[slab_happy]

My current favourite thing is this magnificent achievement by Elodie, "the first chapter of Moby Dick rewritten in tiresome modern idiom":

https://elodieunderglass.tumblr.com/post/700906628057382913/the-first-chapter-of-moby-dick-rewritten-in

You have to understand that, hilarious as this is, it's also a close and surprisingly-faithful translation, and Ishmael is actually LIKE THAT.

It can either serve as an advertisement for why reading Moby Dick can be a wildly entertaining experience, or fair warning that you should not read Moby Dick because if you have to spend that much time with Ishmael and/or Herman Melville you're going to want to punch him.

[owensum]

I have to say, Moby Dick is my least favourite book of all time. I can't understand how it's hailed as an essential classic. I found it a very long traipse through a lot of dull whaling trivia and an interminable plot.

Obviously horses for courses and perhaps it's a brilliant and profound read that went over my head, but for me it was a boring slog that I got to the end of and wished I hadn't bothered.

It's a famously divisive book. For me, it's best of all time, without a shadow of a doubt. He messes with syntax like Shakespeare does. I also love the philosophical musings. Sure, Ishmael uses 1,000 words when 10 could do, but that's the point.

[owensum]

Currently rereading Moby Dick (okay, listening this time round, courtesy of https://www.mobydickbigread.com/ ) in order to follow along with everyone I know who's doing Whale Weekly ( https://whaleweekly.substack.com/ ).

For anyone who doesn't know, it is the WEIRDEST fucking book, which has been done a terrible disservice by the attempt to squash it into the Great American Novel box; I'm not sure it's even a novel per se, but it is sure as hell an Experience.

I listened to half of the Moby Dick Big read years ago.. it's a great concept, having a different narrator for each chapter, and works well with Moby Dick. However, I got annoyed that the sound quality was really variable (this thing was done years ago when good mics were probably not as cheap) and switched to audible to listen to the rest.

But man, this book is meant to be listened to that's for sure! And all the tedious stuff and dense words/phrasing that you don't understand can just wash over you.

[Fultonius]

I guess I'll never know if Closer to the Edge is any good or not - got a free ticket to the Tiso book singing / Berghaus advertorial thing in Glasgow tonight and it confirmed that............I wouldn't be interested....even though they were being handed out free.

[Wellsy]

While we're on whales (and I agree Moby Dick is magnificent) how about this from Charlotte Brontë's Shirley;

"And what will become of that inexpressible weight you said you had on your mind?' 'I will try to forget it in speculation on the sway of the whole Great Deep above a herd of whales rushing through the livid and liquid thunder down from the frozen zone:'"

My god. That is so good.

"The livid and liquid thunder" needs to go on that boulder FA name spreadsheet

[seankenny]

I have to say, Moby Dick is my least favourite book of all time. I can't understand how it's hailed as an essential classic. I found it a very long traipse through a lot of dull whaling trivia and an interminable plot.

Obviously horses for courses and perhaps it's a brilliant and profound read that went over my head, but for me it was a boring slog that I got to the end of and wished I hadn't bothered.

You’re a better man than I! I’ve no interest in reading it whatsoever. Life’s too short.

[teestub]

It's a famously divisive book. For me, it's best of all time, without a shadow of a doubt. He messes with syntax like Shakespeare does. I also love the philosophical musings. Sure, Ishmael uses 1,000 words when 10 could do, but that's the point.

Think I need to read again it was some time ago, I remember really enjoying the loquaciousness!

[SA Chris]

I guess I'll never know if Closer to the Edge is any good or not - got a free ticket to the Tiso book singing / Berghaus advertorial thing in Glasgow tonight and it confirmed that............I wouldn't be interested....even though they were being handed out free.

Not on my list, impressive as what he's done is, I find the way he "pitches" himself quite irritating.

[Johnny Brown]

Think I need to read again it was some time ago, I remember really enjoying the loquaciousness!

Ditto, and the slow build. Never actually finished it as I was reading it on my phone (free download as out of copyright) and I simply kept forgetting about it. Need to pick up an old paperback sometime.

Not on my list, impressive as what he's done is, I find the way he "pitches" himself quite irritating.

Can understand that, I think after Top Gear he was always a bit too desperate to make it as a mainstream celeb, although I think he's both mellowed on that recently and was always better in person than on camera. Plus he's made a bit more room for the team in recent years. The event I went to for his second Antarctic trip was really worthwhile.

[SA Chris]

In hindsight it must be 10 years since I've seen him talk, so maybe he's changed. Never saw the TG episode, how long ago was that?

[Johnny Brown]

Circa 2006.

[SA Chris]

Thanks I do recall it now, must have suppressed the memory.

[slab_happy]

It's a famously divisive book. For me, it's best of all time, without a shadow of a doubt. He messes with syntax like Shakespeare does. I also love the philosophical musings. Sure, Ishmael uses 1,000 words when 10 could do, but that's the point.

Think I need to read again it was some time ago, I remember really enjoying the loquaciousness!

Join the Whale Weekly party! I can't wait to watch the internet reaction to Ishmael spending a whole chapter explaining that a) whales are fish, and b) should properly be classified as various sizes of book. And that narwhals have horns in order to make it easier for them to read small pamphlets.

[Fiend]

Talking of demented quests for giant sea-creatures...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scar_(novel)

[mrjonathanr]

I have to say, Moby Dick is my least favourite book of all time. I can't understand how it's hailed as an essential classic. I found it a very long traipse through a lot of dull whaling trivia and an interminable plot.

Obviously horses for courses and perhaps it's a brilliant and profound read that went over my head, but for me it was a boring slog that I got to the end of and wished I hadn't bothered.

You’re a better man than I! I’ve no interest in reading it whatsoever. Life’s too short.

If you get to page 50 and don’t enjoy reading it, ditch it. That said, Moby Dick is full of C19 romanticism, madness and the struggle between man vs nature. I don’t get how you can’t love it, but we’re all different.

[slab_happy]

Talking of demented quests for giant sea-creatures...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scar_(novel)

Enjoyed it! Though it's not my all-time favourite Mieville.

[Fiend]

Tie between Perdido Street Station and The City & The City for me. The Scar a solid 3rd place tho.

[Wellsy]

The City and the City was great

[slab_happy]

I have to say, Moby Dick is my least favourite book of all time. I can't understand how it's hailed as an essential classic. I found it a very long traipse through a lot of dull whaling trivia and an interminable plot.

Obviously horses for courses and perhaps it's a brilliant and profound read that went over my head, but for me it was a boring slog that I got to the end of and wished I hadn't bothered.

You’re a better man than I! I’ve no interest in reading it whatsoever. Life’s too short.

If you get to page 50 and don’t enjoy reading it, ditch it. That said, Moby Dick is full of C19 romanticism, madness and the struggle between man vs nature. I don’t get how you can’t love it, but we’re all different.

It's also very funny. Mostly on purpose.

I do think part of the problem is that people feel they have to approach it with a sort of reverence, as a Great Literary Work, and that means you can't appreciate the weird wild over-the-top messiness of it, even though that's such a part of what makes it extraordinary.

[slab_happy]

Tie between Perdido Street Station and The City & The City for me. The Scar a solid 3rd place tho.

Hard to argue with those as top two. Still pondering what my third place would be, though.

[seankenny]

Moby Dick is full of C19 romanticism, madness and the struggle between man vs nature. I don’t get how you can’t love it, but we’re all different.

Now I’m really not interested! That’s just a combination that doesn’t appeal in the slightest, overwrought Americans with their Big Nature woes.

[slab_happy]

Moby Dick indisputably has a lot of Big Nature in, yeah. Can't really argue with that one.

[Wellsy]

Just finished Neal Stevenson's "Anathem" was bloody brilliant tbh, so inventive and complex, I loved it. Was definitely for niche tastes though

[jwi]

Just finished Neal Stevenson's "Anathem" was bloody brilliant tbh, so inventive and complex, I loved it. Was definitely for niche tastes though

It is probably the Stephenson novel I've liked best, of those I've read.

The only thing that I found irritating was that the intellectuals who were separated from society believed in the absolute garbage pseudo-science of eugenics. I realise that is likely because Neal Stephenson do so himself, but it was jarring to read the narrator explain to the reader that the avout were not allowed to have kids because it would create a race of übermench—no one with good biology fundamentals would believe such utter nonsense, and the protagonists seemed good at plant breeding.

(Stephenson's Seveneves was much more problematic on this point, and I had to put it down after having screamed "the only way to fix inherent traits is by inbreeding you stupid fucking moron" to the page more than once)

[Rocksteady]

Just finished Neal Stevenson's "Anathem" was bloody brilliant tbh, so inventive and complex, I loved it. Was definitely for niche tastes though

It is probably the Stephenson novel I've liked best, of those I've read.

The only thing that I found irritating was that the intellectuals who were separated from society believed in the absolute garbage pseudo-science of eugenics. I realise that is likely because Neal Stephenson do so himself, but it was jarring to read the narrator explain to the reader that the avout were not allowed to have kids because it would create a race of übermench—no one with good biology fundamentals would believe such utter nonsense, and the protagonists seemed good at plant breeding.

(Stephenson's Seveneves was much more problematic on this point, and I had to put it down after having screamed "the only way to fix inherent traits is by inbreeding you stupid fucking moron" to the page more than once)

I loved Anathem actually and missed that eugenics point despite reading it twice. I haven't got to it yet but interested to read Roger Penrose's work on the brain acting like a quantum computer that formed the premise of the novel.

Seveneves was an odd one; an interesting hypothesis but a bit of a slow read and an odd novel not just of two halves but more of three-quarters and a totally different quarter at the end.

I really liked Crytonomicon and The Baroque Cycle, both very worth a read. Snow Crash good but quite derivative of William Gibson I thought. REAMDE was good fun but a bit unmemorable.