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/lit/ - Literature

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11204883 No.11204883 [Reply] [Original]

What's the funniest book you've ever read?

>> No.11204890

>>11204883
pic unrelated I hope

>> No.11204892

>>11204883
Pic unrelated.

>> No.11204901

>>11204883
Infinite Jest unironically

>> No.11204919

>>11204883
The Divine Comedy

>> No.11204937

>>11204883
Not this.

This was alright...I mean, it's funny, and I guess it's supposed to be amazing because Norm actually wrote it without a ghost writer or anything but....uh...it's just ok man. Definitely funny parts, but a lot of fucking filler.

>> No.11204974

>>11204883
this was pretty crude and mediocre, with nice moments here and there. same goes for norms career

>> No.11204975

>>11204974
Yeah.

>> No.11204979

>>11204883
Lolita. I think I wasn't ready for it the first time I read it because a lot of the humor was lost on me. Earlier this year I reread it and found many parts laugh-out-loud funny.

>> No.11204990
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11204990

>>11204937
I love the dude but it was a middling book. Hopefully when he met with cormac he got some good tips

>> No.11204996
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11204996

>>11204990

>> No.11205040

>>11204901
I'm with this anon. So many of IJ's minor scenes are funnier than entire comic novels. Mark Twain's Roughing It is great, too.

>> No.11205067

The time machine did it

>> No.11205080

>books
>funny
How can you convey the most important aspects of comedy, timing, through plain text?

>> No.11205083
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11205083

>>11204996
>Masterpiece
>The Road

>> No.11205115

A Confederacy of Dunces
Death on the Installment Plan

>> No.11205128

pg wodehouse, the jeeves canon

>> No.11205134
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11205134

>>11204901
help wanted

>> No.11205146

>>11205080
>his internal reading voice isn't a great comedic actor

>> No.11205149

>>11205040
>Roughing It
>The surveyors brought back more tarantulas with them, and so we had quite a menagerie arranged along the shelves of the room. Some of these spiders could straddle over a common saucer with their hairy, muscular legs, and when their feelings were hurt, or their dignity offended, they were the wickedest-looking desperadoes the animal world can furnish. If their glass prison-houses were touched ever so lightly they were up and spoiling for a fight in a minute. Starchy?—proud? Indeed, they would take up a straw and pick their teeth like a member of Congress. There was as usual a furious “zephyr” blowing the first night of the brigade's return, and about midnight the roof of an adjoining stable blew off, and a corner of it came crashing through the side of our ranch. There was a simultaneous awakening, and a tumultuous muster of the brigade in the dark, and a general tumbling and sprawling over each other in the narrow aisle between the bedrows. In the midst of the turmoil, Bob H——sprung up out of a sound sleep, and knocked down a shelf with his head. Instantly he shouted:

>“Turn out, boys—the tarantulas is loose!”

>> No.11205293

>>11205149
I just love it, anon. Twain's language is so rich and colorful, and his knack for capturing voices and illustrating characters is something else. Starchy, proud tarantulas picking their teeth like members of Congress. Beautiful.

Everything about Slade is gold, Hyde vs. Morgan is brilliant, and I'd wager the chapter about Buck Fanshaw's death is one of the funniest things ever put to page: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3177/3177-h/3177-h.htm#linkch47

>> No.11205580
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11205580

>>11204883

>> No.11205591

Dog of the South by Charles Portis

>> No.11205608

>>11204883
What happened by Hillary Clinton (serious)
When she brought up Alex jones and how he made a video about all the kids she had kidnaped, raped, and eaten I burst out laughing at 1am. She mentions her worries about going to jail since trump kept saying lock her up.

>> No.11205620

the recognitions

>> No.11205873
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11205873

So saying, he dashed into the midst of the squadron of ewes, and
began spearing them with as much spirit and intrepidity as if he
were transfixing mortal enemies in earnest. The shepherds and
drovers accompanying the flock shouted to him to desist; seeing it was
no use, they ungirt their slings and began to salute his ears with
stones as big as one's fist. Don Quixote gave no heed to the stones,
but, letting drive right and left kept saying:
"Where art thou, proud Alifanfaron? >Come before me; I am a single
knight who would fain prove thy prowess hand to hand, and make thee
yield thy life a penalty for the wrong thou dost to the valiant
Pentapolin Garamanta.

>> No.11205880
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11205880

>>11204883

>> No.11205948

>>11204883
I don't know about funniest, but I'd like to give an honourable mention to Kingsley Amis's Lucky Jim. I still think about this passage sometimes when I'm working my way through crappy academic writing or journalism:

> In considering this strangely neglected topic," it began. This what neglected topic? This strangely what topic? This strangely neglected what? His thinking all this without having defiled and set fire to the typescript only made him appear to himself as more of a hypocrite and fool.

>> No.11205981

My diary t bh
:^)

>> No.11205987

>>11204883
The novel I'm currently working on is a comedic masterpiece. It's a social satire called "Cuck". It mentions /lit/. There is already a publisher interested.

>> No.11206004

>>11205128
This.

>> No.11206086

>No mention of Gogol

You plebs need to get on The Overcoat right now. Garnett translation. No questions, you'll laugh hard

>> No.11206127

>all these people shitting on norms book

sad

>> No.11206152
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11206152

>>11206127
t.

>> No.11206161

>>11206127
He's just south of mediocre as a comic and is terrible as a writer. This board just likes him because he is a vocal pseud about books like they are.

>> No.11206188

>>11204883

Notes from underground

>>11205987
Tell me more, anon

>> No.11206215

>>11206188
>Tell me more, anon
It's about a couple who are in a long distance relationship. When the girl comes back she confesses to cheating on him. He holes up in his house and everyone in town hears about it and drives by his house laughing and throwing bricks at his window. He retreats into the comfort of the internet, where he meets a charismatic man who is obsessed with Thomas Jefferson. That's all I can say for now. Just the basics. But it spirals out into a madcap satirical romp that is like a combination of Kafka, Twain and Palahniuk. I actually have a friend who has a friend that is close to Trey Parker and Matt Stone who thinks I could get a blurb from them which would be huge.

>> No.11206256
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11206256

>>11204883
Our lady-killer, the great Don Quixote de la Mancha.

>> No.11206361
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11206361

>>11204883
"I Am Not Sidney Poitier" by Percival Everett

>> No.11206377

Homeland, by Lipsyte, is the funniest shit I have ever read.

>> No.11206389

>>11206161
he is the least mediocre comedian currently living.

>> No.11206402

>>11206389
That's like being the best writer on /lit/. Sorry the guy you like for parroting things about Tolstoy sucks.

>> No.11206414
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11206414

>>11206215
>>11205987
I don't know why, but I'm inclined to believe you.

Best of luck lmao

>> No.11206434

>>11206389
I hope you just don’t know about Todd Barry and aren’t an actual retard.

>> No.11206450

>>11206434
Norm fans are pretty ignorant about stand up. They'd have to be I guess.

>> No.11206494

>>11206434
Todd Barry is fairly idiosyncratic but Norm has no competitors, so...
He's like Patrice O'Neal, opinions aside, you can't deny how unflappable they both are to their own interests and that's IMO what makes comedy so great.

>> No.11206496

Hitchhiker's Guide. I've read some other pretty funny books, but not like that one.

>> No.11206514

>>11206450
explain your shitty opinion pls.

>> No.11206518

>>11206434
>>11206450
yeah your right i need to go watch some bill hicks

>> No.11206527
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11206527

The Sot-Weed Factor. The bestiality, pedophilia, small cocks, shit, and all around grotesqueness made me laugh from start to finish.

>> No.11207287

Confederacy of dunces. The fucking way he does voices cracks me up brah

>> No.11207689

by far it's Apathy and Other Small Victories

>> No.11207764

The Verificationist is quite funny

>> No.11207934

>>11204883
the red dwarf novelization is pretty funny. i never watched the show though

>> No.11207967

>>11204883
I heartily enjoyed Pelican at Blandings, though funny seems a strong word for it. I was never crying laughing or gripping my sides, but I did openly guffaw a few times even when I saw how the gag would play out

>> No.11208297

>>11207287
HE'S A COMMUNISS

>> No.11208752

>>11204919
haha virgil actually took him to inferno the absolute madman

>> No.11208757
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11208757

>>11205083
> letting The Road go over your head to the extent you don't recognise its brilliance

>> No.11208809

>>11207287

The part where Ignatius danced in front of the factory negroes

>Ignoring the eyes of the workers, I shuffled about beneath one of the load speakers, twisting and shouting, mumbling insanely, 'Go! Go! Do it, baby, do it! Hear me talkin' to ya. Wow!'

>> No.11209526

>>11204883
That book was really good. Love norm.

>norm getting raped
>doctor telling the moth joke
>doc beats him up
>that last chapter
>the part where he has an entire chapter unedited

It's a great book

>> No.11209536

>>11209526
I liked it a lot.

>> No.11209540

>>11209536
Listening to the audio book was great. Love norm's voice

>> No.11209548

>>11209540
I read it on paper like a normal person.

>> No.11209562

>>11209548
You miss out on the way norm delivers the lines with the audiobook.

>> No.11209567

>>11209562
I've seen enough of his podcast to read the whole book in his voice and pace.

>> No.11209573

>>11208809
lmao in that scene when he's explaining to the workers what to do and then there's a pause and a worker is like "This alotta shit" "Ignatius ignored that comment."

If it's ever adapted it should be a cartoon adaptation in the style of The Simpsons and done as a mini-series.