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The loss of literacy for enjoyment

I usually suggest Amazon, as I can find almost anything through it. I even ordered Phantom by Susan Kay through Amazon, and that book is very difficult to get your hands on. Another useful resource can be found here: Online-Literature. I suggest it often to students that I tutor in English literature that find themselves unable to afford all of the books that they are required to read for their classes. Some works of literature can be surprisingly costly, such as The Epic of Gilgamesh or The Good Earth. I have yet to encounter those books priced for under $10.00 new in stores, so short of buying them used and hoping that a used bookstore will have them, this site works wonders.
 
Or we could all, perhaps, select a book on Amazon or something that is relatively cheap or just insanely good and everyone purchase it and then read and discuss? Several of the books I enjoy have been pretty cheap on there.

OR pdfs if they can be found?
 
Well, I'm in so far as finances, resources, and time allows me to be. As far as any classical works I shouldn't need to search any farther than my bookshelves (I've counted my collection as going over 500 books so far), but admittedly there are many contemporary authors whose work I either haven't read, am unfamiliar with, or have read and didn't care for.
 
While I would love to partake in such a thing, my current list of books to read is rather expansive.

Of all the books I own I'd say roughly a fourth I've finished, half I've started and need to finish and the rest I haven't even gotten to.
 
I am a weird person when it comes to books. >.> If I -bought- the book myself I'm less likely to read it versus someone who bought it for me o_o

I have literally 30 books on my bookshelf I've never read xD That I need to >> Considering they haven't been sorted (the XXXX case vs the Innocent case xD)
 
I would like to suggest Slaughterhouse-5 by Kurt Vonnegut. Quick read, amazingly engrossing book. You can pick it up on Amazon or any used bookstore. I got my copy (new) for $5.99.
 
Except for Requiem I'd suggest "Plague Upon Humanity" which speaks about Unit 731 in WW2. Really engrossing and I got it for .95 cents.

And, again, except for Requiem I'd suggest "Angel Dust Apocalypse," by Jeremy Robert Johnson which is a collection of nice stories.

For everyone I'd say "House of Leaves" by Mark Danielewski. The book is amaaaaaaaaaazing.

I'd suggest staying away from Carlton Mellick the 3rd just because his books are small, rather bland, and a bit too...empty I guess. He has interesting ideas but they are not placed down well.

But yes, I have taken to liking "avant garde" or something or other writing as of late. It amuses me.
 
I saw a new book in barnes called "Grim Reaper: End of Days" and I wanted to buy it, but I wanted writing stuff so I'll wait til next time. But I read the first few pages and it's very very interesting. It has to do with the proposed prophecy of the world ending in 2012- 666 years from when the Black Plague struck Europe.
 
--+Hahvoc Requiem+-- said:
I saw a new book in barnes called "Grim Reaper: End of Days" and I wanted to buy it, but I wanted writing stuff so I'll wait til next time. But I read the first few pages and it's very very interesting. It has to do with the proposed prophecy of the world ending in 2012- 666 years from when the Black Plague struck Europe.
Click to expand...

I find the Mayan culture to be fascinating, and I enjoy researching the 2012 theory based off of the Mayan calender. Although, I personally subscribe to the suggested idea that the reason for the calender's dated end isn't a matter of deliberate prediction on their parts, so much as the fact that the European ventures into the Americas and Oceania's all but wiped out a good majority of native peoples through diseases and violent conquests -the Mayans included. XD I would be more afraid if, somehow, the calender of a dead race of people managed to continue updating itself.
 
The descendants of the Mayan race still exist. It's just the culture is gone, superseded and killed off. Just like the Aztecs; you can still find traces of the Aztec language in the native peoples of the region, but they're all Mexicans now, not Aztecs, really.

Yeah, I saw a webcomic once where one ancient Mayan comes up and says "Hey, how's the calendar coming?" "Oh, pretty good, but I ran out of space on the big wheel." "Oh, don't worry about it, you've got, like, many hundreds of years, nobody's going to care." And the last panel with a modern city with people panicking in 2012...

Here's the thing. The whole Mayan calendar is based on cycles. Things go around, and the big wheel is itself a cycle. So the whole physical calendar is one big megacycle. And what happens when a cycle ends? Does everything stop? No, another cycle just kicks right up, seamlessly. That's why winter doesn't pause indefinitely, that's why spring is always a time for baby animals, etc. The ancient Mayan peoples would laugh at us.
 
I think the Mayans would laugh at how much we freak the fuck out when it gets cold and when it gets too hot.

And when the next fashions are coming out.

And where our car is....

Actually, I think they'd have a heart attack.
 
Yea i really think its a loss to society as a whole, before all this e-book stuff books were great. But so much is lost when you dont turn the pages of a paper or hardback book. I really miss not being able to read a printed book, i just cant stand e-books so i gave up reading and its a darn shame.
 
Requiem, how dare you...

Nah, you're right, that makes no sense. At least people still read ebooks too. And audio books are nice. Really, all books!
 
Problem is alot of youth don't have time to read books. Schools pile so much on kids these days. Most of their time is spent reading text books and classroom material so when they spend so many hours on that they are too burned out to read for enjoyment. And now society is such a fast paced thing kids are expected to be on facebook, so again there is all that preassure so reading for enjoyment is non existant mostly talking about middle and highschool here and how different it is from when i was that age.
 
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