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maruijuana's review against another edition
3.0
this book needs the sort of solid concentration tailor made for Barthes' writing style—poetically verbose, long sentences, too many brackets, pace. reading this book is analogous to listening for three hours to someone with a French accent speaking too fast. here and there the concentration is hard to maintain and the writing becomes dense and the train of ideas becomes severely hard to follow — it could have be written in French. gladly though this is not really an essential read for readers that read for pleasure.
nicolembradbury's review against another edition
4.0
I love this man.
I've never really thought much about why certain texts give me pleasure and others do not, but Barthes dives into this without any reservations. I specifically loved the commentary on how society is embarrassed to admit bliss (which he alludes to orgasm) and rather confuses pleasure with desire. We are so apt to speak about the longing, but too shy to speak about what happens when we have pursued and gotten pleasure.
Also love the commentary on how bliss cannot thrive in an institution. I often think "What would my professors think?" on my own life choices and work I make artistically. But now, it is comforting to know that true pleasure lives outside of the thought of their judgements.
Anyways, this was amazing, and I'd highly recommend.
I've never really thought much about why certain texts give me pleasure and others do not, but Barthes dives into this without any reservations. I specifically loved the commentary on how society is embarrassed to admit bliss (which he alludes to orgasm) and rather confuses pleasure with desire. We are so apt to speak about the longing, but too shy to speak about what happens when we have pursued and gotten pleasure.
Also love the commentary on how bliss cannot thrive in an institution. I often think "What would my professors think?" on my own life choices and work I make artistically. But now, it is comforting to know that true pleasure lives outside of the thought of their judgements.
Anyways, this was amazing, and I'd highly recommend.
rjbs's review against another edition
2.0
Ugh. I'd love to read this book entirely rewritten in plain language. I don't know whether to blame Barthes or the translator, but as presented, it was intolerably thick. The ideas were, at least generally speaking, interesting. The presentation was infuriating.
lowercasepoet's review against another edition
challenging
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
5.0
melg14's review against another edition
1.0
This book is very "text of bliss" it frustrated the crap out of me. And we'll be referring back to this during the semester (yay! not!)
I'm also biased and don't enjoy literary theory.
I'm also biased and don't enjoy literary theory.