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By Potemkin
#14938402
Red_Army wrote:I'm reading Les Miserables. Its abridged though so I feel like I'm cheating. So far I like it, which makes me again curse the musical genre.

It's probably for the best that it's abridged. 19th century French novelists could be... rather long-winded. You've got to page 57 and you're still waiting for something to actually happen. Lol.
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By Red_Army
#14938406
@Potemkin, you may be right. I read the translator's note about what was axed and it didn't sound particularly interesting. I'm hesitant though because I just read an abridged version of The Count of Monte Cristo and it seemed like some of the best parts were left out. The translator removed the episode where Danglars is captured by Luigi Vampa and finds out the Count is Dantes. After the prison bid the whole book is a build up to the revenge reveal and I was pretty pissed that I only got 2/3rds of the payoff...
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By Potemkin
#14938412
Red_Army wrote:@Potemkin, you may be right. I read the translator's note about what was axed and it didn't sound particularly interesting. I'm hesitant though because I just read an abridged version of The Count of Monte Cristo and it seemed like some of the best parts were left out. The translator removed the episode where Danglars is captured by Luigi Vampa and finds out the Count is Dantes. After the prison bid the whole book is a build up to the revenge reveal and I was pretty pissed that I only got 2/3rds of the payoff...

What can I say? Some abridgements, like some translations, are better than others....
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By Red_Army
#14938420
@Potemkin, Ya... I just bought both books when I was meeting some classmates at a shitty chain bookstore for a group project. They were in the 2 for 1 classics bargain bin and I should have known better.
By Decky
#14938421
You should have went to your local monastery and got teams of monks to illuminate a set specially for you.
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By Red_Army
#14938424
Check your monastic privilege. There are like 2 catholic churches here much less a monastery. Its fairly WASPy here I'm afraid. I could probably find a preacher fond of methamphetamines and male prostitutes to strike the sciatica out of my left thigh though.
By Decky
#14938430
Not much Catholic privilege in the United Kingdom. :lol: Still we do have a Friary within walking distance. They keep talking about shutting the bit for the monks and just keeping the church as there are barely any Brothers of Bétharram left here but the Archdiocese somehow manages to keep it open.
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By Red_Army
#14938447
Since this is a subforum of literacy I must remind you the word is personnel, not personal ;)

Do you think the nazi catholics are going to spring Popealtine and establish a new anti-papacy?
By Decky
#14938449
I have noticed American Catholics seem to be mental and right wing and have views on wealth that could have came straight from the mouths of Protestant preachers. Maybe they could set up an antipope for the US? They wouldn't be much of a loss. :lol:
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By Red_Army
#14938451
I think American catholics have immersed themselves into Protestantism in the same way Celts and Dagos have culturally assimilated to Anglo-Saxon bullshit. We are a nation of simpering wannabes and reject or accept whatever we think will be more popular and profitable.

One note on my translation of Les Miserables. So far every footnote has pointed out the most obvious Christian allegories that are at play in the book. Hugo is not a particularly subtle writer, but the translator seems to feel the need to point out that when Jean Valjean goes from a violent criminal to a Godly and charitable mayor that this is redemption. Thanks...
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By Wellsy
#14938476
Decky wrote:I used to reread it every year before I started working in construction. There doesn't seem much point now that I am living it. :lol:

Just finished it today.
Got me down right angry at times thinking about that stuff especially when it came to frustrations of Owen and Barrington in convincing people whose best opposition to them was silence and a hopelessness of anything else being possible.

At least the Owens, Lindens and Eastons found some ease for a while thabks to Barrington in the end.
By Decky
#14938673
Wellsy wrote:Just finished it today.
Got me down right angry at times thinking about that stuff especially when it came to frustrations of Owen and Barrington in convincing people whose best opposition to them was silence and a hopelessness of anything else being possible.

At least the Owens, Lindens and Eastons found some ease for a while thabks to Barrington in the end.


It is pretty much spot on the money, look at the United States, people would rather watch their own colleagues, family and friends die in the gutter of easily preventable illnesses than abandon the Democrats and Republicans and instead vote for a party that would see worker's in the world's richest nation actually have universal healthcare. I still think socialism works, I am just starting to doubt that humanity deserves it. :lol:
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By Wellsy
#14938727
Now reading Catch 22 which has been a good laugh so far ^_^
Decky wrote:It is pretty much spot on the money, look at the United States, people would rather watch their own colleagues, family and friends die in the gutter of easily preventable illnesses than abandon the Democrats and Republicans and instead vote for a party that would see worker's in the world's richest nation actually have universal healthcare. I still think socialism works, I am just starting to doubt that humanity deserves it. :lol:

I tend to speculate such ideologically backwardness is either due to the strength of the capitalist class there and the fragmentstion of social life due to the increased commodification of relations. Leads to a retardation in peoples consciousness and increases their alienation from humanity. Cranky folks whose discontent is easily misdirected for a lack of conscious understanding of somethings. Though I press back on this and think it likely misunderestimates what is possible with amicable influences. But yeah its fucking descipicable.
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By fuser
#14938823
Catch 22 is one of the best things to ever happen in the English language.
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By Bulaba Khan Jones
#14944208
A friend of mine dropped off an Agatha Christie novel called Hercule Poirot's Christmas during my recent hospital stay. I'm not sure if this was some kind of cosmic punishment or not, because it compelled me to get around to reading Murder on the Orient Express, and then realize I didn't really care for Agatha's novels. It's not that the books are really outdated (they don't feel that way), but there's almost no character treatment in either book. Everyone is written on a shallow level, and she had an apparent inability to refrain from constant stereotypes:

(I'm paraphrasing)

"All Italians have an urge to [whip out a random knife they carry since all Italians carry hidden knives since they're Italians and thus they carry hidden knives] stab people when they're excited or angry, because Italians stab people when they're excited or angry since they're Italians"

"English people don't stab people" [BECAUSE, that's why!!], "therefore, that's proof the murder wasn't committed by an English person"

(Guy gets caught in a series of lies for his wife) "I give you my word of honor that I'm not lying this time, I promise you." (Poirot lets the guy go) "He gave us his word of honor and promised he's not lying this time, so we should trust him!"

I'm really not impressed at all.

Right now, I'm reading Red Dragon by Thomas Harris, and I'll read Silence of the Lambs next. It's a good book, and after seeing the Hannibal TV series, I can't help but hear and picture the characters in the book as anything other than the people portraying them on the TV show.
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By Potemkin
#14944210
Bulaba Jones wrote:A friend of mine dropped off an Agatha Christie novel called Hercule Poirot's Christmas during my recent hospital stay. I'm not sure if this was some kind of cosmic punishment or not, because it compelled me to get around to reading Murder on the Orient Express, and then realize I didn't really care for Agatha's novels. It's not that the books are really outdated (they don't feel that way), but there's almost no character treatment in either book. Everyone is written on a shallow level, and she had an apparent inability to refrain from constant stereotypes:

(I'm paraphrasing)

"All Italians have an urge to [whip out a random knife they carry since all Italians carry hidden knives since they're Italians and thus they carry hidden knives] stab people when they're excited or angry, because Italians stab people when they're excited or angry since they're Italians"

"English people don't stab people" [BECAUSE, that's why!!], "therefore, that's proof the murder wasn't committed by an English person"

(Guy gets caught in a series of lies for his wife) "I give you my word of honor that I'm not lying this time, I promise you." (Poirot lets the guy go) "He gave us his word of honor and promised he's not lying this time, so we should trust him!"

I'm really not impressed at all.

Why do you think the English upper-middle classes love her work so much? She was one of them, and her novels reflect the superficiality, prejudices and stupidity of her class. The British upper classes really do think and talk like that. There's an easy way of fixing it: just don't read her books. Lol.
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