Comments on: David Ulin: A Books Editor to Be Deactivated

By: Lee

Lee — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 06:29:41 +0000

Another way of approaching this, Ed, is to ask if you mean that serious reading of fiction requires stepping away from the screen?

By: Lee

Lee — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 06:25:58 +0000

For me this is a particularly interesting discussion – here and elsewhere – since I publish my fiction first and foremost online. Obviously I’ve embraced some aspects of digital culture, but I can’t help noticing how it’s changed my own reading patterns. As a consequence it’s crucial to consider which expectations readers bring to the screen, which ways they are going to read – and whether my fiction will get the sort of attentive reading any serious writer appreciates.

By: Richard

Richard — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 23:41:00 +0000

“But if you’re blaming your reading deficiencies [...] on technology that you haven’t the ability or the discipline to control your contact with, then that’s egotistical projection.”

The problem with this sort of position is that it pretends that the external world, in this case technology, has no effect on us as individuals. That is, I am saying that my attention span has indeed been affected negatively by certain technologies. Could I manage or control this better? Of course I could. But it’s not easy. Whereas, minus the technology I wouldn’t have to make the same effort to simply discipline myself. You can say this is still my problem, and sure, it is, but it’s a problem that doesn’t exist in a vacuum. And just because you are able to manage your time wisely does not therefore mean that it might not be a general problem that people are not. (I should say I’m not addressing Ulin’s article at all, since I haven’t read it. I doubt it says much that is new on the topic.)

By: Andy

Andy — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 22:38:00 +0000

Ed, a failure to approach other perspectives? I certainly didn’t think that an essay (whatever its other deficiencies) that approached from a personal viewpoint the subject of the difficulty of finding time to read was required to weigh all other viewpoints. Do you think you would have liked it better had it been a reported piece? Or are you somehow referring to multiculturalism???

What I still don’t understand is why your attack on Ulin’s innocuous piece of fluff has at its center your insistence that Ulin’s quotation from Stop-Time is somehow sinisterly selective and misleading. The quote has nothing to do with technology and everything to do with exuberant and wide-ranging reading with no concern for “self-betterment” or nuanced understanding. This is bad, or…?

By: DrMabuse

DrMabuse — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 22:07:55 +0000

Andy: You can read anyway you want to. But if you’re blaming your reading deficiencies (and your failure to approach other perspectives, which seems more than a bit xenophobic to me) on technology that you haven’t the ability or the discipline to control your contact with, then that’s egotistical projection. By this logic, should I blame the digital age for not finishing Vollmann’s IMPERIAL? Not at all. That would be as foolish as blaming the author. The onus is on me. I’ll read it as long as I damn well need to. Because I enjoy reading, the rush of other people who are not me, the perspectives that I may have missed, the world’s many real offshoots.

Lee: A fair point, but one of the essay’s many fallacies is that it suggests that one cannot read and develop along the lines of what you describe while embracing the digital age. I don’t have a cell phone. I don’t have a Facebook account. These are non-essentials for me right now because I wish to live, to read, and to embrace other perspectives. It is possible to say no, to step away, while saying yes to the digital elements and helpful tools that don’t clutter your life.

By: Lee

Lee — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 15:46:51 +0000

Thinking further about your post, I feel that you may be misreading Ulin’s intent in quoting Conroy. Is Ulin really holding this up a model of reading to aspire to, rather than illustrating the ‘Werdegang’ of many mature readers?

By: Lee

Lee — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 15:25:26 +0000

I agree with Andy that the way we read at 17 isn’t the way we read at 27 or 37 or whatever7. Most of us start out reading for some form of escape/entertainment and get hooked. You have to live a bit – and read a lot – before you can begin to think about what you read (and maybe, if so inclined, how it works).

By: Andy

Andy — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 14:46:59 +0000

Geez, Ed, it’s hard to imagine there are that many 17-year-olds who read with the focus of Edmund Wilson. Qualitatively, Conroy’s (and Ulin’s) reading experience seems as valid as any other, it just serves a different end — that of immersive escape. Are you suggesting that one should never read that way, ever; or that there are certain authors who should never be read that way; or that an uncritical enthusiasm for indiscriminate reading is (a) inferior and/or (b) incapable of evolving into a more critical and systematic way of reading? If reading is “virtuous,” then that virtue inheres in the act itself, not in some useful or “higher” application of it.

By: Darby Dixon III

Darby Dixon III — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 01:53:05 +0000

Fuck moderation.

By: Anonapotamous

Anonapotamous — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 01:15:44 +0000

You’re right that I’ve written for the LAT, but I tried to stay anonymous because I didn’t want to be seen as having a conflict of interest. I guess there’s no avoiding that accusation, but I promise that any association I have with them is not the reason I’m calling for a little moderation, though that may not be believed.

Anyway, I really do admire your passion, Ed. It’s a great trait to have, and you are very knowledge about books and book-related matters. But I do think there are times when a few deep breaths (again, the recent Baker post comes to mind) might lead to a more nuanced point of view and an actual discussion.

By: DrMabuse

DrMabuse — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 00:17:00 +0000

Anonymatopoeia: It might help if you had the balls to use your real name. See, I did. And I would say everything I wrote to David Ulin’s face. You should probably note that you recently appeared in the Los Angeles Times and that your interest in defending Ulin stems, in all likelihood, from your interest in getting repeat work. It’s an understandable impulse. I was once like you. And I was used and dropped like a sack of potatoes. Rest assured: you will be too. None of this detracts from the overall point of my piece, which has to do with the false (and misread) virtue that Ulin is calling for here. I could care less about any “revenge” you wish to read in this post. Your selective reading interpretation says more about your own motivations.

By: Anonapotamous

Anonapotamous — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 22:46:14 +0000

Ed,

Why do you always feel the urge to crucify or canonize? As with your post on Nicholson Baker’s recent essay (and frankly, with a lot of your angry outbursts), there’s room for a more moderated, nuanced view here. And your admission near the end that you’re no longer writing for the LAT sure makes it seem like your motivations lie in revenge, rather than in attempting understanding or genuine discourse.

By: | The Casual Optimist

| The Casual Optimist — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 20:09:44 +0000

[...] But, if you sympathize with this perspective be warned: you are weak and you just don’t love books enough (and you’re probably a calcified narci…. [...]

By: Brian O'Leary

Brian O'Leary — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 18:29:19 +0000

Ed, how do you really feel?

Sadly, I don’t think one can buy a stereo anymore, only devices whose back sides look like the cockpit of a 757.