I'm missing something...

[juldea]

Sometimes I feel like the only one without some kind of affinity towards literature. Or maybe I'm always looking for too much in a book?

I just finished The Crying of Lot 49. And, it was good. I had read part of it, and I picked it up again to finish it because I was curious. But, on finishing it, all I can say is that I don't get it. What was the point? The back cover says that the main character "attains a not inconsiderable amount of self-knowledge," but I don't know what they're talking about. She went and got hooked into the idea of a long-standing worldwide conspiracy, met some really interesting people, some people died and some went crazy, and... I just don't know. Am I asking too much, wanting to get something out of a book? Because the book made itself out to be something I should profit from. If it had just said, "This is fun to read," I would be fine with it, because it was fun to read.

So maybe I'm just trying to be too deep. *shrug*

It was supposed to be really satirical too, and I missed that as well I guess.

Grumble.

I gave plasma today. I weighed in at 151, so I had to donate 850ml instead of 625 as normal - the cutoff is 150lbs. I felt very very dizzy and woozy after donating because it was more than usual. I saw the end of Tomb Raider, which I had seen before, and the beginning of Legally Blonde, which I hadn't, but now I want to. It actually was kind of cute and funny. Plus, it has a lot of pictures of Harvard Yard, which is a beautiful place that I miss.

On to Children of Dune.

Comments

[vambot5.livejournal.com]

it has a general theme (as does most of pynchon's work, and much of the literature of the time) of paranoia, and conspiracy. some grand conspiracy that is always just beyond your reach. he's also big on the idea of chaos and entropy, and that shows up to some extent, as I recall, though not as much as in his other work. I always think of him as being somewhere between kurt vonnegut jr and william s burroughs.

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[juldea.livejournal.com]

Both of whom I've never read...

[zenandtheart.livejournal.com]

Me neither... I get that feeling with books occasionally.. more often movies. People go on about them being brilliant and I just think that it was boring or I didn't get it. Corch is like that with art *grin*. NEVER go to a gallery with him, it's all 'Wtf is this suppposed to be?', 'I could've done that', 'a monkey could've painted this'.. it just goes ON..

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[vambot5.livejournal.com]

really? that's something you should fix. burroughs isn't for everybody, but vonnegut is almost always a good read.

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[juldea.livejournal.com]

Actually, I've read Breakfast of Champions, and wasn't too impressed. But I'm willing to give another, more popular, book a try.

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[vambot5.livejournal.com]

I thought Cat's Cradle was really witty and interesting. And short. So it's not too much time wasted if you decide you don't like it. :o)