>The last Christian novel
>The greatest first novel by an author in any language
>The most influential american novel of the post-war era.
Do you agree with these statements?
Talk religion
>The last Christian novel
>The greatest first novel by an author in any language
>The most influential american novel of the post-war era.
Do you agree with these statements?
Replace influential with best and I agree. I don't think this novel had a lot of influence and it certainly didn't make Gaddis famous or successful. I'm disappointed that he refused to admit he took a lot of inspiration from Ulysses. The parallels are too strong for him to claim he never even read Joyce
It certainly was influential where it mattered and won him a few prizes and grants that justified his continuation as an author
>I'm disappointed that he refused to admit he took a lot of inspiration from Ulysses
No reason to be disappointed. It's just a long running joke. Like Ulysses being informed both in form and content by The Odyssey
>Not even true
What would be some possible contenders?
>Definitely up there, but there are also other ones.
Like?
>Like Ulysses being informed both in form and content by The Odyssey
Yeah but Joyce admitted that and it was super obvious
I read TR almost right after Ulysses so while I was reading it I saw so many parallels and references and thought man this is so freaking cool. Then I looked it up and saw Gaddis claimed he never even heard of Joyce and that made me quite sad because he's clearly a liar unless they were just insane coincidence
>I recall a most ingenious piece in a Wisconsin quarterly some years ago in which The Recognitions’ debt to Ulysses was established in such minute detail I was doubtful of my own firm recollection of never having read Ulysses.
Greatly funny
It's very small of him not to admit it. If he honestly never had read Joyce and independently created its counterpart then he is America's greatest author
>a Harvard-educated person had never read the most influential 20th century novel in the English language by the time he was in his 30s
If he just got it through "osmosis" or whatever that only speaks volumes of Joyce's influence rather than Gaddis' genius (30+ years late btw).
>I’ve about reached the end of the line on questions about what I did or didn’t read of Joyce’s 30 years ago. All I read of Ulysses was Molly Bloom at the end which was being circulated for salacious rather than literary merits; No I did not read Finnegans Wake though I think a phrase about “psychoanaloosing” one’s self from it is in The Recognitions; Yes I read some of Dubliners but don’t recall how many & remember only a story called “Counterparts”; Yes I read a play called Exiles which at the time I found highly unsuccessful; Yes I believe I read Portrait of an Artist but also think I may not have finished it; No I did not read commentary on Joyce’s work & absorb details without reading the original. I also read, & believe with a good deal more absorbtion [sic], Eliot, Dostoevski, Forster, Rolfe, Waugh, why bother to go on, anyone seeking Joyce finds Joyce even if both Joyce & the victim found the item in Shakespear, read right past whole lines lifted bodily from Eliot &c, all of which will probably go on so long as Joyce remains an academic cottage industry.
June 1975 letter to Grace Eckley
hoes mad
Kinda based but he is lying. I definitely agree that Shakespeare is the common factor
I can almost sense the resentment and envy. What a bitter man.
i almost wonder if he denied the influence of ulysses as a sort of joke to go with the themes of originality in the recognitions.
That wouldn't make any sense. That would be going against the themes TR is presenting. Rectal Brown would deny having read Ulysses perhaps
I wouldn't be surprised. Some of his interviews where he speaks about writing are absolutely venomous. He was a very angry man.
I wonder if he was also a fart fetishist like Joyce given the name Rectal Brown.
I found the article he is referring to:
https://doi.org/10.2307/1207257
Pretty hilarious.
>What would be some possible contenders?
any cs lewis novel
>What would be some possible contenders
there have been literally thousands of christian novels produced since this book was written
>What would be some possible contenders?
Jane Eyre by C. Brontë, Pantagruel by Rabelais, Madame Bovary by Flaubert.
>>The last Christian novel
Not even true.
>>The greatest first novel by an author in any language
Definitely up there, but there are also other ones.
>>The most influential american novel of the post-war era.
e-girlta is far more influential, as is Catch-22.
Where do I start with Gaddis? Any pre-reqs? Also, does anyone have a PDF for his biography? Libgen doesn't have it.
The Agape essay is as good a place to start as any.
>I saw so many parallels and references and thought man this is so freaking cool.
I think interesting parallels could be drawn, but are there really any direct references? Apart from things that look like Joyce like the dashes instead of quotation marks and the vignettes that vaguely resemble the style of Wandering Rocks, are there actually any moments where he quotes from Ulysses or touches on a theme that has to be from Joyce?
It’s one of the best American novels I’ve read and it’s one of my favourites, but I have to admit it does feel a little bloated sometimes. I wonder if it would have been more popular if it was edited a little more judiciously
The only thing that really connects TR to Ulysses is the length, if it was half its length than there would dozens of modernists works which it could be influenced by. But it is 1000 pages so people ignore that much of what is called the influence of Ulysses was essentially generic when it comes to modernism by the time Gaddis showed up and they both have a fairly large amount of shared influences. Also, who the frick cares, this is just a way of avoiding talking about the novel itself by people with either never read it.
Also, calling this Christian is reductive, sure you can say it has Christian themes but it is not so simplistic in its treatment of the world and its theme is not Christianity.
>this is just a way of avoiding talking about the novel itself by people with either never read it.
either never read it or don't understand it. Probably palmed the track pad.
You don't get it, there are like so many references like uh....There's a guy named Stephen and he's an artist
>mostly unknown work by mostly unknown nobody
>influential
Pfffffft
Control your fanboying, OP
Gaddisgays seething in this thread that he is the dime Joyce.
Two totally different aims.
Yet similarities abound.
I doubt the first statement and the last, but sure, it's maybe the greatest novel ever written.
It wouldn't bother me if he had read Ulysses, but I really don't doubt him on this; his stated influences are far more obvious.