I found a website (don't remember what it is) that gave a brief summary and comment about each chapter. It helped a lot. GR is historic, philosophical, comical, slapstick, pop cultural, etc. It is indeed a woven narrative.
@TheActiveMind1
2 ай бұрын
I reviewed a few Reddits at times and also the wiki page set up for GR. It helped with my sanity
@jays2551
Ай бұрын
in a similar vein, there's a book literally called "Pictures Showing What Happens on Each Page of Thomas Pynchon's Novel Gravity's Rainbow" (creative title, I know) and it can be useful for obvious reasons, even though some of the illustrations are difficult to parse out legibly. there are digital versions available on libgen if you don't wanna drop the $70ish on a physical copy
@gavinyoung-philosophy
Ай бұрын
Lovely video! Often times (and I know this from personal experience) GR reviews tend to feel very lost and scattershot, but this was really well paced and would genuinely help any first time reader. I thoroughly enjoyed this :)
@TheActiveMind1
Ай бұрын
Good to hear! With such a strange book, I was unsure how to structure my thoughts and discuss the book so I’m glad it seemed to work out well
@joelharris4399
Ай бұрын
For a first read of Gravity's🌈 Rainbow 🚀where you freely permit the putrid waters of transgressive postmodernism to wash over you, not bad at all! 👍Very insightful and nuanced book discussion (which I think suits maximalist novels like these more than 5-10 minute regular book reviews). You've already read David Foster Wallace before, bravo, so that explains your relative comfort with the tome. I never read the book myself. I just enjoy hearing people's thoughts on the book and receptions can be very divided. I'm tackling Don Quixote, the John Rutherford translation, which I started in early August.
@123456789tube100
2 ай бұрын
Could you do a video on kants critique?? Very few good videos on KZitem about it despite it basically being required reading to read any philosopher after him
@TheActiveMind1
2 ай бұрын
I wish I was qualified! I'd check out Dr Gregory Sadler's channel for philosophical deep dives however he doesn't currently have much specifically on Kant's Critique of Pure Reason
@robcioffi4955
Ай бұрын
After getting thru 1/4 of the way thru both GR and IJ post modernism is not for me I’ve really been so involved with Don Quixote , Middlemarch, War and Peace, Les Miserables, Brothers Karamazov , that offer me so much more on every level. And my time is short - so I’m staying with the older classics
@cynthiaphilmlee5419
25 күн бұрын
Those books do not offer you anything because they don’t make you think.
@Fitness4London
22 күн бұрын
I'm half way through Middlemarch. What did you think of this novel? I'm finding the characters interesting, but it gets bogged-down and long-winded in places, in the same way that the longer Dickens novels do.
@Aypher
4 күн бұрын
IJ is not post modernism at all
@sharpasaknife6456
2 ай бұрын
Though "Solenoid" is still waiting, I just got a copy of Gravity's Rainbow in German, here known as "Die Enden der Parabel" ("The Ends of the Parable"). The German translation came out 1981 (= 9 years after the original), and one of the translators into German was the later Austrian Noble Prize winner Elfriede Jellinek. Along with the copy, in my antiquarian bookshop I found a book called "Ordnung und Entropie" ("Order and entropy") - a collection of essays which deal with his first three novels "V", "The Crying of Lot 49" and "Gravity's Rainbow". Thanks for your informative programme and best summer greetings!
@TheActiveMind1
2 ай бұрын
I'd be interested to see how the translation is but you'll have to judge that since I obviously don't speak German. Hope you have a great time with the book!
@sharpasaknife6456
2 ай бұрын
@@TheActiveMind1 Maybe I won't be able to read it before next year. Anyway, what I learned from your video is, that I'll try to un derstand it out of the time when it was written. In the early 1970s , I was a teenage pupil and I do remember that the so called "Cold War" was a big subject then.
@spikedaniels1528
2 ай бұрын
Dear (very or over) Active Mind, So why read Gravity’s Rainbow? In what ways was it worthwhile? What can your average BookTube viewer expect to take away from the experience? Sophocles is often paraphrased and credited with “No pain, no gain.” The pain is clearly evident: what’s your cost-benefit analysis here? Appreciate your productions, ~Spike 🤠
@TheActiveMind1
2 ай бұрын
Besides the intellectual stimulation of trying to follow a convoluted, imbricated plot, I believe the writing style and key themes make it worthwhile. It’s at times fast paced and entertaining, and at other times invites you into the author’s analysis of the psychology/nature of humanity. The questions and critiques surrounding war/govt corruption/technology/etc are still relevant today. To be fair, I don’t suspect it’s a book that everyone will find worthwhile but for me it was and I look forward to reading it again in the future
@spikedaniels1528
2 ай бұрын
@@TheActiveMind1 // Great response - thanks for taking the time! I’ll take a pass for now (tried it about 30 years ago), but you can Soldier On! 👨🏭
@johnjabez6300
2 ай бұрын
Just ended it now
@cynthiaphilmlee5419
25 күн бұрын
You are wrong!!!! I just wanted to say that because I didn’t want to admit you are right… you are right, and sadly ever lady review I see, DOES NOT UNDERSTAND THAT. Thomas Pynchon doesn’t expect you to understand it in one day, you have to dissect it, take pictures, notes, be curious.
@cynthiaphilmlee5419
25 күн бұрын
It’s pronounced… peacan
@cynthiaphilmlee5419
25 күн бұрын
THE AQYN'S SONG I have come from the edge of the world. I have come from the lungs of the wind, With a thing I have seen so awesome Even Dzambul could not sing it. With a fear in my heart so sharp It will cut the strongest of metals. In the ancient tales it is told In a time that is older than Qorgyt, Who took from the wood of Syrghaj The first gobyz, and the first song-It is told that a land far distant Is the place of the Kirghiz Light. In a place where words are unknown, And eyes shine like candles at night, And the face of God is a presence Behind the mask of the sky- At the tall black rock in the desert, In the time of the final days. If the place were not so distant, If words were known, and spoken, Then the God might be a gold ikon, Or a page in a paper book. But It comes as the Kirghiz Light-There is no other way to know It. The roar of Its voice is deafness, The flash of Its light is blindness. The floor of the desert rumbles, And Its face cannot be borne. And a man cannot be the same, After seeing the Kirghiz Light.
@cynthiaphilmlee5419
25 күн бұрын
The point of Pavlov’s dogs, is not asking how he did it, but we need to ask why? Why would anyone allow him to do it? Isn’t he compared to a nazi ironically? And if you can dehumanize a dog by just doing that: not humanizing with them at all. Then it will make it all the more easier to ignore the why, and focus on how we are going to get Jews and gays, and communists, and Catholics on buses and send them to “re education camps”. I love ironically Pynchon using a Sartre quote “France was more free under a nazi regime than it was without.” I love how bioshock has all these constants and variables, did I mention this is my favorite book?
@Steve-Duh-Rino
2 ай бұрын
I just finished ‘Les Miserables’ which took over four months (pre-work reading each morning). I’ll hold off on another long book for a while, especially if it’s of the convoluted storyline type
@TheActiveMind1
2 ай бұрын
Haha you definitely deserve a break! Save this one for 2025
@Sarah_Jean86
2 ай бұрын
My technique to read such post-modern classics like this (especially the likes of Pynchon) is to read it straight and if I feel hallucinated throughout the process that is ok. The second read through later down the line is where I will take notes (annotations).
@Sarah_Jean86
2 ай бұрын
Ha, I wrote this before you even mentioned that yourself....in that case, I concur with you.
@TheActiveMind1
2 ай бұрын
I agree! That might be the best way to do it
@marinellamaccagni6951
Ай бұрын
I agree with you. The first time I understood barely nothing. The second time I started figuring out what the book was all about.
@jacksoncarterp
2 ай бұрын
Not sure how my KZitem algorithm figured out I’d just finished this book, but very glad it suggested your discussion. You did a great job of explaining it for only one read through. This whole thing made me feel much less stupid than I thought I was after reading the whole thing. First Pynchon book I had gotten all the way through, so I was glad to hear you affirm my confusion lol. I know you’ll get more views if you discuss popular books but I seriously appreciated this perspective.
@TheActiveMind1
2 ай бұрын
Elated to hear it helped! This book is something you really have to wrestle with and I feel more comfortable with it the more I reflect upon it. It just takes time and a bit of zooming out. I appreciate the support!
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