The Syndicate

ColinIsCool wrote: ↑Thu Aug 02, 2018 3:16 pm That’s high praise for Mann — who’s the translator on your copy?

HT Lowe-Porter, from Vintage International. I picked it up at a thrift store without knowing much about Mann or the book at all.

The last few books I've read have been:
The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann
Crime & Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Masks of God: Oriental Mythology by Joseph Campbell
God Emperor of Dune by Frank Herbert

Magic Mountain has blossomed unexpectedly into my favorite novel I've ever read for reasons that aren't fully formed yet. It painted a remarkably intimate and lucid portrait of the human psyche in various aspects. I will need to revisit it later. I was in it for an exceptionally long time. There is a break in the narrative somewhere near the middle where time jumps forward several months and when I reached that point I decided it felt appropriate to let a significant length of time pass in real life as well before picking it back up, but while I had it on hold it didn't really leave my interest. When I came back I found that I was even more engaged with it than before.

Crime & Punishment didn't resonate with me as much as I had hoped that it would, but I'm not sure it is at fault for that. I got through it quickly and it was certainly compelling. Perhaps reading it in such quick succession after The Magic Mountain took something away. Both are stories focused heavily on the mental state of their subjects, but the former was much more dense and sucked me into its aura a bit more thoroughly. I had complete sympathy with Hans Castorp and was still stuck at the sanitarium a little by the time I moved onto Raskolnikov's little garret. Magic Mountain is a very methodical narrative, whereas Crime & Punishment is (intentionally) extremely frantic.

Joseph Campbell is my favorite writer/scholar/personality of the last century and I've spent most of my time out of school consuming as much of his work as I can. The Masks of God is a four part series compiling the history, form, and evolution of world mythology. I'd read the first entry, Primitive Mythology, last summer, and just got my hands on parts 2 & 3 (Oriental Mythology, Occidental Mythology) this year. Part 4 is Creative Mythology, which has been sitting on my bookshelf for a couple of years as I'm committed to reading them in order for some reason.
Oriental Mythology was as compelling to me as everything he did in his life and is exactly what it sounds like: a comprehensive study on the origins and development of Hindu and Buddhist myth and spirituality, starting with a look at some Egyptian and Mesopotamian mythic traditions, and eventually working into India, China, and Japan. I don't recommend it to anybody who's unfamiliar with Campbell though. As an introduction, since I know you all care so much, I'd recommend either The Hero With a Thousand Faces (for which he's most popularly known) or the documentary series The Power of Myth, which is available on Netflix.

God Emperor of Dune is the weirdest of the Dune series that I've read to date. I've been slowly working my way through Dune for a few years now. I like breaking the books up, revisiting the world and themes after some time away. I don't know why, but it's comfortable for me. Dune Messiah is my favorite in the series so far. God Emperor got decidedly wacky but never lost me at any point and I'm looking forward to the day that I sit down to read the 5th book. I forget if that's Heretics or Chapterhouse.

Now I'm doing preliminary readings for classes. I've got some basic literary theory to read about, and also some Arthurian legends, which is something I've always wanted to get around to anyway. But I need to wait for the latter to be delivered first.