While Victor Hugo’s “Les Misérables” has an enthralling story line, the author’s somewhat frequent excursions can become rather annoying. He spends nearly a dozen or more pages informing readers of implications surrounding the French word “gamin” (street child). Anyone who peruses the book will find a score or more pages awaiting them, flush (as it were) with a detailed description of the Parisian sewers. After a few of these lengthy sidetracks one becomes tempted to shout aloud, “get on with it you flaming snail-eater!”
It’s all too tempting to classify the whole of Henry James’ work in this same category. That pom can make a few seconds internal dialogue cover half a chapter. On a similar footing is Jane Austen’s “Emma.” One is often brought to nearly wishing violence upon Miss Bates as she blathers so incessantly.
Well now, what bits of execrable writing (buried in otherwise decent books) have you stumbled across?
Dallas Willard’s The Divine Conspiracy. His writing style is so bad I wanted to trash it at page 20 but stuck it out to page 60. His writing style is so bad I’m not sure he ever made a point.
Moby Dick is anything but tedious, if you’re obsessed with fish. (Melville’s original title for the novel, which thankfully his publisher talked him out of, was Fishy Fish Fish Fish, and the Fish they Fish Fish Fish: A Fish Story.)
Though (and this will bring unto me great shame and alienation here at the SDMB) I really enjoyed Francisco’s speech at Reardon’s party - never thought that people could sound so perfectly bitchy in matters of economic theory.
Actually, I think some of the digressions are rather interesting. That said, the long, LONG passage on the battle of Waterloo was the first thing I thought of when I saw this thread title…
But OTOH it has some interesting digresions. For instance, the conversation in the bar where Casaubon describes the Templars. OK, this was a conversation, which injected some light into it, but that’s kind of the point - IMO Eco made it interesting, and I learned more about the Templars than from anywhere else.
I just think it’s good to see an info dump done well as well. Has anyone any good examples?
The thrice-bedamned turtle at the beginning of Grapes of Wrath. Although at least Steinbeck has the decency to put this at the beginning of the book, before much happens, unlike Hugo, who sticks his 100-page treatise on the Paris sewers in at one of the MOST EXCITING PARTS OF THE STORY.
Poor little 16-year old arisu reading Les Mis for the first time: “Why do I care about the gross fertilization practices of the ancient Chinese?!? Tell me what’s happened to Jean Valjean and Marius!”
I read the title, and I immediately though, “Hunchback of Notre Dame”. I’m usually all about the long, pointless digressions: Foucault’s Pendulum and Moby Dick are two of my favorite novels, but after a hundred and fifty page mediatation on how cathedrals are like corpses, I just wanted to scream “Christ, Vic! Reel it in and get back to making cringingly racist generalizations about gypsies, already!”