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PaperclipPerfector  8d ago (text post)   2707 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 21, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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So, what are you reading?

Still on G. Kirilenko and L. Korshunova's What is Personality? Also going through some Gramsci essays.

Kazuo Ishiguro’s Remains of the Day. A weird little guy goes on a road trip through ‘50s England while reminiscing on his former employer and colleagues.

I don’t think I got it. Delightful prose, vividly drawn characters, and some excellent scenes…but I just don’t understand how it works as a novel. What was the point? Or was it some sort of metafiction where the lack thereof was, itself, the point? It just didn’t land for me. I enjoyed the process but was left unsatisfied and a little embarrassed.

Up next is C J Cherryh’s Merchanter’s Luck for a change of pace. This feels incredibly “genre” in a good way. Pretty impressed with the economy of prose so far, too. Looking forward to it.

Kazuo Ishiguro writes the same story over and over and over again, but he does it well. The servant who believes in their service and doesn't mind that it eats their life up.

It's kind of an anti-novel. You hope for character development, but it doesn't happen. It's more like a series of vignettes.

His other novels do have more development and plot, but never to the point where the main character advocates for themselves.

I found his body of work poignant and depressing.

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