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Posted (edited)
16 minutes ago, SydneyCarton said:

Did someone here say "Fuck those people who listen to audiobooks, they're sub-human and illiterate?" If so, I missed it. 

I don't believe I implied that, but there's for sure a tint of smugness around the argument.

 

16 minutes ago, SydneyCarton said:

I loved that book. Never heard of it being a movie, and I pay attention to movies. Weird. 

Barely was released in the States. The ending, as I'm sure you remember it from the book, is not one that American movie audiences usually tend to flock to. 

Ben Whishaw is Grenouille. Dustin Hoffman is Baldini (probably the weakest performance of the movie but it's not bad or anything). Alan Rickman and Rachel Hurd-Wood round out the principal cast as the father/daughter duo. Tom Tykwer directed it and it's hypnotic to watch.

Edited by safe sex
Posted
On 11/11/2025 at 11:43 AM, Js1 said:

Listening to a book isn't reading and I will die on that hill

 

15 hours ago, safe sex said:

Fuckin' fight me

Poetry should be heard 

Plays should be watched

Prose

     Fiction should be read

     Nonfiction I’m agnostic 

 

I love to read, but not everyone does. The above was my junior year high school English teacher’s approach and she got so many kids interested in literature that were completely turned off by the written word. 

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Posted
12 minutes ago, Sawbonz said:

Where did you get that copy of my classical civ midterm from fall ‘88?

I didn't take Classic Civ till fall of 90.  The semester I started dating my now-wife, who was BIG into Classic Civ.  I was, ummm, not a particularly focused student.  Had a test coming up on the Iliad, which I 100% had not even cracked open.  Thought I'd hit up this cute girl to give me the story.  Dumbass I was.  She decided she wanted me to learn.  So, she starts with "okay....so you've read the Odyssey, right?  And you know that's about the trip back from the Trojan war.  The Iliad happens before the Odyssey, so....what do you think it's about?"  Displaying my best Brian Reagan face...

confused-look.gif

I answered "uhhh......Ilia?"

35 years later, she has NEVER let me forget that.

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Posted
Just now, Sawbonz said:

 

Poetry should be heard 

Plays should be watched

Prose

     Fiction should be read

     Nonfiction I’m agnostic 

 

I love to read, but not everyone does. The above was my junior year high school English teacher’s approach and she got so many kids interested in literature that were completely turned off by the written word. 

FUCKING YES.  I've given that rant on plays (esp. Shakespeare, who I love) since I was 14.  We read Taming of the Shrew.  It was fine.  Then I saw a live performance, and I GOT IT.  In fact, I LOVED IT (it remains my favorite SP comedy).  Making people read something that is meant to be either watched or performed is stupid.

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Posted
4 minutes ago, safe sex said:

I don't believe I implied that, but there's for sure a tint of smugness around the argument.

 

Barely was released in the States. The ending, as I'm sure you remember it from the book, is not one that American movie audiences usually tend to flock to. 

Ben Whishaw is Grenouille. Dustin Hoffman is Baldini (probably the weakest performance of the movie but it's not bad or anything). Alan Rickman and Rachel Hurd-Wood round out the principal cast as the father/daughter duo. Tom Tykwer directed it and it's hypnotic to watch.

That's you projecting. And then trying to justify, when no one asked for justification, that an audiobook can hit different emotionally. Of course it can, it has professional voice actors. The point is you went out of your way to defend audiobooks when someone just said "It's not reading." 

Man, thanks, I've got to go watch this. 

Posted
39 minutes ago, miguelito said:

I always appreciate a good book list.

 

Are there movies out of any of those books?

😁

The BBC series of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell is also quite good, but not up to the novel's standards imo

1 minute ago, SydneyCarton said:

That's you projecting. And then trying to justify, when no one asked for justification, that an audiobook can hit different emotionally. Of course it can, it has professional voice actors. The point is you went out of your way to defend audiobooks when someone just said "It's not reading." 

Man, thanks, I've got to go watch this. 

Fair enough.

$4 on Amazon

Posted
1 minute ago, safe sex said:

The BBC series of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell is also quite good, but not up to the novel's standards imo

Fair enough.

$4 on Amazon

My wife and I watched that series when it came out.  Found it kind of meh, but it was definitely pretty to watch. 

Can't argue w/ $4. 

Posted (edited)

I guess my question (and probably the source of my apparent insecurity about the concept) is this then: what actually makes it different? What am I losing or missing out on by listening to a novel instead of reading it? I've done both. I've been incredibly touched by both. What is the point of it being a "hill to die on" to quote our conversation stater, if not to striate media consumption? (Yes I know he's not being entirely serious there)

Edited by safe sex
Posted

To further derail I have LIBBY and don’t borrow audiobooks often but there are some fantastic BBC radio plays that I like to listen to. Many Sherlock Homes and Agatha Christie mysteries and a fantastic lord of the rings series. They are actual productions not just reading the unabridged works. It’s really sad to me that whole medium is likely gone forever 

I will download the occasional novel if I’m going to be on a long road trip but I read so much faster I usually find my mind wandering. And I’m not interested in Alvin and the chipmunks speed 

Posted
1 minute ago, safe sex said:

I guess my question (and probably the source of my apparent insecurity about the concept) is this then: what actually makes it different? What am I losing or missing out on by listening to a novel instead of reading it? I've done both. I've been incredibly touched by both. What is the point of it being a "hill to die on" to quote our conversation stater, if not to striate media consumption? (Yes I know he's not being entirely serious there)

For me it’s the close reading of text for themes, imagery, etc. I tend to do that naturally which is probably why I wound up an English major. I find I can savor beautifully written prose on a whole other level than I can with an audiobook 

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Posted
6 minutes ago, Sawbonz said:

I will download the occasional novel if I’m going to be on a long road trip but I read so much faster I usually find my mind wandering. And I’m not interested in Alvin and the chipmunks speed 

Just now, Sawbonz said:

For me it’s the close reading of text for themes, imagery, etc. I tend to do that naturally which is probably why I wound up an English major. I find I can savor beautifully written prose on a whole other level than I can with an audiobook 

Dude, are you me?  I'm a fast reader, and I can paint imagery and nuance in my head, as I read, better than most any audiobook I've ever listened to.  When I read something that's just incredible prose, I may read it multiple times.  Not because I don't understand it, but because I want to feel it wash over me in different ways.

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Posted

I find I retain info I have read better than when I listen.

Shit, I can listen to a podcast and forget everything I heard in 5 minutes.  But there's books that stick with me for decades.  I also feel like my brain works harder during reading - audiobooks feel like passively listening, while reading, I am 100% focused on the text in front of me and nothing else. 

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Posted
10 minutes ago, Sawbonz said:

I will download the occasional novel if I’m going to be on a long road trip but I read so much faster I usually find my mind wandering. And I’m not interested in Alvin and the chipmunks speed 

Yeah, I tried this on my drive to Colorado last year - even picked a book I love.  

My mind was wandering after 5 minutes. 

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Posted
2 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Dude, are you me?  I'm a fast reader, and I can paint imagery and nuance in my head, as I read, better than most any audiobook I've ever listened to.  When I read something that's just incredible prose, I may read it multiple times.  Not because I don't understand it, but because I want to feel it wash over me in different ways.

Could be. Just to test

the Shining is the only Stephen King movie better than the book true or false?
 

 

Posted
1 minute ago, Sawbonz said:

Could be. Just to test

the Shining is the only Stephen King movie better than the book true or false?
 

The Shining movie IS better than the book.  But the ONLY one?

Stand By Me would like a word.

Posted (edited)
11 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

The Shining movie IS better than the book.  But the ONLY one?

Stand By Me would like a word.

Nah. Book is better by a nose IMO. As is Shawshank

 

but what is REALLY mind blowing is the cumulative greatness of Different Seasons. Two standalone classics in Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption and The Body (stand my me), a super creepy Nazi survivor tale in Apt Pupil, and more standard King fare with The Breathing Method. 
 

Sadly King was still considered horror pop lit when I was in undergrad. I tried to get a couple of professors to add him to their syllabi but they said the chair would have a fit
 

 

Edited by Sawbonz
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Posted
3 minutes ago, Sawbonz said:

Nah. Book is better by a nose IMO. As is Shawshank

 

but what is REALLY mind blowing is the cumulative greatness of Different Seasons. Two standalone classics in Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption and The Body (stand my me), a super creepy Nazi survivor tale in Apt Pupil, and more standard King fare with The Breathing Method. 
 

Sadly King was still considered horror pop lit when I was in undergrad. I tried to get a couple of professors to add him to their syllabi but they said the chair would have a fit
 

 

Haven't read enough King to have a truly encyclopedic take.  I read The Body as a stand-alone, not as part of the Different Seasons collection.  

Read pretty much everything McMurtry wrote, though.  And my mother was a trained dramatic actress (state champ, that sort of thing).  I recall her reading Texasville aloud on a road trip one year; she did all the characters with different voices and inflections and whatnot (these were her people, after all).  It was actually brilliant, and maybe my first "audiobook" experience after my childhood experiences of mom reading books to me as a toddler and such.

On trips with my family to west Texas a few times, I read some Hank the Cowdog books aloud, same style (made sure to have a proper voice and approach for each character).  We loved those experiences.

But for the most part, the speed thing is what gets me.  An audiobook that takes 8 hours to play out, I can usually read in 2-3 hours or less.

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Posted
1 hour ago, Sawbonz said:

For me it’s the close reading of text for themes, imagery, etc. I tend to do that naturally which is probably why I wound up an English major. I find I can savor beautifully written prose on a whole other level than I can with an audiobook 

I was an English major at one time and ended up with a degree in linguistics (not that I ever did anything with it lmao). I find the enjoyment of reading Nabokov myself versus listening to Jeremy Irons read Nabokov to me to both be beautiful and fulfilling ways to consume Nabokov's work. They are just different, and ultimately they enhance each other.

Maybe my internal narrator just sucks. 😕

 

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Posted
1 hour ago, safe sex said:

I guess my question (and probably the source of my apparent insecurity about the concept) is this then: what actually makes it different? What am I losing or missing out on by listening to a novel instead of reading it? I've done both. I've been incredibly touched by both. What is the point of it being a "hill to die on" to quote our conversation stater, if not to striate media consumption? (Yes I know he's not being entirely serious there)

Well reading and listening activate different areas of the brain, and exercises different mental muscles. But at the end of the day, I think it's really just personal preference. You might not be missing out on anything at all, personally. 

I'm not the poster that claimed it was a Hill To Die On, but I mean, for me, perhaps I'm just dying on the hill of verbal pedantry that listening to a book is not, by definition, reading one. Because I'm on surly, therefore I'm an asshole. 

Personally, I enjoy reading, because I enjoy holding something solid in my hand, and the act of marking progress page by page. I also like that I'm forcing my brain to construct a word, then have to reach for the imagery associated with the words strong together and create the image in my head. I think reading is better for stretching and reinforcing vocabulary than listening. I like re-reading things, as other posters have said, if I find it striking or touching without having to hit the rewind 15 second button over and over. But that's just me. It doesn't mean I won't tell people who watch the movie instead of reading the novelization of a movie idiots, or wrong, etc. 

Also, just to remind everyone, including myself, that Elon Musk is a fucking piece of shit. 

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Posted
20 minutes ago, SydneyCarton said:

Also, just to remind everyone, including myself, that Elon Musk is a fucking piece of shit. 

game of thrones khaleesi GIF

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Posted

One positive about listening to books over reading them is that you can listen to Morning Glory Milking Farm while out and about and no one can call you a pervert 

Posted
On 11/11/2025 at 10:43 AM, Js1 said:

Listening to a book isn't reading and I will die on that hill

As a parent of a child on the autism spectrum, i will say that the one I have does not like reading books. Often audiobooks are the only way we've found to get him to 'read'.  And Elon's definitely on the spectrum.

Posted
2 minutes ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

You woke pussies and all your book talk need to be more hardcore. That’s what Grok says. 

No shit.  That's why these days, I only read Mack Bolan books.

81svhyeo5eL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg

41Tmsne+7XL._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg

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Posted
4 hours ago, miguelito said:

I always appreciate a good book list.

Here you go, it's a book list in podcast/vtube format and we need to get this trending on twitter so Musk can opine on it and tell the incels to read it.

 

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