- To paraphrase Sam Tanenhaus, who profits if Bill Watterson doesn’t write it? Clearly, not the NYTBR. The WSJ has coaxed the reclusive Bill Watterson out of retirement for a review of the new David Michaelis’s Charles Schulz biography. Meanwhile, the Schulz family has cried foul. Although now that I’m almost finished with the book, I can tell you that Michaelis’s portrait of Schulz, while certainly interesting, is hardly the devastating portrait one finds in a Robert Caro biography.
- Michael Hirschorn, momentarily surfacing above the Atlantic paywall, asks if we are suffering from too much quirk. Which makes me wonder if “quirk” is the new postmodernism and whether the current spate of articles hostile towards those writers (John Barth was responsible for the abandonment of sentiment in literature? Really?) who dare to walk to an idiosyncratic beat represents the latest trend by critics to take all the fun out of literature. (via Wet Asphalt)
- Speaking of Barth, The Sot-Weed Factor has been thoroughly messing with Darby Dixon’s head. Darby is right to point out that Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle would have been infinitely improved had Stephenson taken himself less seriously. In fact, the next time an author comes out with a big fat Historical Novel of Significance, I think the Sot-Weed Comparison Test might be the apposite yardstick.
- Jason Boog talks with author Allen Rucker about becoming paralyzed at fifty-one. (Which is not to say that Boog himself is paralyzed or fifty-one, unless he has been pulling a fast one on us or looks very good for his age. But he does get some interesting answers from Rucker on the subject.)
- Were the between-the-wars Bright Young People nothing more than helpless hedonists?
- What’s better than a takedown of a fatuous band riding too long on its past achievements? Well, a smackdown of the biographer who takes the band too seriously. (via Slushpile)
- I was thinking the same thing. I do hope the WaPo book editors aren’t having relationship troubles these days.
- Ron Silliman believes that this year’s National Book Award poetry nominations are a scandal.
- It’s good to know that dildos have received the appropriate Library of Congress categorization. I was getting a bit worried. What’s even more fantastic is that there is apparently a geographical taxonomy, leaving one to ponder the advantages of an East Coast dildo over its West Coast counterpart.
- Mr. Wheeler, for the good of humanity and letters, I must insist that he sure as hell ain’t any generation’s premiere rock critic.
Roundup
– October 15, 2007Posted in: Roundup
The Call by Yannick Murphy: The always interesting author of Here They Come and Signed, Mata Hari returns with a novel that whips up a worldview from a rather quirky set of limitations: namely, the call logs that a veterinarian maintains as his son is unexpectedly put into a coma and an unforgiving economy denies him work. What emerges is a surprisingly optimistic, often funny, and very moving account on how one family uses acceptance and forgiveness as a way to atone for hard knocks. (
Birds of Paradise by Diana Abu-Jaber: Forget Franzen and Eugenides. If you're looking for a social novel that counts, Diana Abu-Jaber is the author you're looking for. Building from the free-form exploration of consciousness and identity in Crescent and the gripping procedural structure of Origin, Abu-Jaber's latest novel is her finest, equally fluent with gutterpunk culture and smarmy real estate men. It has been suggested by The Washington Post's Ron Charles that you will likely gain some pounds while reading this novel. This is certainly true. Abu-Jaber's description of food is so precise that it often made me want to do more cooking. But I very much admired the way in which Abu-Jaber presents all her characters as unwitting victims of rough capitalism, which permits them some dignity even as they perform terrible acts.
The Last of the Live Nude Girls by Sheila McClear: This memoir isn't so much about the decline of the Times Square peepshow, as it is about one young woman's efforts to pull herself up by by her bootstraps when presented with few economic options. Filled with self-introspective candor and a quiet dignity, McClear's story is one that might befall any of us in these volatile times. While McClear does get back on her feet, her book leads one contemplating the terrible fates of other young women now moving to New York and falling into deadlier vocations. (
Klosterman isn’t a very good rock critic, but damn who else is there? I can’t think of anyone off hand that does a decent job with in-depth rock criticism. Help us out.
As much as Hirschorn et al complain about McSweeney’s, Ira Glass, David Foster Wallace and so on as being the new death of literature, it’s funny that these guys nonetheless seem to attract such a wide audience.
It’s interesting that here is another article (closely following the American Scholar one that Ed linked to a couple of weeks ago) that attempts, in a high-minded fashion, to deal with creators (writers, directors, etc) who inexplicably (the flimsy attempts at criticism in both articles comes off as condescending without any concrete literary reasons) frighten many in the ‘Establishment’.
It’s the way of all things in the lit world; Ghettoize it, corral it, and you lessen it’s literary merit; see SF and Fantasy, and further see steam- or basically anything- punk and slipstream… Ok, fine, so this Quirk is prevalent–and as Tadd says ‘these guys nonetheless seem to attract such a wide audience….”
But with that in mind, let’s retro-actively create a new ghetto– The Upper Middle Class Middle Aged White (insert white collar profession, preferably ‘writer’ here) and Thier Obsession with Adultery… Shall we call it… Bad Dads Lit?
Like Chick-lit, but with more ‘accolades’ attached.
Can anyone think of writers who fit into this new sub-genre?