Well I didn't really call them shit. What I was sort of railing against were the professors who told me that if I didn't enjoy the writers I mentioned that it was my fault because I wasn't "getting it". I was on the Dean's list as an English major in college/university and I felt that I was "getting it" just fine I just wasn't enjoying it or appreciating it.
In regards to how I think. I sort of feel that I do think with pauses, stops, in a grammatical sort of fashion when I am concentrating on a subject. When I am sort of free floating in thought I guess stream of conciousness is a close approximation of how I would transcribe it although to do it properly it would take countless reams of text. (I am glad Joyce didn't do this or Ulysses would have been 18 volumes
I do enjoy re reading some of Joyce's other work very much and I love Pynchon's "The Crying of Lot 49". "Gravity's Rainbow" on the other hand is three weeks of my life that I am never getting back.
Finally I differ greatly that Ulysses is the most important book in 20th Century Lit. I would probably argue for Steinbeck or Faulkner for that but I am a bit predisposed towards American Realists. And boy am I in the minority in that nowadays.
Good discussion, thanks.