Worst of all is when certain folks knowingly spoil something and then right afterwards sarcastically say “spoiler alert for a 10 year old thing by the way”, mocking the audience.
"Sorry for spoiling a 400-year-old play!" Yeah, well, I ain't four-hundred years old. I've only been around for 35 years, and there's a lot of books to cover!
In defence of Penguin classics, I do almost always appreciate the footnotes. They _actually_ give context where needed, and just straight up tell me what an old timey word means that I would never have known
Yes completely, but I didn’t need to spend my morning reading 40+ pages of Pushkin life, the effect of the December revolution and key points from the book. Just put it at the end
Dune's preface: So anyway, this is what Frank Herbert thought of this character, which earned him hate mail from fans when he made his point much more apparent in these later books.
Best thing about Dune is that the actual characters in the book just tell you everything that's going to happen. No need for spoilers in the preface, the characters do it for you.
“Albert’s uncle says I ought to have put this in the preface, but I never read prefaces, and it is not much good writing things just for people to skip.” - E. Nesbit
Thank you for saying what my teachers always said. We always skip the prefaces and forwards. Prologue is usually fine bc it’s part of the narrative just outside of it.
Sometimes the prologue is just chapter one, or chapter zero I guess you could say, where the inciting incident occurs. Calling it a prologue just makes it fancier and more impending.
@@Selrisitai Right. But the Forward and/or Preface rarely ever is. A few writers try to play with the medium by making it important, but the moment you discover that's how they're playing it (presumably from the huge number of plot-relevant footnotes or whathaveyou), you might go back and read the preface and smile.
I haven’t read Warrior Cats, but it is a common motif in classical, medieval, and renaissance literature, particularly tragedies, to begin with a prologue that “spoils” the story (though not all of its elements) in order to give the impression that it is a well-known legend and that it’s (likely unfortunate) conclusion is a dreaded inevitability. The characters not knowing the ending like you do serves as dramatic irony and a desperate, and ultimately failed, attempt to avoid fate. If the prologue was like that in Warrior Cats, it was probably an artistic choice on the author’s part, unlike what is in this video which is more so written by and for scholars.
@@sylph8005 the only problem with how its done is that it makes the characters look dumb for bringing it up so many times but not considering the dogs to be a problem until it results in the injuring of an apprentice (apprentices are like cat teens who train to become either warriors or healers) and the death of another. its less about tragedy foreshadowing in general being bad and more that it either should have been written better or should have been removed (to clarify this is meant as a respectful comment and not a rude one)
@@nicholasmartin534 Dogs are released in the prologue shouting a phrase that would've been a really good clue if it wasn't spoiled right at the beginning, and then the next 2/3 or so of the book is spent worrying so much about the mysterious dark threat in the forest which is immensely boring for the reader
In terms of the Western canon (broadly speaking) if there is a tragedy from the classical, medieval, or renaissance periods, the protagonist will do, if not many or all of the other characters
This happened to me with Absalom Absalom lol. The preface went into a deep thematic discussion of what the book was about and I was like “thanks I was actually hoping to draw those conclusions from reading it myself but being told works too I guess”
But see, in Romeo & Juliet, "spoiling" the plot is the entire _point._ We're _supposed_ to go through the story already knowing that they will die and sitting with that dread. It's like stories that start with "this is the story of how I died." The introduction to R&J is part of the play, and people watching the play would've received that spoiler too. Whereas prefaces and forwards are not part of the original story.
Nah in Romeo and Juliette and stories that have that ‘this is how it ends’ the point is to be on edge knowing what the characters don’t. You see them fall in love and can’t help but want to scream at them not to because you know it can’t end well. it’s like the tension from knowing the bomb is planted under the table and not knowing of the characters will notice.
That's an old, classic tragedy performance. The audience is intended to know that things won't end well so that it can add to the dread which is actually extremely common among old tragedies.
While the prose speaks for itself, I found the circular chamber of Clemens’ childhood to be somewhat on-the-nose as a metaphor, which made the eventual reveal that his captor was his father all too predictable. Three stars out of five.
This happened to me when I read the preface to War of the Worlds. While it is nice to know how HG Wells got some of his ideas, I would have better appreciated it at the end. Prefaces are like watching the Director's commentary before watching the movie. I never read them.
I don't even read the back of the book anymore. I just like books and usually if I hear about a book or get it recommended, that's enough for me. One too many times I've had the back-of-book pitch or inside cover tell me something as if it's what kicks off events in the first act, only for it to be a twist two thirds of the way in.
I despise the "this thing has been out for this long it's okay to spoil mentality." Okay that's cool this thing is thirty years old I wasn't alive in 1994 when it came out. Even then, it's still not okay if the person just missed it. These are all just justifications from jerks who enjoy spoiling stories.
Fr. Like, is putting a warning REALLY all that much effort? Oftentimes when people make this argument, the point they're trying to make is that "it's already widespread cultural knowledge so we shouldn't have to bother" and that is to some extend understandable, for example people aren't exactly putting spoiler warnings over memesa about Vader being Lukes father, but if something isn't a complete and utter cultural icon that you can just assume everyone knows about, there's really no reason not to put a warning
I always thought it was scholars who don't care about plot assuming people were picking them up to examine and pick them apart for syntax and symbolism like they do, not to actually read and enjoy the story.
If I know someone is putting in effort to read a certain book series from years ago or something I'll hold my tongue about what happens. But if they've never expressed an interest in watching Fight Club, I'm not going to protect them from the twist just so that they can maybe one day watch it without the twist. I don't like the spoiler mentality because it betrays a lack of attachment to the stories themselves. If a story is ruined by your knowledge of it, then it wasn't a good story to begin with.
@@EzaleaGraves Saying a story is "ruined" by spoilers is usually an exaggeration, but there are plenty of stories that are much more meaningful if you can experience them without knowing the twist ahead of time, and then you can go back and experience it again with that knowledge for a different experience
The Vintage International edition of Nabokov’s Invitation to a Beheading spoils the ending in the blurb on the back. I think it actually just flat out summarizes the last page.
I recently read Stephen King's Pet Semetary, having never seen any of the adaptations. In the preface he spoils a major event about halfway through the book and heavily hints at the ending. That said, King does have a bad habit of spoiling events in the prose, as if he's so excited to get to that part of the story that he can't control himself. "And that was the last time she was ever in his house" and that sort of thing. He does it in many of his books.
I read the preface of pet semetary and read the story until he was like "And I didn't know that this day would be my last happy one". I just said nope, I can't do this- and closed the book. Never went back for it because I knew exactly what was waiting in the pages. Too creepy for me. In a way, that heavy spoiler saved me.
Note to self: Don't write a preface. Okay, but seriously... everything shown in this is what belongs AFTER the prose. This actually is fine to include, but at the end, not the beginning.
I've been watching your videos for about a year, and it's incredible to see how much your writing and acting chops have grown in that time. It's inspiring to watch. Keep it up.
Preface: this monumental book is widely known for its complex third act twist that’s been built up for the entire novel right under the reader’s nose. Make sure to pay attention to any sentence starting in ‘Y’! (The preface is half the length of the story)
The worst part is when the preface offers a really good analysis of the book's themes... but refers to a bunch of characters and plot points that I don't know about.
Whoa whoa whoa! The preface from the 2008 re-translation of 'It Has Been Said..." does contain valuable context for how this story is subtle satire of the political climate in post-war Italy where it was first published. Also the reveal after it's publication that Samuel Frederald Levitt had been a member of the SS during WWII and the subsequent controversy it caused an interesting piece of literary history. I didn't realize you were such an anti-intellectual!
Honestly, I prefer this to the preface of The Scarlet Letter. 42 pages of Nathaniel Hawthorne rambling on and on with far too many commas, in an introduction that has literally no relevance to the actual book. The book itself is already unpleasant enough, I don’t need 42 pages of similarly structured irrelevance
I literally just watched booktuber Michael K Vaughan's video where he says that Stephen King spoiled the ending to The Running Man in the preface he wrote FOR HIS OWN BOOK.
This is why I never bothered with a preface. I can always google the author or the book if I want to learn about its history. Just give me the story that I signed up for.
Author interviews too. I listened to Tyler Cowen's new interview of Neil Stephenson about Polostan last night. Cowen asks him about the name of the book and he goes "Well, toward the end of the book..."
The Preface and a Introductory Chapters of Penguin Books: yeah, let's just go ahead and spoil the whole thing. If we could just clarify and tell you the whole plot in 20 pages, that would be great.
I'm reading Macbeth in school though, there was totally no way I could have known that the main character in one of Shakespeare's plays would ever die. Why'd you have to spoil that?
Yeah, I also read the preface after reading the rest of the book... and the prologue too, because _some_ publishers seem to think that both words are interchageable 🙄
My teachers always had us read the preface and forewords so we would have context. I always hated it because it told the story we were literally about to read in a worse way. If we need cultural context, that's the teacher's job.
I guess the best preface I can think of is the preface to the Communist Manifesto since it is truly iconic and knowing what communism can accomplish and how it is what the ruling class doesn’t want you to know only hypes you up for the rest of the book.
5:13 i hate it when people say something like "well this movie came out in 1970, so you should know it" "its a 400 year old play" yeah fun fact im not 400 years old, i didn't have that much time to read/watch it
What's the point of a preface when most of us have already read a synopsis or at least been told the general idea of a story by someone who has recommended a work? If I wanted context outside of the work, I'd look it up, because that's something we can do in the 21st century.
I like prefaces, but I oftentimes don't read them because it tends to be a rundown of how much more bright, accomplished, lucky and worldly the writer of the book is than myself. I'm trying to become a writer, and although I'm still young enough that it wouldn't be unusual, I'm also not nearly as experienced at large as a lot of these people, nor naturally gifted, I think, beyond a general competence with the language.
😤 Preface, and I mean The Character Reading 📖! Is a Two-Faced sequence of Words at the beginning of the Book!!! 😠 … and don’t get me started on the summaries at the beginning of most early Renaissance Works! 😞
This is why I tend to just skip the preface of a book, unless it's a non-fiction book, or a book where I feel like I can't be spoiled any further because it's so famous that there's already tons of spoilers in popular culture, like when I first read Frankenstein, it had a preface, and I read that too because fuck it, not like I didn't already know most of the plot.
Yep. I feel this. I bought this Japanese classic to READ Japanese literature, not read ABOUT Japanese literature being babbled on by an American professor. It's not MY fault the only English edition is from the University of Hawaii.
Your thumbnail and title spoiled this video...
Sorry.
The video's been out since today. Basically every kindergartner can recite it.
@@christoferguson My infant can recite the book, if I had one.
Don't forget that once you finish the preface, you've still got the foreword, the introduction and the "Notes on this new edition" to endure too.
Ha ha!
" Notes on the new edition " 😂😂
This is a secret trick not many know, but did you know that you can just skip all of that shit and start reading the real book?
Only if you're reading "Lord of The Rings."
I hate the "it's a x years old book", it doesn't matter! I had only like 20 years to read stuff. I wasn't born with knowledge
Spoilers are timeless. Don't ruin somebody's experience just because
Thank you! I've never understood that. There's always people who haven't read it yet, especially younger people just growing up.
Worst of all is when certain folks knowingly spoil something and then right afterwards sarcastically say “spoiler alert for a 10 year old thing by the way”, mocking the audience.
@@Zolanum Yep! Some people enjoy doing it. I think that is so nasty. Why do that to someone?
FINALLY some sane people.
"Sorry for spoiling a 400-year-old play!"
Yeah, well, I ain't four-hundred years old. I've only been around for 35 years, and there's a lot of books to cover!
For hardcore spoiler avoidance, things to skip: synopses, dramatis personaes, (titled) chapter indexes, prefaces.
I can't skip chapters title 😂
And the entirety of The Book Thief, because the narrator spoils the entire story halfway through because, and I quote, "Suspense bores me."
Also occasionally even UA-cam comments sections on unrelated videos :(
(happened to me with a show I was watching)
Don’t forget the blurb. Those things can be terrible
Ender's Game was spoiled for me when I noticed how few pages were left before the end.
In defence of Penguin classics, I do almost always appreciate the footnotes. They _actually_ give context where needed, and just straight up tell me what an old timey word means that I would never have known
Yes completely, but I didn’t need to spend my morning reading 40+ pages of Pushkin life, the effect of the December revolution and key points from the book. Just put it at the end
I keep a dictionary handy when reading old books. It's a wonderful experience of its own.
The _footnotes_
@@renskedunnewold1995 Joshi’s notes on the penguin (I think) editions of Howard Lovecraft’s books really help.
Dune's preface: So anyway, this is what Frank Herbert thought of this character, which earned him hate mail from fans when he made his point much more apparent in these later books.
I've read Dune. But guess what? This is new to me. Why?
*Because I skipped the preface.*
Best thing about Dune is that the actual characters in the book just tell you everything that's going to happen. No need for spoilers in the preface, the characters do it for you.
@@EzaleaGraves "chani i think im gonna jihad" "oh no paul dont jihad that'd be bad" "the golden path chani, the golden path"
“Albert’s uncle says I ought to have put this in the preface, but I never read prefaces, and it is not much good writing things just for people to skip.”
- E. Nesbit
"The Treasure Seekers"? :D
Thank you for saying what my teachers always said. We always skip the prefaces and forwards.
Prologue is usually fine bc it’s part of the narrative just outside of it.
Sometimes the prologue is just chapter one, or chapter zero I guess you could say, where the inciting incident occurs. Calling it a prologue just makes it fancier and more impending.
@@Selrisitai Right. But the Forward and/or Preface rarely ever is. A few writers try to play with the medium by making it important, but the moment you discover that's how they're playing it (presumably from the huge number of plot-relevant footnotes or whathaveyou), you might go back and read the preface and smile.
just don't read anything that wasn't written by the author
The fifth book of Warrior Cats. 250 pages of mystery completely ruined by the prologue. Rare W for prologue skippers
ayyyy
It's been years since I have read it. Would you mind refreshing my memory on what happened?
I haven’t read Warrior Cats, but it is a common motif in classical, medieval, and renaissance literature, particularly tragedies, to begin with a prologue that “spoils” the story (though not all of its elements) in order to give the impression that it is a well-known legend and that it’s (likely unfortunate) conclusion is a dreaded inevitability. The characters not knowing the ending like you do serves as dramatic irony and a desperate, and ultimately failed, attempt to avoid fate. If the prologue was like that in Warrior Cats, it was probably an artistic choice on the author’s part, unlike what is in this video which is more so written by and for scholars.
@@sylph8005 the only problem with how its done is that it makes the characters look dumb for bringing it up so many times but not considering the dogs to be a problem until it results in the injuring of an apprentice (apprentices are like cat teens who train to become either warriors or healers) and the death of another. its less about tragedy foreshadowing in general being bad and more that it either should have been written better or should have been removed (to clarify this is meant as a respectful comment and not a rude one)
@@nicholasmartin534 Dogs are released in the prologue shouting a phrase that would've been a really good clue if it wasn't spoiled right at the beginning, and then the next 2/3 or so of the book is spent worrying so much about the mysterious dark threat in the forest which is immensely boring for the reader
I had somehow managed to avoid that Macbeth spoiler up until now, but alright. Sacrifices must be made for entertainment, generic though it may be
I haven't read it since high school so I actually muted that bit because I do want to read it again sometime. LOL!
I've never read it either, but I don't have any interest in those stories, so no big deal for me. Still annoying though.
In terms of the Western canon (broadly speaking) if there is a tragedy from the classical, medieval, or renaissance periods, the protagonist will do, if not many or all of the other characters
Go watch Akira Kurosawa's Throne of Blood (if you're okay with subtitles or speak Japanese), no reason in particular...
Well, it's a tragedy, so at least it's not that much of a surprise.
This happened to me with Absalom Absalom lol. The preface went into a deep thematic discussion of what the book was about and I was like “thanks I was actually hoping to draw those conclusions from reading it myself but being told works too I guess”
It feels like the preface should have its own preface.
the preface is the preface for the foreword.
childishly annoyed Preface is the highlight of my day so far
I have only ever started prefaces, after the third one I was like, "Yeah nah, I ain't doin this." Never finished any of em.
The train sounds at the end really are a nice touch. Really gets me in the head space of this train loving author
I think that’s a drum
Basically Romeo & Juliet.
But see, in Romeo & Juliet, "spoiling" the plot is the entire _point._ We're _supposed_ to go through the story already knowing that they will die and sitting with that dread. It's like stories that start with "this is the story of how I died."
The introduction to R&J is part of the play, and people watching the play would've received that spoiler too. Whereas prefaces and forwards are not part of the original story.
Nah in Romeo and Juliette and stories that have that ‘this is how it ends’ the point is to be on edge knowing what the characters don’t. You see them fall in love and can’t help but want to scream at them not to because you know it can’t end well. it’s like the tension from knowing the bomb is planted under the table and not knowing of the characters will notice.
@@chloej1611 plus Shakespeare wrote the 'spoiling part' of Romeo and Juliet, often prefaces aren't written by the author.
“What do you mean the story is laid in fair Verona? Spoilers!”
That's an old, classic tragedy performance. The audience is intended to know that things won't end well so that it can add to the dread which is actually extremely common among old tragedies.
While the prose speaks for itself, I found the circular chamber of Clemens’ childhood to be somewhat on-the-nose as a metaphor, which made the eventual reveal that his captor was his father all too predictable. Three stars out of five.
This happened to me when I read the preface to War of the Worlds. While it is nice to know how HG Wells got some of his ideas, I would have better appreciated it at the end. Prefaces are like watching the Director's commentary before watching the movie. I never read them.
We got some serious Samuel Ferdinald Leavitt lore today
I don't even read the back of the book anymore. I just like books and usually if I hear about a book or get it recommended, that's enough for me. One too many times I've had the back-of-book pitch or inside cover tell me something as if it's what kicks off events in the first act, only for it to be a twist two thirds of the way in.
I despise the "this thing has been out for this long it's okay to spoil mentality."
Okay that's cool this thing is thirty years old I wasn't alive in 1994 when it came out. Even then, it's still not okay if the person just missed it.
These are all just justifications from jerks who enjoy spoiling stories.
Especially since if something is really old, it’s usually going to be very good because people can look past its age (e.g. Shakespeare’s plays).
Fr. Like, is putting a warning REALLY all that much effort? Oftentimes when people make this argument, the point they're trying to make is that "it's already widespread cultural knowledge so we shouldn't have to bother" and that is to some extend understandable, for example people aren't exactly putting spoiler warnings over memesa about Vader being Lukes father, but if something isn't a complete and utter cultural icon that you can just assume everyone knows about, there's really no reason not to put a warning
I always thought it was scholars who don't care about plot assuming people were picking them up to examine and pick them apart for syntax and symbolism like they do, not to actually read and enjoy the story.
If I know someone is putting in effort to read a certain book series from years ago or something I'll hold my tongue about what happens. But if they've never expressed an interest in watching Fight Club, I'm not going to protect them from the twist just so that they can maybe one day watch it without the twist.
I don't like the spoiler mentality because it betrays a lack of attachment to the stories themselves. If a story is ruined by your knowledge of it, then it wasn't a good story to begin with.
@@EzaleaGraves Saying a story is "ruined" by spoilers is usually an exaggeration, but there are plenty of stories that are much more meaningful if you can experience them without knowing the twist ahead of time, and then you can go back and experience it again with that knowledge for a different experience
The Vintage International edition of Nabokov’s Invitation to a Beheading spoils the ending in the blurb on the back. I think it actually just flat out summarizes the last page.
I recently read Stephen King's Pet Semetary, having never seen any of the adaptations. In the preface he spoils a major event about halfway through the book and heavily hints at the ending.
That said, King does have a bad habit of spoiling events in the prose, as if he's so excited to get to that part of the story that he can't control himself. "And that was the last time she was ever in his house" and that sort of thing. He does it in many of his books.
I read the preface of pet semetary and read the story until he was like "And I didn't know that this day would be my last happy one". I just said nope, I can't do this- and closed the book. Never went back for it because I knew exactly what was waiting in the pages. Too creepy for me. In a way, that heavy spoiler saved me.
this is unironically why I couldn't read crime and punishment. Someone has finally put my frustrations into words
Note to self: Don't write a preface.
Okay, but seriously... everything shown in this is what belongs AFTER the prose. This actually is fine to include, but at the end, not the beginning.
Why do you have my blanket?
Idk, I got it in a market in Mexico City. I guess somebody stole it from you and sold it to me there?
damn@@genericallyentertaining
I'm in complete agreement. I always skip the prefice. I sometimes read it at the end. I've only found 2 prefaces that have added something of value.
He wasn't going to spoil it until you did him like that.
5:15 So has Academia itself.
They don't deserve it lol
Samuel Ferdinal Lewitt is my favorite author. The novel "Waiting a Hundred Years for Manhattan" is just pure brilliance.
I actually really like supplemental material in stories.
I do too, actually. Norton Critical Editions are my favorite editions of classic books. I'm being extremely hypocritical by posting this.
@@genericallyentertaining you are hereby forgiven
and I'll even throw a blessing while I'm at it
@@genericallyentertaining I do too. But I try to avoid it until after I read the book and form my own view about it.
@@Yesica1993 But do you come back and read it after?
@@fixyourshoes Ha! I think sometimes I do. But maybe not always.
I'm just here for the Levitt lore, it's really hard to get the edition with this preface
I just got an AI-gen summary of this five minute video
Wait, Macbeth dies!?! Now I can’t watch the movie 😢
I've been watching your videos for about a year, and it's incredible to see how much your writing and acting chops have grown in that time. It's inspiring to watch. Keep it up.
Preface: this monumental book is widely known for its complex third act twist that’s been built up for the entire novel right under the reader’s nose. Make sure to pay attention to any sentence starting in ‘Y’! (The preface is half the length of the story)
why is this too accurate lmao
Petition to move prefaces to the END of the book, please.
The premise of, "It has Been Said," reminds me of, "Life is a Dream," by Pedro Calderón de la Barca.
The teacher never skips the fkn preface
*traumatisierte Corpus Delicti flashbacks*
The Passive-Aggressiveness of this is beautiful, also, that last paragraph, chilling.
Preface be like:
"Snape Killed Dumbledore."
The worst part is when the preface offers a really good analysis of the book's themes... but refers to a bunch of characters and plot points that I don't know about.
If you're plagued by spoilers in the preface, just be glad it's not like the titles of Chinese manhuas.
It took me too long to remember that preface and prologue are different things
Haven't read it but based on the preface I'm getting Oldboy meets Telltale Heart energy. Hey, I bet I could write a preface now.
Whoa whoa whoa! The preface from the 2008 re-translation of 'It Has Been Said..." does contain valuable context for how this story is subtle satire of the political climate in post-war Italy where it was first published. Also the reveal after it's publication that Samuel Frederald Levitt had been a member of the SS during WWII and the subsequent controversy it caused an interesting piece of literary history. I didn't realize you were such an anti-intellectual!
"You have no respect for academia!"
CORRECT!
Honestly, I prefer this to the preface of The Scarlet Letter. 42 pages of Nathaniel Hawthorne rambling on and on with far too many commas, in an introduction that has literally no relevance to the actual book. The book itself is already unpleasant enough, I don’t need 42 pages of similarly structured irrelevance
You should do a video about how the description on the book jacket often spoils a book.
They should give the intro to the book after the book lmao
I usually skip any preface or introduction not written by the author
Бронеслав Арсений Степанов - best author of all time, he's like our national treasure
This is hilarious how do you not have more subscribers
Good thing i love knowing what happens before i read (mostly watch)
Brilliant.
Wait Macbeth dies?
If I had one bad tooth, I would not have all my teeth taken out.
I literally just watched booktuber Michael K Vaughan's video where he says that Stephen King spoiled the ending to The Running Man in the preface he wrote FOR HIS OWN BOOK.
Basically trailers spoiling movies
I only read the preface on a reread of a book.
I prefer Mr Prologue. Sir Preface is mean :(
gotta love the Levitt lore drop
This is why I never bothered with a preface. I can always google the author or the book if I want to learn about its history. Just give me the story that I signed up for.
Author interviews too. I listened to Tyler Cowen's new interview of Neil Stephenson about Polostan last night. Cowen asks him about the name of the book and he goes "Well, toward the end of the book..."
You are literally the funniest comic
I was laughing so hard! Because IT'S SO TRUE!
The Preface and a Introductory Chapters of Penguin Books: yeah, let's just go ahead and spoil the whole thing. If we could just clarify and tell you the whole plot in 20 pages, that would be great.
To be fair, Macbeth is a tragedy, & that's how most tragedies end.
I'm reading Macbeth in school though, there was totally no way I could have known that the main character in one of Shakespeare's plays would ever die. Why'd you have to spoil that?
Watching this directly after reading the 48 pg long preface to eugene onegin
Yeah, I also read the preface after reading the rest of the book... and the prologue too, because _some_ publishers seem to think that both words are interchageable 🙄
This is why I don't read any books written after 1891. Or beg 1891
Woot! Permission to not read intros and prefaces granted! Thanks cool book man! :3
Definitely read it afterwards.
Preface to an Agatha Christie 💀
My teachers always had us read the preface and forewords so we would have context. I always hated it because it told the story we were literally about to read in a worse way.
If we need cultural context, that's the teacher's job.
I guess the best preface I can think of is the preface to the Communist Manifesto since it is truly iconic and knowing what communism can accomplish and how it is what the ruling class doesn’t want you to know only hypes you up for the rest of the book.
Wait, it's just Oldboy, but with an opposite-generational twist?
Shortest Norton Critical Edition
5:13 i hate it when people say something like "well this movie came out in 1970, so you should know it" "its a 400 year old play" yeah fun fact im not 400 years old, i didn't have that much time to read/watch it
That book sounds actually interesting. I wish I could read it!
dammit, actually spoiled Macbeth
The first episode I saw of breaking bad was the shows finale . The first episode I saw of game of thrones was the red wedding episode . . .
that's on you tho
the oxford worlds classics version of the moonstone got me in the explanatory notes. why john sutherland? why?
it has been said
What's the point of a preface when most of us have already read a synopsis or at least been told the general idea of a story by someone who has recommended a work? If I wanted context outside of the work, I'd look it up, because that's something we can do in the 21st century.
I like prefaces, but I oftentimes don't read them because it tends to be a rundown of how much more bright, accomplished, lucky and worldly the writer of the book is than myself. I'm trying to become a writer, and although I'm still young enough that it wouldn't be unusual, I'm also not nearly as experienced at large as a lot of these people, nor naturally gifted, I think, beyond a general competence with the language.
My copy of Animal Farm literally did this
😤 Preface, and I mean The Character Reading 📖! Is a Two-Faced sequence of Words at the beginning of the Book!!! 😠
… and don’t get me started on the summaries at the beginning of most early Renaissance Works! 😞
What kind of physcopath reads the preface?
This is why I tend to just skip the preface of a book, unless it's a non-fiction book, or a book where I feel like I can't be spoiled any further because it's so famous that there's already tons of spoilers in popular culture, like when I first read Frankenstein, it had a preface, and I read that too because fuck it, not like I didn't already know most of the plot.
Woah woah woah, spoilers for Macbeth! I was going to get to that! Eventually.
me reading godel escher bach (i just wanna see cool math stories)
I've never read MacBeth, so this video actually spoiled me on it.
Not that I actually care, since I wasn't particularly planning on reading it.
Accurate
Yep. I feel this.
I bought this Japanese classic to READ Japanese literature, not read ABOUT Japanese literature being babbled on by an American professor.
It's not MY fault the only English edition is from the University of Hawaii.
I have never read macbeth.