I like books. I just don't want to take on too much. Do they have an introduction to the modern blurb?

Buffy ,'Lessons'


Literary Buffistas 3: Don't Parse the Blurb, Dear.

There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."


Polter-Cow - Aug 02, 2006 8:45:15 am PDT #1111 of 28131
What else besides ramen can you scoop? YOU CAN SCOOP THIS WORLD FROM DARKNESS!

I didn't actually ask for the long story, erika! Maybe we'll be safe.

Did you read them on Spring Break as part of school, or on your own?

On my own. Kind of a "Why the hell haven't I read these books for school?" binge. Oh, I also read Brave New World after 1984.

I ended up writing my senior thesis on dehumanization in dystopian societies in the two books, so I got more bang for my intellectual buck.


erikaj - Aug 02, 2006 8:47:59 am PDT #1112 of 28131
Always Anti-fascist!

Sometimes you don't have to ask. But I'm not putting the cinnamon out, just in case.


Hayden - Aug 02, 2006 8:53:26 am PDT #1113 of 28131
aka "The artist formerly known as Corwood Industries."

No one authorized the cinnamon, that's for sure.


Frankenbuddha - Aug 02, 2006 8:55:17 am PDT #1114 of 28131
"We are the Goon Squad and we're coming to town...Beep! Beep!" - David Bowie, "Fashion"

I see the whole sick crew is here, then.


lisah - Aug 02, 2006 8:55:35 am PDT #1115 of 28131
Punishingly Intricate

cinnamon

hee!


Hayden - Aug 02, 2006 8:57:25 am PDT #1116 of 28131
aka "The artist formerly known as Corwood Industries."

Wikipedia told me something I'd never gotten out of Oedipa Maas's name: It's a mispronunciation of "Sam Spade" backwards.


erikaj - Aug 02, 2006 8:59:40 am PDT #1117 of 28131
Always Anti-fascist!

Some people think it's good. But not, apparently,if it shreds your mouth. (Sorry. Tangent. But that happens to be some of the first symbolism I ever really liked. And you do have a way of fucking declaiming sometimes. You know it's true. But maybe if I had an expertise deeper than looking at at bloody crime photos, I could do it, too.)


Volans - Aug 02, 2006 9:05:51 am PDT #1118 of 28131
move out and draw fire

But you can just not read them, right?

You'd think. But I have this terrible problem with books ending. I get locked into some Newtonian inertia - the reader in motion stays in motion - and before I know it I've read the first page of questions. They are usually annoying enough to jolt me out of the inertia.

In books without questions I read the acknowledgements, about the author, any adverts, and the back cover blurb.

Tolkein earned my undying love (in so many ways) with those meaty appendices.

In casual reading news, I just this instant finished The Chinatown Death Cloud Peril. It's basically one big in-joke about the pulps and pulp writers. The author has some great ideas, but the prose doesn't fly.


DavidS - Aug 02, 2006 9:18:54 am PDT #1119 of 28131
"Look, son, if it's good enough for Shirley Bassey, it's good enough for you."

what the hell is the point of The Crying of Lot 49 ?

It's to provide Corwood's next band a bunch of songs by The Paranoids.

Honestly, Cor, doing a gig of nothing but Pynchon songs would pack a house in Austin.

In books without questions I read the acknowledgements, about the author, any adverts, and the back cover blurb.

What? No love for Notes About The Typeface?


Volans - Aug 02, 2006 9:20:41 am PDT #1120 of 28131
move out and draw fire

No love for Notes About The Typeface?

I am a font ho. I read that first. Sometimes I create my own Questions for Discussion Groups about the typeface choice.