Personal Failures
Submitted by jim on Mon, 03/05/2001 - 12:15
Tags:
- The Discoverers by Daniel Boorstin
- Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter
- The Symbolic Species by Terrence Deacon
Author Comments:
I really wanted to like/understand/appreciate these, but I just couldn't get through them. I bow my head in shame.
No shame; my list of personal failures is endless, lead off by multiple attempts to complete Moby Dick, Crime and Punishment, and Uncle Tom's Cabin. Everytime I give up, a little part of me dies (OK, so that was an exageration). However, on about the fifth try, I did complete Heart of Darkness, so it can happen...
Johnny Waco
Funny, two of the books you mention are on my Glad I Was Forced to Read These list. Not sure if I would have made it if not for the duress. As for Uncle Tom's Cabin and Heart of Darkness, I was forced to read those too, but am not particularly grateful for it. So I suppose, even though I technically completed them, I should probably also add them to this list. Great. More shame! :-)
I am the only human being alive, I am guessing, who actually loved Heart of Darkness. A bit over-written, given, but haunting and creepy like few books ever are.
Ah, well...
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs
I never did get this whole trouble with Heart of Darkness. It's one of my favorites, and spawned Apocalypse Now, which as far as I can tell is a favorite on this site. Actually, I think both are best appreciated in light of each other. Each one enhances my understanding of the other one. I'd go on ranting about this, but I should really return to writing my final (as in last one EVER!) term paper.
I know it's important, I just couldn't get into the text (I read it in high school). It was really slow going for me. The fault is mine, I'm sure; I was never a very good student. :-)
I guess I can understand that. I just thought that among the many horrid, difficult to read pieces of literature that have been forced on me (like Tristram Shandy), Heart of Darkness was a nice change. And I don't really think high school is the ideal time to try and read such things. Anyway, I just felt like ranting about something. I was on a role from my essay. BTW, just because you happen to be the first ear available, I finished my term paper. No more essays, exams, or anything! I think I'll go do a jig....
Jig up a storm. Congrats!
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs
Congratulations! That's wonderful!
More on Heart of Darkness . . . on one level I was very grateful to have challenging books assigned in high school. It felt like a vote of confidence. On another level--a much lazier level--I resented having to plow through some of them. Heart of Darkness was one of them. I just didn't dig it. But you never can tell. Of my high school reading list (just a sample), I liked Moby Dick, The Iliad, The Odyssey, Crime and Punishment, Deliverance, and 1984. I did not like Heart of Darkness or The Sound and the Fury. And there are a ton of others that I'm blocking on at the moment. Ah well. You win some, you lose some.
GEB took me about 4 years but I finally made it through..
A lot of these books are just plain difficult. Heart of Darkness is a great book, and I'm sure that rereading would help many people in understanding the novel. I had to read it for English class and I can tell you that without guidance from the prof I would've been totally lost. It takes a great deal of concentration while reading that book to understand its meanings. I think Johnny mentioned Moby Dick, well I for one hated that novel. I just couldn't get into it, but I have to say that I did enjoy Bartleby the Scrivener and Billy Budd seems quite promising. Crime and Punishment is one of the best books I have ever read; Dostoevsky is one of the best authors I have ever read, even in translation his power is easily apparent.
Don't get me wrong; it took me five tries to finish Heart of Darkness, but I love it. It sounds paradoxical, but it might be one of my favorite novels. It always captured me right away, and I would linger on every page, just letting the atmosphere soak in, but at some point (probably because I get briefly obssessed with books and if I don't finish them in a short time, I'll move on) I would always put it aside and come back to it months later, feeling that I must start over to get the full effect.
By the way, Apocalypse Now shows an obvious debt to Heart of Darkness, but Citizen Kane has a more subtle debt. Welles originally meant to film HOD, but because of cost, he moved on to Kane. Kane can be seen as a move into a personal heart of darkness, Kane's life. Both the reporter in Kane and Marlow in HOD want to understand the meaning of the unsettling last words: "Rosebud" and "The horror! The horror!" respectively. I could go on and on ad nauseum, but that's just a little food for thought...
Johnny Waco
What was your problem with the Discovers? I've been inching my way through it for a year or so and am finding it interesting. (I haven't been trying to read it any faster than that)
To my shame, I found it slow and dry. Couldn't get into it. Made it about 1/3 of the way through, and then gave up. But that's why this is a "Personal Failures" list: I'm sure the books on it are all good - I just wasn't up to snuff as a reader. I intend to give all of these another shot someday. Someday.