Roundup
Written by Edward ChampionPosted on June 24, 2008
Filed Under Uncategorized
- Dwight Garner and Sam Tanenhaus, the two spineless editors who insult the intelligence of their audience every Sunday at the New York Times Book Review, seem to think that Jay McInerney is somehow a big name. Which is a bit like believing that Robert Palmer is not only still alive, but remains a major fixture on the pop music circuit. Perhaps this strange assignment represents the duo’s dormant adolescent longing to raise spoons to noses and make up for the lost time in which they failed to live. Whatever their motivations, they have enlisted this third-rate oenophile to offer his thoughts about Andre Dubus III’s latest novel. They are under the mistaken impression that McInerney — a smug man so ass-backwards in acumen that he threw in more than two grand to support Giuliani for President — actually has penetrating insight. Alas, McInerney seems less concerned with offering a reasonable assessment, pro or con, of The Garden of Last Days and more fixated upon the novel’s concern for flesh. But any man who writes the sort of laughable sex scenes that Louis Menand rightly ridiculed (”Strange pleas, cries like those of a wounded creature, sounded within her and possibly escaped her lips.”) has no business quibbling with another novelist’s portrayal of carnality. If you’re looking for a sterling example that demonstrates why newspapers are losing readers, look no further than the wizened wizards, no doubt suffering both erectile and phantasmagorical dysfunction, behind the curtain.
- Thankfully, the Washington Post has shown more class. They’ve sent a correspondent to visit Detroit and concluded that it’s all “gritty and romantic.” But there’s no mention of the decayed Michigan Central Station, which leads me to believe that Ms. McCarthy didn’t venture very far. So I’m not sure if Ms. McCarthy truly investigated the real Motortown, much less the seamier side of life. There is perhaps more space devoted to the Frenchmen who discovered the place, as well as its Motown origins. But as mainstream articles go, Ms. McCarthy’s piece represents a slightly unexpected philanthropic nod to Detroit realtors. Let us hope that the next journalistic excursion represents more of the truth. (via The Tomorrow Museum)
- Like Stephen Mitchelmore, I too was astonished to see James Wood begin his Atmospheric Disturbances with a reference to Georg Büchner’s “Lenz.” But it’s the kind of unexpected association that does make Wood a critic that one cannot easily discount. Particularly when Wood has also name-checked Dostoevsky, Knut Hamsun, and Thomas Bernhard.
- Richard Nash points to several video streams of author readings from Bookcourt, including Toby Barlow and Samantha Hunt. To my knowledge, this is the first independent bookstore that has done this. But I hope all bookstores do this, if only so that we can see just how much boilerplate material authors carry on tour.
- J.G. Ballard’s “The Enormous Space” has been adapted by BBC4. (via Splinters)
- Slushpile raises several important questions concerning a new Vince Neil book, but fails to consider why this has-been singer would be given more than $500,000 to “write” a book after the harrowing account known as The Dirt, which opened with the following lacrimal-sensitive sentences, “Her name was Bullwinkle. We called her that because she had a face like a moose. But Tommy, even though he could get any girl he wanted on the Sunset Strip, would not break up with her.” Yes, it’s true that Motley Crue grossed an unfathomable $39.9 million in 2005 concerts (although Neil Diamond grossed $7 million more; the capitalist world is just too cruel). But just how many of these concertgoers, who might have spent their hard-earned money on pleasurable skank weed but opted instead for another silly performance of “Dr. Feelgood,” are pining for a redux? Your faithful correspondent does not possess a Bookscan account, but he beseeches all prospective buyers to truly consider just what they might be wasting their hard-earned dollars upon.
- Has erotica jumped the shark? I don’t believe that anal sex and ménage à trois were ever particularly shocking to me, but then I lived in San Francisco for thirteen years. Nevertheless, Ellora’s Cave publisher Raelene Gorlinsky seems to believe that these two sexual practices have become vanilla, that readers have become acclimated to these forms of titillation, and that the human body can “only do so many things.” While the hunt is now on for more crazed positions and more taboos to be punctured, I find myself more concerned with Ms. Gorlinsky’s dire pronouncements about the body’s apparent limitations. If I am averring these premonitions correctly, this means that I will never have sex again. But since this is perfectly timed with the decline of the American empire (and its Roman comparisons), there is some small solace in knowing that we’ll begin seeing more eunuchs to serve the pleasures of the upper class. (via Smart Bitches)
- A grammarian has died. They’ll be carving tildes into his tombstone and swastikas upon his corpse’s forehead. (via Books, Inq.)
- Splice Today interviews Gaddis expert Steven Moore.
- And I think it’s safe to say that The Atlantic is almost certainly making us stupid. Given contributions from Nicholas Carr, Lori Gottlieb, and B.R. Myers, this is a magazine that has, in the year of our load, 2008, suggested that being sodomized is a more bearable substitute than these insipid articles. I used to be a subscriber. But no more. Scott has more on this.
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Books To Jump Up and Down Over
Beyond Heaving Bosoms by Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan. The famed writers behind Smart Bitches, Trashy Books have written a very funny and thoughtful volume about romances, both Old Skool and New Skool. Here is a book that any smug and humorless literary manboy beating his flabby passive chest over Banville or Bolano should probably read pronto, if only for the distant possibility that he might get over himself. While the Choose Your Own Adventure segment at the end caused me to have a very disturbing dream involving Shelley Long (don't ask), Sarah and Candy did have me rethinking many of my own misperceptions when I wasn't busy laughing. They're not afraid to take on the New York Times Bok Review or even the groupthink within certain sectors of the romance community.
Alice Fantastic by Maggie Estep. This wild and highly enjoyable narrative involves two sisters (presumably, the third one was still being rented out by Chekhov), a hippie ex-junkie mother who lives with seventeen dogs, a murder, gambling, and libidinous Hollywood actresses who live in Woodstock. But this is the wonderful Maggie Estep we're talking here. And what seems at first like a quirky yarn becomes something unexpectedly moving about connectivity. What I love about Estep's work is the way that she'll juxtapose an extremely astute observation (now that you mention it, why do cab drivers always have somebody to talk with on the phone past midnight?) with an often outrageous story development.
Generosity by Richard Powers. It doesn't come out until September 29th, but Richard Powers's latest will have anyone committed to books reconsidering their literary fervor. I foresee some animosity from the vanilla critics hostile to idea-driven novels, but book bloggers, YouTube chroniclers, and MFAs would do well to plunge into this chance-taking narrative, which introduces vital questions about what the reader's relationship is with media, scientific dissection, and "creative nonfiction." Are we rats fleeing to happy cities? Or can we find the humanism within the purported plague?
Pieces for the Left Hand by J. Robert Lennon. Lennon is one of the most underrated fiction writers working today. Much as On the Night Plain proved that Lennon had a lot more in the toolbox than heartfelt (and often very funny) suburban satire, this slim but fascinating volume juxtaposes 100 small-town anecdotes -- arranged by category -- in a manner that reads, at times, like Nicholson Baker's passions for minutiae and, at other times, Stewart O'Nan's concern for psychological detail. The result is fiction that makes us wonder about whether one person's subjective view of particulars can entirely be trusted. This book never found a publisher in 2005. But thankfully, Graywolf has released it in the United States, along with Lennon's latest novel, The Castle.
Wonderful World by Javier Calvo. This wonderfully raucous volume has been completely ignored by the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times. But it's probably one of the most delightful reading experiences I've had this year. Calvo cavalierly mashes up multiple genres and manages to mix up familial subtext with larger-than-life, almost cartoonish characters. (Indeed, one might argue that one mobster's penis is a character of its own in this sprawling novel.). This is not an easy thing to pull off, but Calvo makes it work. And it's helped immeasurably by Mara Faye Lethem's idiom-specific translation. (See longer post.)
The Means of Reproduction, Michelle Goldberg This thoughtful book tackles the complicated (and little discussed) subject of reproductive rights from numerous angles, which includes a number of unpleasant but necessary ones. The upshot is that there isn't a quick fix solution for declining birth rates and fundamentalist abuses. Just about every political faction has contributed to the friction. But you'll want to read this book anyway to refamiliarize yourself with the topic, but also to understand just what's occurred during the past several decades to get us where we are today. (See also podcast interview with Goldberg.)
- Overheard in Alaska: "You won't have Sarah Palin to kick around anymore." 5 hrs ago
- Good Christ, look at these sentences. Sarah Palin is the Warren G. Harding of the 21st century. http://bit.ly/vMR1X 5 hrs ago
- @fishsauce August, see the email I just sent you. Hopefully that should clear things up. If not, that's cool too. Thanks! in reply to fishsauce 6 hrs ago
- More updates...
Contact Ed by email.
Or send materials to:
315 Flatbush Avenue, #231
Brooklyn, NY 11217
Or send materials to:
315 Flatbush Avenue, #231
Brooklyn, NY 11217
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“Hands, touching hands, reaching out
Touching me, touching you
Oh, sweet Caroline
Good times never seem so good
I’ve been inclined to believe it never would”
Dude, that’s poetry.
[...] Ed swipes at Jay McInerney, unfairly, I think. McInerney’s review (of Andre Dubus III’s The Garden of Last Days) was so entertaining that it made me curious about what else McInerney is writing these days. For my money, though, the best review of the book appeared in the LA Times; although it was a little more sedate, it provided historical context, illuminates a seeming contradiction between the balance of fiction and fact that Dubus lays claim to. [...]
Ed, courtesy of Bookscan:
The Dirt: 99,000 in hardcover, 166,000 in paperback. Wow.
The link about the vanilla-ization of anal sex reminded me of a recent Onion article: Pornography-Desensitized Populace Demands New Orifice To Look At.
http://origin.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/pornography_desensitized
I can say without shame that The Dirt is the only non-fiction book I’ve read in the last two years, and it is fascinating. I don’t even like the band on an ironic level and I couldn’t stop reading.
[...] Ed Champion’s claws are out [...]
It’s odd that you’d quote from a largely positive review of McInerney’s most recent novel to excoriate his own book reviewing. Say what you will about McInerney the public figure but I think he got the fundamental problem of terrorist-lit right.