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I have had a similar experience but I don't blame the internet. I blame my age and a growth of my own critical thinking. It used to be that anything an authorit

I have had a similar experience but I don't blame the internet. I blame my age and a growth of my own critical thinking. It used to be that anything an authority told me was "great writing" was great writing. This of course included a wide array of 18th and 19th century writing. But as I've read more I've come to the conclusion that while writing of that era is full of many woderful plots, observations, philosophies, etc, it mostly is not great writing. And a good portion of the ideas illuminated in that writing have been better presented in later writing. So I have a develop an extreme intolerance for 1) naval gazing in writing and 2) complexity. Your thoughts can be complex. Your use of the comma however should not be. This is not an intolerance for complex ideas or difficult subjects. It is the same reaction I have to a set of bad instructions. That is to thrust them away and try for myself or find another source. Edit: A little more succinctly, I trust authors less. I have less faith that because you've published a book you have something worth saying. I believe less that wrangling with your abstruse language will yield a reward worth struggling for. So when I encounter difficulty, I discard the coconut and seek an orange.

fredsanford 8y ago
Are you able to get through books by Tolkein, Robert Jordan or Terry Goodkind? I wonder because as I've aged I don't have the patience to sit through a description of every blade of grass in a meadow...
- DubiousPusher 8y ago
  Never read Goodkind. I don't think I could read Jordan anymore. Just kind of got over high fantasy a bit and don't find it all that rewarding. With Tolkien, I used to view "The Hobbit" as pretty good and TLOTR as his magnum opus. Now I'm convinced it's the other way round. Generally, I'm very much the same. Let's set the scene quick and get the characters doing stuff. I used to see intricate scene dressing as a skill now I see it as an indulgence. There are too many period films, mini-series and series with beautiful sets and costumes etc if I really want that. There I can marvel at them without much addition time cost.
  - fredsanford 8y ago
    >> Never read Goodkind. I like his Sword of Truth books, the whole Confessor magic user thing leads to some good dynamics. He falls down in his 80 pages of character introspection... For me anyway. I used to reread this series every few years but now I end up putting books down when the blades of grass start. >> Let's set the scene quick and get the characters doing stuff Yes. Please!

fredsanford 8y ago

Are you able to get through books by Tolkein, Robert Jordan or Terry Goodkind? I wonder because as I've aged I don't have the patience to sit through a description of every blade of grass in a meadow...

DubiousPusher 8y ago
Never read Goodkind. I don't think I could read Jordan anymore. Just kind of got over high fantasy a bit and don't find it all that rewarding. With Tolkien, I used to view "The Hobbit" as pretty good and TLOTR as his magnum opus. Now I'm convinced it's the other way round. Generally, I'm very much the same. Let's set the scene quick and get the characters doing stuff. I used to see intricate scene dressing as a skill now I see it as an indulgence. There are too many period films, mini-series and series with beautiful sets and costumes etc if I really want that. There I can marvel at them without much addition time cost.
- fredsanford 8y ago
  >> Never read Goodkind. I like his Sword of Truth books, the whole Confessor magic user thing leads to some good dynamics. He falls down in his 80 pages of character introspection... For me anyway. I used to reread this series every few years but now I end up putting books down when the blades of grass start. >> Let's set the scene quick and get the characters doing stuff Yes. Please!