Month / February 2006

by Edward Champion

The Red Badge of Experiential Courage

Ocracoke Post compares Vollmann and Stephen Crane, noting that their respective work falls into adventure journalism. J.M. Tyree offers some fascinating comparisons (both authors were attracted to prostitutes in their early fiction), pointing out that the books that critics have singled out “historical fiction” as their greatest accomplishments (Europe Central and The Red Badge of Courage).

I’d venture one further comparison. Both authors plunged themselves hard into exotic settings before writing about them. And yet with these two books, one might argue that they are the most imagined. Vollmann, of course, did not observe World War II, save through the copious books at his disposal. Crane never observed a single battle.

In fact, what makes EC such an interesting departure from previous Vollmann novels is the way that EC‘s “narrator as guide,” a stylistic device found to varying degrees in nearly all of Vollmann’s work, is even more imagined this time around. The “narrator” often serves as a proletariat who seems to know all the inside and intimate dirt about top Party officials and the like, often referring to the reader as “comrade.”

It would seem that the early real-world obsessions that both Vollmann and Crane essentially gave them license to invent the world of danger in their later ficiton.

by Edward Champion

Or It Could Be That Nobody Real Likes a Whiner, No Matter How Talented

Could it be that DFW’s fussiness with public appearances is losing converts? Or at least causing the staunch support of DFW zealots to waver? Counterbalance has posted her conclusion of “DFW on the Installment Plan” and opines, “But then, somewhere, I lost my crush. His sermon from the mount veered into the realm of too preachy, too misunderstood-genius-artist for me. And it pissed me off. I began to feel that I had to — if at all possible — separate the man from the writing. But is such a thing possible? Necessary?…Perhaps that is why he doesn’t do readings & interviews. His self-referential musings that charm on the page seem somehow inappropriate and lofty in person. Almost vulgar.”

by Edward Champion

Feminists More Fragmented Than the Left

Bad Feminist — a fascinating and eclectic new blog examining this issue, happily added to the blogroll.

Here’s one thought from BF that nobody bothered to proffer: “But why shouldn’t the female representative in the political blogosphere engage earnestly with issues like health care and national security rather than packaging them like a pink puffy confection on acid? Since leaving Wonkette, Cox has joined the rank of post-blogger novelists with her new book, Dog Days, described as ‘a light comedy of Washington power, halfway between Primary Colors and Sex and the City,’ and filled with zingers like ‘their bodies were both campaign-white and campaign-soft. . . . During an election year D.C.’s standards of attractiveness — already graded on a generous curve — tracked to availability. . . .’ Sorry for the bad feminist moment, but I can’t help but feel that Cox was anointed as the token woman for the same reason so many are: she looks pretty sitting on that pundit’s couch.”

by Edward Champion

Podcasting Authors

While Slushpile is busy noting any and all Jay McInerney developments, it should be noted that McInerney, perhaps taking a cue from Cory Doctorow, might be the first big author to exploit podcasting beyond mere chapter excerpts. McInerney has been providing excerpts from his readings, and it looks like he’ll be offering other goodies far beyond this. There are only two podcasts so far. But if this is representative of what authors plan to do with the form, I hope we’ll see more of it.

by Edward Champion

Give Burgess a Chance

Colin Burrow on the new Anthony Burgess bio (and more): “Burgess’s confused and not quite nasty response to his times (it is not quite nasty because it is so clearly a pose) makes it extremely hard to assess how good he is. There are those who think he was a miracle of style. Others regard him as a verbalist, someone who could perceive no reality beyond words, who liked the bigger ones the best, and who wanted his readers to cry out with ‘ahs’ and ‘ohs’ as they reached for their dictionaries….But despite all the show there can be a kind of brilliance in his work. Burgess is at his best, and his funniest, when he is a grammarian and a phonologist.”

by Edward Champion

A Special Note to Return of the Reluctant Readers

[EDITOR’S NOTE: After Mr. Champion made an appearance on a nationally syndicated talk show and was told by his agent to “go jump into a lake,” the powers that be (namely, the telling impetus of self-preservation) demanded that he follow the examples of others and write the following note to aid future readers who peruse his blog.]

Return of the Reluctant is about linking to news stories I am unlikely to remember and about fabricating some of the stupid ideas that mesh within my mind. While there have been references here to shrooms, alcohol and masturbation in the past three weeks, this does not necessarily mean that I am a Hunter S. Thompson type regularly engaging in these activities. As has been accurately revealed by nearly every person who has commented on my posts, there is something suspect about a litblogger who is into occasional cross-dressing and who has repeatedly claimed that he beat Sir Edmund Hilary to Everest. Never mind that I probably never set foot in New Zealand and that my birth certificate states that I was born many years after Hilary reached the summit. But I still maintain that I wrote primarily from memory and that if my head recalls the wintry weather atop Everest during the Eisenhower administration and the partial frostbite I contracted on the climb back down, then it must be true!

During the process of writing this blog, I embellished many details about my sexual experiences. In 2005, there was, in fact, a longer time period between two fuck buddies than I initially reported. It was personal shame which provoked the impulse. No, I did not fuck 2,200 midgets in a cramped Westin suite over a 72-hour period. No, my cock isn’t eighteen inches long. It is considerably smaller.

Yes, I have desired to wear a bustier and a garter so that I might be able to impress some of my hunky West Coast peers such as Scott Esposito and Mark Sarvas. Unfortunately, both gentlemen have rebuffed my advances and I have spent many hours in therapy trying to come to terms with my self-worth.

I didn’t chronicle any of this in my blog because the last thing the world needed was another blog about a balding loser who couldn’t get laid. You wanted a tale of a blogger overcoming his addiction to cross-dressing and learning to copulate without a sartorial complement.

Well, dear readers, I gave you that tale and made a tidy sum. And I have no regrets about any of it. Ultimately, it’s a story, the kind of thing you’ll see turned into Lifetime TV movies.

I’m still very much riding the horse. I’m still on the path and I hope, ultimately, I’ll get there. Preferably in boxers rather than panties.

Edward Champion
San Francisco
January 2006

by Edward Champion

Monty Python Predicted It in 1972!

Not too long ago, I attended a quiet party (and wrote about my experience and lost a 3,000 word post about this). My basic conclusion was that a quiet party involved the same principles as a meat market. My wit, my esoteric references and my sonnets (in true meter!) were lost upon the women who I was “flirting” with via 3×5 cards. They wanted more declarative sentences and debauchery. Well, fair enough. But I had a good time and somehow managed to finagle a date out of it.

Now, however, I think I’ve found a dating alternative in which I may have a distinct advantage: literary speed dating. Although it’s a bit criminal to have only six minutes (well, more like two or three really, given that there’s another person) to discuss William Gaddis’s The Recognition. It’s not unlike the Summarize Proust Competition. In fact, some of the dateless participants mght indeed have “masturbation” as a hobby! (via Sarvas)

by Edward Champion

Wenclas Covers Up Nasdijj Worship

Radosh has the scoop. Apparently, the ULA’s ability to detect charlatans only applies in hindsight. (via Number One Hit Song)

Incidentally, the ULA cache claims that the source came from edrants. But I should point out that it was the imposter who identified himself as “Nasdijj” who left a comment, not me.

In the meantime, to prove that I am not a demi-puppet, I publicly challenge King Wenclas to talk about these inconsistencies and other issues on The Bat Segundo Show, if he dares. King, if you’re out there, you know my email. If so, drop me your phone #. Do you have what it takes to tango with the Bat?

by Edward Champion

Today Takes Us Elsewhere…

…but…