Korean Job Discussion Forums

[ifa79]

recently I've read:

If your interested in an alternative history of WWII, then read:
The Plot Against America by Phillip Roth

If you are interested in Islam and Secularism in Turkey then read:
Snow by Orhan Pamuk

If you want 1000 pages of adventure then read:
Shogun by James Clavell

If you want something crazy, wild but difficult to read, then read:
Catch 22 by Joseph Heller

If you want to read about shunned mixed-race kids and Korean prostitutes for the US military in the 1960s then read:
Fox Girl by Nora Okja Keller

If you want a fun classic then read:
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne

That's all I can think of now. Lately I'm into political fiction so the first two are what I liked best. Especially read SNOW because it is so important to world politics right now.

[vandyshannon]

This book is amazing. it won the pulitzer. it's 600 pages but totally worth it. You can get it from What the Book. It's definitely the best book I've read recently. One of the bests I've read ever.

[Xerxes]

Brothers K it is. I am to my neck in classes today, so I will posit an assertion by the end of the day. Grand Inquisitor is fine too, although I was wondering if we could assault Dostoyevsky's hatred of Catholicism and his addressing Catholicism in the work. What aberrations were there in his depiction and what does that say about his attitudes to the Western invasion, as it were, of his ideals of Russian orthodoxy. We can use the Grand Inquisitor passage as a case in point of this.

We could also do a comparative on Huck and Alyosha, which is also interesting.

Or, too tough for you big boy? Any unoriginal ideas (plagiarized ones) effectively calls the game off with evidence to that effect being the smoking gun, ok, sport?

[gypsyfish]

I'm reading China Star by Bartle Bull. It's about a white Russian in Paris in the 1920's trying to find his twin sister. Full of action and adventure, great summer reading.

I like Bull's African novels better, but this is a good one, too.

[Xerxes]

[Don Gately]

[Tiberious aka Sparkles]

[Bulsajo]

[Tiberious aka Sparkles]

As for The Brothers Karamazov, I'd like to discuss what you imagine Dostoevsky would have written had he lived long enough to pen his planned sequel. Supposedly that novel was to end with Alyosha's death by capital punishment for the attempted murder of the Czar (not sure if it was to be the Czar, actually). This is somewhat foreshadowed in Karamazov with Alyosha and his friendship with Kolya Krasotkin.

Also, how do you feel about the most recent translation? It's been lauded by many, but from what I've read I feel it oversimplifies the text. I've always been partial to the Andrew R. MacAndrew translation, despite some slight problems.

Sparkles*_*

[Don Gately]

[Xerxes]

Yes, you could make that statement that I plagiarize the oft discussed issue, but by your picking Grand Inquisitor, you imply that issue. I took your cue. The particular argument and supporting evidence therein being original would be the real test, wouldn't it? I have never seen a professor argue that an issue in a specific part of literature itself used as a point of departure for discussion is in itself plagiarism. If that were the case, discussing the symbolism of "darkness" in Heart of Darkness would be plagiarism; as long as the citations and relevant gloss were original or even evocative of another facet of the symbolism, the issue itself is still fair game. It is sometimes the assertion itself and but more often the supporting evidence that is prone to plagiarism. I think that any issue of approach (i.e. Grand Inquisitor and religion) of any canonical work is difficult to make original without some serious and original research.

I will claim then the (often cited) argument that Dostoyevsky is anti-Catholic not only because I will cite passages to that effect in Brothers K (not cited by other people to that point) but also because his prose works specifically and not too cryptically indicate that attitude. He makes no bones about that in his prose writing and letters. The controversy is whether that that is borne out in his writing of his literature, to wit Brothers K. This work is an especially controversial one in that regard because it seems, superficially, that he is pro-Catholicism.

[Don Gately]

[cypher]

good lord, you all need to get a room.

What I don't understand is people who limit their experiences based on rather arbitrary lines drawn by someone else. Who says this book is literature and this mystery? Who says this is fantasy and that is horror? There are books all over the bookstore that have depth and grit to them, and then there are the other books, which are also fine to read sometimes. Personally, I read many books from all over the spectrum for different reasons, and I don't limit myself based on what others think. Currently, I'm on a non-fiction kick so I don't really have much to offer this thread-even the latest school book I have to read is non-fiction.

[Xerxes]

[flotsam]

Books are cool.