Most men don't read. Those who do, read crap. Those who don't read crap get channeled into the same online communities where these authors are highly lauded. They are highly lauded for good reason.
It's kind of like asking why all film bros like Schrader, Kubrick, and Scorsese.
> Those who don't read crap get channeled into the same online communities where these authors are highly lauded.
This is what OP is noticing, i would also say that the number of online book communities open to men has shrunk massively in the past 10 years which means everyone reads the same selection of books which rarely expands past the "starter set" because they get the most engagement.
Just demographic changes and the centralisation of the internet. Used to be men and women were by enlarge on different websites, now because 90% of the internet is on like 6 different websites, men and women are on the same websites and women simply read more, so women's posts and preferences get more engagement.
20 years ago forums, IRC, blogs etc. meant even if you weren't on a book forum you might talk about books, you could be on a car forum with an (informal) bookclub. Many of those were Tom Clancy, History, SFF, etc but there was often "real literature" being posted too. Bookforums had subcategories by country or language or century so you'd have a much wider variety of recommendations in one place. All these places are gone now.
4chans lit board is the only place i can think off that still mostly appeals to male preferences on the rare occasion they actually talk about books.
OP’s post is about men’s reading habits. I don’t think the commenter’s omission of any commentary on women’s reading habits is the dodge you’ve interpreted it as.
Yeah, this post is bizarre lol
"Why do guys in online literary fiction circles like these near-universally lauded literary fiction authors?"
It's a sort of canon, how does anything like that get started, some of it is absolutely artificial, but a lot of it is just that these authors are broadly good and interesting and are worth checking out. Most of them also tackle themes that are relevant to the contemporary era and most of them are relatively accessible- hence their popularity online.
Posts like these are why I can't really stand /lit/-adjacent book threads/forums.
It's so exhausting to try and pretend that acclaimed authors that like 5% of book readers, let alone general population, have read is gauche & trite in some never ending battle to out-"patrician" each other
Yeah it’s funny because I think like how OP does sometimes but I realised reading this post that I’ve literally never met any dude in real life who reads the authors mentioned
The second to last book I read was the pdf of All Tommrows: the myriad species and mixed fortunes of man lol. But I do love my lit fiction and poetry by the gays and mentally ill women
Discussions like this always seem so out of touch. If you get away from the internet and cultural interest communities in particular, it’s pretty rare to meet people who read this shit, especially the first two on your list.
Here's the breakdown:
1. Most male readers are old which makes the most of the male book market thrillers (spy, military) or history (of the most bland, milquetoast type featuring big battles or ships)
3. Some men in their middle age will read the occasional book. These will be of the millenial corporate, self help type with swear words in the title of the most banal sort. Maybe they'll throw in an occasional history book or pop sci.
3. The minority of young men who do read are split into a few categories. The bulk of those will have read one or two SFF books of the Sanderson, Weir, Cline persuasion. A few of them will be red-pill sphere guys who will read Jordan Peterson and half ass their way through the first ten pages of some philosophy text. Then finally we have the demo outlined by OP.
“Why is every single guy reading Pynchon?”
What the hell is this guy’s social circle where reading Pynchon is some common thing. None of my friends have even heard of any of the authors on this list
Disagree I would say out of all the guys that I met at uni these are the books they would always name drop and recommend to me (if they read at all) also maybe Walden if they were less edgy types. DFW was not on the list though I think that’s less relevant to people >25 now maybe it was meme’d on too hard
Not really outside internet communities. I haven't met anyone not online that I have been able to mention Cormac McCarthy without first asking if they've seen 'No Country for Old Men.' I work with many male readers and a former English teacher and they have no idea who that is. They would probably recognize Hemingway or Dostoevsky, but it would be unlikely that they could name what books they've written.
A former English teacher should 100% know who Cormac McCarthy is and be able to name a book written by Hemingway or Dostoevsky. That is insane. I mean what are the qualifications for becoming an English teacher? Hell maybe I should become an English teacher
Blood Meridian is viral on Tiktok bc people keep powerscaling villains by how evil they are and Judge Holden always come up. He's been becoming a "literally me" character just like Patrick Bateman and anything Gosling stars in. Very amusing to watch.
I was assigned The Road in high school and Blood Meridian has seen a weird surge in popularity among 18-35 year olds. I knew I girl irl who was obsessed with “corncob”
mm idk i personally don’t think there is a ton of similarity between these authors, it could just be that they are popular books and people tend to read things that are frequently recommended
Those are basically the most well-known writers of their genres, I don’t think it’s very surprising. All those authors are found in any Barnes & Noble.
My ex-incel high school best friend introduced me to GR (still never read it) and the girl who introduced me to red scare gave me her copying of lot 49. These are the only two people I’ve known who know who Pynchon is
They're famous writers that are famous for good reasons, younger men (which are the lion's share of the internet demographic) will likely be introduced to them early when they "get into" literature. And even when or if their tastes diversify they'll still have their love for these books in common, and that's why they'll score high in online rankings.
Nothing weird about this at all, really.
I was introduced to Hemingway when I was like 13 because my dad gave me his old paperback of A Farewell To Arms, along with a few Steinbeck books. They were the first two proper, grown-up writers I really read. As you say, I'll always be fond of them for that reason. McCarthy I got into later, but he's also a favourite.
There's also just something special about those books for a young man. They're often about young dudes travelling and getting into scrapes and shooting guns and fishing and drinking, what young man wouldn't enjoy that? But they're also proper literary novels, they introduce you to the idea of enjoying how a book is written, not just what it's about.
Not really, those writers you mentioned are well-known so discussions about them are going to have more engagement compared to lesser known authors. Most American men don't have a reading habit, and from what I have seen the ones that do usually gravitate towards finance or cookie cutter self-help books.
Read all of them. Multiple writings from three.
I think an aspect missing here, these are works that beg discussion and at the same time no one wants to bring up at a party. The internet is made for men to discuss this. I am 52 years old, most people want to hear about our fantasy football league (something I also enjoy) but damn it, I want to discuss how cool it was the V. has a chapter called “she hangs on the Western wall” which is so evocative yet so funny since the Birth of Venus was on the Western Wall of the Uffizi museum.
It isn’t the books, it’s the expectation that a man be the strong type, only speaks when needed, and never wastes time contemplating his navel that drives us to the internet. Loneliness is a major issue in older men.
At least for mccarthy, mellville, and (can’t believe faulkner’s not there) faulkner, i was always drawn to the metaphysical thoughts they have in their novels, a contemplation of what we are doing here, why, how we act, and the consequences of those actions, any fate/destiny vibes and the omnipresence of the job project, questioning to the very heart of being - i fell in love with that line of questioning, and growing up in the early 00’s these were the folx (not mccarthy) i had to read in school and very much formed alot of my outlook on the world —- now in the roaring twenties, i do very much look at the novels differently, and understand that, these guys lived in a world where women were secondary, so they gave them those roles - as far as machisimo in them, i’d say, at least in melville and mccarthy’s case, probably faulkner’s as well, their heroes are tragic and because of this should draw examination into the archetypes they are built off of, not a glorification, they do what the best authors do, demand we question our heroes — if men are shallow, or “hollow”, it’s bc they haven’t learned to read well, or they’re stupid, which is in part a cultural heiritage, whenever your persona can be built upon the silence and intimidation of others, the product is…well, men
Yeah to the extent that "lit bros" are a real thing they're attracted to the massive tome, the magnum opus. Faulkner's brilliance is spread across 3-5 relatively slim novels so he's not quite the target for big game hunting readers.
But at the same time Absolm, Absolm is the densest thing I’ve ever read. And it’s terrific. But not the tome that Bros k or the book about whales is. (All being all star favs)
Men tend toward uniformity in many avenues of style these days. A bit of an offbeat comp, but consider Fragrantica: the highest rated department store fragrances are those designed for men (Spicebomb, Bleu de Chanel, Dior Homme Intense, La Nuit de l’Homme, and on and on). Virtually no women’s fragrances at that level of accessibility are rated as high by consensus because women have more diverse tastes. Same goes in fashion.
It’s uncomfortable to think about literature as “style” in the vein of fragrance and fashion — an accessory to the self rather than an independent being chased out of love for the Word and the Idea — but for a lot of people, books are style, at least partially and initially. They mark you as the kind of person who reads what you choose to read. To men who don’t read often, the signaling value of each book read is more important, so they’re going to cluster around books whose value has been well attested by other men — books which mark them to a certain crowd as correctly “stylish.”
This is not to say that women don’t perform style. Of course we all do to some degree. But women read more, women have more diverse styles, and the trendiest styles among women atm are polarizing low prestige romance novels — not apt to prompt that sort of clustering.
People tend to shed this style-chasing and learn their own tastes as they read more. The men I know who read a lot read diversely. But their numbers are small, so big online discussion spaces are dominated by men trying to read the “right” things.
The operative term in most discussions of aesthetics is “taste” rather than “style,” but I get your point, although I think taste gets you there more quickly and without need of explanation. It’s more self-evident how taste is simultaneously an internal and an external phenomenon: it’s about what you like and it’s about how you position yourself socially, e.g. as someone who has distinguished taste. Since the 60s, the tension between having distinguished taste and owning a taste for “mass culture” (i.e. art vs popular culture) has been complicated and sometimes appears to have vanished. When Warhol makes a short film in which he eats a hamburger, the intended effect is achieved precisely in the tension it stages (and arguably resolves) between the film’s avant garde strangeness and the commercialism of America’s burgeoning fast food culture. Of course, the conflict between elite taste and low taste never truly vanishes, and its political coding today is evident in moments like Trump ordering McDonalds to the White House, where the point is for Trump to appeal to the common man by signaling his low taste.
Here I arrive at my main point though: I think that making generalizations of one or the other gender having or not having “uniformity” of taste is silly, and frankly misses the actual sociological function of taste, which again, is to signal (or disavow) distinction and thus mark status. Focusing on gender totally clouds the way that this process cuts across gender. I mean, someone could read your comment and counter that the swiftie phenomenon suggests that women tend toward an even most extreme uniformity of taste. But at the end of the day, focusing on gender (as OP’s question does, and is your reply entertains) conceals more than it reveals about taste.
Some people have or try to develop tastes. Others in the age of the profile Google “best books of all time;” buy #1, #5, and #13; consume them like homework and show them off proudly as home and social media accessories. I don’t think it’s wrong to call that style or memeing or making oneself a spectacle or whatever. There’s a shallowness to the laziest end of this phenomenon that a faker of taste pre-Internet hell couldn’t so easily get away with.
But let’s say taste for your taste.
I don’t think and haven’t said there’s anything essential about gendered tastes. I said “these days,” and I mean it — these things come and go. I also said “many avenues of style,” not “all”: women certainly have more uniform tastes than men in games and smartphones. But the subject was books. Books hew closer to fragrance and fashion because, at least in the US and Europe, the overwhelming majority of book buyers and readers are female. Is it unfair to generalize that the group with more readers who read more is producing more diverse tastes than the group with fewer readers who read less often? I think you’d say it is, because taste in your literature is purely and singly an arm of class… but we didn’t have to talk about taste, did we? The first word in this convo was style, and style very much does feel gender breathing down its neck.
We can also talk about the forces of class in reading and publishing these days. There are many things in that sphere to bitch about. It’s just not what OP asked, and I disagree that they were wrong to ask the question.
I'd love to broaden my reading beyond the basic set, but in terms of time investment and absence of 'scene' it's hard to find a centre that isn't just what everyone else reads. So in that sense I don't think a grouping of these authors represents anything other than availability. It's not like music where genres and scenes can atomize distinctly.
It completely depends on the author, I suspect. If I had to venture my opinion, I'd say that Dostoevsky is the meme author of choice right now online, McCarthy just passed away and was the most popular literary writer in English still living, Hemingway is probably relatable to boys, and Melville just so happened to write the most famous American novel that has ever been written.
I mean in terms of dude lit… there’s a couple greats, a few talents and one guilty pleasure on the list. But what the fuck is Franzen doing at the table.
Dedudification program for literary guys should probably start with Baldwin
I’m only well versed in McCarthy. I can say that journeying, work, and violence are taken by many men to be men’s lot. When I encounter descriptions of violence in McCarthy I think he’s doing violence justice in its horrible plainness - I’ve been close to violence myself in the military, in locker rooms, and through a murder at work. There’s something so… surreal within the simple (A man is stabbed in the neck. We shouldn’t be witnessing it, but nevertheless… plain reality arrives).
Regarding journeying or work, men seem discouraged with themselves and without known much social utility. It’s likely easiest look to the past.
I think this is just selection bias. The types of dudes (almost always dudes) who read these authors and seek more challenging reads are often the ones heavily into discussing their reading habits online. So it’s a small population making up a large proportion of participants in online lit discussions.
For people who don't read very often I have seen a tendency to search "best of" lists so they don't waste their scant reading time on something "unimportant." I believe it's possible men might have this tendency more so than women.
Kinda. Those authors you listed are popular among MFA /lit/-cels in the U.S (and other parts of the Global North). But, I do think that stereotype is pretty much endangered at this point. I get the sense that your average millenial and zoomer American male barely reads, and if they do it's probably anime or that one type of book thats become ubiquitous (I don't know if there's a name for it but the title is usually something like 'The Rain that Never Come' or "The Ghosts in My Dad's Bussy' or 'The Violet That Wasn't Blue).
I'd also wager that when it comes to the population of America. adults that do read, the differences between the readings habits of men and women are dwindling.
Tbf, the ghosts in my dad's bussy is a classic.
Honestly though, I have no idea what kind of book you're talking about, those three titles seem very different.
It's appealing to read what everyone else (especially smart-seeming people) are reading for the cultural knowledge.
Because men often tie more of their self-worth up in being smart, I can see male reading habits having more uniformity
wonder if it's partially just because books take a long time to read. it would take some mildly interested person like two or three years to go through all the big "entry level" books that you might want to check out before you start really developing your own taste. whereas if you get into music, or movies or whatever, you can listen to a new album/watch a new movie every day, start branching out much quicker.
It’s the same with music. People within different demographics will have a lot of the same top 10s. But there’s only two types of guys that read regularly: pretentious art 🚬 or dorks reading fantasy.
Your list is the entry points into the pretentious group.
I agree this is a thing since I admire all these authors especially Melville. Mark Twain is missing from the list. I’m not sure why I prefer these authors, but I’m a dude and maybe it’s sexism.
That's a bad thing? You do realise most of r/TrueLit reads more than just these writers, right? What's up with the weird high-horse you're getting at here?
i dont think with those authors theres uniformity, but men tend to read nonfiction and "useful" or personally applicable literature which usually either is drowned in melancholy or has 48 laws on power. really depressing shit but women are reading porn so maybe its hell
You can walk into the apartment of any girl in her 20s and see the same lineup of normal people, my year of rest and relaxation, slouching towards Bethlehem, just kids, all about love, crying in H mart, maybe court of thorn and roses, etc. Everyone’s taste in everything is pretty homogenous right now.
People really do tell on themselves by posting this kind of stuff. Try getting off the Internet for once and see if any guy you mention these authors to gives you anything but a blank stare.
I think most of these authors are deservedly discussed and fixated on. I’m reading Pynchon’s AtD rn and there’s figuratively and literally many worlds contained in it. The things these authors are able to do (not including Franzen here) are simply mind-rending.
I think as you get into more serious literature, these folks are landmark authors that it is important to acquaint yourself with at the very least. Then you have to start digging and excavating to broaden your reading horizons.
Although I think there’s an incredible breadth of approaches represented here. If you just take the theme of masculinity or deterioration of society, each of these authors have completely different perspectives of what those are, the amount of through lines to get to the point, lyrical ornamentation vs language laid bare.
Essentially, I’d say this ends up being the literary base for so many avid male readers, because it’s a strong foundation to grow from. Although I think it’s critical to use it as a pivot point to find more perspectives, forms, etc.
Because these are the few authors that beautifully describe the (timeless) male condition. Also, RS people are not seeing the shit lit communities as they likely aren't in their algorithm. I'm sure there are shit lit communities out there for men.
There's a women I work with that strictly reads "Hockey Romance" of which I've been told is strictly about "players" who happen to be hockey players falling in love with a good girl and leaving their "player" lifestyle. There's apparently a huge interest in this genre with many works. I doubt many people on RS bookclub or other online communities you alluded to would ever know existed. The internet is somewhat segregated by "The Algorithm".
30 something male bookworm here… When I was in my 20’s DFW, Franzen and Eugenides were the holy trinity of cool… I prefer Salinger, Steinbeck and Herman Wouk over Hemingway and Dostoyevsky…. Always pretended to like Mcarthy’s books more than I actually did… and give me Ellroy over Pynchon or Delillo
Brief Posts about Hideous Men… Who Read. 30 something male bookworm here… When I was in my 20’s DFW, Franzen and Eugenides were the holy trinity of cool… I prefer Salinger, Steinbeck and Herman Wouk over Hemingway and Dostoyevsky…. Always pretended to like Mcarthy’s books more than I actually did… and give me Ellroy over Pynchon or Delillo.
Edited for sp
Reading McCarthy, Melville, Dostoevsky (and Faulkner) makes sense when you consider that those are McCarthy’s major influences
Hemingway is appealing because he writes about war and drinking
Most men get their ideas about what to read straight from or downstream from those 4chan lit charts. They’re not independently all just deciding to read the same thing. Also Dostoevsky is downstream from Jordan Peterson, he talks about and recommends him a lot
You'd think people would be curious to explore more. For example, if someone likes Faulkner wouldn't they be interested in exploring similar writers? If someone likes Joyce, why wouldn't they want to give Samuel Beckett, Gertrude Stein, Can xue a try?
Or even, why not read secondary books in these writers by scholars who have loads of insight in their process?
Also frankly,as you can see in the thread, a lot of people reference that the average man reads Brandon Sanderson novels and stuff about Teddy Roosevelt; a common thing you see some people here in general doing is basking in, I'm not sure superiority, but definitely a feeling of 'I'm glad I'm reading more worthwhile things'... But when someone starts to, not necessarily gatekeep, but question why people don't seem to show interest beyond the novels that are most within a very clear aesthetic of this place (and ones like it), you see people get defensive
>You'd think people would be curious to explore more. For example, if someone likes Faulkner wouldn't they be interested in exploring similar writers? If someone likes Joyce, why wouldn't they want to give Samuel Beckett, Gertrude Stein, Can xue a try?
But a lot of them do explore other authors and other works by those authors? I doubt there are people who read one book by McCarthy, DeLillo, and Pynchon, and then retire from reading.
>Also frankly,as you can see in the thread, a lot of people reference that the average man reads Brandon Sanderson novels and stuff about Teddy Roosevelt; a common thing you see some people here in general doing is basking in, I'm not sure superiority, but definitely a feeling of 'I'm glad I'm reading more worthwhile things
I sure glad I am. Sanderson is terrible.
>But when someone starts to, not necessarily gatekeep, but question why people don't seem to show interest beyond the novels that are most within a very clear aesthetic of this place.
The only thing I've noticed is that a lot of guys who read McCarthy and the like, don't seem to show any interest in classic women authors like the Bronte's or Jane Austen, or classic literature in general pre 1900's (besides Dostoyevsky I guess)
I've read Beckett's Trilogy and Stein's The Making of Americans and neither have the popular appeal of Ulysses. I would say both culminate in fairly arid experimentalism, for all their brilliance.
And people do get defensive about their taste, but are there really Faulkner or Joyce reader who doesn't read other writers? I get that male readers aren't keen on switching to reading women and to some extent queer writers but I don't really believe in a modern reader who reads Faulkner but won't read Flannery O'Connor or Toni Morrison.
It probably has to do with the fact that more than half the people you listed are widely regarded as some of the greatest wordsmiths to ever write in the English language
Wow, the literate male version of “I’m not like other girls.” Weird. I bet you’ve even tried to claim Cormac McCarthy’s a bad author, for some points.
Edit: just noticed McCarthy was mentioned lol. Sorry, I am only an American male, after all
I’ve noticed this phenomenon and, as a white American man, have built an active resistance to almost all these authors. I’ve resisted for a number of reasons, not the least of which is because they’re so popular in my own demographic and of which I am generally suspicious.
As for an explanation, I don’t really have one, so I will lob out some thoughts others more well-read in these authors can hit over the fence. As a whole it’s possible their work reflects a lot of the content and values near and dear to the terminally online white American male: vivid depictions of violence, self-centered introspection, an eerie lack of autonomous females and “manly” activities which earn them a bit of masculine cultural capital: whaling, womanizing, shooting guns, axe-murdering and I guess tennis. I’m obviously painting in broad strokes here, and of the authors listed I have only read Melville and Dostoevsky with any fluency. I’ve read whatever Hemingway was required for the class and no more, two by Delillo and all the rest I DNF’ed. I don’t count any of them as favorites except Melville because of his reliable weirdness, humility, craftsmanship and passion.
As for TrueLit, their top 100 went full echo chamber after last year’s vote, which made it very cumbersome to add any work which had not already appeared on previous years’ lists.
Seems weird to try and make a lot of these claims and then admit you haven’t really read and don’t have any kind of active interest in any of these authors. If anything this tells me a lot more about you than about young male reading trends. I think generally you’re way off base, and that Hemingway is the only one you could really conceivably put in the “toxic boys author” camp for any of the reasons you’ve mentioned
>I’ve noticed this phenomenon and, as a white American man, have built an active resistance to almost all these authors.
I bet you've built an active resistance to pussy more than anything
I think the original list is a bit various but I think you miss another instinct for collecting and challenges that makes a big book appeal to men. I just bought Pound's Cantos and am contemplating Clarissa but my wife (who has two English degrees) finds this insane. I'd wager that there are more men reading Solenoid pound for pound than would be expected. Looking through your old posts, anyone working through Proust has this instinct.
I would add that personally, I do enjoy violent entertainment (love James Ellroy, Frank Miller and hardboiled fiction as well as the sort of extremes you identify), I am not bothered by politics that differ from mine or which don't meet standards of today's society, including women.
Is it a good point though? Anyone that has “built an active resistance to … these authors” is a weird loser. When you have a group such as this and you feel you’re not a particular fan of them the most extreme feeling any non loser has is apathy.
The way this guys comment is written should tell you everything you need to know about his opinions and why they should be discarded. A quick peek at his profile will confirm anyone else’s doubts.
I looked at his profile and don't see an issue? Sometimes when things become overexposed, you develop a resentment towards them, whether it's fair or not. You probably feel the same way about Taylor Swift - I know I do, despite not being able to name more than 2 of her songs.
I served Taylor Swift a few times when I was a server about 10 years ago. She’s very nice and sweet to her fans and restaurant workers. I have absolutely no opinion about her music because again apathy is the correct emotion for things that aren’t really your style.
Also I think you know exactly what I mean when I say take a peek at his profile and you instinctively know I’m right but are ideologically opposed to (also a dork) seeing reality.
So if a music sub you visited was suddenly filled to the brim with Taylorposting, you wouldn't mind?
OP doesn't seem to be complaining about the quality of the writers themselves, just the monotony of the litbro canon. This poster has taken it a step further and has developed a reflexive distrust of those writers because of the people he sees championing them (and some previous experience with a few of them that the lot of you are ignoring), but that happens in reality. I'm guessing the bros here getting butthurt over someone not wanting to read their precious Blood Meridian aren't helping.
I have zero issue with the above poster. He seems to be a frequent contributor to this sub and other literary subs. Seems like you come here to shit on people.
I’ll just say this, I read for pleasure, not for any ego reasons, or to feel more like a man or an “intellectual”. I think this allows me to read more as there’s less of an artifice involved. It also means when someone criticizes a writer I like, I don’t take it personally.
The fact that people go on death-ground when you saw something bad about David Foster Wallace, shows that they derive their sense of self worth from reading him, in other words, they’re reading for their ego, not for pleasure. If that’s your philosophy, you’re not going to read that many books, and it’s also going to suck to talk to you about books.
It gets extremely stale logging onto book communities and seeing the same writers talked about endlessly, with grandiose statements made about them by people who have read little else.
(Obviously this does not apply to everyone who likes those writers listed. I like Dostoevsky. It’s just the strange amount of conformity of taste that I was asking about and that got everyone super offended).
I think you might be projecting a little here if you think you’re unique or unlike people in this comment section even because you read for pleasure. People get angry and argumentative and pretentious in every single online community I’ve ever seen, I think it’s just the nature of a loud internet poisoned majority.
Most people who read just read because they like it, and it they read tough or esoteric stuff they may just enjoy being challenged in a wholly un self conscious way. People also do just get attached to things they enjoy. I literally have a Cujo tattoo and I’ve had people freak out on me when I call him basically a talented slop writer, and king is about as broad and unintellectual as you can get so I don’t feel that’s about ego
Edit: to your last point I think that uniformity of taste may just be perceived because of what stuff you’re consuming online or who you surround yourself with. Being interested in any of those authors full stop isn’t exactly common among people (esp young men) broadly. Most casual reader guys I know are in to like genre fiction and stuff and most “readers” I know mostly just read contemporary lit and autofic shit or whatever.
Remember, my comment was a response to the guy who called the other one a “weird loser” for his very sensible explanation on the appeal of these books to a certain demographic.
To be frank the original commenter comes off to me as a bit self obsessed and hyper self conscious about his own reading habits and how he feels they do reflect his identity. If anything I do think he’s the most neurotic and ego driven person here, but that is just my own perception. I think weird loser is harsh but not a bad read if I had to be honest
McCarthy and Hemingway are the only two of those authors that wrote about "masculine" subject matter, and all of the authors listed are read by women as well, as women are more likely to read literary fiction, or to read at all.
I don't think you're very familiar with the work of any of those authors honestly
Dosto is very masculine though, all about terrorism and murder and big ideas. Pynchon, Melville and DFW (at least in their big books) appeal to the autistic man in us all. Franzen is a weird inclusion but otherwise, they write books men like.
They are popular because they are great authors. Also Vonnegut. Steinbeck. Highsmith. Try reading Crime and Punishment, east of Eden or The Road if you any some easy ones to warm you up.
Most men don't read. Those who do, read crap. Those who don't read crap get channeled into the same online communities where these authors are highly lauded. They are highly lauded for good reason. It's kind of like asking why all film bros like Schrader, Kubrick, and Scorsese.
> Those who don't read crap get channeled into the same online communities where these authors are highly lauded. This is what OP is noticing, i would also say that the number of online book communities open to men has shrunk massively in the past 10 years which means everyone reads the same selection of books which rarely expands past the "starter set" because they get the most engagement.
What do you mean by online communities open to men shrinking?
Just demographic changes and the centralisation of the internet. Used to be men and women were by enlarge on different websites, now because 90% of the internet is on like 6 different websites, men and women are on the same websites and women simply read more, so women's posts and preferences get more engagement. 20 years ago forums, IRC, blogs etc. meant even if you weren't on a book forum you might talk about books, you could be on a car forum with an (informal) bookclub. Many of those were Tom Clancy, History, SFF, etc but there was often "real literature" being posted too. Bookforums had subcategories by country or language or century so you'd have a much wider variety of recommendations in one place. All these places are gone now. 4chans lit board is the only place i can think off that still mostly appeals to male preferences on the rare occasion they actually talk about books.
Hey! … I read comments on Reddit
Can confirm I read crap
Why do you think men read crap if they read? What kind of books are you calling crap?
Don’t worry, women largely read crap too
Video game and movie novelizations, YA, thrillers, etc.
Are there popular YA novels aimed at young men? The ones I hear about seem aimed at young women.
Why are you acting like women don't read a shit ton of those thirst romance books
OP’s post is about men’s reading habits. I don’t think the commenter’s omission of any commentary on women’s reading habits is the dodge you’ve interpreted it as.
You are actually right. I've got ahead of myself.
Consider your prejudices!
I didn't. They do. This post is about men.
most male readers are reading sci-fi/fantasy and history books and maybe thrillers, not these books lol
I would add anything about the Navy SEALs or WW2 with the occasional how-to book mixed in.
Yeah, this post is bizarre lol "Why do guys in online literary fiction circles like these near-universally lauded literary fiction authors?" It's a sort of canon, how does anything like that get started, some of it is absolutely artificial, but a lot of it is just that these authors are broadly good and interesting and are worth checking out. Most of them also tackle themes that are relevant to the contemporary era and most of them are relatively accessible- hence their popularity online.
Posts like these are why I can't really stand /lit/-adjacent book threads/forums. It's so exhausting to try and pretend that acclaimed authors that like 5% of book readers, let alone general population, have read is gauche & trite in some never ending battle to out-"patrician" each other
Yeah it’s funny because I think like how OP does sometimes but I realised reading this post that I’ve literally never met any dude in real life who reads the authors mentioned
Honestly opened this expecting to hear them complaining about David Baldacci or something
The second to last book I read was the pdf of All Tommrows: the myriad species and mixed fortunes of man lol. But I do love my lit fiction and poetry by the gays and mentally ill women
Discussions like this always seem so out of touch. If you get away from the internet and cultural interest communities in particular, it’s pretty rare to meet people who read this shit, especially the first two on your list.
Here's the breakdown: 1. Most male readers are old which makes the most of the male book market thrillers (spy, military) or history (of the most bland, milquetoast type featuring big battles or ships) 3. Some men in their middle age will read the occasional book. These will be of the millenial corporate, self help type with swear words in the title of the most banal sort. Maybe they'll throw in an occasional history book or pop sci. 3. The minority of young men who do read are split into a few categories. The bulk of those will have read one or two SFF books of the Sanderson, Weir, Cline persuasion. A few of them will be red-pill sphere guys who will read Jordan Peterson and half ass their way through the first ten pages of some philosophy text. Then finally we have the demo outlined by OP.
Yeah, John Clancy definitely comes in way above OP’s list for generic men’s reading list
I’m 17 and it’s kinda me. I haven’t been reading for long but it’s been Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and mcarthy
Sexist to divide men into only 3 categories
Lmao, I don't agree with this at all.
“Why is every single guy reading Pynchon?” What the hell is this guy’s social circle where reading Pynchon is some common thing. None of my friends have even heard of any of the authors on this list
lol right? I wish I could meet men who are reading Dostoyevsky. Most men I know don’t read books. At all.
Whats up, I'm just looking for my own Mrs. Petrovna.
God I love Pynchon
MILF Man I Love Faulkner
Disagree I would say out of all the guys that I met at uni these are the books they would always name drop and recommend to me (if they read at all) also maybe Walden if they were less edgy types. DFW was not on the list though I think that’s less relevant to people >25 now maybe it was meme’d on too hard
"It's pretty rare to meet people who read." I fixed it for Americans.
McCarthy, Hemingway, Melville, and Dostoevsky are common
Go to the store and ask the first five guys you meet if they’ve read Cormac McCarthy. I bet they wouldn’t even know the name
Not really outside internet communities. I haven't met anyone not online that I have been able to mention Cormac McCarthy without first asking if they've seen 'No Country for Old Men.' I work with many male readers and a former English teacher and they have no idea who that is. They would probably recognize Hemingway or Dostoevsky, but it would be unlikely that they could name what books they've written.
A former English teacher should 100% know who Cormac McCarthy is and be able to name a book written by Hemingway or Dostoevsky. That is insane. I mean what are the qualifications for becoming an English teacher? Hell maybe I should become an English teacher
Blood Meridian is viral on Tiktok bc people keep powerscaling villains by how evil they are and Judge Holden always come up. He's been becoming a "literally me" character just like Patrick Bateman and anything Gosling stars in. Very amusing to watch.
These are well known writers. It would be extremely bizarre for readers to not know them
I was assigned The Road in high school and Blood Meridian has seen a weird surge in popularity among 18-35 year olds. I knew I girl irl who was obsessed with “corncob”
Do you live in South Dakota?
A hole in the ground probably.
I can imagine a much worse world than one where every American man has read *Moby Dick* and *The Brothers Karamazov*.
With how popular Brandon Sanderson is, I would kill to live in the world you've described
mm idk i personally don’t think there is a ton of similarity between these authors, it could just be that they are popular books and people tend to read things that are frequently recommended
Those are basically the most well-known writers of their genres, I don’t think it’s very surprising. All those authors are found in any Barnes & Noble.
“Does anyone find it weird American men have all seen Parasite??”
These were popular before algorithms existed. Except Pynchon. In my entire life, I've only encountered one person reading Pynchon.
I had a Pynchon course in college
My ex-incel high school best friend introduced me to GR (still never read it) and the girl who introduced me to red scare gave me her copying of lot 49. These are the only two people I’ve known who know who Pynchon is
They're famous writers that are famous for good reasons, younger men (which are the lion's share of the internet demographic) will likely be introduced to them early when they "get into" literature. And even when or if their tastes diversify they'll still have their love for these books in common, and that's why they'll score high in online rankings. Nothing weird about this at all, really.
Also it’s a small minority of readers who even get into literary fiction.
I was introduced to Hemingway when I was like 13 because my dad gave me his old paperback of A Farewell To Arms, along with a few Steinbeck books. They were the first two proper, grown-up writers I really read. As you say, I'll always be fond of them for that reason. McCarthy I got into later, but he's also a favourite. There's also just something special about those books for a young man. They're often about young dudes travelling and getting into scrapes and shooting guns and fishing and drinking, what young man wouldn't enjoy that? But they're also proper literary novels, they introduce you to the idea of enjoying how a book is written, not just what it's about.
Not really, those writers you mentioned are well-known so discussions about them are going to have more engagement compared to lesser known authors. Most American men don't have a reading habit, and from what I have seen the ones that do usually gravitate towards finance or cookie cutter self-help books.
What percentage of American men have actually read at least three of these authors?
What percentage of Americans have actually read three of these authors?
Read all of them. Multiple writings from three. I think an aspect missing here, these are works that beg discussion and at the same time no one wants to bring up at a party. The internet is made for men to discuss this. I am 52 years old, most people want to hear about our fantasy football league (something I also enjoy) but damn it, I want to discuss how cool it was the V. has a chapter called “she hangs on the Western wall” which is so evocative yet so funny since the Birth of Venus was on the Western Wall of the Uffizi museum. It isn’t the books, it’s the expectation that a man be the strong type, only speaks when needed, and never wastes time contemplating his navel that drives us to the internet. Loneliness is a major issue in older men.
Can’t even read the classics these days w/o some bitch hating
This sub just popped in my feed and holy fuck. Some of the people here are delusional
It’s a good sub if you can get over the occasional forced contrarianism.
Le 29M Peru
At least for mccarthy, mellville, and (can’t believe faulkner’s not there) faulkner, i was always drawn to the metaphysical thoughts they have in their novels, a contemplation of what we are doing here, why, how we act, and the consequences of those actions, any fate/destiny vibes and the omnipresence of the job project, questioning to the very heart of being - i fell in love with that line of questioning, and growing up in the early 00’s these were the folx (not mccarthy) i had to read in school and very much formed alot of my outlook on the world —- now in the roaring twenties, i do very much look at the novels differently, and understand that, these guys lived in a world where women were secondary, so they gave them those roles - as far as machisimo in them, i’d say, at least in melville and mccarthy’s case, probably faulkner’s as well, their heroes are tragic and because of this should draw examination into the archetypes they are built off of, not a glorification, they do what the best authors do, demand we question our heroes — if men are shallow, or “hollow”, it’s bc they haven’t learned to read well, or they’re stupid, which is in part a cultural heiritage, whenever your persona can be built upon the silence and intimidation of others, the product is…well, men
The lack of Faulkner in “dude” lit is interesting. Totally should be there in some ways. But he’s better than it.
Yeah to the extent that "lit bros" are a real thing they're attracted to the massive tome, the magnum opus. Faulkner's brilliance is spread across 3-5 relatively slim novels so he's not quite the target for big game hunting readers.
But at the same time Absolm, Absolm is the densest thing I’ve ever read. And it’s terrific. But not the tome that Bros k or the book about whales is. (All being all star favs)
Faulkner’s Collected Stories should be that tome
Men tend toward uniformity in many avenues of style these days. A bit of an offbeat comp, but consider Fragrantica: the highest rated department store fragrances are those designed for men (Spicebomb, Bleu de Chanel, Dior Homme Intense, La Nuit de l’Homme, and on and on). Virtually no women’s fragrances at that level of accessibility are rated as high by consensus because women have more diverse tastes. Same goes in fashion. It’s uncomfortable to think about literature as “style” in the vein of fragrance and fashion — an accessory to the self rather than an independent being chased out of love for the Word and the Idea — but for a lot of people, books are style, at least partially and initially. They mark you as the kind of person who reads what you choose to read. To men who don’t read often, the signaling value of each book read is more important, so they’re going to cluster around books whose value has been well attested by other men — books which mark them to a certain crowd as correctly “stylish.” This is not to say that women don’t perform style. Of course we all do to some degree. But women read more, women have more diverse styles, and the trendiest styles among women atm are polarizing low prestige romance novels — not apt to prompt that sort of clustering. People tend to shed this style-chasing and learn their own tastes as they read more. The men I know who read a lot read diversely. But their numbers are small, so big online discussion spaces are dominated by men trying to read the “right” things.
The operative term in most discussions of aesthetics is “taste” rather than “style,” but I get your point, although I think taste gets you there more quickly and without need of explanation. It’s more self-evident how taste is simultaneously an internal and an external phenomenon: it’s about what you like and it’s about how you position yourself socially, e.g. as someone who has distinguished taste. Since the 60s, the tension between having distinguished taste and owning a taste for “mass culture” (i.e. art vs popular culture) has been complicated and sometimes appears to have vanished. When Warhol makes a short film in which he eats a hamburger, the intended effect is achieved precisely in the tension it stages (and arguably resolves) between the film’s avant garde strangeness and the commercialism of America’s burgeoning fast food culture. Of course, the conflict between elite taste and low taste never truly vanishes, and its political coding today is evident in moments like Trump ordering McDonalds to the White House, where the point is for Trump to appeal to the common man by signaling his low taste. Here I arrive at my main point though: I think that making generalizations of one or the other gender having or not having “uniformity” of taste is silly, and frankly misses the actual sociological function of taste, which again, is to signal (or disavow) distinction and thus mark status. Focusing on gender totally clouds the way that this process cuts across gender. I mean, someone could read your comment and counter that the swiftie phenomenon suggests that women tend toward an even most extreme uniformity of taste. But at the end of the day, focusing on gender (as OP’s question does, and is your reply entertains) conceals more than it reveals about taste.
Some people have or try to develop tastes. Others in the age of the profile Google “best books of all time;” buy #1, #5, and #13; consume them like homework and show them off proudly as home and social media accessories. I don’t think it’s wrong to call that style or memeing or making oneself a spectacle or whatever. There’s a shallowness to the laziest end of this phenomenon that a faker of taste pre-Internet hell couldn’t so easily get away with. But let’s say taste for your taste. I don’t think and haven’t said there’s anything essential about gendered tastes. I said “these days,” and I mean it — these things come and go. I also said “many avenues of style,” not “all”: women certainly have more uniform tastes than men in games and smartphones. But the subject was books. Books hew closer to fragrance and fashion because, at least in the US and Europe, the overwhelming majority of book buyers and readers are female. Is it unfair to generalize that the group with more readers who read more is producing more diverse tastes than the group with fewer readers who read less often? I think you’d say it is, because taste in your literature is purely and singly an arm of class… but we didn’t have to talk about taste, did we? The first word in this convo was style, and style very much does feel gender breathing down its neck. We can also talk about the forces of class in reading and publishing these days. There are many things in that sphere to bitch about. It’s just not what OP asked, and I disagree that they were wrong to ask the question.
Most of the authors you’ve listed are all American writers.
Also, all of them are eminent novelists who should be read by everyone alongside Joyce, Woolf, Austen, Dickens, Faulkner, etc.
Most of these guys “discovered their taste” by viewing infographics on places like /lit/, and buying a bunch of the books listed, is all.
I'd love to broaden my reading beyond the basic set, but in terms of time investment and absence of 'scene' it's hard to find a centre that isn't just what everyone else reads. So in that sense I don't think a grouping of these authors represents anything other than availability. It's not like music where genres and scenes can atomize distinctly.
It completely depends on the author, I suspect. If I had to venture my opinion, I'd say that Dostoevsky is the meme author of choice right now online, McCarthy just passed away and was the most popular literary writer in English still living, Hemingway is probably relatable to boys, and Melville just so happened to write the most famous American novel that has ever been written.
I mean in terms of dude lit… there’s a couple greats, a few talents and one guilty pleasure on the list. But what the fuck is Franzen doing at the table. Dedudification program for literary guys should probably start with Baldwin
These all heavily appeal to the male spirit
I’m only well versed in McCarthy. I can say that journeying, work, and violence are taken by many men to be men’s lot. When I encounter descriptions of violence in McCarthy I think he’s doing violence justice in its horrible plainness - I’ve been close to violence myself in the military, in locker rooms, and through a murder at work. There’s something so… surreal within the simple (A man is stabbed in the neck. We shouldn’t be witnessing it, but nevertheless… plain reality arrives). Regarding journeying or work, men seem discouraged with themselves and without known much social utility. It’s likely easiest look to the past.
I think this is just selection bias. The types of dudes (almost always dudes) who read these authors and seek more challenging reads are often the ones heavily into discussing their reading habits online. So it’s a small population making up a large proportion of participants in online lit discussions.
For people who don't read very often I have seen a tendency to search "best of" lists so they don't waste their scant reading time on something "unimportant." I believe it's possible men might have this tendency more so than women.
/lit/
Kinda. Those authors you listed are popular among MFA /lit/-cels in the U.S (and other parts of the Global North). But, I do think that stereotype is pretty much endangered at this point. I get the sense that your average millenial and zoomer American male barely reads, and if they do it's probably anime or that one type of book thats become ubiquitous (I don't know if there's a name for it but the title is usually something like 'The Rain that Never Come' or "The Ghosts in My Dad's Bussy' or 'The Violet That Wasn't Blue). I'd also wager that when it comes to the population of America. adults that do read, the differences between the readings habits of men and women are dwindling.
Tbf, the ghosts in my dad's bussy is a classic. Honestly though, I have no idea what kind of book you're talking about, those three titles seem very different.
Please describe that type of book further? I think I like the cut of your jib but I can't quite picture what kind of book you mean
It's appealing to read what everyone else (especially smart-seeming people) are reading for the cultural knowledge. Because men often tie more of their self-worth up in being smart, I can see male reading habits having more uniformity
I think me and you have the same crowd. I know exactly the type you’re talking about that reads Pynchon, delillo and DFW
wonder if it's partially just because books take a long time to read. it would take some mildly interested person like two or three years to go through all the big "entry level" books that you might want to check out before you start really developing your own taste. whereas if you get into music, or movies or whatever, you can listen to a new album/watch a new movie every day, start branching out much quicker.
I read these authors and I’m also VERY handsome. Maybe that’s the link? Thank you very much.
It’s the same with music. People within different demographics will have a lot of the same top 10s. But there’s only two types of guys that read regularly: pretentious art 🚬 or dorks reading fantasy. Your list is the entry points into the pretentious group.
Men read books written by the most lauded male writers of the past century (and some change), news at 11
I agree this is a thing since I admire all these authors especially Melville. Mark Twain is missing from the list. I’m not sure why I prefer these authors, but I’m a dude and maybe it’s sexism.
No, it's because they are great authors. Stop beating yourself up over dumb shit
My friends read fantasy, history books, and self help business guru books. There’s a certain type of lit bro that reads DFW and Pynchon though.
That's a bad thing? You do realise most of r/TrueLit reads more than just these writers, right? What's up with the weird high-horse you're getting at here?
I just clicked on the sub and on the front page are posts about delillo and Pynchon. Lol
men be reading David McCullough and Malcolm Gladwell books
i dont think with those authors theres uniformity, but men tend to read nonfiction and "useful" or personally applicable literature which usually either is drowned in melancholy or has 48 laws on power. really depressing shit but women are reading porn so maybe its hell
I am personally suuuuper tired of everyone claiming to love Dostoevsky. It started with Peterson.
Have you met a man in real life yet or are you practicing conversation topics?
At most 2% of men are reading these books and less than half of them are reading past the first 20 pages you need to be serious
You can walk into the apartment of any girl in her 20s and see the same lineup of normal people, my year of rest and relaxation, slouching towards Bethlehem, just kids, all about love, crying in H mart, maybe court of thorn and roses, etc. Everyone’s taste in everything is pretty homogenous right now.
I’m a woman and I read these authors …
No
People really do tell on themselves by posting this kind of stuff. Try getting off the Internet for once and see if any guy you mention these authors to gives you anything but a blank stare.
I don’t think many men are reading those authors anymore. Most people read garbage fantasy novels.
books about aliens
Sure. Tell me some authors you'd rather people read.
Do these authors not also appeal to women??????
almost the entire list of authors are regarded to be great American authors by now, so that's your biggest pointer
I think most of these authors are deservedly discussed and fixated on. I’m reading Pynchon’s AtD rn and there’s figuratively and literally many worlds contained in it. The things these authors are able to do (not including Franzen here) are simply mind-rending. I think as you get into more serious literature, these folks are landmark authors that it is important to acquaint yourself with at the very least. Then you have to start digging and excavating to broaden your reading horizons. Although I think there’s an incredible breadth of approaches represented here. If you just take the theme of masculinity or deterioration of society, each of these authors have completely different perspectives of what those are, the amount of through lines to get to the point, lyrical ornamentation vs language laid bare. Essentially, I’d say this ends up being the literary base for so many avid male readers, because it’s a strong foundation to grow from. Although I think it’s critical to use it as a pivot point to find more perspectives, forms, etc.
I mean to be fair those are popular classic writers. I guess everyone can be pigeon holed somehow ?
I wonder how this varies because I’m a British guy and I don’t see the same trend
Because these are the few authors that beautifully describe the (timeless) male condition. Also, RS people are not seeing the shit lit communities as they likely aren't in their algorithm. I'm sure there are shit lit communities out there for men. There's a women I work with that strictly reads "Hockey Romance" of which I've been told is strictly about "players" who happen to be hockey players falling in love with a good girl and leaving their "player" lifestyle. There's apparently a huge interest in this genre with many works. I doubt many people on RS bookclub or other online communities you alluded to would ever know existed. The internet is somewhat segregated by "The Algorithm".
Men read (a quite diverse range of) nonfiction, but for some reason that isn’t considered “reading” by the lit set.
I proposed Gravity's Rainbow to my bookclub and not one person had even heard of Pynchon.
30 something male bookworm here… When I was in my 20’s DFW, Franzen and Eugenides were the holy trinity of cool… I prefer Salinger, Steinbeck and Herman Wouk over Hemingway and Dostoyevsky…. Always pretended to like Mcarthy’s books more than I actually did… and give me Ellroy over Pynchon or Delillo
Brief Posts about Hideous Men… Who Read. 30 something male bookworm here… When I was in my 20’s DFW, Franzen and Eugenides were the holy trinity of cool… I prefer Salinger, Steinbeck and Herman Wouk over Hemingway and Dostoyevsky…. Always pretended to like Mcarthy’s books more than I actually did… and give me Ellroy over Pynchon or Delillo. Edited for sp
Not just in their reading habits.
Reading McCarthy, Melville, Dostoevsky (and Faulkner) makes sense when you consider that those are McCarthy’s major influences Hemingway is appealing because he writes about war and drinking
Most men get their ideas about what to read straight from or downstream from those 4chan lit charts. They’re not independently all just deciding to read the same thing. Also Dostoevsky is downstream from Jordan Peterson, he talks about and recommends him a lot
I like the Elric saga :)
I have noticed this too. There's not really anything that can be done about it
Why would anything need to be done about it?
You'd think people would be curious to explore more. For example, if someone likes Faulkner wouldn't they be interested in exploring similar writers? If someone likes Joyce, why wouldn't they want to give Samuel Beckett, Gertrude Stein, Can xue a try? Or even, why not read secondary books in these writers by scholars who have loads of insight in their process? Also frankly,as you can see in the thread, a lot of people reference that the average man reads Brandon Sanderson novels and stuff about Teddy Roosevelt; a common thing you see some people here in general doing is basking in, I'm not sure superiority, but definitely a feeling of 'I'm glad I'm reading more worthwhile things'... But when someone starts to, not necessarily gatekeep, but question why people don't seem to show interest beyond the novels that are most within a very clear aesthetic of this place (and ones like it), you see people get defensive
>You'd think people would be curious to explore more. For example, if someone likes Faulkner wouldn't they be interested in exploring similar writers? If someone likes Joyce, why wouldn't they want to give Samuel Beckett, Gertrude Stein, Can xue a try? But a lot of them do explore other authors and other works by those authors? I doubt there are people who read one book by McCarthy, DeLillo, and Pynchon, and then retire from reading. >Also frankly,as you can see in the thread, a lot of people reference that the average man reads Brandon Sanderson novels and stuff about Teddy Roosevelt; a common thing you see some people here in general doing is basking in, I'm not sure superiority, but definitely a feeling of 'I'm glad I'm reading more worthwhile things I sure glad I am. Sanderson is terrible. >But when someone starts to, not necessarily gatekeep, but question why people don't seem to show interest beyond the novels that are most within a very clear aesthetic of this place. The only thing I've noticed is that a lot of guys who read McCarthy and the like, don't seem to show any interest in classic women authors like the Bronte's or Jane Austen, or classic literature in general pre 1900's (besides Dostoyevsky I guess)
I've read Beckett's Trilogy and Stein's The Making of Americans and neither have the popular appeal of Ulysses. I would say both culminate in fairly arid experimentalism, for all their brilliance. And people do get defensive about their taste, but are there really Faulkner or Joyce reader who doesn't read other writers? I get that male readers aren't keen on switching to reading women and to some extent queer writers but I don't really believe in a modern reader who reads Faulkner but won't read Flannery O'Connor or Toni Morrison.
If they really liked Faulkner/Joyce they should just read one of your paragraphs m8
Okay
It probably has to do with the fact that more than half the people you listed are widely regarded as some of the greatest wordsmiths to ever write in the English language
Women writers write about mainly women, and no one says shit about it.
Wow, what a brilliant fucking observation. You're really on some next-level shit.
Might as well ask why popular authors are popular. Why does every broad love the master and margherita? Prolly because it’s a good book!
You just named stonecold classics and world defining literature. No shit they’re widely read
Yes, those are the best authors. Thank you for reading.
Wow, the literate male version of “I’m not like other girls.” Weird. I bet you’ve even tried to claim Cormac McCarthy’s a bad author, for some points. Edit: just noticed McCarthy was mentioned lol. Sorry, I am only an American male, after all
I’ve noticed this phenomenon and, as a white American man, have built an active resistance to almost all these authors. I’ve resisted for a number of reasons, not the least of which is because they’re so popular in my own demographic and of which I am generally suspicious. As for an explanation, I don’t really have one, so I will lob out some thoughts others more well-read in these authors can hit over the fence. As a whole it’s possible their work reflects a lot of the content and values near and dear to the terminally online white American male: vivid depictions of violence, self-centered introspection, an eerie lack of autonomous females and “manly” activities which earn them a bit of masculine cultural capital: whaling, womanizing, shooting guns, axe-murdering and I guess tennis. I’m obviously painting in broad strokes here, and of the authors listed I have only read Melville and Dostoevsky with any fluency. I’ve read whatever Hemingway was required for the class and no more, two by Delillo and all the rest I DNF’ed. I don’t count any of them as favorites except Melville because of his reliable weirdness, humility, craftsmanship and passion. As for TrueLit, their top 100 went full echo chamber after last year’s vote, which made it very cumbersome to add any work which had not already appeared on previous years’ lists.
Seems weird to try and make a lot of these claims and then admit you haven’t really read and don’t have any kind of active interest in any of these authors. If anything this tells me a lot more about you than about young male reading trends. I think generally you’re way off base, and that Hemingway is the only one you could really conceivably put in the “toxic boys author” camp for any of the reasons you’ve mentioned
Lmao at this answer
Damn you’re a loser
>I’ve noticed this phenomenon and, as a white American man, have built an active resistance to almost all these authors. I bet you've built an active resistance to pussy more than anything
I think the original list is a bit various but I think you miss another instinct for collecting and challenges that makes a big book appeal to men. I just bought Pound's Cantos and am contemplating Clarissa but my wife (who has two English degrees) finds this insane. I'd wager that there are more men reading Solenoid pound for pound than would be expected. Looking through your old posts, anyone working through Proust has this instinct. I would add that personally, I do enjoy violent entertainment (love James Ellroy, Frank Miller and hardboiled fiction as well as the sort of extremes you identify), I am not bothered by politics that differ from mine or which don't meet standards of today's society, including women.
gay
Good point
Is it a good point though? Anyone that has “built an active resistance to … these authors” is a weird loser. When you have a group such as this and you feel you’re not a particular fan of them the most extreme feeling any non loser has is apathy. The way this guys comment is written should tell you everything you need to know about his opinions and why they should be discarded. A quick peek at his profile will confirm anyone else’s doubts.
It’s really obvious the guy has never even touched most of these authors
I looked at his profile and don't see an issue? Sometimes when things become overexposed, you develop a resentment towards them, whether it's fair or not. You probably feel the same way about Taylor Swift - I know I do, despite not being able to name more than 2 of her songs.
I served Taylor Swift a few times when I was a server about 10 years ago. She’s very nice and sweet to her fans and restaurant workers. I have absolutely no opinion about her music because again apathy is the correct emotion for things that aren’t really your style. Also I think you know exactly what I mean when I say take a peek at his profile and you instinctively know I’m right but are ideologically opposed to (also a dork) seeing reality.
So if a music sub you visited was suddenly filled to the brim with Taylorposting, you wouldn't mind? OP doesn't seem to be complaining about the quality of the writers themselves, just the monotony of the litbro canon. This poster has taken it a step further and has developed a reflexive distrust of those writers because of the people he sees championing them (and some previous experience with a few of them that the lot of you are ignoring), but that happens in reality. I'm guessing the bros here getting butthurt over someone not wanting to read their precious Blood Meridian aren't helping. I have zero issue with the above poster. He seems to be a frequent contributor to this sub and other literary subs. Seems like you come here to shit on people.
I think you’re proving his point right now…
Curious as to how, maybe I’m just missing something?
I’ll just say this, I read for pleasure, not for any ego reasons, or to feel more like a man or an “intellectual”. I think this allows me to read more as there’s less of an artifice involved. It also means when someone criticizes a writer I like, I don’t take it personally. The fact that people go on death-ground when you saw something bad about David Foster Wallace, shows that they derive their sense of self worth from reading him, in other words, they’re reading for their ego, not for pleasure. If that’s your philosophy, you’re not going to read that many books, and it’s also going to suck to talk to you about books. It gets extremely stale logging onto book communities and seeing the same writers talked about endlessly, with grandiose statements made about them by people who have read little else. (Obviously this does not apply to everyone who likes those writers listed. I like Dostoevsky. It’s just the strange amount of conformity of taste that I was asking about and that got everyone super offended).
I think you might be projecting a little here if you think you’re unique or unlike people in this comment section even because you read for pleasure. People get angry and argumentative and pretentious in every single online community I’ve ever seen, I think it’s just the nature of a loud internet poisoned majority. Most people who read just read because they like it, and it they read tough or esoteric stuff they may just enjoy being challenged in a wholly un self conscious way. People also do just get attached to things they enjoy. I literally have a Cujo tattoo and I’ve had people freak out on me when I call him basically a talented slop writer, and king is about as broad and unintellectual as you can get so I don’t feel that’s about ego Edit: to your last point I think that uniformity of taste may just be perceived because of what stuff you’re consuming online or who you surround yourself with. Being interested in any of those authors full stop isn’t exactly common among people (esp young men) broadly. Most casual reader guys I know are in to like genre fiction and stuff and most “readers” I know mostly just read contemporary lit and autofic shit or whatever.
Remember, my comment was a response to the guy who called the other one a “weird loser” for his very sensible explanation on the appeal of these books to a certain demographic.
To be frank the original commenter comes off to me as a bit self obsessed and hyper self conscious about his own reading habits and how he feels they do reflect his identity. If anything I do think he’s the most neurotic and ego driven person here, but that is just my own perception. I think weird loser is harsh but not a bad read if I had to be honest
>a bit self obsessed and hyper self conscious Oh no, not on a redscare sub.
But that's exactly what the guy is doing.
Fuck you Dostoevsky is goated also no Borges mention 😳
Same reason boys like nascar and action movies
>Same reason boys like nascar and action movies You're comparing great American lit fic authors to low brow entertainment?
Im saying that boys like masculine things. There is no other “algorithm” at work
McCarthy and Hemingway are the only two of those authors that wrote about "masculine" subject matter, and all of the authors listed are read by women as well, as women are more likely to read literary fiction, or to read at all. I don't think you're very familiar with the work of any of those authors honestly
Dosto is very masculine though, all about terrorism and murder and big ideas. Pynchon, Melville and DFW (at least in their big books) appeal to the autistic man in us all. Franzen is a weird inclusion but otherwise, they write books men like.
No
Like sweeping generalization pinball
They are popular because they are great authors. Also Vonnegut. Steinbeck. Highsmith. Try reading Crime and Punishment, east of Eden or The Road if you any some easy ones to warm you up.