# Really Tedious Literary Passages **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 18, 2003, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402 "2003-09-18T16:34:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Manduck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manduck/32/256_2.png) [@Manduck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Manduck)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2003, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/61 "2003-09-20T03:12:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Zenster \* > \*\*“Pamela” (a novel about a virtuous young lady put upon by all sorts of nasties) so revolted another writer, Henry Fielding (author of “Tom Jones”), that he rattled off a farce of that same work titled, “Shamela.” \*\* I read Pamela just so I would have the background to get the jokes in Shamela. I can’t believe I did that. It’s amazing how much time we had on our hands in the days before the internet. ---
**Author:** ![Zenster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/cdc98d/32.png) [@Zenster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zenster)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2003, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/62 "2003-09-20T23:28:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Manduck \* > I read Pamela just so I would have the background to get the jokes in Shamela. I can’t believe I did that. It’s amazing how much time we had on our hands in the days before the internet. I suppose there’s something to say for having a “completist” attitude, but I’ll refrain from saying it just right now. ---
**Author:** ![Manduck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manduck/32/256_2.png) [@Manduck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Manduck)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2003, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/63 "2003-09-21T19:14:36Z")
😛 ---
**Author:** ![neutron\_star](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/51bf81/32.png) [@neutron\_star](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/neutron_star)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/64 "2003-09-22T06:41:18Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Shirley Ujest \* > \*\*War and Peace sucked so bad that I couldn’t make it past the first page. \*\* The first 2,000 pages or so had me enthralled. The last ~80 pages, though, comprise a **damn** tedious literary passage. It’s mostly Tolstoy going off on fate versus freewill and other philosophical stuff. After barely being able to put the book down for two weeks, I had to force myself to finish it. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_Wright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@Steve\_Wright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_Wright)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 10:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/65 "2003-09-22T10:40:16Z")
I can’t read Henry James. I know the man was respected by a number of writers I _can_ read and enjoy (James Thurber, for example), but Henry James, I cannot read. (And I’ve read, and enjoyed, a number of other entries in this thread. Not _Pamela_, though.) ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 11:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/66 "2003-09-22T11:14:24Z")
Everything written by Thomas Mann, especially _The Magic Mountain_. His prose style is unbelievably stilted and boring and completely makes reading his books a chore instead of pleasure. And if I may trash a translator, Constance Garnett. I love Dostoyevsky, but that frail absolutely is the most gawdawfully tedious translator of his work, ever. Avoid her if at all possible. In defense of ol’ Marcel: Yeah, as posters note, if you’re reading him for story, fuhgeddaboutit, he takes pages to describe even the simplest action, and if you’re forced to read him with frequent interruptions, it’s just about impossible to get back into the mood (and I, at least, really need to be in a Proustian reverie in order to enjoy his work). But if you can go somewhere by yourself and read free of distractions, you’ll find that his descriptions of human relations, the psychological motives of our social behavior, and the lies we spin to disguise them from ourselves are unequalled by any other author. ---
**Author:** ![picunurse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@picunurse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/picunurse)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/67 "2003-09-22T13:09:03Z")
The 37 page golf game in Ian Fleming’s _Goldfinger_ ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/68 "2003-09-22T15:33:19Z")
Faulkner. My god. Who let that man near a typewriter? The beginning of _Absalom, Absalom_ makes me want to weep in despair, and that’s the good part. _sob_ Julie ---
**Author:** ![Zenster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/cdc98d/32.png) [@Zenster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zenster)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/69 "2003-09-22T16:24:14Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by gobear \* > Everything written by Thomas Mann, especially _The Magic Mountain_. His prose style is unbelievably stilted and boring and completely makes reading his books a chore instead of pleasure … Oooh, good call there, **gobear**! I seem to recall picking up “The Magic Mountain” and reading about two or three pages before tossing it into my roaring fireplace. That was almost twenty years ago and even now I can still recall Mann being an incredibly boring nit. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/70 "2003-09-22T18:14:05Z")
I’ll agree with Henry James. There’s a hilarious des ription I read once about his asking for directions on the road that seems borne out by his unbelievably tedious writing. The man can make a sentence go on for _pages_. I thought **a Turn of the Screw** was bad (how many people can make a ghost story boring?), but the all time winner has to be **The Beast in the Jungle**. There _is_ no Beast in the Jungle. The point of the book is that Nothing Happens. But with James, it takes _so damned long_ not to happen. > [@](#): > > The most tedious literary passage of all? The entire of Frankenstein Them’s fightin’ words! I’ve read Frankenstein several times through (especially fun in Leonard Wolf’s Annotated or Essential editions), and I’ve got Robbie Coltrane reading it on audiotape. Of course, De Gustibus non Disputandum Est. I had a professor who _loved_ Henry James, although he had no other signs of brain damage. ---
**Author:** ![Sad\_Waters](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/898d66/32.png) [@Sad\_Waters](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sad_Waters)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/71 "2003-09-22T19:05:12Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Michael Ellis \* > \*\*Dostoevsky \*\* Huh? He may be my favorite writer of all time. The Brothers K? Notes from Underground are some of the best writings ever translated to english. I would say the first part of “The Sound and the Fury” – Benjy’s passage. Only after having some sort of critical understanding cpuld I really remotely appreciate it. ---
**Author:** ![Michael\_Ellis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/977dab/32.png) [@Michael\_Ellis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Michael_Ellis)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/72 "2003-09-22T19:27:39Z")
No no no. I wasn’t calling Dostoevsky boring. I was correcting someone else’s misspelling of his name. Siddhartha by Herman Hesse. Gah! Flannery O’Connor. Bah! ---
**Author:** ![Liberal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Liberal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Liberal)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402/73 "2003-09-22T19:56:57Z")
The King Tedious of All Time just _has_ to be the John Galt speech. For those who may doubt this, don’t say I didn’t warn you! [http://www.angelfire.com/va2/lmbenterprises/johngalt.html](http://www.angelfire.com/va2/lmbenterprises/johngalt.html) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-tedious-literary-passages/202402.md?page=3)