply because the organization of white money in the county was too great, too swift, binding together at a level of organization the blacks could only dream of. That's almost definitely a major misreading, but it was my first impression of it.

129 Name: Bookworm : 2024-04-05 15:11 ID:aAgmjHzf

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

A gripping read. Though very reminiscent of the sort of esoteric horror framework that made House of Leaves a hit, this is much more succinct and straightforward with its delivery at a brief 250 pages and offers a very satisfying conclusion, albeit with tantalisingly few unsolved threads to speculate about. Highly recommended.

130 Name: Bookworm : 2024-04-29 11:07 ID:aAgmjHzf

The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

Satisfying mystery set in ye olde new zealand golde rush times, with the interesting archetypal symbolism of character personalities being based on particular astrological signs and celestial objects, and their interactions derived from stellar conjunctions during the dates the novel spans. It's kinda like homestuck's astrology characters, but with a bit more substance. Each chapter is half as long as the preceding one which I liked, but consequently the opening chapter made up half of the novel, which was a bit brutal.

131 Name: Bookworm : 2024-05-01 02:38 ID:1wgRB86a

The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

HOLY CRAP! This book is amazing, and a true work of art that can only come from a divine power. The book provides great in-depth detail of a hungry caterpillar and his struggle to quench his hunger in this new world, but eventually succumbing to lust for food and making an example of what can come from gluttony, a tummy ache. I recommend this book for all of those wanting to educate themselves and become self-conscious of this caterpillar's story.

132 Name: Bookworm : 2024-07-26 10:47 ID:7TX3NowD

I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream by Harlan Ellison

Not what I was expecting and a bit lacklustre. AM's behaviour felt more like an angsty teenager than the evil supercomputer it was intended to be, and the "non-exposition" scenes felt contrived and stupid. Maybe I just have a hard time relating to the narrator and his companions. Overall I found the setting very interesting - I'd like to see it expanded on. I guess I'll give the old PC game a go sometime.

133 Name: Bookworm : 2024-11-06 22:33 ID:22QU0+O1

To Mock a Mockingbird by Raymond Smullyan

Starts off fairly tame but soon ventures into a delightful adventure in combinatorial logic. The introduction to the “birds” section was pretty alienating, but the more I read, the more I felt like I understood.

134 Name: Bookworm : 2024-11-07 13:22 ID:No4eAYDW

The Tartar Steppe by Dino Buzzati

I admittedly only picked this one up because it was apparently the inspiration for Sora no Woto. Some of the metaphorical passages were laid on a little bit too thick for my tastes, but overall I really enjoyed this one. It managed to keep a very personal, human feeling to it throughout despite its fairly impersonal subject matter, and it definitely distinguished itself well against other military/war novels.

135 Name: Bookworm : 2024-11-22 22:23 ID:AVgpLtyS

Red Thread: On Mazes and Labyrinths by Charlotte Higgins

A very odd book. The writing deliberately evokes a labyrinth, with lots of odd digressions and tangents that sometimes loop back to being relevant and sometimes don't. It also shifts back and forth between fiction, nonfiction, and personal anecdotes. I rather enjoyed it but I suspect a lot of people wouldn't.

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Lolita (3)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2024-10-28 04:38 ID:l6mRulyR

I just finished the Lolita novel.

It added a lot more context that the movies did not have.

Humbert and Lolita are both awful people but i do feel sorry for them.

It isn't like the movies where my opinion is clear, Humbert is a narcissistic asshole who sees himself as better than everyone else and does awful things like repeatedly touch Lolita when she does not want it or lie to her but at the same time he also does good things like try to be a good father he takes her to movies and out to lunch he buys her a bike for her birthday and lets her hangout with friends.

Lolita obviously loved him at first but fell out of love with him once she hit her teenage years and went from being a typical tomboy kid to a bitchy teenage girl who seduces Humbert to get money from him.

Also, while Lolita to a certain extent is a victim there were parts where she clearly was the initiator and wanted it as well.

Post too long. Click to view the whole post or the thread page.

2 Name: Bookworm : 2024-10-31 00:20 ID:/6DZN0MI

>while Lolita to a certain extent is a victim there were parts where she clearly was the initiator and wanted it as well.

This is probably what makes the book controversial nowadays. Since we usually expect victims to be blameless and innocent and children to be asexual. Its hard for people to accept that abuse isn't some night stalker jumping out of the bush or some horrible ordeal that the victim always hates and victims too can have hand in their own molestation. I'm pretty sure most kids who are trafficked or raped on camera for CP fappers don't think they are being hurt or think its normal because of all the positive rewards they get from their adult abusers.

Lolita is a good commentary for why modern sex and relationships suck. We are all Humberts now. Not in the sense of being molesters, but because our approach to relationships is always narcisstic and selfish. A partner is just a means to an end and therapy books, professional relationship advice, and self-help lit all encourage people to be self-interested narcissistic bastards.

3 Name: Bookworm : 2024-10-31 06:02 ID:l6mRulyR

>>2

You make a good point anon.

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the portrait of dorian gray (1)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2024-10-05 17:19 ID:WgfL3UPU

no one told me it would be this gay

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[literature] high fantasy / dark fantasy novels (7)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2024-06-09 17:17 ID:Z3WLbnTT

Hello 4-ch, I am looking to read a fantasy novel, do you have any suggestions? Of course, I'm interested in less mainstream works, no lord of the rings or narnia.
Other than that, feel free to use this thread to discuss fantasy novels.

2 Name: Bookworm : 2024-06-14 15:50 ID:LbQvPOkp

What about the Hobbit?

3 Name: Bookworm : 2024-06-29 19:45 ID:PQuI0v3X

>>2
The Hobbit is dark? Was there a hidden child sex orgy beheading scene I missed in the censored version?

4 Name: Bookworm : 2024-07-08 16:45 ID:Heaven

I'd love to read a literature equivalent to the dark fantasy world of Berserk. All the "dark fantasy" novels I have read are about racism and sex and bloodlines and monarchies, and I don't have the attention span for CK2 shit like that. But I'm not very storied, so also hoping for some recommendations.

5 Name: Bookworm : 2024-07-29 14:22 ID:RrKoAYoA

>>4
exactly what I was thinking!

6 Name: Bookworm : 2024-10-01 09:21 ID:ux8+bsJ9

Chronicles of the Black Company by Glenn Cook

Malazan Book of the Fallen by Steven Erickson

7 Name: Bookworm : 2024-10-04 00:24 ID:T+blD8so

> Chronicles of the Black Company by Glenn Cook

This was the first thing that came to mind but then I wasn't sure if it was a bit too much empires and machinations. I guess it is more focused on the down-in-the-trenches "we're mercenaries and we do the job, even if we're hired by fem-Sauron" with the politics taking more of a backseat.

As far as things that haven't been brought up I think Angus Wells' "Kingdoms" trilogy starting with "Wrath of Ashar" can get my mention if not necessarily my full recommendation (the third book I found a bit of a letdown, but not enough to ruin the whole thing for me). It has a villain who's pretty graphically grisly at times but still leans overall more towards the classic fantasy "chosen hero must battle the evil" sort of plot rather than Game of Thrones type stuff. Wells is also kind of interesting in that apparently when he's not writing fantasy shit he writes westerns (under a different pseudonym) and that shows through in his fantasy writing a bit.

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Jap Lit (4)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2024-08-26 13:22 ID:VQapuKRZ

Any recommendations, apart from the obvious like Mishima, Akutagawa and Soseki?

2 Name: Bookworm : 2024-08-27 08:01 ID:trV9wFvw

Reika Monogatari, The Manyoshu, the Tale of the Bamboo Cutter, and the Heike Monogatari are classics. If you don’t like traditional fiction then try Kobo Abe’s Woman In The Sand Dunes or Ryu Murakami’s In The Miso Soup.

I don’t know if you consider VNs and light novels to be lit but there’s those too.

3 Name: Bookworm : 2024-09-04 19:52 ID:jlOg3fbz

Start with the kojiki

4 Name: Bookworm : 2024-10-01 09:15 ID:GWAF4wLJ

anything by Kenji Siratori is rather avant garde modern japanese literature

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Recommend me works on psychology (5)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2024-07-29 14:25 ID:Heaven

Recommend me works on psychology to help me better understand the human mind so that I can attain power and seduce everyone around me

2 Name: Bookworm : 2024-08-01 14:22 ID:jz9q1Oip

Freud's Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis, the Milgram studies idk when you read enough of it you realize most psychology is actual bullshit pseudo-philosophy. The exception is stuff like cognitive science where they study perception and optics and stuff. Neuroscience is also a load of shit filled with ignorant pseuds.

3 Name: Bookworm : 2024-08-17 19:30 ID:mSM0WrCJ

I'm reading this essay by Noam Chomsky called Language and the Brain. So far I don't understand any of it but I am determined to learn about cognitive psychology and universal gramamr even if I'm a total retard. I wish there were easier intros to this stuff. Also check out Elizabeth Loftus. She did a bunch of studies where she found you can insert false memories into people's heads. Disturbing.

4 Name: Bookworm : 2024-09-22 20:54 ID:UraKcbxj

>She did a bunch of studies where she found you can insert false memories into people's heads. Disturbing.

Isn't that a known manipulation/control tactic?

5 Name: Bookworm : 2024-09-24 00:30 ID:7v4wVklT

>>4
Yeah, Loftus did a bunch of studies on how "repressed memory therapists" were inserting false memories of sexual abuse and satanism in the heads of their patients to extract moneys from lucrative court cases. To this day, some of those "repressed memory therapists" and brainwashed satanic ritual abuse victims (that is victims of the therapists) are convinced Loftus is either a victim of memory repressed sexual abuse herself or part of a big satanic cult conspiracy. She still stalk her and send death threats to this day.

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Star Wars EU Thread (11)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2024-04-08 07:29 ID:+od16ZSY

Star Wars EU Thread.

No new Disney canon allowed only legends.

What books have you read?

I am currently reading Children of the jedi.

2 Name: Bookworm : 2024-04-12 22:39 ID:zNPjjxhj

Never read anything from the EU. Anything you'd recommend?

3 Name: Bookworm : 2024-04-17 19:21 ID:+od16ZSY

>>2

Heir to the empire.

4 Name: Bookworm : 2024-04-18 16:58 ID:OHaGe+O0

Didn't Disney kill the EU? I would have thought it would have been source material for them but as usual coorperate suits and self-annointed screenwriters think they can do everything better.

5 Name: Bookworm : 2024-04-22 00:55 ID:+od16ZSY

>>4

Yes, it was de-canonized in April 2014.

6 Name: Bookworm : 2024-04-25 16:56 ID:r7byQcTd

>>5

>de-canonized

They can actually do that?

7 Name: Bookworm : 2024-05-01 02:41 ID:DrfRCWWO

If they can de-canonize what is stopping them from de-canonizing the original films? They could get J. J. Abrams to rehash them and give them a Disney make over. I always thought Empire Strikes Back would be better if it had more convoluted plot and characters flatter than a loli’s chest.

8 Name: Bookworm : 2024-06-04 21:26 ID:1bja0Q9w

>>5
Such a shame, the Old Republic era is so much more interesting than their half-assed replacement 'High Republic'

9 Name: Bookworm : 2024-07-09 22:21 ID:5vewZaY2

>>8

The original clone wars were also great.

10 Name: Bookworm : 2024-07-10 09:51 ID:gMmSi2oB

Disney scrapped the Clone Wars series too?

11 Name: Bookworm : 2024-09-15 02:19 ID:5vewZaY2

>>10
The 2003 clone wars.

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Page Industries (2)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2024-07-23 23:16 ID:6gWZAAA0

The Secret Service couldn't keep up. As consumer-grade Universal Constructors flooded the market, people began using them to manufacture satellite weaponry. The unthinkable became routine: holding Senators hostage with the mere threat of a strike, coordinates programmed into hastily assembled, orbiting death machines.

Page, ever the schemer, had seen the writing on the wall long before the chaos erupted. He ordered us to clone the entire Senate, ensuring his precious legislation remained untouchable and live, regardless of the threats. Now, the real Senators were hidden away, their roles played by perfect duplicates, indistinguishable even under the closest scrutiny.

But that was only the beginning. Page had his secret plan. He implanted the cloned Senators with advanced augmentation devices, giving him unprecedented control. Through SSH, he now wrote laws directly, bypassing the sluggishness of democracy. His clandestine augmentations turned the Senators into mere extensions of his will, puppets executing his commands with unerring precision.

In the midst of this upheaval, Everett, our once-diligent watchdog, had retreated into silence. He wouldn't even read the news, overwhelmed by the sheer impossibility of the world we had created. Page's grip tightened, his influence expanding as he bent the Senate—and by extension, the entire nation—to his vision.

Post too long. Click to view the whole post or the thread page.

2 Name: Bookworm : 2024-07-26 10:50 ID:Heaven

Page Industries Limited is an Indian manufacturer and retailer of innerwear, loungewear and socks, headquartered in Bangalore. It is the exclusive licensee of Jockey International in India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Qatar, Maldives and Bhutan. In 2011, it licensed Speedo swimwear from Pentland Group for India and Sri Lanka.

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ITT post banned/taboo books you read (11)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2023-10-23 01:55 ID:EyNll25V

I read the anarchist cookbook and it sucked! I tried Uncle Ted’s book but everyone’s read that already. De Sade is just porn spam that’s not even gurochan tier. Lolis are banned in my country. I need some recommendations.

2 Name: Bookworm : 2023-10-24 00:57 ID:X81qgEiB

Fascism: 100 Questions Asked and Answered. 90% of it is just establishing a new parliament based on interest groups(e.g one for the steel industry, one for agriculture, etc.), holding foreigners on a tight leash, and forcing capitalists to use local labor. I think he mentions something about expanding pensions and welfare, but my memory is shoddy. Honestly not much even a normie would disagree with minus the anti-Jewry.

3 Name: Bookworm : 2023-11-14 03:23 ID:Heaven

I read Sayyid Qutb. He really isn't that bad. It's basically, dictatorship is bad, people should be free, religion commands us to fight for freedom. That's literally it. I'm disappointed. CNN told me this guy was the philosopher behind ISIS. It's all a lie as usual.

4 Name: Bookworm : 2023-11-19 02:30 ID:ndYHRpm5

I read Bin Laden’s Letter to America. I don’t see what the fuss is about. It’s just him carefully explaining why he attacked America and most of the points were pretty reasonable and not the “he just hates our freedoms” thing. Turns out Bin Laden doesn’t like America propping up Israel or dictators or the Saudis and as a weeb he didn’t like the nuking of Japan. There’s a whole section where he complains about US corporations polluting the earth with toxic chemicals. He also claims AIDS was spread by America, which, looking at the state of online discourse, was probably right.

5 Name: Bookworm : 2023-11-27 01:33 ID:5VVGlRQj

I read one of Stalin’s books. He actually wrote philosophy. He’s surprisingly erudite and knowledgable and not the foaming at the mouth lunatic you’d expect. But he sees the world in a very mechanical top down way like you’d a communist dictator naturally would.

6 Name: Bookworm : 2023-12-02 18:51 ID:X81qgEiB

>>5
Which one did you read in particular, Anon? Maybe you could talk about it in the Lenin-Stalin thread?

7 Name: Bookworm : 2023-12-04 16:32 ID:ZNpUwa6+

>>6
Dialectical and Historical Materialism. Its supposed to be a textbook intro to Marx’s philosophy. Stalin advises readers to just ignore Hegel and his understanding of dialectics is actually closer to Fichte and then he makes it all about biological development. Lenin and Stalin literally think that every physical thing has two basic contradictory elements inside it that are opposites and studying the struggle between them gives you the key to understanding the development of that thing. They take this method and think they can apply it to literally everything, from the history of society to how to read a book and manufacture cars. Its like a crystal ball that can do everything. They consider it objective science.

None of this actually matches up with anything Hegel or Marx actually wrote, except for when Stalin quotes them like a Bible thumper at a Sunday school. It actually explains a lot about communist countries and why they were so fucked up. These people think their geniuses that figured out the truth about the universe and everyone has to obey them because muh dialectic material analysis.

8 Name: Bookworm : 2024-02-04 23:34 ID:M6qRvO12

I tried reading Crowley's books.

9 Name: Bookworm : 2024-04-12 22:40 ID:Heaven

I read this collection of /pol/ memes. It was garbage total waste of time. Didn't even finish.

10 Name: Bookworm : 2024-05-15 22:59 ID:mBrxiscy

It's not banned, but the book The Memoirs of Josephine by Felix Salten - better known as the guy who wrote children's books such as Bambi - is pretty good. I'm surprised it isn't banned. I can't really describe anything about here without getting myself on a w*tchl*st, but suffice to say it deals with a lot of horny stuff. It's great - from a literary perspective, of course. If you like books about girls doing extreme degenerate sex acts in high society 19th century Vienna and enjoying themselves look no further!

You may have to track down a used copy off some book website, as it's not exactly something any publishers want to print anymore (insofar as I know).

11 Name: Bookworm : 2024-06-29 19:51 ID:czH0p1ja

Not banned but definitely taboo. Stephen King's It. Yeah I know its a mainstream horror classic and got four movies but in the book there's graphic child sex. When the kids are running around in the sewers looking for the clown man, the girl Beverly tries to cheer them all up by forcing them to have sex with her. And by force I mean it, she practically pulls one of the guys shorts off and whispers some seductive shit in his here to get him over his virgin anxiety. All the boys take turns fucking her. King goes into detail too, describing the pain of penetration and joy of 12 year old girl orgasm in autistic detail. Its such an odd scene because it has nothing to do with the plot and hits you out of left field. Like, yeah we're looking for the killer clown in the killer clown lair so lets have underage group sex now.

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Is it dumb to post here? (15)

1 Name: Bookworm : 2007-11-12 21:40 ID:MD0mwgOE

Anyone else think that it's kind of absurd to post here? I'm pretty sure that at least 85% of 4ch reads nothing that isn't online.

6 Name: Bookworm : 2007-11-18 02:10 ID:eh5FjzVJ

Many classical literatures are available online as electronic text nowadays.

7 Name: Bookworm : 2007-11-18 14:08 ID:3qbtZWpt

OP is wrong. I love books.

8 Name: Bookworm : 2007-11-24 01:45 ID:onJ2v25O

umm I find it's better to post on any of these text boards than on imageboards. I'm just so afraid I'll get made fun of by other /b/tards.

9 Name: Bookworm : 2007-11-30 04:57 ID:Heaven

I love books. Though I think it's unfair to discount the internet as "unliterate" or whatever. There's the Gutenberg project and stuff, yeah, but...I have been truly amazed by the beauty and veracity of some internet copypasta. Or at least some good writing.

As we all know, smoking is really bad for your health. What a lot of people don't realize is that when you smoke, those few minutes of your expected lifespan are literally transformed into the ash you flick away into an ashtray. Ashtrays, each and every one of them, are constructed by a single group running several dozen front companies.

Basically, unless you're putting out your smokes beneath your heel or in the ashtray your kid made at camp, you're dispensing your ashen life into this group's eager little recepticle. Their ashtrays absorb the life force from the ashes and sends it to a central holding facility. No one knows for sure what these guys are going to do when they've collected all that life energy, but it's probably going to be huge.

Incidentally, there's talk of a rival organization leading the anti-smoking political agenda from behind the scenes. They probably figure removing smoking sections, and thus ashtrays, from restaurants and bars is a good first step towards thwarting whatever it is this ashtray company is trying to do.

10 Name: Bookworm : 2008-02-27 17:11 ID:FqHmKlw8

"The copypasta" may become the great new literary form of the 21st century, just as "the film" overtook "the novel."

11 Post deleted.

12 Name: Bookworm : 2020-08-13 09:12 ID:BJ3a7dIU

Yes

13 Name: Bookworm : 2020-12-31 04:36 ID:Heaven

i am a heron. i ahev a long neck and i pick fish out of the water w/ my beak. if you dont repost this comment on 10 other pages i will fly into your kitchen tonight and make a mess of your pots and pans

14 Post deleted.

15 Name: Bookworm : 2024-05-24 06:34 ID:Heaven

I don't even fucking care about reading anymore. I'm not smart enough to do any analysis with the information I'm given. If I was I wouldn't need to read other people's posts so much.

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New thread

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