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[Sir Raptor]

The Fan Man has a completely screwed up style that is ridiculously awesome, man.

[Dustin Smith]

I read way too much Tim Rogers, for what its worth.

When I'm reading I'll keep this thread in mind.

[C.A. Sinner]

Shakespeare's not so bad after you read 6 or 7 of his plays in succession.

One of the reasons Shakespeare is difficult to read for modern audiences is that he uses outdated language, having lived in the 16th century and stuff. Also, don't forget that Shakespeare wrote plays. They're not supposed to be read like prose or even poetry but performed by  actors on stage.

Which is why it's pretty retarded that schools usually force students to read them. Thankfully my literature teacher was smart enough to show us recorded performances, or in the case of Hamlet, that one one movie adaption that's 4 hours long and has all the original text.

[Taiko]

Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash has a very rapid-fire, humorous prose style that I think would be well suited to video games.  If you're not into sci-fi, I'd also advise checking out his more mainstream Zodiac.  Both are excellent books.

[JaJitsu]

in the case of Hamlet, that one one movie adaption that's 4 hours long and has all the original text.

I personally own this, haha

[Smithy]

I was too sick one morning to get up at 4:30 a.m. -- or according to our clock 7:27 and one half. I shut off the alarm and went back to sleep. A couple of hours later there was a loud noise in the hall. "What the hell is it?" asked Jan.

I got out of bed. I slept in my shorts. The shorts were stained--we wiped with newspapers that we crumpled and softened with our hands--and I often didn't get all of it cleaned off. My shorts were also ragged and had cigarette burns in them where the hot ashes had fallen in my lap.

I went to the door and opened it. There was thick smoke in the hall. Firemen in large metal helmets with numbers on them. Firemen dragging long thick hoses. Firemen dressed in asbestos. Firemen with axes. The noise and confusion was incredible. I closed the door.

"What is it?" asked Jan.

"It's the fire department."

"Oh," she said. She pulled the covers up over her head, rolled on her side. I got in beside her and slept.

[_Madk]

"You are right—a thousand times right. But do not think that this has escaped my thoughts. For myself I would die fighting, so would Ralston, so would Ainslie. I have talked to them, and it is settled. But the others, I have spoken with them, but what are you to do? There are the priest, and the missionary, and the women?"

"Would they wish to be taken alive?"

"They would not promise to take steps to prevent it. They would not lay hands upon their own lives. Their consciences would not permit it. Of course, it is all over now, and we need not speak of such dreadful things. But what would you have done in my place?"

"Kill them."

"Mein Gott! You would murder them!"

"In mercy I would kill them. Man, I have been through it. I have seen the death of the hot eggs; I have seen the death of the boiling kettle; I have seen the women—my God! I wonder that I have ever slept sound again." His usually impassive face was working and quivering with the agony of the remembrance. "I was strapped to a stake with thorns in my eyelids to keep them open, and my grief at their torture was a less thing than my self-reproach when I thought that I could with one tube of tasteless tablets have snatched them at the last instant from the hands of their tormentors. Murder! I am ready to stand at the Divine bar and answer for a thousand murders such as that! Sin! Why, it is such an act as might well cleanse the stain of real sin from the soul. But if, knowing what I do, I should have failed this second time to do it, then, by Heaven! there is no hell deep enough or hot enough to receive my guilty craven spirit."

The Colonel rose, and again his hand clasped that of the Professor.

"You speak sense," said he. "You are a brave, strong man, who know your own mind. Yes, by the Lord! you would have been my great help had things gone the other way. I have often thought and wondered in the dark, early hours of the morning, but I did not know how to do it. But we should have heard Ainslie's shots before now; I will go and see."

Again the old scientist sat alone with his thoughts. Finally, as neither the guns of the relieving force nor yet the signal of their approach sounded upon his ears, he rose, and was about to go himself upon the ramparts to make inquiry when the door flew open, and Colonel Dresler staggered into the room. His face was of a ghastly yellow-white, and his chest heaved like that of a man exhausted with running. There was brandy on the side-table, and he gulped down a glassful. Then he dropped heavily into a chair.

"Well," said the Professor, coldly, "they are not coming?"

"No, they cannot come."

There was silence for a minute or more, the two men staring blankly at each other.

http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks07/0701141h.html

The best piece of literature ever written.

[Ben Kuhn]

What, no mention of Joyce yet?

A few light taps upon the pane made him turn to the window. It had begun to snow again. He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark, falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time had come for him to set out on his journey westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves. It was falling, too, upon every part of the lonely churchyard on the hill where Michael Furey lay buried. It lay thickly drifted on the crooked crosses and headstones, on the spears of the little gate, on the barren thorns. His soul swooned slowly as he heard the snow falling faintly through the universe and faintly falling, like the descent of their last end, upon all the living and the dead.

(Full text: http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Dead)
I really liked Dubliners. Haven't tried Ulysses or Finnegans Wake yet, and I'm not anxious to without some serious guidance, but Dubliners is very readable.

And while I'm in my junior-year English mood, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.

Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question…
Oh, do not ask, "What is it?"
Let us go and make our visit.

I love that poem so much. One of the few I've bothered to memorize, though I forget most of it now.

Of course, neither of these is really that applicable to most games, unless they're going to be seriously narration-heavy. Dialogue (and character development and whatnot) is a whole different ballgame.

[Captain_404]

I believe good writing is applicable anywhere.

[ThePortalGuru]

I couldn't agree more with JaJitsu's previous post citing Hitchhiker's Guide.  I adore Douglas Adam's style of writing.  It manages to be intelligent and funny without ever coming off as overly complicated.

[Jrsquee]

Damn, I love E. E. Cummings. His language is all topsy-turvy and curls and collapses around itself. Soooo good. He was even writing like that when he was little!

The seeds of Cummings' unconventional style appear well established even in his earliest work. At age six, he wrote to his father:

    FATHER DEAR. BE, YOUR FATHER-GOOD AND GOOD,
    HE IS GOOD NOW, IT IS NOT GOOD TO SEE IT RAIN,
    FATHER DEAR IS, IT, DEAR, NO FATHER DEAR,
    LOVE, YOU DEAR,
    ESTLIN.

People often think he's this weird experimental poet that uses bizarre structure and stuff, but really most of his work is in highly-structured forms like sonnets (or the following villanelle, for example). The only really weird thing is his stylistic lack of punctuation.

anyone lived in a pretty how town
(with up so floating many bells down)
spring summer autumn winter
he sang his didn't he danced his did

Women and men(both little and small)
cared for anyone not at all
they sowed their isn't they reaped their same
sun moon stars rain

children guessed(but only a few
and down they forgot as up they grew
autumn winter spring summer)
that noone loved him more by more

when by now and tree by leaf
she laughed his joy she cried his grief
bird by snow and stir by still
anyone's any was all to her

someones married their everyones
laughed their cryings and did their dance
(sleep wake hope and then)they
said their nevers they slept their dream

stars rain sun moon
(and only the snow can begin to explain
how children are apt to forget to remember
with up so floating many bells down)

one day anyone died i guess
(and noone stooped to kiss his face)
busy folk buried them side by side
little by little and was by was

all by all and deep by deep
and more by more they dream their sleep
noone and anyone earth by april
wish by spirit and if by yes.

Women and men(both dong and ding)
summer autumn winter spring
reaped their sowing and went their came
sun moon stars rain

[siiseli]

I'm surprised Hunter S. Thompson hasn't been mentioned yet. I hereby mention Hunter S. Thompson, hooray.

[thecatamites]

WYNDHAM LEWIS



to be fair the insane typography is a large part of what makes it great but the writing is wonderfully bilious/fractured as well. you should read this pdf... don't be a fool by missing out on this pdf... there are great things, inside this pdf...

[Jrsquee]

http://www.timecube.com/

Man evolves from teenager -

in cube metamorphosis

but ignores teenager to worship a male mother,

guised in woman's garb,

churchman called father.

[Dustin Smith]

Hunter S. Thompson is great stuff, I blame him for my disjointed reviewing style. Chuck Palahniuk is a great minimalist author; Bret Easton Ellis is too nihilistic for my liking, but I really love me some Raymond Carver. Kafka has style, and sure, I'd love to have The Castle in game form, but his writing style isn't something I'd personally emulate*.

thanks thecatamites, downloading the pdf as i type.


*probably because I can't.