I'm looking forward to the movie now

books:


	• Fight Club: A Novel Chuck Palahniuk W. W. Norton, 2005 - 224 pages average customer review:based on 632 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Better Than Expected

I don't know about you but I was obsessed with the Movie, so much so that I bought the book. I found the book to be much deeper and richer in the philosophical side of the story. Which gives the story a more profound, darker, and psycotic element, one that is not as prominent in the movie. But I still remain a huge fan of both. I enjoyed reading this book very much and would recommend it to anyone. Well deserving of 5 Stars.

You don't talk about fight club...

Chuck Palahniuk's novel "Fight Club" has become a cult classic since it was published in 1996. A controversial novel from the start, it has been debased as pretentious and trashy by some critics, and hailed as a masterwork by others. Whatever the case, "Fight Club" has become culturally significant enough to merit a reading no matter how pretentious you think it might be.

For its size, the plot of the novel runs pretty thick. It involves a sort of existential love triangle, philosophical musings on anarchy, and the infamous underground fight club which gives the book its name. The unnamed narrator has insomnia and is told to visit various support groups for ailments ranging from testicular cancer to blood parasites to see how bad it really can get, and develops an obsession with death. Somewhere along the way he meets Marla and Tyler, renders fat into soap, and starts fight club and a terrorist group aimed at destroying corporate America, culminating in an epic confrontation on `the tallest building in the world.'

The plot moves along at a fast pace due to Palahniuk's minimalist, to the point writing style. This `pop art' style can be thrilling to read but a little unfulfilling to the reader wanting more depth of language. In fact, the prose is quite ugly, and seems rather testosterone driven, but I have seen critics hail the style as reactionary, as well as some who claim that it's just poor writing.

One thing that did seem a little over the top, though, was the faux-Nietzschean philosophical ramblings of Tyler. I can only assume that he was supposed to inspire a profundity in the reader, but it all seemed rather contrived.

"Fight Club" is an efficient piece of fiction that is fun to read. It only takes a few hours to get through so it couldn't hurt to pick it up and give it a shot. Maybe you'll find something about his language more profound I was able to.

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awesome

this is an amazing book. if you've seen the movie there won't be any surprises, but the book goes more in depth into the concepts and such so the reader can get a firmer grasp on the ideas the author is trying to convey.

the story starts off with this guy who's going to these anonymous groups for people with terminal diseases, but he doesn't have a terminal disease. so right at the beginning of the book we have the main character searching out destruction as a way to solve his discontent. the cause of his discontent of course would be that he feels he doesn't belong within his own society, that his individual self has no presence when interacting with society as a whole. so the individual revolts against society, reasserting its authority over itself. and this would be the reason for fight club. what makes fight club so wonderfully appropriate as a beacon for the individual to rise up against society is that society finds the concept of fight club so abhorrent, it doesn't understand the logic. society's morality dictates that we are all special individuals that are to cherished. we are all special individuals... something of an paradox, but as we all sway to society's rhythm we can see the logic. but if we take this statement apart and apply it to our own lives, because the western world believes this to be true, generation me as an example, and yet we are all alienated and desire/ are forced to be the same. one of the mantra's in this book was 'i am not a special snow flake' or something to that effect. by denying society's morality, the individual recognizes their discontent and counters it (of course in real life the contrasting extreme is no better than what caused the trouble in the first place, but one very much deserves the other... and its great for symbolic purposes:P). the members of fight club act in a way that society does not comprehend so that the individual can gain autonomy over itself, wresting itself out of the numbing grasp of society. this would manifest itself as destructive behaviour, both towards the self and towards the other, desiring the loss of the individual in a crowd, looking beneath the superficiality we create around ourselves to present as an image, and presenting something unacceptable in its place.

besides the extreme need for society and the extreme need for the individual there is also the need for balance, hence there being three components to the novel. the aggravator, the aggravatee, and something detached from both. the aggravator would be society, whose desire is to quell individuality and can be found in characters that are 'normal' like the guy's boss, or the very motivation in each of our heads and within the scope of each character's awareness to conform to the bigger picture. the individual would contrast this in it's desire to rise up out of society establishing its autonomy over itself, and this can be found in the idea of fight club and those who believe in it's teachings. the third party would be able to see the benefits and flaws in both extremes, and that would be our narrator, or even the reader, and this person sees a need for both.. or a need for neither.

it was very symbolic, which i enjoyed, but if you're not the type that goes for symbolism... well it'll tap into your rebellion or something.. and it has the fighting (which is you revelling in the symbolism but denying it!). great book though. i recommend.

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Great Read!

Having watched the movie before reading the book, I found two things fairly interesting:

1.) The movie is 85% exactly the same as the book. However, the other 15% makes something of a difference.

2.) Already knowing the major plot twist, I was able to better appreciate the foreshadowing throughout the narrative.

If you've neither seen the film nor read the book, I honestly couldn't tell you which to experience first; however, if you've seen the film, don't write the book off as "ruined." I still enjoyed it a lot.

I'm looking forward to the movie now

I really enjoyed this book. I actually haven't seen the movie and surprisingly didn't know much about it. As a result, I read the book with open eyes, in much the same way that people did before Brad Pitt and Edward Norton beat each other senseless on the big screen.

I've read a couple of Palahniuk's other novels and have found them insightful and morbidly funny. Palahniuk has a reputation as an unflinching, cringe-inducing author. I have to admit that while parts of his other novels have been excellent, overall I've found them to be uneven.

Not so with Fight Club. I enjoyed it from start to finish.

There's some great dialogue in Fight Club and some sharp observations on male culture. Ultimately this is a satirical novel about men; specifically men who, in previous generations, would have worked the land or built things with their hands, but in today's world find themselves in mindless `grey collar' service jobs like waiters, chauffeurs, & low level office drones. These are men who have lost their identity, having neither power, nor the satisfaction of performing meaningful labour.

Fight Club may not be for everyone. It's a testosterone driven novel that, while tame by Palahniuk standards, may make some readers cringe.

Bottom Line: Palahniuk has a unique voice. Fight Club is sharp, lean, and remarkably entertaining. I highly recommend this novel and look forward to seeing the movie (finally).

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

The first rule about fight club is you don't talk about fight club.

Chuck Palahniuk's outrageous and startling debut novel that exploded American literature and spawned a movement. Every weekend, in the basements and parking lots of bars across the country, young men with white-collar jobs and failed lives take off their shoes and shirts and fight each other barehanded just as long as they have to. Then they go back to those jobs with blackened eyes and loosened teeth and the sense that they can handle anything. Fight club is the invention of Tyler Durden, projectionist, waiter, and dark, anarchic genius, and it's only the beginning of his plans for violent revenge on an empty consumer-culture world.

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