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Originally posted by C Elegans
Leo Tolstoy: I know War and Peace is supposed to be a true masterpiece, and it certainly belongs to the world literature. I like many of Tolstoy's contemporaries, and I like the classic and modern Russian literature in general. Maybe I'm unfair and I was very young when I read him, but Tolstoy just bored me to tears. On the other hand, I read Dostoyevsky prior to Tolstoy, still I felt Crime and Punishment and Notes from the underground gave me much more than War and Peace and Anna Karenina.

I know exactly what you mean. I really enjoyed Dostoyevsky. In addition to truly appreciating Crime and Punishment I also derived a great deal from The Brothers Karamazov......these works have so much depth and complexity, and his writing style is really gripping.

Tolstoy on the other hand...... I was truly bored by Anna Karenina, and despite many attempts I still have not managed to read more than about 50 pages of War and Peace . It might be Tolstoy's characters or maybe it is his writing style....but I just can't read him without dropping off to sleep. I once actually successfully combatted insomnia by picking up Tolstoy

Another great I dislike is William Faulkner.....for me....that stream of consciousness style.....is utterly claustrophobic.


I also intensely disliked the one movie that came out around the early/mid nineties.....The Cook, the Thief, his wife, and her Lover . All the art/movies critics raved about it, but I found that it was a sensory overload. And although it is very different in nature I didn't much like The Red Violin for fairly similar reasons.

The Hobbit. I got halfway through it in High School, but never finished. Too 'thick' for me. Now, I pick it and the other LotR books up, read two pages, and then find something else I'd rather do.

I didn't care for Steinbeck. Though, I did enjoy Hemmingway's style of writing.

One of the things I found with LotR is that the first book is the slowest by far... If you persevere with it, it gets a lot better in the second two books, IMO.

i just came to think of those "self help" books.
i never gave much for them.....
"lern to be rich in 15 minutes"..... ARRGGGHHH.

and i cant remember who never got through the hobbit. i tried 3 or 4 times, before i did it.
and i still skip that one, when i read the Lotr books. it's just too dry.
it's all about walking around and singing....

Originally posted by Azmodan
i just came to think of those "self help" books.

Nobody should like those, though...

Originally posted by Azmodan
i just came to think of those "self help" books.
i never gave much for them.....
"lern to be rich in 15 minutes"..... ARRGGGHHH.

But are you really supposed to like them? I thought everybody loathed them...

EDIT: @Georgi: Great minds etc

its odd that i like the hobbit more than the other books(but i just skip the singing)



but i really dont like fotr or ttt and i after that i just quit on rotk lol

Originally posted by Georgi


I was about to say that! It tastes horrible, why do people want to drink it?

I don't drink coffee or tea either, generally... I especially don't get why people like tea. *shrugs*

@Aegis shan't Stairway To Heaven is overrated and all. Although Rolf Harris' version has a certain je ne sais quoi... Ok, so I like Stairway, I'm just being argumentative for the sake of it now...

Great minds think alike, they say.

I usually drink a coffee in the morning, when I remember to make one, at any rate.

Here's another one: Rolf Harris. As a patriotic Aussie I should like the guy, but he comes across as just plain annoying.

@CE-Couldn't agree more on Dusk 'til Dawn and Pulp Fiction.

I agree with CE on the Wilde wit: Walking up hills is difficult, but what is truly difficult is not walking up hills.

Damn, that was meant to be a joke, but it actually came out rather well. Ah well, you know what I mean .

@McB, yeah I did read Moby D!ck, and was (although now I'm ashamed to say ) thoroughly gripped all the way through...

The Red Violin

Yeah, that movie certainly wasn't as great as critics made out...and Samuel L. bloody Jackson!!!! He is in everything I defy anyone now to name a movie made in America which does not have Samuel L Jackson in it. Now he is over-rated!

Originally posted by frogus
Yeah, that movie certainly wasn't as great as critics made out...and Samuel L. bloody Jackson!!!! He is in everything I defy anyone now to name a movie made in America which does not have Samuel L Jackson in it. Now he is over-rated!

Have you seen his earlier performances in movies such as Jungle Fever? Also have you seen Eve's Bayou or Jackie Brown?

I am not a massive L. Jackson connoisseur (sp?)...I have seen Jackie Brown but not Junle Fever or Eve's Bayou...however, I thought that he was average in Jackie Brown, and completely upstaged by Pam Grier.

Originally posted by frogus
I am not a massive L. Jackson connoisseur (sp?)...I have seen Jackie Brown but not Junle Fever or Eve's Bayou...however, I thought that he was average in Jackie Brown, and completely upstaged by Pam Grier.

I agree Pam Grier was great, as was Robbie De Niro the scene in the car lot with Melanie is priceless, and his explanation later is also brilliant

Eve's Bayou is definately worth checking out, it is quite dark and disturbing.

Ahem....

...I HATE Mozart ( - that is - HIS MUSIC) .

For an Austrian that's supposed to be a terrible crime. . But I just can't bear it.


No worries,

Beldin

To tell the truth I'm not a big fan of Tolkien.....perhaps I'm too simpleminded, but the description sometimes bores me to death. Granted his writing is genious....but too much description turns me off a little. I don't hate his books, but I don't like them......

@Beldin: Isn't Mozart German though?

@beldin oh my god BURN HIM!!!

lol

i love motzart he rocks(my favorite classic composer)

Jazz. I think I'm supposed to like jazz - it's 'in' right now with all the 'cool' people. It seems to be the thing to know and talk about, sort of like how coffee was back in the '90s.

But I'm not so hot on it. It irritates me that my NPR station insists on playing jazz from 9 to 3 every day......

Atonal, mish-mashes of random notes. Ug.

Originally posted by Georgi
One of the things I found with LotR is that the first book is the slowest by far... If you persevere with it, it gets a lot better in the second two books, IMO.

Hmmm. I suspect this is one of those aspects in which I reveal myself to be a Typical American (If you want to know the salient characteristics of the Typical American, just ask C. Elegans. For some odd reason, she is the resident expert on the subject.... ). In this case, think in terms of that unique American contradictory quality of slothfulness combined with a need for instant gratification....

Now, if Bilbo's eleventy-first birthday party had had dancing girls or a good car chase I might have been hooked...

I think I am supposed to like the Dave Matthew's Band, but I dont. I hear it on EVERY bloody station here. Im tired of it and it sounds like the main singer needs to clear his throat all the time.

@tybaltus i find them to be soooo annoying as well im like holy crap do something NEW dont copy yourself 100times over!!