tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post1751101219213718379..comments2024-03-27T16:48:21.039-05:00Comments on Wuthering <br>Expectations: When it was night, Michel said - puzzling over The ImmoralistAmateur Reader (Tom)http://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-46792776505497408822011-03-28T22:49:32.843-05:002011-03-28T22:49:32.843-05:00I don't want to make too much out of one novel...I don't want to make too much out of one novel, but I'm warming to the idea that a number of people, including some who should know better, have read the book quite badly.<br /><br />Interested in sexual liberation, or Gide's life, or proto-Existentialism, or Nietszchean whatnoterry, they turn the novel into an <i>explication du quelque</i> and abandon the <i>fiction</i>, the novel itself, when the fiction is at the heart of the argument.<br /><br />As a tract, I have severe doubts about the quality of <i>The Immoralist</i>. As a <i>novel</i>, it is not at all boring or empty.<br /><br />Tomorrow I will identify the episode that converted me - no, the episode where I wised up, and began to see what was actually going on.Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-19574161146453411322011-03-28T22:24:05.450-05:002011-03-28T22:24:05.450-05:00Now here’s something unusual for this Appreciation...<em>Now here’s something unusual for this Appreciationist, a novel I disliked from the first page and grew to despise as I read on. </em><br /><br />Having read your posts on Gide in reverse chronological order, I was rather shocked by this, since in your other two entries you do such a nice job with the de-puzzlement.<br /><br />I know nothing about Gide except that, as you note, he is supposed to have done these "novels of ideas," autobiographical, etc. De-puzzling these, though, even if you have to turn them into a puzzle first, seems key. Otherwise, aren't they a little empty, boring? If someone wants me to take their ideas seriously, and they've decided to write them into a novel, the package had better be there as well.nicolehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17532641082944082516noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-7734969851164761412011-03-25T12:10:16.747-05:002011-03-25T12:10:16.747-05:00Well, Gide has converted me. We are both throwing...Well, Gide has converted me. We are both throwing hatchets at the same target, it turns out.<br /><br />I thought you'd like this - there are analogies with the <i>Ethan Frome</i> narrator. Similar Who? Why? How? questions. Totally different purpose in the end, though.Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-56701973450693727692011-03-25T10:33:06.435-05:002011-03-25T10:33:06.435-05:00Happy kerfuddlement. I'm eager to see your hat...Happy kerfuddlement. I'm eager to see your hatchet work on full passionate display. KInterpolationshttp://interpolations.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-30200182418184394822011-03-24T22:41:34.491-05:002011-03-24T22:41:34.491-05:00The Counterfeiters, then, fits right in with The I...<i>The Counterfeiters</i>, then, fits right in with <i>The Immoralist</i>. <br /><br />So, another puzzle is why so many readers of Gide just swallow the whole Novel of Ideas business whole. Maybe they don't - I only vaguely remember whatever I might have read about Gide. But I think they do - it's all veiled autobiography, the narrator is a veiled Gide, etc. Nonsense.<br /><br />I do not even want to think about what horrors one might find in my undergraduate papers.Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-29724731865773238952011-03-24T19:23:17.540-05:002011-03-24T19:23:17.540-05:00I read Les faux-monnayeurs in college, which is a ...I read Les faux-monnayeurs in college, which is a novel within a novel (one of the characters is writing a book of the same title.) Gide likes this kind of framing, and this kind of play with what is true and false and real and serious (or not.) I remember writing a paper about the idea of the frame story as a point of reference for the entire idea of counterfeiting. I got a C on it, I think because my French was inadequate to the task at the time.Jennyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00251983804060081813noreply@blogger.com