I made a post at /r/jamesjoyce after finishing the book, and I can agree with you that I would NOT recommend the Wake to other people. I only got through it because I’m obsessed with Joyce.

Still, I would not say it was a waste of time. Some parts of it was better than Ulysses. And now that I’m listening to the audiobook, it’s a lot of fun.

> he used the word Hogwarts. and also said " he googled" and this was way before we knew those words.

He also used “bussing”, which is a word I see young people use a lot these days. He also used “simp”. There are a lot of “unexpectedly modern” words in the book.

There’s also a passage that says “Twitter litter” , bet he coined a lot of things coincidentally because he was creating every possible twist on English words

Reddit is the only social media I use and even here I only look at 4 or 5 subs.

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>Stay off of social media.

That's pretty solid life advice in general.

Try reading Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage during a winter blizzard and below zero!

I only managed to read 1 chapter and the only thing I liked was the string of gibberish Joyce used as the sound effect for the giant falling.

I enjoyed it. 🤷🏻‍♂️

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Hey, me too. I was reading Volume 5 when I dreamt I was partaking in the commala dance.

"I didn't understand it..." "It was hard to read..." Shouldn't a competent author strive for clarity, rather than obfuscation?

I don't do this, but I think there are books that are better if read in a certain situations or in certain periods of one's life, or to say it better, I believe some kind of experiences can enrich the reading experience of a book.

I spent the entire lockdown here in Italy, reading travel literature and poetry. Talk about an escape 😂

I read On the Road twice. Once at 16 and once at 26. Not intentionally. I just hadn't read it in 10 years was feeling nostalgic and re-read it. The experiences were night and day.

At 16 I saw adventure and exploration and how cool this Kerouac guy was. At 26 I realized what a flaky asshole he was. I saw how he tended to be judgmental and make false promises to people in shitty situations that he never intended to keep.

There's a passage where he talks about this single mother he's been dating. How he's been trying to get them money to get them back to his home so that they can get married and he can be the father to her son. Then he talks about how he split off from them so he could go get money and send for them.

As soon as he's away from them he wires his aunt for money and leaves the area. When I was 16 I missed how that played out. At 26 I was appalled.

For some reason, every winter as a kid, I would reread The Chronicles of Narnia. I have no idea why, but they seemed like wintertime books. I guess because in the first book it is winter most of the time.

Get off of tiktok and other social media, especially ones that are primarily dealing with strangers.

I used to love the Warrior cats books, but when I tried them again recently, at least 40% of each book was spent rehashing the names and rules of the clans, almost nothing actually happens.

I read the Great Influenza at the beginning of the COVID pandemic and it was riveting.

Also there's the whole "the Chinese government is using it to spy on Americans" issue.

I've actually managed to find a bunch of fandom subs that are really nice (some of them do have toxic moments from time to time). The worst scandal in the subs I visit was an issue with people sexualizing characters who at the time were not older than 15 in-story. The mods very quickly stepped in and were just like "stop doing that". People would be like "hey some of us fans are also minors!" but it's like, but some aren't and don't want to accidentally run into innuendos about minors randomly.

It's weird how some fandom subs are way worse than the others in terms of toxicity. r/gilmoregirls is basically always "UM THIS CHARACTER IS LITERALLY SATAN AND YOU'RE HITLER IF YOU LIKE THEM" which is annoying as hell.

That is very creepy, lol

I didn't think it was ever popular at all, just that people knew of it.

It's funny if you point out that dissenting opinions get downvoted, and then you get downvoted for pointing it out.

Don't ever tell r/movies that they overwhelmingly hate anything aimed at females of any age with like 3 exceptions.

Another one bites the dust.

All my exposure to tiktok is youtube videos that are compilations of funny animal tiktoks and the handful of stuff that was made by popular viners when tiktok first opened (when it was still musica.ly).

Stay off of social media.

Problem solved.

Read when you want to and stop when you don’t enjoy it.