Cormac McCarthy doesn’t use punctuation because he “doesn’t believe in it”. His books are terrible to read. They’re clunky, unclear, difficult to parse, and read like a middle-schoolers first try at story time. James Joyce, his inspiration, same story; I can’t even get through one chapter of anything he’s ever written.
I realize I’m in the minority when I say this, but grammar has rules for a reason. When you don’t follow the same rules as everyone else, when you don’t adhere to the reader’s expectations, that makes it more difficult for the reader, not less.
If you were to take the list of all professional basketball players, and sort them by the number of free throws missed per game, you’d see the top of the list is dominated by Hall of famers.
That’s not because missing free throws makes for a good basketball player. Or even that it isn’t important in basketball to be able to make free throws. It still remains important at every level of the game! But some of the people who miss a lot of free throws were just so utterly dominant at other parts of the game that they had long successful basketball careers despite being bad at an important skill for basketball players.
Cormac McCarthy and James Joyce have a signature style, yes, but I’d argue that they’re successful despite that, rather than because of that.
I think that’s the point too, you know? His writing style acts as a literary device in and of itself. It’s not always like that, but when it’s like that I feel it helps drive home the scene.
And I say that while I agree 100% that it’s hard to read.
The road felt like a stream of consciousness to me. It flowed so well that I tore through it in 2 days because I just couldn’t stop reading lol. I’d love to be* that immersed in a book again but nothing else I’ve read has come close
Joyce is meant to be read like poetry. It plays off the sound of the language. His stuff is genuinely awful to sit down and read, just like it would be awful to sit down and read through a collection of poetry (to me anyway). Some Authors play with language in a good way, like the way Hemingway rarely attributes dialogue and forces you to pay attention and understand why the character would say something like that. It also reads very minimalist and leaves a lot to your own imagination and voice.
And this is where I feel like the mental state of the reader affects the way they are likely to respond to a given text.
Whenever I’m reading a good book (or poetry), I am able to mentally narrate the text and enter a flow state. Dialog is narrated with purpose, and with a story it basically turns into a film in my mind. My appreciation of the text is affected by how well I can conceptualize it.
But my friend has aphantasia. He can read and understand the words on a page just fine, but that’s all they are to him. It’s hard to puzzle together certain elements of deeper meaning when all you’re really looking at is the relation of words to one another.
Point of clarification. I think there’s a big difference between reading something where your internal narrator is a beat poet as opposed to a broadcast news presenter. If you slowly absorb Joyce and narrate it yourself properly it can be enjoyed. But if you sit down and read it like you would a news article, just trying to scan for info as fast as you can, you miss the entire point of the endeavor.
I only read the beginning of the Ulysses (had to return the book sooner than expected) and the flowing of the words and concepts one into the other is absolutely unique. I felt like I was carried among by the gently flow of a river.
I agree. I read The Road recently since it’s my wife’s favorite book and holy shit it was exhausting at times. I enjoyed the story to a degree, but the stream-of-thought writing style and unspecific grammar took me out of it. If it had been written in a more understandable prose I think I would have enjoyed it more; but would it have been as famous then I wonder
When it comes to the readers expectation, things become a lot more complex. I don’t remember the exact words, but Brandon Sanderson talked about promises to the reader, where it’s OK to do surprising things, but expectations must be carefully managed in that surprises must not feel like betrayal. Poor execution of this is why everyone hates the “…but it was all a dream” trope.
This is the standard line, but a lot of the time I find it to be bullshit. Sure, Cormac McCarthy gets to look cool and modernist by not using quotation marks, but my view is you would spend less time trying to decipher narrator vs. character if he did use them, and you would have a better reading experience at the same time.
I agree- which is the way I believe most Cormac McCarthy fans view his writing style. I have never read his books, they aren’t for me- but I feel that bucking trends is the way art is meant to evolve. Some trends getting bucked are more annoying than others, though.
Do you have any authors that you suggest to others?
I tend to read books about religion and history, so there isn’t really a lot of breaking the mold there unfortunately.
Gormenghast and Neuromancer are the kind of heavy atmospheric and descriptive fiction I like, but they don’t really deviate from standard punctuation or presentation in any way.
Gormenghast… I read a translation si I wouldn’t know about grammar rules, but it definitely broke storytelling rules. The style of the descriptions, how description and action blend into one another, how decay becomes almost a tangible presence through the pages… a unique book by any means
Well, I forgot about that. Looking at it, I’d say it was a part that I managed to get through quite quickly, since it wasn’t just describing the texture of a wall for a full page.
Fair enough- I had never heard of either of those before. However, I know Mervyn Peake has been a heavy inspiration of modern fiction. I may have to give the Gormenghast series a try- just super daunting.
Anyways, thanks for indulging my curiosity. Just had time to kill. Have a good one!
I thought House of Leaves dragged on, but I think the confusion was kind of the story too, you know? You have this scenario going on in the book, and the book itself has you looking left right up down here and there for the context.
“House of Leaves” challenges what is a book! Forget grammar, this is an identify crisis of narrative. Or is it even narrative at this point? Work of art, absolutely.
Yes tbh, with the same reasoning too. The difference is if I do the right thing and break the law, the fun police (aka the actual police) will arrest me.
You need to know the rules to know how to break them with intention.
Cormac McCarthy doesn’t use punctuation because he “doesn’t believe in it”. His books are terrible to read. They’re clunky, unclear, difficult to parse, and read like a middle-schoolers first try at story time. James Joyce, his inspiration, same story; I can’t even get through one chapter of anything he’s ever written.
I realize I’m in the minority when I say this, but grammar has rules for a reason. When you don’t follow the same rules as everyone else, when you don’t adhere to the reader’s expectations, that makes it more difficult for the reader, not less.
If you were to take the list of all professional basketball players, and sort them by the number of free throws missed per game, you’d see the top of the list is dominated by Hall of famers.
That’s not because missing free throws makes for a good basketball player. Or even that it isn’t important in basketball to be able to make free throws. It still remains important at every level of the game! But some of the people who miss a lot of free throws were just so utterly dominant at other parts of the game that they had long successful basketball careers despite being bad at an important skill for basketball players.
Cormac McCarthy and James Joyce have a signature style, yes, but I’d argue that they’re successful despite that, rather than because of that.
The Road is one of my favorite pieces of writing. It’s art like anything else. The lack of punctuation really made it feel raw and close to home.
I think that’s the point too, you know? His writing style acts as a literary device in and of itself. It’s not always like that, but when it’s like that I feel it helps drive home the scene.
And I say that while I agree 100% that it’s hard to read.
The road felt like a stream of consciousness to me. It flowed so well that I tore through it in 2 days because I just couldn’t stop reading lol. I’d love to be* that immersed in a book again but nothing else I’ve read has come close
Have you read Gone Girl? That’s the single most unputdownable thing I’ve ever read
Joyce is meant to be read like poetry. It plays off the sound of the language. His stuff is genuinely awful to sit down and read, just like it would be awful to sit down and read through a collection of poetry (to me anyway). Some Authors play with language in a good way, like the way Hemingway rarely attributes dialogue and forces you to pay attention and understand why the character would say something like that. It also reads very minimalist and leaves a lot to your own imagination and voice.
And this is where I feel like the mental state of the reader affects the way they are likely to respond to a given text.
Whenever I’m reading a good book (or poetry), I am able to mentally narrate the text and enter a flow state. Dialog is narrated with purpose, and with a story it basically turns into a film in my mind. My appreciation of the text is affected by how well I can conceptualize it.
But my friend has aphantasia. He can read and understand the words on a page just fine, but that’s all they are to him. It’s hard to puzzle together certain elements of deeper meaning when all you’re really looking at is the relation of words to one another.
Point of clarification. I think there’s a big difference between reading something where your internal narrator is a beat poet as opposed to a broadcast news presenter. If you slowly absorb Joyce and narrate it yourself properly it can be enjoyed. But if you sit down and read it like you would a news article, just trying to scan for info as fast as you can, you miss the entire point of the endeavor.
I only read the beginning of the Ulysses (had to return the book sooner than expected) and the flowing of the words and concepts one into the other is absolutely unique. I felt like I was carried among by the gently flow of a river.
I agree. I read The Road recently since it’s my wife’s favorite book and holy shit it was exhausting at times. I enjoyed the story to a degree, but the stream-of-thought writing style and unspecific grammar took me out of it. If it had been written in a more understandable prose I think I would have enjoyed it more; but would it have been as famous then I wonder
The Road is so god damn depressing that the writing style was the least of my concerns while reading
I think you’re in the vast majority.
When it comes to the readers expectation, things become a lot more complex. I don’t remember the exact words, but Brandon Sanderson talked about promises to the reader, where it’s OK to do surprising things, but expectations must be carefully managed in that surprises must not feel like betrayal. Poor execution of this is why everyone hates the “…but it was all a dream” trope.
Ok theres 2 replies about Cormac McCarthy, there’s clearly something I’m missing contextwise about understanding rules and how to break them.
If anime taught me anything It’s that character development is just padding
This is the standard line, but a lot of the time I find it to be bullshit. Sure, Cormac McCarthy gets to look cool and modernist by not using quotation marks, but my view is you would spend less time trying to decipher narrator vs. character if he did use them, and you would have a better reading experience at the same time.
This is not an inflammatory response, I am just curious- How do you feel about “House of Leaves?”
Generally considered to be a phenomenal work of art, but it DEFINITELY doesn’t follow the vast majority of standard grammar rules.
I hadn’t even heard of it until your comment.
I respect going all in on breaking convention for the sake of art a lot more than leaving out punctuation as a style.
I agree- which is the way I believe most Cormac McCarthy fans view his writing style. I have never read his books, they aren’t for me- but I feel that bucking trends is the way art is meant to evolve. Some trends getting bucked are more annoying than others, though.
Do you have any authors that you suggest to others?
I tend to read books about religion and history, so there isn’t really a lot of breaking the mold there unfortunately.
Gormenghast and Neuromancer are the kind of heavy atmospheric and descriptive fiction I like, but they don’t really deviate from standard punctuation or presentation in any way.
Gormenghast… I read a translation si I wouldn’t know about grammar rules, but it definitely broke storytelling rules. The style of the descriptions, how description and action blend into one another, how decay becomes almost a tangible presence through the pages… a unique book by any means
Doesn’t Gormenghast have that dinner scene that’s a massive stream of consciousness curveball?
Edit: Book 1 Chapter 57 The Reveries
Well, I forgot about that. Looking at it, I’d say it was a part that I managed to get through quite quickly, since it wasn’t just describing the texture of a wall for a full page.
Nobody captures a wall in its decaying magnificence like he does. He makes the ugly beautiful.
Fair enough- I had never heard of either of those before. However, I know Mervyn Peake has been a heavy inspiration of modern fiction. I may have to give the Gormenghast series a try- just super daunting.
Anyways, thanks for indulging my curiosity. Just had time to kill. Have a good one!
I thought House of Leaves dragged on, but I think the confusion was kind of the story too, you know? You have this scenario going on in the book, and the book itself has you looking left right up down here and there for the context.
Jumping in.
I tried ‘House’ and noped out about fifty pages in.
Too much work and not much payout.
imho it was a gimmick book.
“House of Leaves” challenges what is a book! Forget grammar, this is an identify crisis of narrative. Or is it even narrative at this point? Work of art, absolutely.
Yeah, you can break the law as long as you know what it says, right?
Fuck off, you bad faith shitstain.
Yes tbh, with the same reasoning too. The difference is if I do the right thing and break the law, the fun police (aka the actual police) will arrest me.