>Why does IQfy like this book so much?
IQfy likes this because they are IQfy's moronic younger brother, and look up to us, but aren't at our level yet.
this book was very aimless on reread. Moby Dick still gets my vote for greatest American novel, it at least had a raison d'etre in the form of a whale named Moby Dick.
A Feature is not a flaw. Nor the expectations from late 20th century fiction the same as middle 19th century.
this book was very aimless on reread. Moby Dick still gets my vote for greatest American novel, it at least had a raison d'etre in the form of a whale named Moby Dick.
>A major theme is the warlike nature of man. Critic Harold Bloom praised Blood Meridian as one of the best 20th century American novels, "worthy of Herman Melville's Moby-Dick," but admitted that his "first two attempts to read through Blood Meridian failed, because [he] flinched from the overwhelming carnage".
this is the person whose opinion you are following
>sleep aid
Literally the cetology chapters. Moby dick suckers are hypocrites. BM never gets as boring despite the deliberate repetitions of its middle body.
compelling points and yet the fact that he doesn't explicitly swim or destroy boats with his jaws like scissor makes me think that maybe h
e represents something other than just Moby Dick
he's also very white, a thing to consider, and kills a lot of people
1 year ago
Anonymous
good point, but moby dick doesn't take pleasure in killing them
1 year ago
Anonymous
how do you know? Other whales just run away, he must be getting something out of killing
also at the end everybody is dead because of him and he lives to kill another day, can't be a coincidence
No he clearly represents the BOOK Moby Dick, and Glanton's Gang represent various aspects (AKA personalities) of McCarthy's mind while he was reading and trying to understand Moby Dick (the book).
1 year ago
Anonymous
No he represents the BOOK Blood Meridian. BM is highly self-referential (many books about this) and the narrator of the book shares with Holden diction, interest in geology and plants and similar ambiguous word games. The narrator also behaves like a slavering fanboy whenever Holden is on the page.
1 year ago
Anonymous
Wrong, he quite obviously represents the MAN Cormac McCarthy because Cormac wishes he was perfect in doing all the things he loves to write about (science, violence, getting strange, being inscrutable). So Judge Holden is a power fantasy-self insert.
1 year ago
Anonymous
This is partially true. But Holden is an enigma and was designed to never be fully interpreted. He is WHOLLY OTHER, which Mckenna said is the experience of observing God within reality, on LSD. LSD triggers the language centers of the brain and reveals the underlying patterns of our understanding. McCarthy has described mystical experiences (when on LSD) as "direct apprehension of reality unmediated by symbol". I think it shows in his language, BM is a self consciously anti-symbolic work.
1 year ago
Anonymous
That's a really interesting response, I didn't expect you to actually take mine seriously lol, but while we're here you said "this is partially true." What do you mean? Are you saying that Cormac wishes he was God or thinks he's God?
1 year ago
Anonymous
I think Judge Holden is the Platonic ideal of Cormac McCarthy. Everything that interests Holden interests McCarthy. Science, philosophy, language, violence etc. Do you know that McCarthy was a very talented Painter when he was about 8-10 years old?
I don't think Holden is God btw. I mean Terrence isn't really an unmistakable authority on everything. It is after all his interpretation of the mystical experience.
he never does magic. what are you referring to? and only in his words is he immortal. part of what makes him such a terrifying character is that everything he does, while amazing, is technically possible and believable.
1 year ago
Anonymous
he does magic tricks with a coin iirc. nothing supernatural though
1 year ago
Anonymous
i'm referring to him throwing the coin out of the camp and then it returning to him, i think its near the "war" monologue
he explains that while he is doing it. not supernatural magic, a trick. >the arc of circling bodies is determined by the length of their tether
1 year ago
Anonymous
what tether? he literally chucks the coin out of sight and returns it to him that shits magic
1 year ago
Anonymous
if you're not trolling, go read chapter 17 again, the context of the trick is also important.
1 year ago
Anonymous
I'm not trolling, the wording is explicitly ambiguous also just because there is some logic does not discount some sort of supernatural force
1 year ago
Anonymous
It is explicitly not ambiguous. Go read the chapter again, then come back.
Getting sidetracked here anyway - is that your only evidence that the judge is inhuman? Flimsy at best.
1 year ago
Anonymous
>is that your only evidence that the judge is inhuman? Flimsy at best.
my argument is not that he is inhuman, my argument is that he represents some concept or idea which is outright explicit in the text, what concept is left up to interpretation, for you what is the judge is my question
1 year ago
Anonymous
I believe the judge is much too complex a character to be reduced down to just being a personification of war or something. For me, he represents a theoretical human that has mastered being a human and that representation is used to explore themes of violence, authority, history and more.
1 year ago
Anonymous
Interesting
1 year ago
Anonymous
>only evidence
I haven't read the book in a long time, but doesn't the ending say something about him not having aged a day despite the 20+ year timeskip?
1 year ago
Anonymous
I will fully admit the last chapter kind of throws a wrench in my theory and I still struggle to understand it fully.
1 year ago
Anonymous
Post-timeskip Judge is clearly supernatural since he can also read the Kid's mind, but that can easily be explained as him being a "mere" figment of the Kid's imagination at that instance.
1 year ago
Anonymous
I'm not trolling, the wording is explicitly ambiguous also just because there is some logic does not discount some sort of supernatural force
Do you genuinely believe someone like the judge is incapable of slight of hand?
1 year ago
Anonymous
i'm referring to him throwing the coin out of the camp and then it returning to him, i think its near the "war" monologue
I've thought a lot about it myself and I think it's extremely likely he represents My Dick. Think about it: He's big, fat, white, tall, and unyielding, oh and there's literally nothing he cannot do perfectly. This should be obvious to you.
>needlessly verbose descriptions of landscape >pause for simplistic dialogue from underwritten characters >something violent happens >the Judge acts like a capeshit character and monologues >rinse, repeat
This is the entire book and it is dry and it is boring and it is formulaic and truly nothing special and full of little gimmicks for the lesser-read to either fawn or yawn for and there's truly only one character you can even call a character and unsurprisingly it's the only one people talk about and it is a book that is more praised for undeserved reputation than any acknowledgeable merit and one that serves as more conversational fodder that explores the history between McCarthy and film and as pointed out by others the fantastical debates of who would direct and who would write and who would play this and who would play that and it sucks. The Road is better.
>underwritten characters
what an odd complaint. who? the judge, the kid, glanton, tobin, toadvine, davy, black jackson all have plenty going on and most of the rest of them die more or less immediately.
this isn't a novel about characters anyway, and the narrator not being omniscient is used to explore the theme of being witnessed
it's also presented so that you're supposed to feel like a part of the gang - the narrator isn't the kid, but the reader takes on the same role as him
I newly discovered that Michael Sugrue has a lecture on the book in Bibliotheca's Classics revisited series. If you dislike Amy Hungerford or Yale or both, this is really nice.
The Classics revisited series is awesome in general.
Why does IQfy like this book so much?
it's cool
The overrated Trifecta of IQfy "literature" seems to be this book, BOTNS and infinite jest, all of which are below 7/10 books.
BOTNS?
Book of The New Sun
Blood on the Neeger Store.
dr seuss runnin the joint
The detached perspective and descriptions read like a movie. They probably like the violence as well
>Why does IQfy like this book so much?
IQfy likes this because they are IQfy's moronic younger brother, and look up to us, but aren't at our level yet.
the only one they've read
I have no idea what IQfy likes or why but this book just fricking rocks. It's a brutal, aesthetic feast with some dips into profundity.
sums it up
Because they like IQfy.
because they go back and forth about who could make a proper film adaptation when in reality it can't and won't be done.
>muh violence
The Adventures of Augie March is better.
Canadian novel
A Feature is not a flaw. Nor the expectations from late 20th century fiction the same as middle 19th century.
this book was very aimless on reread. Moby Dick still gets my vote for greatest American novel, it at least had a raison d'etre in the form of a whale named Moby Dick.
It sets mostly in Mexico.
so is book not American because it is sets in Mexico?
>A major theme is the warlike nature of man. Critic Harold Bloom praised Blood Meridian as one of the best 20th century American novels, "worthy of Herman Melville's Moby-Dick," but admitted that his "first two attempts to read through Blood Meridian failed, because [he] flinched from the overwhelming carnage".
this is the person whose opinion you are following
kys
1) Moby-Dick
2) The prose is a literary sleep aid.
>sleep aid
Literally the cetology chapters. Moby dick suckers are hypocrites. BM never gets as boring despite the deliberate repetitions of its middle body.
Any book written after the 60s cannot be good
reddit
No, it's the 2nd greatest.
Moby Dick is automatically better because of how much BM derrives from it.
agreed. the judge is one of the most captivating characters ever written
and then you read your second piece of American literature
if the whale represents God or nature, what does the judge represent?
he represents the whale (is big, fat and weird)
compelling points and yet the fact that he doesn't explicitly swim or destroy boats with his jaws like scissor makes me think that maybe h
e represents something other than just Moby Dick
he's also very white, a thing to consider, and kills a lot of people
good point, but moby dick doesn't take pleasure in killing them
how do you know? Other whales just run away, he must be getting something out of killing
also at the end everybody is dead because of him and he lives to kill another day, can't be a coincidence
Or does he?
No he clearly represents the BOOK Moby Dick, and Glanton's Gang represent various aspects (AKA personalities) of McCarthy's mind while he was reading and trying to understand Moby Dick (the book).
No he represents the BOOK Blood Meridian. BM is highly self-referential (many books about this) and the narrator of the book shares with Holden diction, interest in geology and plants and similar ambiguous word games. The narrator also behaves like a slavering fanboy whenever Holden is on the page.
Wrong, he quite obviously represents the MAN Cormac McCarthy because Cormac wishes he was perfect in doing all the things he loves to write about (science, violence, getting strange, being inscrutable). So Judge Holden is a power fantasy-self insert.
This is partially true. But Holden is an enigma and was designed to never be fully interpreted. He is WHOLLY OTHER, which Mckenna said is the experience of observing God within reality, on LSD. LSD triggers the language centers of the brain and reveals the underlying patterns of our understanding. McCarthy has described mystical experiences (when on LSD) as "direct apprehension of reality unmediated by symbol". I think it shows in his language, BM is a self consciously anti-symbolic work.
That's a really interesting response, I didn't expect you to actually take mine seriously lol, but while we're here you said "this is partially true." What do you mean? Are you saying that Cormac wishes he was God or thinks he's God?
I think Judge Holden is the Platonic ideal of Cormac McCarthy. Everything that interests Holden interests McCarthy. Science, philosophy, language, violence etc. Do you know that McCarthy was a very talented Painter when he was about 8-10 years old?
I don't think Holden is God btw. I mean Terrence isn't really an unmistakable authority on everything. It is after all his interpretation of the mystical experience.
Terrence is the platonic ideal of a charlatan
he represents a human who has mastered the unique ability of humans - knowledge/language - and uses it to the fullest extent
but he does magic and is immortal, he's not completely human now is he?
The human who masters knowledge and language ceases to be human and then becomes suzerain
he never does magic. what are you referring to? and only in his words is he immortal. part of what makes him such a terrifying character is that everything he does, while amazing, is technically possible and believable.
he does magic tricks with a coin iirc. nothing supernatural though
he explains that while he is doing it. not supernatural magic, a trick.
>the arc of circling bodies is determined by the length of their tether
what tether? he literally chucks the coin out of sight and returns it to him that shits magic
if you're not trolling, go read chapter 17 again, the context of the trick is also important.
I'm not trolling, the wording is explicitly ambiguous also just because there is some logic does not discount some sort of supernatural force
It is explicitly not ambiguous. Go read the chapter again, then come back.
Getting sidetracked here anyway - is that your only evidence that the judge is inhuman? Flimsy at best.
>is that your only evidence that the judge is inhuman? Flimsy at best.
my argument is not that he is inhuman, my argument is that he represents some concept or idea which is outright explicit in the text, what concept is left up to interpretation, for you what is the judge is my question
I believe the judge is much too complex a character to be reduced down to just being a personification of war or something. For me, he represents a theoretical human that has mastered being a human and that representation is used to explore themes of violence, authority, history and more.
Interesting
>only evidence
I haven't read the book in a long time, but doesn't the ending say something about him not having aged a day despite the 20+ year timeskip?
I will fully admit the last chapter kind of throws a wrench in my theory and I still struggle to understand it fully.
Post-timeskip Judge is clearly supernatural since he can also read the Kid's mind, but that can easily be explained as him being a "mere" figment of the Kid's imagination at that instance.
Do you genuinely believe someone like the judge is incapable of slight of hand?
i'm referring to him throwing the coin out of the camp and then it returning to him, i think its near the "war" monologue
The gnostic demiurge
the demiurge wants people to suffer, they cant suffer if they are dead
I've thought a lot about it myself and I think it's extremely likely he represents My Dick. Think about it: He's big, fat, white, tall, and unyielding, oh and there's literally nothing he cannot do perfectly. This should be obvious to you.
I'm not sure I'd go so far as to say "the greatest," but it's definitely the sort of novel you only see once in a century.
Why does IQfy like this book so much?
Cuz good book.
Correct opinion. Good post. Nice work OP.
The trinity is the greatest of American literature
Incorrect
Incorrect
Demonstrably wrong
Wrong
Wrong
Erroneous
Mistaken, moronic, gay, potentially even illiterate
Laughably false on all accounts
IQ score @ freezing point (Fahrenheit)
Wrong
Then demonstrate it.
The demonstration is all around you. Look at the better trinity.
Marx, Engels and Gramsci?
No. King, McCarthy, Pynchon.
Who are they?
I've read NCFOM and The Road, am I ready for Blood Meridian?
You were ready before you even read page 1 of No Country, my sir
thanks lad
crip meridian
>needlessly verbose descriptions of landscape
>pause for simplistic dialogue from underwritten characters
>something violent happens
>the Judge acts like a capeshit character and monologues
>rinse, repeat
This is the entire book and it is dry and it is boring and it is formulaic and truly nothing special and full of little gimmicks for the lesser-read to either fawn or yawn for and there's truly only one character you can even call a character and unsurprisingly it's the only one people talk about and it is a book that is more praised for undeserved reputation than any acknowledgeable merit and one that serves as more conversational fodder that explores the history between McCarthy and film and as pointed out by others the fantastical debates of who would direct and who would write and who would play this and who would play that and it sucks. The Road is better.
>to either fawn or yawn for
Fawn or yawn *over
And you are calling yourself lesser-read by calling it boring. Paradoxical.
>underwritten characters
what an odd complaint. who? the judge, the kid, glanton, tobin, toadvine, davy, black jackson all have plenty going on and most of the rest of them die more or less immediately.
this isn't a novel about characters anyway, and the narrator not being omniscient is used to explore the theme of being witnessed
it's also presented so that you're supposed to feel like a part of the gang - the narrator isn't the kid, but the reader takes on the same role as him
>needlessly verbose descriptions of landscape
>needlessly
Filtered
>Them's four things that can destroy the world: Women, whiskey, money, and Black folk
truer words have never been written
I newly discovered that Michael Sugrue has a lecture on the book in Bibliotheca's Classics revisited series. If you dislike Amy Hungerford or Yale or both, this is really nice.
The Classics revisited series is awesome in general.