>Definition of "classic": judgedover a period of time to be of the highest quality and outstanding of its kind.
By whom? Why would you trust anyone else? Or trust anything but your own critical faculties?
8 months ago
Anonymous
>By whom?
The definition? By Oxford >Why would you trust anyone else? Or trust anything but your own critical faculties?
Have you ever tought of investigating a book before buying it? Not every book can achieve the label of "classic". If someone tries to sell you a book that is not a classic labeling it as a classic (by its definition) then you are the foolish one, it's not the fault of the Oxford dictionary or the fault of the market.
8 months ago
Anonymous
You didn’t answer my questions. Word meanings don’t begin and end with dictionaries; they’re descriptive and don’t define words for all time.
Oxford dictionary doesn’t have the list of classic works in fiction, so I won’t trust it.
Again, why are you trusting other people?
8 months ago
Anonymous
>Oxford dictionary doesn’t have the list of classic works in fiction, so I won’t trust it.
Did you read my post? I said that you need to investigate by yourself to know if a book is a classic or not. If the book is a classic then it must have to either been extremelly popular in its time, or it must have revolutionized the writing of literature. To give you examples: The epic of Gilgamesh was practically the first epic poem that we know of. Then the Iliad and The Odyssey popularized the genre in ageless classics. The greeks also created and popularized philosophy with Plato's and Aristotle's works (I'm not saying that they achieved "truth", I'm only saying that they are classics for their importance in philosophy). Aeschylus was the father of tragedies and created the genre. Maybe I'm giving too many greek examples, if you don't want this then I can give you plenty of exampñes of classics from other places. The Holy Bible completely changed the world (The catholic instution did, but The Bible was the base of said institution). Another example would be Dante's Inferno which changed how people saw hell (Some iliterate people even believe in its hell nowadays). Shakespeare revolutionized the world of teathre plays and a lot of people use phrases written by him nowadays, almost 400 years after his desth. Then there are also controversial classics like The Capital by Marx or Mein Klampf by Hitler which are important parts of human history. I'm not going to list every single classic and how they changed the world, it's your job as a reader to investigate.
8 months ago
Anonymous
>If the book is a classic then it must have to either been extremelly popular in its time, or it must have revolutionized the writing of literature.
Your view of literature is completely after the fact and retrospective. You think a book "revolutionized" literature because it seems that way from your point of view. You have no idea what it was like when the book came out. >To give you examples: The epic of Gilgamesh was practically the first epic poem that we know of. Then the Iliad and The Odyssey popularized the genre in ageless classics.
They're completely different and "epic" poetry is a genre that tries to bridge together disparate cultures' oral histories into some sort of continuity of similar literary objects. It's artificial. Just read it for what it is. >The greeks also created and popularized philosophy with Plato's and Aristotle's works (I'm not saying that they achieved "truth", I'm only saying that they are classics for their importance in philosophy).
There was philosophy before that, called the Pre-Socratics, which Plato and Aristotle had to have come before them otherwise there would be no field of philosophy.
I'm not going to read the rest of your post, because you already seem very confused. You need to read things on their own. Stop trying to find origins for things. Classics don't exist.
8 months ago
Anonymous
>You have no idea what it was like when the book came out.
Right. At the time they came out they weren't classics. What you are saying doesn't makes any sense. >They're completely different
I never said they weren't. >There was philosophy before that
You got me there. I'm not a philosophy guy. >I'm not going to read the rest of your post
You missed the best examples on purpose. good luck by going against basic definitions of the dictionart just because you can't trust millions of people through time, schizo.
8 months ago
Anonymous
>Millions of people
There weren't millions of readers agreeing that we should remember Jane Austen. Most people haven't read her. We only remember her because it's shilled by academia and publishers since it's "important" and makes you "understand the era". It's bullshit.
8 months ago
Anonymous
My fricking god please learn to read. I'm telling you this for the third and last time, if you don't understand now you are a lost cause.
You need to INVESTIGATE by YOURSELF in order to know which classics are WORTH OF THE LABEL and which ARE NOT. I haven't read Jane Austen, but it took me 1 minute to google "Why is Jane Austen important to read". Some answers said that it was because she demostrated that women are capable of writing as men do. Did this changed literature? It's open to debate. I have not investigated or read her enough, so I can't say it for sure (I need more INVESTIGATION).
8 months ago
Anonymous
>googling the "answer"
You are beyond saving. ESL?
8 months ago
Anonymous
i agree with you mostly but you type like you're esl. also i think you're having a schizo argument with yourself
8 months ago
Anonymous
>The Capital by Marx or Mein Klampf by Hitler
lol'd irl
8 months ago
Anonymous
Why should one never value the critical faculties of another? If we never could rely on the critical faculties of other people, it would be very difficult to choose what to read.
8 months ago
Anonymous
No one can read for you. That's a very simple truth. If you rely on some academic's say so, you are probably incapable of even understanding a book you are "allowed" to read.
8 months ago
Anonymous
No one can read for you, sure. I don't disagree. But how would you know where even to begin reading novels written a century ago without relying, in part, on the critical faculties of others?
8 months ago
Anonymous
>But how would you know where even to begin reading novels written a century ago without relying, in part, on the critical faculties of others?
By picking up a book from a century ago and reading it.
8 months ago
Anonymous
You wouldn't mind the enormous amount of time you would need to devote to finding works of literature that are of high quality of past centuries or even this century? You realize how long an ordeal that would be if we didn't at all rely on the critical faculties of other people?
8 months ago
Anonymous
You can look at the first sentence or skim the first paragraph. Everything from a century ago is online for free, especially on legal websites.
Do you really look at some made-up "canon" list that never existed until academia needed to stay relevant, then let that guide you?
8 months ago
Anonymous
I mean, I'm not especially concerned with whether my tastes are in accordance with consensus about what is and is not in the literary canon, or with what contemporary critics think is the best work being published today, but I think taking things in the extreme direction that you take them would make it difficult to study literature at all. It would be difficult to converse with others on literature.
I really don't like Charles Dickens's novels and popular, as well as academic, insistence that he is one of the greatest novelists of the 19th century can't change that.
I mean, I even have my suspicions that the moon landing was faked, despite all of the experts and "independent fact checkers" who assure me that I shouldn't have these suspicions.
But I think your position makes the study and appreciation of literature a much more difficult process than you seem to think it would. I'd have to actually know how you got about choosing the works that you read to really know if it's tenable or not but it just seems rather a-social and overly individualistic
The secret is you don’t need to read book at all. Socrates says in Meno that you already know everything you just have to concentrate real hard and remember it. Ever since reading that I haven’t even picked up a book or rationally thought about everything. I just “rememever” what I should know and go with that instinct.
I don't know if it is OP or someone else but whoever is arguing with everyone here about "reading every book yourself to check if it truly is a classic according to your own definition of a classic" has the funniest schizo take and i commend your insurmountable stance
By not doing it.
dont spew shit
>Another day without reading boring books! What a life!
This is my favorite thread--
a fighter, a mercenary if you will, for boring ass books!
Give me an example of what you consider boring.
If they are classics, then you are not ready yet, come back later.
>classics
Anyone who uses this meme marketing term, which was coined so publishers can sell morons free domain texts, can be dismissed outright
Definition of "classic": judgedover a period of time to be of the highest quality and outstanding of its kind.
Example: "a classic novel"
>Definition of "classic": judgedover a period of time to be of the highest quality and outstanding of its kind.
By whom? Why would you trust anyone else? Or trust anything but your own critical faculties?
>By whom?
The definition? By Oxford
>Why would you trust anyone else? Or trust anything but your own critical faculties?
Have you ever tought of investigating a book before buying it? Not every book can achieve the label of "classic". If someone tries to sell you a book that is not a classic labeling it as a classic (by its definition) then you are the foolish one, it's not the fault of the Oxford dictionary or the fault of the market.
You didn’t answer my questions. Word meanings don’t begin and end with dictionaries; they’re descriptive and don’t define words for all time.
Oxford dictionary doesn’t have the list of classic works in fiction, so I won’t trust it.
Again, why are you trusting other people?
>Oxford dictionary doesn’t have the list of classic works in fiction, so I won’t trust it.
Did you read my post? I said that you need to investigate by yourself to know if a book is a classic or not. If the book is a classic then it must have to either been extremelly popular in its time, or it must have revolutionized the writing of literature. To give you examples: The epic of Gilgamesh was practically the first epic poem that we know of. Then the Iliad and The Odyssey popularized the genre in ageless classics. The greeks also created and popularized philosophy with Plato's and Aristotle's works (I'm not saying that they achieved "truth", I'm only saying that they are classics for their importance in philosophy). Aeschylus was the father of tragedies and created the genre. Maybe I'm giving too many greek examples, if you don't want this then I can give you plenty of exampñes of classics from other places. The Holy Bible completely changed the world (The catholic instution did, but The Bible was the base of said institution). Another example would be Dante's Inferno which changed how people saw hell (Some iliterate people even believe in its hell nowadays). Shakespeare revolutionized the world of teathre plays and a lot of people use phrases written by him nowadays, almost 400 years after his desth. Then there are also controversial classics like The Capital by Marx or Mein Klampf by Hitler which are important parts of human history. I'm not going to list every single classic and how they changed the world, it's your job as a reader to investigate.
>If the book is a classic then it must have to either been extremelly popular in its time, or it must have revolutionized the writing of literature.
Your view of literature is completely after the fact and retrospective. You think a book "revolutionized" literature because it seems that way from your point of view. You have no idea what it was like when the book came out.
>To give you examples: The epic of Gilgamesh was practically the first epic poem that we know of. Then the Iliad and The Odyssey popularized the genre in ageless classics.
They're completely different and "epic" poetry is a genre that tries to bridge together disparate cultures' oral histories into some sort of continuity of similar literary objects. It's artificial. Just read it for what it is.
>The greeks also created and popularized philosophy with Plato's and Aristotle's works (I'm not saying that they achieved "truth", I'm only saying that they are classics for their importance in philosophy).
There was philosophy before that, called the Pre-Socratics, which Plato and Aristotle had to have come before them otherwise there would be no field of philosophy.
I'm not going to read the rest of your post, because you already seem very confused. You need to read things on their own. Stop trying to find origins for things. Classics don't exist.
>You have no idea what it was like when the book came out.
Right. At the time they came out they weren't classics. What you are saying doesn't makes any sense.
>They're completely different
I never said they weren't.
>There was philosophy before that
You got me there. I'm not a philosophy guy.
>I'm not going to read the rest of your post
You missed the best examples on purpose. good luck by going against basic definitions of the dictionart just because you can't trust millions of people through time, schizo.
>Millions of people
There weren't millions of readers agreeing that we should remember Jane Austen. Most people haven't read her. We only remember her because it's shilled by academia and publishers since it's "important" and makes you "understand the era". It's bullshit.
My fricking god please learn to read. I'm telling you this for the third and last time, if you don't understand now you are a lost cause.
You need to INVESTIGATE by YOURSELF in order to know which classics are WORTH OF THE LABEL and which ARE NOT. I haven't read Jane Austen, but it took me 1 minute to google "Why is Jane Austen important to read". Some answers said that it was because she demostrated that women are capable of writing as men do. Did this changed literature? It's open to debate. I have not investigated or read her enough, so I can't say it for sure (I need more INVESTIGATION).
>googling the "answer"
You are beyond saving. ESL?
i agree with you mostly but you type like you're esl. also i think you're having a schizo argument with yourself
>The Capital by Marx or Mein Klampf by Hitler
lol'd irl
Why should one never value the critical faculties of another? If we never could rely on the critical faculties of other people, it would be very difficult to choose what to read.
No one can read for you. That's a very simple truth. If you rely on some academic's say so, you are probably incapable of even understanding a book you are "allowed" to read.
No one can read for you, sure. I don't disagree. But how would you know where even to begin reading novels written a century ago without relying, in part, on the critical faculties of others?
>But how would you know where even to begin reading novels written a century ago without relying, in part, on the critical faculties of others?
By picking up a book from a century ago and reading it.
You wouldn't mind the enormous amount of time you would need to devote to finding works of literature that are of high quality of past centuries or even this century? You realize how long an ordeal that would be if we didn't at all rely on the critical faculties of other people?
You can look at the first sentence or skim the first paragraph. Everything from a century ago is online for free, especially on legal websites.
Do you really look at some made-up "canon" list that never existed until academia needed to stay relevant, then let that guide you?
I mean, I'm not especially concerned with whether my tastes are in accordance with consensus about what is and is not in the literary canon, or with what contemporary critics think is the best work being published today, but I think taking things in the extreme direction that you take them would make it difficult to study literature at all. It would be difficult to converse with others on literature.
I really don't like Charles Dickens's novels and popular, as well as academic, insistence that he is one of the greatest novelists of the 19th century can't change that.
I mean, I even have my suspicions that the moon landing was faked, despite all of the experts and "independent fact checkers" who assure me that I shouldn't have these suspicions.
But I think your position makes the study and appreciation of literature a much more difficult process than you seem to think it would. I'd have to actually know how you got about choosing the works that you read to really know if it's tenable or not but it just seems rather a-social and overly individualistic
History books.
I don't read books. I don't consume media.
The secret is you don’t need to read book at all. Socrates says in Meno that you already know everything you just have to concentrate real hard and remember it. Ever since reading that I haven’t even picked up a book or rationally thought about everything. I just “rememever” what I should know and go with that instinct.
I don't know if it is OP or someone else but whoever is arguing with everyone here about "reading every book yourself to check if it truly is a classic according to your own definition of a classic" has the funniest schizo take and i commend your insurmountable stance
write scathing remarks in the margins