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The loss of literacy for enjoyment

Mr Master said:
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 It's just the culture is gone, superseded and killed off.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.
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Mm, good point. I should have worded it differently and specified that it was their culture rather than all traces of their ancestry that was destroyed. I recall coming across that very same comic however, and I found it hysterical. Personally I find it somewhat ironic (my inner cynic reveals itself), given that the majority of people who do buy into the scare can likely claim to have ancestors of European descent. Unintentionally, it's as if the Mayan peoples left us with the equivalent of a very amusing middle finger! XD
 
Huh. No Margaret Atwood? Bret Easton Ellis? Jonathan Franzen? Kazuo Ishiguro? Annie Proulx? Even Jonathan Lethem or Elizabeth Kostova?

It's not as though we don't have incredibly talented authors. It just that they are overshadowed by more popular authors. Popularity says little about the writing, but instead the appeal.

I think it's funny that most of the authors mentioned are, by genre, either fantasy/science fiction writers or have written one of "The Classics".
 
So you're going to toss around names without any association?

Thank you oh so much.

I also don't see the amusement, this is a site devoted to role play. It's highly likely that a lot of us draw inspiration and influence from said types of books.
 
Margaret Atwood is a very popular, critically acclaimed author. She wrote The Handmaid's Tale. Excellent book. Bret Easton Ellis is, on the other hand, basically the pinnacle of the Gen-X author. Writing laden with ennui, entitlement and snobbish presumption hidden in layers of post modern surrealism and allegedly transgressive gore candy. However, American Psycho was excellent, if somewhat shallow as a story.
 
I'm not trying to be offensive, and I'm sorry if I hurt anyone's feelings or put them off.

It was my impression that these names would be recognized, but I guess not. Annie Proulx wrote the short story Brokeback Mountain was based on, Kazuo Ishiguro wrote "Never Let Me Go", the movie of which...should already be out. Lethem wrote Motherless Brooklyn (kind of hilarious, mostly because of this: http://betterbooktitles.com/post/816389698/motherlessbrooklyn), and Elizabeth Kostova writes long books about Obession - Vampires and Obsession - artist. Good enough?

I...struggled through American Psycho. I enjoyed Rules of Attraction much more, but then, I'm basically in love with Donna Tartt.
 
Nihilistic_Impact said:
So you're going to toss around names without any association?
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Well, Wikipedia is right THERE, after all.

I read a lot of short fiction, as I subscribe to Analog magazine (80 years of publishing and still going strong), and most of the fiction on my shelves is SF. Of course, that's marginalized and trivialized due to stereotypes that haven't been true of the genre for at least 40 years now.

But woe betide anyone who gets branded with the SF stamp. Genetic engineering to bring back dinosaurs, dealing with chaos theory and monster run amok? Certainly don't call it sci fi! Conservative military forces take over chunks of the US, invent new social orders, sexual mores and traditions, and in a throwaway reference, invent computers that you can call in and they'll say your prayers for you? Well, that's certainly mainstream fiction, isn't it? Not SF!

Mainstream fiction tends to bore me. Genres, whether it's mystery, SF (speculative fiction, encompassing sci fi, fantasy, crossovers, alternate histories, etc.), and so forth, that has interest to me. And the most interesting and popular bits of mainstream fiction seem to borrow SF elements, but refuse to acknowledge that the inclusion of those elements makes them SF. "Well, sure, my protagonist travels back and forth through time, but it's really a love story, not science fiction."

Bastards. Elitist snob genre-hating bastards.
 
i wish i found this thread sooner. i LOVE to read. however, with college and family, I havent read as much as i used to while i was in high school.

I read any genre, maybe except romance, as long as the book captures my attention, and draws me in. I am surprised noone has mention Christopher Paolini. He wrote the Inheritance cycle, AKA Eragon, Eldest, and Brisinger. I can't wait for the fourth and finial book, which ill probably read in two days. But because I don't know a lot of good books, I tend to not buy them, unless I can sit down and read a chapter or two before buying it. This goes with the, "I have to feel the book, smell the book, and be into the book." Nothing will ever replace that. I used to have a ebook, tried it once, and never used it again.

One series that is original [[that i know of]] Is called "The Last Apprentice." Its more of a fantasy/horror book, and one of the series actually made me turn on the light, i got THAT creeped out. but it was so good, i continued to read it, while I was creeped out. The author is joseph delaney, in case you look it up and get a weird book.

i am glad I was not in the tech fling, until after i got used to books. I was born in 1990, and played outside until i moved. After i moved, my imagination went towards books. The movie harry potter got me into it to me honest. I have been reading, and re reading books since. i can say i must have re read harry potter 3 to 4 times, and the Inheritance cycle 2 to 3 times.

again, I am into mainly fantasy, but i am really into almost anything from mystery to Sci-fi
 
The only reason Paolini ever got published is because his parents were publishers.

And his books, at least amongst my circle of associations, have been heavily critiqued.

For good fantasy I'd recommend Song of Ice and Fire, Black Company, Malazan Book of the Fallen and Prince of Nothing.

Also, MM, you know I'm far too lazy to do another person's work for them.
 
Isn't it "His Dark Materials," the trilogy that the Golden Compass was the first book of? I can't be arsed to look it up.

I'm fond of all the old masters, too. Asimov and Anderson and Anthony and Heinlein and Burroughs and all that stuff. Larry Niven rocks my world. A lot of the social interaction is hopelessly dated, and much of the science has been disproved, but they're still well written and largely coherent. A lot of the stuff from the early days is the source of a lot of the old stereotypes, but the stuff that sticks around is the cream of that era.
 
@Nihilistic_Impact
I did not know his parents were publishers, to be honest. And what critques do you have him under? out of curiosty.

and I will definitely look those up, thanks for the tips.
 
His story is ripped from Lord of the Rings and Star Wars.

There's sites out there devoted to the subject; I no longer have a link to any.
 
I'm about halfway through "Jesus Freaks" by Andre Duza. It's about a zombie apocalypse and then two men coming and proclaiming they are Jesus Christ and performing miracles, one who is the Aryan version idolized by Whities and another being a dark skinned Iraqi man who is demonized by many people for not being white. Thus while the Rapture has gone to hell, so to speak (and might not even be the Rapture), we follow what I assume is an Asian policeman who is trying to stay sane in a world gone mad.

I'm pretty sure the main character is supposed to be black/part black like all of Duza's main protagonists, but with a last name of "Makane" I just keep hearing "Mah-Ka-NAY" in my head and seeing him as a fellow slant.

It's pretty neat actually, written in a very bizarre post-modern type style that feels more like you are reading a movie script than a book.
 
@Nihilistic_Impact
Yea, so i heard, however, I have never been into lord of the rings to know exactly what he ripped from it. for some odd reason Tolkin does not pull me into a book like Paolini does.

And star wars? How exactly? The only thing i can think of is luke wants to become a Jedi, and his teacher gets killed just like Eragon running away, and Brom training him.

@hahvoc
I completely agree with you. Eragon takes me into a different world. My girlfriend hates it when i read it because i don't pay attention to anything around me, including her. same goes for the harry potter books, and The Last Apprentice. few books do that. Others i get so bored with it i put it down to do other things. Thats how Steven King's Dream catcher was. I hit such a boring part of the book, i couldn't finish it. Another book(s) is the World of warcraft ones. They were interesting, But I wasn't in another world.
 
I hate the harry potter books. The writing style is too dry for me to get into. I literally read two pages of the first book and then threw it.
 
Dreamcatcher was awesome, shit weasels and a bacon loving alien. Those two facts made up for everything else that was dull or boring about the book.
 
You can usually tell folks who don't actually read all that much. That sense of being transported, of being immersed in the world you're reading about... that's supposed to be the standard. That's how it's supposed to work. Hell, it says that in every "reading is cool" special for kids.

I've lost track of the number of books that's done that to me. Looking over at my shelf, I can see Lensman series, Doc Savage, the Illuminati Trilogy, so many movie tie-ins I can't even count 'em. John Carter of Mars. Jack Chalker's Well of Souls books. The Chanur books. the Null-A series. Asimov's Foundation books. And a metric fuck-ton of random library books have all done that for me. Man, I can't even count 'em.
 
I did mention earlier, I really dont read a lot of different books, because i find it hard to get into them. Hence the reason why i would spend hours at a book store. I want to read the first two chapters of the book inside the store to see if i actually want to continue reading the book. If the book does not do that to me, then I don't read it.

but yea, i have to admit, the first two harry potter books were kinda dry, and the beginning of the third one as well. However, the movies kept me reading, and by the time i hit the fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh book, the dry beginnings i did not mind, and most of the time they were not dry anymore. She always tried to do something else than him starting in his room at his uncles and aunts house like the beginning three books.
 
The movies made me interested in the story itself- not the books that they represented. If it's too dry, I won't bother trying to get into the rest of it. It's not worth struggling over.
 
wasnt too much of a struggle for me. Especially when my school was 30 minutes away to and from, and i had nothing else better to do. but yea, the movies made me interested in the books. and when i do re-read the books, i dont re read the first two. i sometimes even skip the third book. the forth book and on, it stepped out of the kid realm, and she made it more teenage-adult like. but yea, anyways.
 
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