Submitted by Campbell_MG t3_yz5pls in dataisbeautiful
Comments
IronicStrikes t1_iwy7y5f wrote
How do you do these? Looks like a lot of work.
Nameless408 t1_iwy8vvu wrote
Note to self, Moby Dick is a horror story.
AhoraMeLoVenisADecir t1_iwy96dk wrote
Omg, this is soooo useful. How you did that? Is it page-by-page evaluation?
Different-Term-2250 t1_iwy9bha wrote
Anything with “Dick” in the title is going to be a horror story!
Campbell_MG OP t1_iwy9m6f wrote
I have no idea why my main comment isn't showing up but here's how it was done:
> These were created by running public domain books from Project GITenberg, through a python script that uses this NLP model to determine the emotions in a given sentence. Each sentence is then processed into a colour representing each emotion's prevalence and stitched together into these barcodes.
aminervia t1_iwyc3s5 wrote
You could do a search for emotional words in the text without actually having to read the book. If each line is an emotional word then you could lay them out in order. Personally I couldn't do it but I could see how you could automate this pretty quickly
aminervia t1_iwyc8v4 wrote
The red works for anger and blue works for sadness, but the purple doesn't really work for fear. Because of the red and blue it definitely makes the purple look more prevalent
300kIQ t1_iwyd8sq wrote
Indeed, black for fear would have been much better
ayyohh911719 t1_iwydebw wrote
Well Moby Dick looks like a real charmer
sanpunkanmatteyaru t1_iwye8wh wrote
They're the Inside Out colors
cactusphage t1_iwyek55 wrote
That model includes neutral. Why isn’t that on the legend. If I squint enough, will I see a fifth color in the barcodes?
cutelyaware t1_iwyeofa wrote
Same. They were pretty much just excited about killing whales, though they were rather concerned near the end.
cutelyaware t1_iwyes9w wrote
It's not like that, though the well-known rule is that it shouldn't be read by anyone under 40, and I kind of get that.
Piecesof3ight t1_iwyfgoe wrote
Those were probably removed to reduce noise
err0rz t1_iwyflqn wrote
Moby Dick is without a doubt the most boring book I’ve ever read.
Edit: getting downvoted by people who haven’t read moby dick lol
Edit2: no seriously, I absolutely don’t believe anyone who read Moby Dick found it exciting. Please enlighten me as to what you enjoyed. If you’re about to downvote, leave a comment explaining what you thought was good about it and I promise to award you. I 100% do not believe anyone who has read it is downvoting this comment.
Oscar_Cunningham t1_iwygnqu wrote
The colour yellow is associated with cowardice. So you could use that for fear, leaving green for joy.
StagnantEnema t1_iwygpfw wrote
This shows nothing besides books being sad
kiwilapple t1_iwygsly wrote
I think it's because the red blends in. He's mad at the whale right??? Idk i didn't read it lol
aminervia t1_iwygv7a wrote
Sections with lots of fear and sadness would then appear green though, we'd have the same problem
MmM921 t1_iwyh7ho wrote
google "sentiment analysis", neural networks are used to analyse texts pretty widely these days on social media and what not
op probably took every sentence of these books and ran them through sentiment analysis to get this graph
Craygor t1_iwyh8ee wrote
The book isnt really about Captian Ahap, but follows the story of Ismael and is quite light hearted in the first third (at least I thought so). Ahap doesn't really show up much until the last quarter or there abouts. .
ScuttleCrab729 t1_iwyh9ri wrote
Where’s disgust [green]
kiwilapple t1_iwyhb0n wrote
Ohhhh. I should probably read it.... But also. Lazy. Thank you!
Lachimanus t1_iwyhdkg wrote
Problem with this is that is subjective and not clearly defined.
You could push words into certain categories and then do this. But still not nice, I think.
99-bottlesofbeer t1_iwyhdot wrote
The colours come from Inside Out (2016), don't they
Oscar_Cunningham t1_iwyhhv7 wrote
It depends what colour mixing model you use. With paint it's true that yellow and blue mix to make green, but with light they instead make white (and your problem would instead be red and green mixing to make yellow). I was thinking of the Natural Color System in which red and green are opposed and yellow and blue are opposed.
I suppose the other solution would be to use lightness as well as hue. For example each mixture of the four emotions would correspond to a mixture of red, green, blue and white.
Campbell_MG OP t1_iwyhqio wrote
Yep, keen eye
Campbell_MG OP t1_iwyi01q wrote
This is exactly how it works. Each emotion is layered on top of one another with the opacity driven by the likelihood of the emotion from the ML model.
I tried a few different colours but this ended up being the most distinct I could find.
While red and blue mixed won't be helping, the model definitely seems to lean towards fear. If you look at the raw numbers fear seems to show up the most.
Craygor t1_iwyi6j5 wrote
Warning, the middle of the book is EXTREMELY dry, but I think you'll like the friendship that develops between the New Englander Ismael and a harponner named Queequeg, a Polynesian tattooed cannibal.
Campbell_MG OP t1_iwyibbh wrote
Yeah, this is exactly right. There's a comment in here with a link to the model I've used.
thepuksu t1_iwyll1f wrote
Imagine the horror of actually reading? r/bookscirclejerk
PuttingAround t1_iwylv7d wrote
Would you be willing to share your code?
unique_username_72 t1_iwymx2q wrote
Same, though Anne of green gables seems to be a slightly different slime.
printergumlight t1_iwymxmm wrote
Black for fear would solve all the color mixing issues I think. Stands out well on its own.
nicholasimontwo t1_iwyoc8u wrote
Like the idea (not being critical) however the execution requires a lot more thought. That could be anything. 'I smudged some colors in photoshop'.
Not sure of the answer however there must be a better way to do that
ArsenalAM t1_iwypofx wrote
Or lighter filter (you could represent it with white I guess) for joy, and darker (grey or black) for fear? Not really an opacity filter but maybe a gradient filter? I’m not sure what to cal it really.
TheThiefMaster t1_iwypv5q wrote
For what it's worth - it's two different blues!
The positive primary (light) is "royal blue", and the negative primary (paint, ink) is "sky" blue.
Children's paint sets regularly get this wrong...
plg94 t1_iwyqbob wrote
There's a lot of green and orange and light blue in the second film, but not in the label.
Karl_Havoc2U t1_iwyqtv2 wrote
I really dig this a lot! Thanks for sharing
epicLeoplurodon t1_iwyr1kg wrote
Please elaborate
cacoecacoe t1_iwyrl09 wrote
No, allowing scope to add envy
TwinkGapingHole t1_iwys63k wrote
They look fine and separated to my eyes though...
CleverMarisco t1_iwysid7 wrote
Then you will have sadness+fear = joy
[deleted] t1_iwyszwo wrote
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[deleted] t1_iwyt6n9 wrote
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According-Bad8745 t1_iwyt7ih wrote
nah to me yellow is joy and fear is green. just like english is red, math is blue and science is green 😆
Oscar_Cunningham t1_iwytz9p wrote
To me that mixture does look almost grey. But changing the exact choice of yellow and blue will change exactly what mixture they make. In any case it's much closer to grey than a 'primary' green would be.
nifty_fifty_two t1_iwyu866 wrote
Black for sadness. Blue for fear. Red for anger. Green for joy. White for any emotion I've forgotten.
Most digital displays work on RGB, so that'd be the best way to display the data on digital screens.
luke_in_the_sky t1_iwyu9fs wrote
Well, it's weird because sadness+anger layered on top of one another will appear as fear.
Maybe, instead of bars, you could use a grid with colored squares and a good resolution, so they don't get mixed.
Oscar_Cunningham t1_iwyubg4 wrote
Yeah, and then you get a really murky green and purple.
alt_account_6 t1_iwyuojb wrote
I liked the exhaustive discourse on cetology. It's almost religious. But not really a book for people who need constant stimulation and action scenes
MercedesCR t1_iwyuv3k wrote
How did moby dick give you that much fear lol. Looks cool tho
SquirrelAkl t1_iwyvbyx wrote
This would help you decide which books to read, based on how you want to feel.
SquirrelAkl t1_iwyveyn wrote
Why not?
SquirrelAkl t1_iwyvj2o wrote
Is that why Moby Dick looks like it’s filled with fear? I haven’t read it myself, but I didn’t think it was a fearful/scary book.
JaxTaylor2 t1_iwyw2h0 wrote
I wonder what a Calculus textbook would look like? lol
JesterMcPickles t1_iwyw4bd wrote
Ah yes, the four emotions.
JaxTaylor2 t1_iwywbqo wrote
This explains the survey over at r/polls about whether the math binder should be red or blue. lol
SnooLobsters8922 t1_iwywgpi wrote
Curious about the method: are those emotions attempts the author makes to raise them in the reader or felt by the characters?
rockingmonkey t1_iwywijt wrote
> op probably took every sentence of these books and ran them through sentiment analysis to get this graph
Op probably wrote some code to feed every sentence of these books and run them through sentiment analysis to get this graph. I doubt op spend 4 days just copy pasting lines one at a time and running them through the algorithm.
thepuksu t1_iwywq5d wrote
I know, only joking :)
tommy_chillfiger t1_iwywwwc wrote
I would be interested to see the same viz with a 'less granular unit' if that makes sense. Sorry I'm chronically weak on terminology lol - but instead of having the model classify every sentence, maybe every paragraph. It is so granular as it is now that it's hard to read intuitively, but I also suspect mood is more meaningful in literature over longer units than a single sentence on average.
I have never used ML models except for janky bespoke corpus analytics software in college linguistics classes so if there are computational reasons this approach wouldn't work then I get that.
DrTommyNotMD t1_iwywxtn wrote
Look at these dynamic characters with their 4 modes. Here I am just happy sad neutral.
winged_owl t1_iwyx1mc wrote
Does anybody know the big sad block in huckleberry finn?
MmM921 t1_iwyx5a7 wrote
well duh, someone who knows how to use neural networks definitely knows how to use "sep = '.'"
mez1642 t1_iwyz8rh wrote
And opaqueness could indicate intensity. Each grid could be a page, but always scaled to a fixed maximum with so the barcodes are always 2 inches wide by 1 inch tall at 300 dpi (or insert your dimensions here)
ElegantUse69420 t1_iwyz9og wrote
Should have included "Use of N-word "
ferriswheelpompadour t1_iwyzrml wrote
This is a cool concept. I'd like to see a more thorough range of emotions. And maybe have subcategories for anger as it's a secondary emotion.
letsreticulate t1_iwz0dcb wrote
The Stone Angel would be almost all blue and red.
Excelsior0032 t1_iwz0jwv wrote
they used Inside Out colors
legbreaker t1_iwz0lhe wrote
How about using black for fear and white for neutral pages. Breaks the colors up
Robodachi t1_iwz0lmn wrote
Hm I read it at 25 and liked it. Sometimes it feels like reading a wikipedia page on whales.
RonstoppableRon t1_iwz0zkg wrote
This is bizarre. You represent 4 emotions, but 75% of them are negative, and those 3 are really all interrelated emotions that are much the same thing, just different phases(fear anger sadness) For all this is worth you could have just done 2 emotions positive vs negative and it’d be a better representation of your “data”.
Ok_Stomach_5448 t1_iwz1qqw wrote
As a color deficient person, this looks so confusing
polandtown t1_iwz1qtx wrote
Nice! Was this via HF or did you train your own model?
DukeofVermont t1_iwz1ro8 wrote
That's the dumbest rule I've ever heard. I would say that most people won't like it because they are not used to books written like Moby Dick.
It's the same reason that a lot of people HATE reading LOTR. It's slow, boring, has too many details, reads like a textbook, etc etc etc.
There is nothing wrong with the book, it's just different from what people are used to and makes them work. That second part is important because I think it's what separates good art from great art. Art that engages you, brings you in and makes you think will always be better than art that is easy to digest. Now it's vital to understand that easy art is still art and just as valuable. Filet Minion for breakfast everyday would make me puke and I'd gouge my eyes out if I had to watch 2001: A Space Odyssey every week. But when you are in the right mood and want it? It's amazing and far better then a bowl of cereal or re-watching Captain America: Winter Solider (both of which I really enjoy).
A lot of people only consume easy art and so when art (film, poetry, theater, literature, dance and even paintings and sculpture) doesn't just tell them what to think or feel they get bored and drop it. If you try to watch/read a deep film/book like you would a Tom Clancy book or a Marvel film you'll hate it. You'll miss the forest for the trees. You'll never actually understand what really going on because you only see the character actions and nothing else. "It's so boring!" is the complaint I hear the most when trying to get people to read or watch amazing things that are not paced like a Marvel film.
I personally love classic lit and classic films. So much amazing work is overlooked by many people because it is old, slower paced or made with a different purpose. A book like Moby Dick has depth and when read thoughtfully you can get a lot more out of it than just a book about a man explaining whaling and his crazy captain hunting a white whale.
I think the "don't read it if you are under 40" is idiotic but younger people have so much easy art that they haven't seen yet. A lot of people just indulge in the easy art, but by the time they are 40+ they get sick of it. Like eating candy everyday as a kid is awesome but when you are older it is gross, and there is so much better stuff out there anyway. So you turn 40 and want something new and deeper and read Moby Dick and actually engage with it whereas someone younger might just get bored and drop it.
Personally I think Moby Dick is average for the great books from the 1800s. It's much better IMHO than Les Mis, or War and Peace, but no where close to Crime and Punishment, Middlemarch, or Tom Sawyer. I'd put it in the same level as Madame Bovary, Anna Karenina and The Count of Monte Cristo. (also this is very much my personal taste and not me trying to say which is objectively better or worse).
TLDR: I've read a lot of "classic lit" so I know what to expect when I start reading but a lot of people go in blind after being told "it's amazing!" and are not ready for how different books can be.
Personally I love deeper books which really are about so much more than what happens on the page. When you can get into them it's really like nothing else. Some of my favorites are: On the Beach-Nevil Shute 1957 (post-apocalyptic survivors of nuclear war in Australia), Solaris-Stanisław Lem 1961 (Scientists try to communicate with an alien that's the size/shape of our oceans, but on a different plant so it remakes their dead loves ones). Crime and Punishment-Fyodor Dostoevsky 1866 (a man struggles to live with the effects of being a murderer), The Forever War-Joe Haldeman 1977 (a sci-fi war book that's really about the effects of coming home from Vietnam). Slaughterhouse Five-Kurt Vonnegut (a man experiences life out of order because of aliens aka finding meaning after seeing the horrors of WWII) and a light one The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy-Douglas Adams 1970s-80s - It's just silly, hilarious, funny and amazing. I love that book so much.
supersayanssj3 t1_iwz20tj wrote
Should have used black for fear. This is just a blurry purple mess tbh.
supersayanssj3 t1_iwz24ap wrote
Kinda confused why noone has suggested something obvious like black for fear. Would contrast to all the others and give clear separation between colors.
purplezart t1_iwz2hr0 wrote
now do the very hungry caterpillar
Strong-Patience-2759 t1_iwz2lw4 wrote
Really beautiful. Thanks for the introduction to sentiment analysis.
oudenetekei t1_iwz3a5z wrote
I'm trying to pick out the scene in Anne of Green Gables where she breaks the slate over Gilbert's head
detecting_nuttiness t1_iwz3jgq wrote
You should redo this with different colors! I'd love to interpret it but it's just not possible with these color choices.
viridiformica t1_iwz408d wrote
Doesn't that mean that whichever layer is added last will dominate?
I'd quite like to see this as a stream graph, maybe using a rolling average. Is the data available somewhere?
leftiesrepresent t1_iwz474w wrote
I dont get the Moby Dick one, which color is supposed to denote Melville showboating his command of English?
somethingrandom261 t1_iwz490g wrote
If there was a gray for boredom, and black for stopped reading, I could do the same for those books lol
sofwithanf t1_iwz4ecq wrote
The Anne of Green Gables one is really captivating. There's so much joy mixed in with all the other emotions. I love it
I wish I knew what green meant though
leftiesrepresent t1_iwz4g5v wrote
The book is purely Melville showing off how smart he is. He wrote the novel with the expressed intention of proving his higher command of English than his contemporaries. The "story" and "plot" are alllll tertiary to that goal lmao
breddit1945 t1_iwz4h8y wrote
Also, if this is done by each implication of emotion, that is far too much data in my opinion. Do it by chapter and if that’s too few data points, do every 0.5 or 0.25 chapter. That, or pick something other than emotional points. A fun example might be: deaths in A Song of Ice and Fire, or switching of character perspectives/setting/scene in a different book or series, or frequency of a particular word/phrase.
Part of the charm of the movie poster one is that you could possibly distinguish the film without a title. Take away the titles here and I’d have no clue what I’m looking at.
nothingidentifying_ t1_iwz52th wrote
yellow for joy and purple for fear feel pretty random, but otherwise, this is just fantastic!
JonathanL73 t1_iwz5569 wrote
Great idea, but I can’t tell the difference between fear, anger & sadness when it’s all next together, it just looks purple.
Probably better to use a different color, like Red, Green, Blue,
Joy = Green.
Fear = Gray? Black? White?
Anger = Red
Sadness = Blue
Stitchmond t1_iwz59oy wrote
Book: Call me Ishmael.
Me: gasps in fear
2020Hills t1_iwz887j wrote
I thought Moby Dick was a comedy?
I’ve never read it, that’s just what I’ve heard about it
lordicarus t1_iwz8c78 wrote
It also needs a category for general apathy. The four emotions here don't allow for complete neutrality which would 100% be possible with many sentences.
Like... The sentences above. Sad? Happy? Angry? Scared?
biaimakaa t1_iwz8gwh wrote
As a slightly colorblind person who have a hard time differentiate blue and purple and sees red as just not popping like it would to anybody, this is horrendous.
tommy_chillfiger t1_iwz93ka wrote
I'm gonna go with "politely critical" 🥴
Nosttromo t1_iwzdxc1 wrote
perhaps its that mix of badly colored anger and sadness kicking in.
[deleted] t1_iwzjwnf wrote
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Craygor t1_iwzxjcc wrote
I'm not going to argue. One, is because I'm not that smart, and two, that actually makes kind of sense
SquirrelAkl t1_ix0co6r wrote
I like your distinction of “easy art” vs “harder art”.
I am well over 40 but I pretty much only consume “easy art”. My job is mentally and emotionally demanding, I read (economics & business stuff) all day, and at the end of the day I like to be able to switch my brain into neutral and just consume entertainment.
Perhaps I’m missing out though? Perhaps what you describe is what the people who say “I love reading!” actually love about reading?
Hmmm, food for thought. Thank you.
NomadTerran t1_ix0lgpg wrote
It's all sad rage everywhere
The_real_Hresna t1_ix0nvxx wrote
I was as interested in the how, maybe more, than the product. Thanks for including this
ethosveros t1_ix0qg50 wrote
With a filter this would be too good
SirSaladHead t1_ix0tpyf wrote
People are complaining about the colors, but it’s just Inside Out lol
randomuserasking2 t1_ix0vahv wrote
maybe use other different colors instead.
Chrisboy265 t1_ix0xd5e wrote
This might be beautiful if I wasn’t color deficient. I can’t tell the blue from the purple.
Sure_Surprise_1661 t1_ix0xlc3 wrote
Was this using sentiment analysis? Would you please share your methodology?
We have no idea how you are interpreting this data.
cutelyaware t1_ix0xqq5 wrote
Yeah, I thought it dragged unnecessarily with those long sections on all the details of whaling. I'm also vegetarian and really dislike that sort of thing so I simply skipped over those sections, and didn't feel like I missed anything important to the story. Same goes for all the songs in The Lord of the Rings books.
ThrowAwayRayye t1_ix0xx20 wrote
If you did stormlight archives prepare for Big deep blue bars for any kaladin chapter.
kramerica_intern t1_ix0y3ch wrote
Very little of the book is them trying to kill Moby Dick. Most of it is a textbook about whales.
gsvnvariable t1_ix0yps6 wrote
Nice, can you do the same for my investment portfolio with those same emotions 🥹🥹🥹
cutelyaware t1_ix0ziov wrote
Speaking of tomes, that's quite the comment! I think it's fair to boil it down to easy vs hard books. That's sort of what I understood the rule to mean. IE it will turn people off to the book if they're not mature enough to make the effort needed. Personally I simply skipped all the expository sections on whaling as I found them both dry and disturbing, and not contributing much if anything to the story.
I also agree with your comparison to LOTR where I learned to simply skip over the songs. I thought they were terrible and didn't add to the story.
I think we're on the same page, which ironically supports the idea of not pushing heavy works onto young people who may reject them and then never discover those gems later.
cutelyaware t1_ix0zoek wrote
WritPositWrit t1_ix11jaf wrote
All I see is purple. These books are 100% fear.
Robodachi t1_ix13ojs wrote
Hey not eating meat is understandable but you don't like songs too? God damn son.
cutelyaware t1_ix15faj wrote
Have you read those songs?
[deleted] t1_ix19c1j wrote
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541mya t1_ix1fbtt wrote
Yeah I was looking at the bars and thinking.... I don't remember Peter Pan being such a fearful movie.
Juice-De-Pomme t1_ix1ginn wrote
This is very interesting thanks for the sources
Conarm t1_ix1hiac wrote
Scary whale
Conarm t1_ix1hogm wrote
Purple should be erronious rope details and outdated whale zoology
Colalbsmi t1_ix1inz7 wrote
It was outdated when he wrote it, I loved when he said scientists are wrong about whales being mammals.
[deleted] t1_ix1k2h4 wrote
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RamenTheory t1_ix1lc08 wrote
Would have been interesting if the data were some kind of spectrum. Like if the neural network didn't just put a blanket label on every scary section of the book as 'fear,' but were instead able to rate out of 10 how intense the sentiment is. Then in the barcode, the color of corresponding 'fear' sections could be on a scale of gray to purple, and same for the other sentiments. A less emotional book like Moby Dick may be more desaturated or something
smaugthedesolator t1_ix1n6jt wrote
I wonder what the Fox and the Hound would look like... definitely a big block of blue at the end
tier7stips t1_ix1prs9 wrote
I am reading Moby Dick right now. About a third through. Got some sadness to look forward too.
nowhereisaguy t1_ix1ssov wrote
Isn’t this purely subjective?
Redhorse1371 t1_ix1xbp4 wrote
“Without fear there cannot be courage.”
fallllingman t1_ix2016v wrote
Abah is a pretty prominent character from about page 200 onwards, and I’d argue the book isn’t about the story of Ishmael. It’s about Ishmael’s role as a witness or observer, not a participant.
fallllingman t1_ix2058y wrote
I’d argue a great story isn’t as good as a meaningful story.
fallllingman t1_ix20a59 wrote
Very little of it is a textbook about whales. Only about 4 chapters are like that, out of the 100+ total chapters. I mean, there’s also a lot about whaling, but the actual textbook parts are still pretty brief. It’s like 1/4th of the book, it’s not that much.
fallllingman t1_ix20c3v wrote
It’s occasionally very funny and satirical but it’s not a comedy as a whole. Melville is pretty earnest.
fallllingman t1_ix20g2i wrote
And it doesn’t make the book any the lesser. In fact it does the opposite, because the book is, in part, about the unknowability of things.
kramerica_intern t1_ix22fam wrote
Yeah, I should have said whales and whaling. I don’t know the percentage of pages that are actually devoted to chasing Moby Dick but whatever it is it feels like a very small amount.
fallllingman t1_ix24lps wrote
I have read Moby Dick and I believe it is one of the most perfect novels to ever exist. I’m not writing a well organized essay defending its merits and I’m sure there are plenty of those around. Since you’re coming to it in a bad capacity of bad faith, you’ll probably reject a lot of what I say as trying to inject meaning into a work where there isn’t any. To that I raise you Nathaniel Hawthorne, famous for his incessant use of symbolism. He was Melville’s best friend.
If you’re looking for a plot or a rousing adventure story, it will definitely bore you. It’s deliberately slow-paced, deliberately plotless. I don’t expect many people will have the same appreciation for it that I do, but I found myself intrigued by the symbolism in it, the sort of mythicism it has and it’s religious references. I loved it’s almost surreal atmosphere (a good example is the squid chapter), and how it grows increasingly dark and mysterious until it crescendoes in its climax. Plus the prose is astonishingly evocative.
Since you’re positing it as a “boring book” I’ll address the main issue that most readers have with it, because it’s really not an accessible work. First and foremost, Moby Dick is about the unknowability of God in a world with seemingly no meaning. The book is therefore deliberately obsessive. Ishmael writes extensively about whales and about whaling, with an almost religious fervor. He writes about whales extensively and yet still their unknowable whiteness lingers on. The whale himself even seems to possess godly powers, with how it teases them before disappearing ahead of their ship. All of the crew try to interpret the coin, but none of them can truly know it’s nature. The quest itself is meaningless. There is no justice for Ahab, no Old Testament victory.
And most of the nonfiction chapters deal explicitly with the meaning of life, like in The Line where Ishmael likens whaling lines to mortality.
The book is also simply very funny to me. All of the weird gay undertones with Queequeg and Ishmael, the whale penis, and the chapter about squeezing sperm are so peculiar and distinctive I couldn’t help but love it. Name another gay whaling novel. The book feels more modern than even a lot of 20th Century works.
Melville was also ahead of his time in many ways. His description of Queequeg is wonderfully subversive among other texts at the time that portrayed the “noble savage.” Queequeg is one of my favorite characters in any book because of how sensitively Melville treats him. He treats him not as a native, but as a human. He is by far the most likeable character in the book, and he was introduced as a “cannibal.” And of course the famous line about his birthplace: “It is not down on any map. True places never are.” As a huge fan of experimental fiction, I was astounded by all of the techniques that he invented. I mean, he was using metafiction two centuries before it became popular.
Also, it’s hard to think of a better “sea” novel. One as evocative as Moby Dick. Many marine biologists list it as the reason they chose to enter the field. Think of the chapter in the whale breeding ground. How it’s instantly torn up by bloodshed, and the mother whale staring at its dying child. I felt like I was at sea for two weeks reading it. No other book has given me that feeling.
fallllingman t1_ix2515k wrote
I mean do you expect 500 of 600 pages to be devoted to chasing a whale in hot pursuit? If we choose to call the whale God (and goodness knows Moby Dick is all about it’s symbolism), isn’t it proper that he makes an appearance only in the last thirty pages after we spend the novel doubting his existence? That’s not my personal interpretation of it, but the novel would be much worse if any more of it was devoted to chasing a whale. This is Herman Melville, not Robert Louis Stevenson.
kramerica_intern t1_ix25vjc wrote
I didn’t think they’d be in hot pursuit the whole time but yeah, kinda. I picked up the book expecting to read about Ahab insanely chasing after Moby Dick. I didn’t expect entire chapters about objects found on a whaling vessel.
Though I suppose that’s what whaling might have been like. Lots of boredom before you finally get the intense rush of the chase.
Otherwise-Tutor-7822 t1_ix2c6kz wrote
This could be used to train AI on emotion
thedadinblack t1_ix2dd4q wrote
Moby needs a hug. Is that the whale or the dude trying to kill it? I never read the book.
Colalbsmi t1_ix2drgp wrote
I only enjoyed it more for the author’s weird tangents
fallllingman t1_ix2e4on wrote
Yes. Beyond its reputation as a literary masterpiece it’s just such a peculiar and odd and funny book
fallllingman t1_ix2emns wrote
The book isn’t dry. The prose is brilliantly evocative and is consistently great throughout.
DukeofVermont t1_ix2fo58 wrote
I think not pushing is key and properly introducing things. It's the same for literally everything, you start small and learn, but for some reason a lot of people just are thrown in the deep end of literature and hate it because they got pushed.
I think my love of classic lit is because I had an amazing 75 year old high school teacher who taught British Lit. He was super chill, it was all he taught, he was a great teacher and you knew he loved it. He did a great job explaining and introducing things so Shakespeare wasn't just reading it to read it.
It's a world of difference being introduced to something by someone who can explain, is excited and can answer questions vs my junior year English teacher who just assigned books and spent 50% of class talking about his old high school sports achievements (no joke, I hated him) and no one cared at all about anything we read.
I also taught ESL in NYC and I had my class read a simplified version of Frankenstein and they loved it. I was really surprised how well they took to it. They though the simplified Dr. J and Mr. Hyde was just okay in comparison.
Commercial_Habit_923 t1_ix2hhoa wrote
Personally I am not able to draw any conclusions from this due to the way the data is presented
DukeofVermont t1_ix2hrww wrote
Hey nothing wrong at all with having personal relaxation time. Like I said I love slow complex movies but I can't watch them all the time, just too taxing and not what I want to do after a long day.
I also think it really depends on what you are looking for. I love reading because I can really connect with characters, and find it interesting to explore how they think/feel/etc and I like loooong books because you can spend so much time with the characters.
I wouldn't say you're missing out because it might not be your thing and that's a-okay. It's like food, some people love to try new things, challenge their tastes/ideas of what food can be, explore textures, flavors, etc. But it's perfectly fine if you are not a food person and like sticking to what you like.
That said it's hard to know if you are "a gourmet" or "a cinephile" or love classic literature until you try it with an open mind. No one is ever too old to try new things and if it isn't for you there is nothing wrong with that. I love complex Lit/Film but oh boy do I have no interest in modern art. I've tried to get into it, and I can learn and understand what they are going for but I just don't like it and have zero interest in it. It's just not my thing.
I'd suggest figuring out what types of shows/films you like and find an old classic book that's on the same topic. Also not all old books are "hard art" for the snobs like me. Just like how not all new books are "easy art".
Agatha Christie's crime mysteries and Sherlock Holmes were/are the popular media of their day. Agatha Christie is the most successful author of all time with over two BILLION sales (she's only behind the Bible). Her play "The Mousetrap" opened in 1951 and has played continually ever since (but stopped for a year due to corona). They are somewhere close to the 28,000 performance now. I think they both are great because they are engaging and can really pull you in as you try to figure out what happened.
Lastly I should say that it's also super dumb shove everything into the two boxes of "easy" and "hard" art because we all know it's much more on a spectrum. But it is important to try new things, challenge ourselves and explore what it is to be human.
So try new things, but don't feel bad if it isn't for you. The world would be a boring place if we all had the same interests and tastes.
idkijustlurk t1_ix2j2z0 wrote
It’s the colors of the characters from Inside Out
TheGuyYouHeardAbout t1_ix2jutl wrote
Makes me want to read Moby dick
swaggyquack t1_ix2kulv wrote
I think I would use black
SquirrelAkl t1_ix2ouva wrote
Agatha Christie is a very good recommendation for me. My favourite genre of TV is “British cop drama”, so Christie will be a good place to start. I have 3 weeks off coming up over summer, so I’ll add “figure out how to use Libby and get some books out” to my list :)
Lightning_Lance t1_ix2u5qz wrote
Modern paints use magenta for "red" and Cyan for "blue". So it's literally just inverted RGB, using the secondary colors instead of the primary (of course, language is malleable and so they just call those the primary colors in paint... But it's the secondary colors of RGB).
err0rz t1_ix2zf1s wrote
I like that you just wrote an essay acknowledging that it’s boring.
iMakeWebsites4u t1_ix39dve wrote
Can it be scanned? If not, then it's not a barcode.
fallllingman t1_ix477rh wrote
It’s not boring to me. I acknowledge it’s boring as an adventure novel because it isn’t an adventure novel. That’s like saying Taxi Driver is boring because it’s not a good thriller. The book fascinates me because of its symbolism, postmodern techniques, evocative prose and it’s humor. It’s slow paced but it’s more intriguing to me than virtually any other American novel, exceptions being Invisible Man and The Recognitions. If you don’t like the things I’ve mentioned, then it’ll bore you. It’s not an intrinsically boring book however. I mean, I first read it in its entirety when I was fifteen. I loved it then and I love it now.
err0rz t1_ix4hi49 wrote
My initial point was that it’s boring.
You can’t refute this point by rephrasing my initial statement.
It’s boring, end of.
I didn’t say it’s unenjoyable or without merit.
Character_Mushroom83 t1_ix4hy4j wrote
I’ve been meaning to read The Recognitions lately. I’m currently reading The Instructions by Adam Levin & Solenoid by Mircea Cartarescu (solenoid JUST got translated into english, brilliant romanian surreal novel, check it out if you haven’t).
The most detailed writing i’ve read about the experience of reading The Recognitions is from Franzen’s essay Mr. Difficult where he talks about feeling cool because he read it (which was unhelpful, and a little annoying hahahhaha). I love what you wrote about Moby Dick and would love to read a short rundown of what you enjoyed about The Recognitions. I would really appreciate if you would be kind enough to do so: i want to get hyped-up to read it but need a little motivation to push it to the top of my list.
fallllingman t1_ix4i2rf wrote
End of? Boringness is subjective.
err0rz t1_ix4k2aj wrote
What part of this long detailed response would you say claims it wasn’t boring?
Ahh the “unknowability of G-d” what a riveting subject.
JanitorKarl t1_ix4mcfi wrote
> It’s deliberately slow-paced, deliberately plotless. I don’t expect many people will have the same appreciation for it that I do, but I found myself intrigued by the symbolism in it,
That would be boring to me.
fallllingman t1_ix4mrxg wrote
The Recognitions is a long, bloated mess of a book. Its underlying plot (and it does have one, and it's a good one) works in fits and starts. You follow about ten different characters concurrently, with the focus of the story being on a struggling artist who has abandoned his aspirations and become an expert forging. The characters are all very good and memorable, but they revolve around and orbit themes rather than a central story.
It's a book about fraud and forgery, about pretentious pseudo-intellectuals claiming to see the meaning of life in a used t-shirt, about drug addicts and alcoholics who think God is their Man, about crazed Christians turned cultists and about nihilistic capitalist pigs. It's about finding truth and meaning in a world of falsehoods and deception, not the truths espoused by ministers or Dale Carnegie or shitty artists, but real truth, real meaning, that Recognition.
The book was completely dismissed when it was published. 53 of the 55 reviews published about it were negative. It was doomed to obscurity because all anyone could say about it was that it was a piece of shit. What's funny is the book itself takes aim at critics and paints them as idiots who like only what's in trend. In The Recognitions, real art is neglected and ignored by critics who don't even bother to read what they review (likewise, most of the critics who reviewed this book wrote wildly inaccurate summaries of it, implying that they had not actually read it themselves).
Reading it now, it's hard to see why it was so dismissed. It's a perfect critique of pseudo-intellectualism and the capitalist art world. It's a hilarious roast of the modern era. Its language is beautiful and completely unusual, containing countless references to literature and history. He can describe an apartment room party as a hellish underworld, can find the bizarre in the ordinary, can make the deal between a capitalist and an artist as life-and-death important as a deal with the devil. And it's really, really funny, it's absurdly humorous. There's a grave robbery scene where they steal a corpse so they can make a forgery of it (long story) and they sit it up next to them on a train, Weekend at Bernie's style, and move it a little and talk to it try to make people think this decomposing corpse is their grandmother.
Anyway, before this gets too long (it already is), I'll leave you with two quotes. One of which is from Gaddis himself and disputes that arrogant prick Franzen's assertion (seriously, fuck Franzen), in explaining the necessary difficulty (which is really overhyped imo, I've read far more difficult works) of The Recognitions. The other is the first two sentences of the novel, which I think constitutes one of the most peculiar and intriguing openings to any book ever.
​
>"I do ask something of the reader and many reviewers say I ask too much ... and as I say, it's not reader-friendly. Though I think it is, and I think the reader gets satisfaction out of participating in, collaborating, if you will, with the writer, so that it ends up being between the reader and the page. ... Why did we invent the printing press? Why do we, why are we literate? Because the pleasure of being all alone, with a book, is one of the greatest pleasures."
​
>"Even Camilla had enjoyed masquerades, of the safe sort where the mask may be dropped at the critical moment it presumes itself as reality. But the procession up the foreign hill, bounded by cypress trees, impelled by the monotone chanting of the priest and retarded by hesitations at the fourteen stations of the Cross (not to speak of the funeral carriage in which she was riding, a white horse-drawn vehicle which resembled a baroque confectionery stand), might have ruffled the shy countenance of her soul, if it had been discernible."
By the way, thanks for the recommendation. I've been reading a lot of surrealism lately (I'm reading Maldoror now) and I'll check Solenoid out.
fallllingman t1_ix4n7qk wrote
The humor. The sperm jokes. We find different things interesting but I think most people would find the sperm chapter of Moby Dick and constant innuendoes quite amusing. Also, you asked what aspects did I enjoy, not what aspects would you enjoy. I answered honestly and sincerely. I hope I've convinced you that I myself don't find this work boring, although others, looking for plot or whale battles or conditioned by the constant need for stimulus in the modern world may. I personally find it exciting, you don't. That's the only end of we have here.
fallllingman t1_ix4nmmz wrote
Fair enough. I'd be more excited to watch a Tarkovsky film than a mindless action spectacle, but that's just my personal preference.
fallllingman t1_ix4rhyw wrote
Also I looked through your account because I like your taste, it is absolutely imperative that you read The Tunnel. Personally I found it extremely difficult but reading it was like a revelation to me. I doubt there’s a better novel about human hatred, or a novel more philosophically disturbing. It’s one of my favorite books next to The Recognitions, Moby Dick, Ulysses, Under the Volcano, In Search of Lost Time, Darconville’s Cat, Dostoevsky’s Demons and the Divine Comedy.
Character_Mushroom83 t1_ix50mw8 wrote
This is precisely the write-up i have been wanting about The Recognitions, thank you. This has me extremely excited to start it. I listened to Gass introduce Gaddis at some event and (if i remember correctly) he talked of the fun of Gaddis’ writing. To have it all laid out here like this (especially the weekend at bernie’s style scene) is encouraging. I just checked out Maladror from your mention of it: it looks awesome, added to my list.
I want to recommend you another author: Evan Dara. I’m not sure if you’ve heard of them but they are an anonymous author whose work gets compared to Gaddis. William T Vollmann judged and awarded their first novel The Lost Scrapbook. That book is fucking amazing. It’s almost all monologue, and anecdote. It’s like tuning through a radio. Pretty brilliant stuff.
Character_Mushroom83 t1_ix50umx wrote
Sounds amazing! I have been meaning to get to William Gass. I will absolutely be reading it i have a copy on my shelf. For some reason that book seems so opaque to me: i can’t for the life of me imagine what’s inside. But that’s not so important. When i read it i’ll see.
fallllingman t1_ix51lln wrote
I've heard of Evan Dara but I haven't had a chance to read him. There's such a huge world of great neglected authors that never get their place in any bookstore.
Character_Mushroom83 t1_ix53fd9 wrote
So fucking true. Speaking of bookstore i recently found both Laura Warholic & An Adultery by Alexander Theroux in my local used bookstore. Both in great condition for super cheap. And i’m ALWAYS on the search for Joseph McElroy in a bookstore. No luck so far but one day.
Campbell_MG OP t1_iwy7ans wrote
These were created by running public domain books from Project GITenberg, through a python script that uses this NLP model to determine the emotions in a given sentence. Each sentence is then processed into a colour representing each emotion's prevalence and stitched together into these barcodes.