"History is like therapy for the present: it makes it talk about its parents." - Maya Jasanoff, The Dawn Watch
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I should admit I was attracted to "History is like therapy for the present: it makes it talk about its parents." - Maya Jasanoff, The Dawn Watch
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I should admit I was attracted to the book, while browsing at Las Vegas' fantastic bookstore Writers Block by four things: 1. the art (done by the Bill Bragg), 2. the le Carré blurb (if you don't know, late le Carré has a heavy Conrad flavor, 3. Conrad himself. I've read about 2/3 of what he has produced and love him more with every word, 4. the concept of Conrad as the dawn watch of globalization, and perhaps even modernity. The book was brisk, interesting, and filled with enough Conrad prose to almost dance. Jasanoff's writing is meant more for the New York Times Magazine crowd than the academic crowd, but if you enjoy Conrad this book will not disappoint. It isn't brilliant history or biography, but she manages to blend the edges of history, biography, and literary analysis and keep all three balls afloat. No easy feat. She is also able to thread the needle between cutting Conrad too much slack and too little for his views. Also, no easy feat.
For me Conrad is one of the great writers of the late 19th, early 20th century. He enchants and haunts at the same time. He is a fascinating character, but more than that, he is a damn fine complicated writer. Jasanoff explores Conrad's world, and in this exploration, she attempts to show us another way to view our own. "In all his writing", says Jasanoff, "Conrad grappled with the ramifications of living in a global world: the moral and material impact of dislocation, the tension and opportunity of multiethnic societies, the disruption wrought by technological change." Conrad understood us before there really was an us. Conrad saw us before the sun had even risen on the 20th and 21st centuries....more
Shakespeare's narrative poems, for me, fit in a valley between his most lyrical plays (Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Richard II) and hiShakespeare's narrative poems, for me, fit in a valley between his most lyrical plays (Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Richard II) and his sonnets. They are great, just not as good as either. They seem almost to be aborted efforts at plays. Perhaps, Shakespeare realized while working on Venus and Adonis that it wasn't going to really work as a play, but hell, since he'd already written a couple hundred lines of iambic poetry, he might as well keep going and finish it. It is a shame really (from the perspective of his lyrical poems) that he was so brilliant at his plays and sonnets. These seem almost to be after thoughts. Hell, they WERE after thoughts. I read all of his plays and his sonnets and figured I was done, but remembered there was something else. They REALLY do deserve more attention than they got from me and from the world. ...more
"What scared you all into time? Into body? Into shit? I will tell you: "the word." - William S. Burroughs, Nova Express
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Writing about the Nova Tr"What scared you all into time? Into body? Into shit? I will tell you: "the word." - William S. Burroughs, Nova Express
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Writing about the Nova Trilogy is frustrating. It feels... a bit... like reviewing Joyce's Finnegans Wake.
At 3:00, now 4, am it is hard to really, REALLY, get to the meat and idahosoftbones of it all. The books (all 3) are so damn knotty and naughty. Now, I'm not even REALLY comparing the Nova Trilogy to Finnegans Wake. No. They are two different beasts in scale, complexity, method, etc. I only bring them together, briefly, HERE to compare because, for me (reader), they hit me (reader) hard with their experimentalism and dark, almost ugly, UGLY, opacity. They aren't meant to be understood as much as they are intended to be experienced. They were both written to flickerclusterfuck with the reader (me). Yes. Mission Accomplished.
One of the other difficulties with the "Nova Trilogy" is the VERY concept of these 3 books being an actual trilogy, or defining WHAT exactly the Nova3 was. The novels that are NOW generally considered to be part of the trilogy were writen in an order that is different than the order they were eventually published. Many of the novels in the Nova3 were REVISED and some revised again, so knowing what version of the cut-up novel is part of the Nova3 becomes, within the overall word horde, a bit dicey. Add to that--both The Wild Boys and Naked Lunch were considered at one poin to be part of Nova3 makes defining/containing things even more fragmented and confusing.
But please, don't let that daunt you. I'm not sure multiple versions of the novels, and the swirling versions of the trilogy were ever INTENDED to not confuse; Burroughs WAS ever and mutliple always breaking and rebuilding forms. He was cutting and re-cutting constantly. So, the idea of a living, breathing Nova3 is part of the whole word horde experiment. Go with it. Grab a version. Grab one of the 3. Hell grab one of the 5. Read it. Read another. Don't get too stuck on whether you are reading the "right" version, or reading the novels in the right order. Relax. Drink something. Smoke something. Pop something. Enjoy?
Of the three books that make up the currently accepted Nova3 (1. The Soft Machine, 2. The Ticket That Exploded, 3. Nova Express) Nova Express is the by far easiest to read, the least offensive, but also my least favorite. And NOT really because it was easist to read and stomach. Perhaps, I was just weary of the whole word horde world, or gassed out, or even a bit [gasp] bored. Nova Express just didn't bend me over like SM & TTTE both did. It was a soft landing, a walking last lap, a migraine bruise. But still, together, these three novels are hard to shake off. They are rash and a rush and infection and a cure, a nightmare and a VERY strange trip. They are, together, a literary cold sore that won't go away.
Lust for life I got a lust for life I got a lust for life - Iggy Pop, Lust for Life
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Reviewing, cutting, looking slowly back at 1962 o͝orˌtekst, 19Lust for life I got a lust for life I got a lust for life - Iggy Pop, Lust for Life
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Reviewing, cutting, looking slowly back at 1962 o͝orˌtekst, 1967 Endetext, fold, refold, oragami fold, cut, paste, recut, film and redact. So? Start again. From the bigbanging. - there are no good words- I wrote silences - review the story of two halves, two texts, living text, breathing review Here comes Johnny Yen again/With the liquor and drugs - 'Better than 'the real thing?' - there is no real thing - reviewing the review, before the end, I'm not sure the cut-up review will work. Abandon all holes, ye whosorifices here. Mother smother may I must I smother mother this May. And the flesh machine/He's gonna do another striptease. I've naked lunched and snacked on soft machines. I've dined on queers and feasted on exterminators! These all do their part, they have all left me full and slightly sick. Puppy sick. Sick. sick./[sic]poopy. I'm not sure my form or pattern or strategy will add much to the Universe. I'm not sure it will subtract either. It will (like a Luxor light on New Years) attract only non-native moths, that feed the non-native bats, that feed the non-native owls, circling the giant urban a$$hole of the Las Vegas universe. Boys will be boys and boys, 'Boys we've been sublimated.'I'm worth a million in prizes/With my torture film.I'll redraft this draft, re-view this review, and post it toast it on Audible. I'll come at Amazon from two directions. Equally futile F body. I'll let DearGODreads swallow my early editions. I'll let Audible carry my post-review drip penicillin. Clock. clock. Tap. tap. Tock. tock. Written before on 'the Soft Typewriter' - transparent quivering substance the body is two halves stuck together around - Jeff B3zos - Lizard king. Owns my words. Licking the metallic air. Sells me your word drones. Shed your skin. Barter, trade, and consume all words made flesh - No good - No bueno - Departed have left no address - It's all done with tape recorders.Well I am just a modern guy/Of course I've had it in the ear before Listen again. Listen harder. Escape to and from the Nova. But never dream of leaving the word horde....more
“Our reasons are not prophets When oft our fancies are.” ― William Shakespeare, The Two Noble Kinsmen
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This play sits next to Pericles, The Two “Our reasons are not prophets When oft our fancies are.” ― William Shakespeare, The Two Noble Kinsmen
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This play sits next to Pericles, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Henry VIII, and Cymbeline as one of my least favorite Shakespeare plays. Ugh. I'm not a fan of Shakespeare's collaborations (see Henry VIII) and the Two Noble Kinsmen is also just a bit boring.
The story is loosely based on Chaucer's 'A Knight's Tale', but Shakespeare puts the two cousin's in love with one woman and sets the story in Athens and Thebes. I think the failing of this tragedy stems from, surprisingly, the inability of the play to convince me (the reader) in the transformation of the cousins from noble cousins to jealous dicks. There just isn't a strong enough catalyst. My other major beef with the play, is there isn't enough Shakespeare in it. Not enough amazing lines. Not enough dance to the English.
Most scholars agree on the following division in the play:
There is some disagreement about whether Shakespeare or Fletcher wrote the first 33 lines of Act 5. Think about THAT. That is Biblical level exegesis when scholars, nearly 400 years after the fact are still disputing a page of lines of a VERY minor play. That level of byzantine back and forth is worthy of a play, or at least a narrative poem....more
“The unendurable is the beginning of the curve of joy.” - Djuna Barnes, Nightwood
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I listened to this novel one night as I drove from Phoenix to L“The unendurable is the beginning of the curve of joy.” - Djuna Barnes, Nightwood
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I listened to this novel one night as I drove from Phoenix to Las Vegas. It was ominously dark, beautiful and creepy. I guess that equally applies to the book as to the drive. Art exists when something can be both creepy and beautiful at the same time. This isn't David Lynch, but I can imagine few other directors directing this book into a movie. Nightwood also gave my The Alexandria Quartet vibes. Barnes like Durrell can capture the humanity of freaks and outcasts. She can disturb you and seduce you at the same time. I can see veins of Nightwood web through the later novels by Patricia Highsmith. As a CIS white male, reading books like Nightwood are useful. They give me a glimpse or shade of an experience that is completely foreign to mine. But, I'm not sure how far to extend that because at times, reading Nightwood felt like I was traveling through a nightmare drunk. I was disoriented, disturbed, and on shifting literary sand. But I have rarely read something that felt more like a trip....more
"The impossible cannot have happened, therefore the impossible must be possible in spite of appearances.” ― Agatha Christie, Murder on the Orient Expr"The impossible cannot have happened, therefore the impossible must be possible in spite of appearances.” ― Agatha Christie, Murder on the Orient Express
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I wanted to read this because the movie* was coming out and I had never read the book and didn't want this classic to be defined in my brain by the movie. It was OK. I had to keep telling myself that some of the conventions and tropes she used, she probably INVENTED, so there is that. I also enjoyed how she subverted the whole form of the locked-room mystery form. She blew it to hell (about as much as I can say without giving the ending away to whoever on this planet doesn't know how it ends). But the prose was mediocre and the characters floated between bland/conventional and cut-outs. Again, it wasn't bad, just not a genre I spend a lot of time with. If I'm reading detective novels, it is a different type entirely.
* The movie was also good without being exceptional....more
“President Kennedy’s eloquence was designed to make men think; President Johnson’s hammer blows are designed to make men act.” ― Robert A. Caro, The P“President Kennedy’s eloquence was designed to make men think; President Johnson’s hammer blows are designed to make men act.” ― Robert A. Caro, The Passage of Power
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One of the most amazing aspects of this series is how consistently good the books are. Each one of the four books has been different and amazing. Some people might prefer Beethoven's 4th, others his 5th, others his 9th, still others his 3rd (my personal favorite). The fact remains, they are all brilliant. So too with these books. Each one was absolutely delicious. The writing was superb, the research detailed, he expanded the historical record but was never radical. He gave LBJ a nuance that the man deserved.
At its core, the fourth book explores the 1960s election, and LBJ's political miscalculation that allowed JFK to keep the primaries out of the backroom and win on the first ballot. He explores LBJ's calculation about serving on the JFK ticket, and how his energy and single-mindedness helped the JFK/LBJ ticket win Texas and several other states in the South. The hardest part of this book was the period while LBJ served as VP to JFK. The major subject of this book is LBJ, but it isn't just a biography of LBJ, but a look at political power. So, the period from 1960-1963 shows LBJ without power. While that might seem an unfacinating leg of this long journey, it also provides a counter-balance to the period directly after JKF was assassinated, and the 47 days after LBJ assumes the mantle of the presidency. It becomes a contrasting field to judge the man before with senatorial power with the man after with presidential power.
A benefit from this book is the sections devoted to the Kennedy brothers, especially Bobby Kennedy. Any book on LBJ is only partial if it ignores the complex relationship beteen LBJ and these two brothers. Caro explores these three with nuance and a keen eye for not just the story, but the cracks in the myths. Nobody in his stories is flat, nobody is caricatured. He shades and blends details ignored by others or swallowed by the lights of flattery and the shadows of time.
The best way to describe this book and to describe this series is to say this is one of the weakest books of the series, and STILL a 5-star book. Caro is JUST THAT GOOD.
Every night I ask God to protect my children, look after the poor, the sick, the suffering, and PLEASE, PLEASE, DEAR GOD... keep Robert Caro healthy and and mentally alert so he can finish Book 5....more
“Suddenly the day was gone, night came out from under each tree and spread.” ― Ray Bradbury, The Halloween Tree
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It was nice to read this and re“Suddenly the day was gone, night came out from under each tree and spread.” ― Ray Bradbury, The Halloween Tree
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It was nice to read this and remember that before Stranger Things and before Neil Gaiman there was Ray Bradbury. Not one of his great novels, but still seasonally important. The plot seemed a bit too contrived. But how can you not adore a book that transports you from Egypt, to Greece, to Rome, to Druid England, to the top of Notre Dame, to Mexico celebrating Día De Los Muertos? The Halloween Tree is an obvious metaphor for the stemma of traditions that bleed down into what is today Halloween. Bradbury does seem to be everywhere I go at Halloween. I see him when I read Neil Gaiman, when I watch Stranger Things, when I look at Mugnaini art (and Mugnaini's descendants: see Burton/Selick's Nightmare Before Christmas), when I listen to Danny Elfman & Oingo Boingo.
Anyway, I'm also amazed going back to Ray Bradbury how much poetry there is in his prose. He was one of those storytellers who can't help but write beyond most of his audience. I only now have REALLY started to appreciate how wonderful a writer Bradbury is. That is one of the reasons I'm going back and reading a lot of his novels. The guy can WRITE the shit out of a pumpkin....more
"The man who believes himself free of any taint of madness is a damned liar." - John D. MacDonald, A Purple Place for Dying
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John D. MacDonald's "The man who believes himself free of any taint of madness is a damned liar." - John D. MacDonald, A Purple Place for Dying
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John D. MacDonald's 3rd book in his Travis McGee series. This one takes place largely in Southwest Desert. Along with his first two novels The Deep Blue Good-By (1964) and Nightmare in Pink (1964), A Purple Place in Dying was also published in 1964. Actually, all three of his first books were published in a 3-month period. Sometimes you space out your publications, and sometimes you cluster bomb that shit.
Essentially, this is a novel where McGee is hired to investigate the financial dealings of a woman's estranged husband, but before he can be hired his potential boss gets killed. McGee sets out trying to figure out who shot Mona (the wife). Not because he's getting paid to, and not because he even liked her. He's trying to figure out who did it, because it pissed him off. In many ways, that is almost one facet in all of the McGee novels. ...more
“And jealous now of me, you gods, because I befriend a man, one I saved as he straddled the keel alone, when Zeus had blasted and shattered his swift “And jealous now of me, you gods, because I befriend a man, one I saved as he straddled the keel alone, when Zeus had blasted and shattered his swift ship with a bright lightning bolt, out on the wine-dark sea.” —Homer, The Odyssey, Book V —"oínopa pónton"
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So, "wine-dark sea" is a phrase used quite a bit by Homer. And Homer was quite an author I guess. And he did some pretty damn good writing about boats and stuff. So, it is only natural that Patrick O'Brian would eventually get around to using the "Wine-Dark Sea" image in one of his books. In Book 16 to be specific. This book is actually book 4, of a 5-novel circumnavigation of the globe sieries within his greater 20 book (21 if you count his last unfinished novel) Aubrey-Maturin series. There is some nice sailing, and the wine-dark sea section happens to appear at a point when some volcanic activity is happening nearby (which given the location of most of Homer's sea stories, also ties the mysterious wine-dark colors together).
Anyway, there was some interesting sections dealing with South American politics, and Andes hiking. Some of my favorite new characters are the two little girls rescued from a South Asian island that was decimated with small-pox. They have attached themselves to Dr. Maturin and become a lovely feature on the Surprise. I'm starting to get that feeling one gets towards the last couple days of an amazing vacation. You still enjoy the country, beach, mountains, etc., but there is a sense of impending dread that this all will end too soon. One day, I'll reach to the table next to my bed and there won't be a new O'Brian novel to read. I'm already sad.
"Our minds we salvage from history’s rubbish, & they are machines to make chaos into story." - China Miéville, Railsea
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I enjoyed it. Not fantast"Our minds we salvage from history’s rubbish, & they are machines to make chaos into story." - China Miéville, Railsea
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I enjoyed it. Not fantastic Miéville, but an amazingly constructed universe. The story was well-developed and the characters were interesting. Very steampunky. Very weird. But when Miéville is ON he is really ON and his prose train is moving. There is a genius engine under his hood. He has produced some of my favorite books, and I still don't think he is close to writing his great novels. I think even his masterpieces might just be rungs he is climbing. There is a lot of potential and a lot of energy in this guy. Overall, I would probably rate this one below Perdido Street Station, Embassytown, and The City & the City, but above The Scar and This Census-Taker. It is probably, for me on par with Kraken and The Last Days of New Paris....more
"...the deep logic of Romans comes into sharp focus around a single premise: Paul’s claim that grace is not God’s backup plan." - Adam S. Miller, Grace"...the deep logic of Romans comes into sharp focus around a single premise: Paul’s claim that grace is not God’s backup plan." - Adam S. Miller, Grace is Not God's Backup Plan
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This book, essentially, is a paraphrase/modernization/interpretation of Romans. As Miller puts it, it is his "Pauline house mix". It is also the second book of scripture Adam Miller has modernized. It is the yang to his Nothing New Under the Sun: A Blunt Paraphrase of Ecclesiastes yin. From Miller's perspective, these two books (Ecclesiastes and Romans) are linked. According to Miller, "These books are two sides of the same coin: grace on one face, hopelessness on the other."
I've probably read Romans a half-dozen times. Each time I learned something new, but Miller's perspective was helpful. He is bold. It is a bit audacious to not actually translate a book of scripture, but to interpret it and modernize it. Especially a book so central to Christian thought as Romans. But no one would accuse Miller of NOT being bold. He is graced, however, with a soft touch and a sharp mind. I enjoyed his introduction to this book almost as much as the interpretation. In his introduction he provides his approach, his methods, his limitations. He sets up the problem: "The King James Version, for instance, renders Paul’s letter with uncanny beauty but is opaque as an argument." He details why this problem exists: "Their overriding concern is with the letter of the text, not with its logic." And he proposes an approach that seems both novel and simple: "To make sense of Romans, we have to surrender a very natural assumption. We have to stop pretending that the world revolves around us. We have to let God be the center of the universe."
Probably my favorite part of Miller's introduction deals with the limitation of translations. It doesn't matter if you are translating scripture or Nabokov, a translator has to make big choices. Moving text from one language and time to another language and time, while keeping the poetry and meaning exactly would require a parallelism between different languages that just doesn't exist. So, the translator makes tough choices. She either has to keep the poetry and lose some accuracy in translation, or keep the accuracy and lose the poetry. And it isn't binary either. This is 3D chess. There is logic that might not exist distinct from the syntax and the poetry. Choices are made in every sentence translated. According to Miller, "The question is never whether something was lost. The question is always what was lost." To aid in our understanding of Romans, Miller choses to focus on the argument, the logic of Paul. In doing so, he dances right past direct translation. He isn't interested in accuracy in terms of WORDS, he is interested in accuracy in terms of IDEAS. "Rather than worry over the letter of the text, my goal has been to illuminate the large scale patterns that structure it."...more
"Surrender. Let go. Everything is on fire." - Adam S. Miller, Nothing New Under the Sun
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Part of my Sunday, pew-reading diversion. I've used this s"Surrender. Let go. Everything is on fire." - Adam S. Miller, Nothing New Under the Sun
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Part of my Sunday, pew-reading diversion. I've used this space to read big books (Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy) and regular books (Peck's Science the Key to Theology: Volume One: Preliminaries). Miller's little books are just about the right size to be read (if not fully digested) in an hour or two, quietly sitting on a pew.
This book, essentially, is a paraphrase/modernization/interpretation of Ecclesiastes. I'm a big fan of the Wisdom books (Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Solomon). They are books that deal with very modern issues. They exist in the grey. They avoid easy classification and aren't built billboards or bumper sticker evangelism. Plus, they are very poetic. I love them. It doesn't mean they are easy. They aren't they wrestle with big issues and their answers aren't always the ones we hope for, or the ones we expect. But there is something both beautiful and affirming about reading something that says: THIS IS LIFE. There is something that feels right about reading scripture that doesn't deal with platitudes or provide easy answers.
Miller has modernized two different books, one from the Old Testament (Ecclesiastes) and one from the New Testament (Epistle to the Romans) to teach something old in a new way and to connect the idea that there "is no love without out attendant surrender". To further quote Miller on why these two books should be viewed as companions: "These books are two sides of the same coin: grace on one face, hopelessness on the other."
"White people are, in some profound way, trapped; it took generations to make them white, and it will take more to unmake them." - Ta-Nehisi Coates, fr"White people are, in some profound way, trapped; it took generations to make them white, and it will take more to unmake them." - Ta-Nehisi Coates, from his notes to the fourth year, We Were Eight Years in Power
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The framework is basic. Ta-Nehisi Coates takes one essay he wrote from the Atlantic during each of the eight years of Barack Obama's presidency*. That's it. Well, actually, if that was it you could just Google his Atlantic essays (see list below) and not have to bother with the book. The essays were great (many REALLY, REALLY great), but since I've read them much they weren't the real gift of this novel. The GIFT are the introductions. The value add that Coates writes between. The space between the essays. His context and honesty about where he was in his writing, his thinking, makes the evolution of the essays feel more coherent. This book become a development of a writer. I really enjoyed it.
I just can't give it 5-stars because it doesn't quite measure up to his previous work. It isn't Between the World and Me. It is more inline with his other book The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons and an Unlikely Road to Manhood. His essays are pretty amazing (just not, for me, quite 5-stars fantastic) and introduction essays are pretty great too. So, I don't know 4-stars? I realize I would have been suckered by just the eight essays alone, but despite their near-genius still feel constrained a bit (not quite as constrained as Mehrsa Baradaran) to give the book something just below five stars. The book really is MORE than just the eight republished essays, so 4-stars I guess. Thanks BHodges. Even though you didn't change my rating, your perspective DID change my thinking, a bit and I've changed/patched my review (a bit).
Here are the eight original essays. I warn you, however, that you are only cheating yourself if you skip the book. Those binding essays, those value add spaces, the introduction and the epilogue are all worth your time, and yes, your money. If you have never read Coates, pick an essay. Read it. If he unmakes you a bit. Good. Read more.
"It's always better when you don't have to give a damn." - John D. MacDonald, The Scarlet Ruse
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If Philatelic Beach Noir is your gig, this book is"It's always better when you don't have to give a damn." - John D. MacDonald, The Scarlet Ruse
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If Philatelic Beach Noir is your gig, this book is for you. I guess in the age (1972) before block chain technology and Bitcoins, stamps seem a very likely avenue for moving large amounts of money from one country to the next. MacDonald flushes this idea out and weaves into it: the Mob, women, and Meyer (a trusty economist friend). MacDonald is hanging out in Florida, which usually is my favorite setting for the owner of the Busted Flush.
The plot is interesting and novel, the characters are round, and MacDonald nails the details. I enjoyed it and don't remember being too turned off by MacDonald's usual treatment of women....more
"Yeah man, you know to me a mountain is a Buddha. Think of the patience, hundreds of thousands of years just sitting there bein perfectly perfectly si"Yeah man, you know to me a mountain is a Buddha. Think of the patience, hundreds of thousands of years just sitting there bein perfectly perfectly silent and like praying for all living creaturs in that silence and just wwaiting for us to stop all our frettin and foolin." - Jack Kerouac, The Dharma Bums
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I recently started going to a weekly Kadampa Buddhism and meditation class at a local Unitarian church with a friend of mine. I'm far too skeptical to jump into or out of religions easily, but I have been attracted to secular Buddhism for awhile (for years I used to tell people I was a Zen Mormon). Anyway, this recent flirtation with meditation has launched me back into authors I haven't visited in a while. The last Kerouac I've read was 20 years ago, and I never read The Dharma Bums, so I figured it was a good place to start.
The novel is based losely on Kerouac (Ray Smith) and his relationship with Gary Snyder (Japhy Ryder). The book was an early shot in the counter-culture movement that included Buddhism, the hippy lifestyle, mountaineering, etc. Having grown up in Utah, California, etc., there has always been a resonance from this period. I remember friends of mine in HS and college hitchhiking, riding the rails, and heading into the mountains to commune, nearly naked, with nature. We were basically just kids playing at Buddhism, and sometimes it feels like Kerouac was too. I have to keep reminding myself that I'm not reading a cliché; that these are the guys who really started a lot of this. These are the beats, the generation that helped expand and energize the SF Renaissance.
Anyway, I enjoyed it; for the beats, the bums, the Buddhism, and yes even the bullshit....more
"The truth always come home..." - Don Winslow, Kings of Cool
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I actually preferred Winslow's 'Kings of Cool' to Savages. Both are slick and sexy S"The truth always come home..." - Don Winslow, Kings of Cool
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I actually preferred Winslow's 'Kings of Cool' to Savages. Both are slick and sexy Southern California crime novels, but KoC (the prequel to Savages) is structurally a more complicated novel. Backstory on the genesis of the Savages/Kings of Cool was interesting and allowed Winslow to explore the rise and changes in Southern California drug culture. And, I know. I know. Steven King LOVED Savages. What's my problem then? It might just be me. I just found both Savages and Kings of Cool to be a little too slick and superficial. It was MTV it wasn't jazz. It hit all the notes and technically hit them well, but I just wasn't changed or altered by the books.
Again, this goes back to judging these books using the knowledge that Winslow CAN write 'The Cartel' and 'The Power of the Dog'. These seem like the product of a skilled crime writer who knows exactly what he's doing, but is mailing it in. Or, perhaps, not mailing it in, but softening the edges and polishing it to a point it is shell with no heart. It seems like a well-designed Apple product. Slick, pretty, sexy even, but... some grit or friction is missing. But again, I find myself over criticizing it because I KNOW the powerful writing Winslow CAN produce. Perhaps, it is my problem and it is an expectation problem. As cotton candy, this stuff is great. As a book that can easily transfer to celluloid, this book is perfect. Hell, Oliver Stone MADE Savages into a movie and the movie made money....more
"the form should shape the text but not be conspicuous in itself, what matters are the emotions and thoughts it evokes, while the text itself, to thos"the form should shape the text but not be conspicuous in itself, what matters are the emotions and thoughts it evokes, while the text itself, to those who discern it, should be as cold and clear as glass." -- Karl Ove Knausgård, Autumn
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Knausgård has published a beautiful (both the HB Penguin press printing and the writing) book. Obviously, one of four. Why start in Autumn? Why not. I'm not sure if this was an idea that came to him one summer and so the obvious time to start was the beginning of the next season. Who knows. But the structure is relatively (and seductively) simple. Knausgård writes every day for three months on a variety of subjects, for example:
Piss War Labia Twilight Forgiveness August Sander Buttons Pain
These subjects range from specific items or people to general abstractions. These vignettes are the subject. The organizational principle is Knausgård's desire to transmit information, knowledge, a sense of place and understanding to his unborn daughter (his fourth child?). Therefore, each month (September, October, November) also begins with a "Letter to an Unborn Daughter". He wants to show his embryonic child the world as it is now. He wants to describe the beauty, the banality, the NOW. Like his previous "novels" Knausgård world centers on his family. But where his My Struggle cycle began with his father's death and was primarily concerned with history (fictionalized or not), his Seasons cycle (at least so far) seems to be grounded in the present or the future. It is interesting that this cycle starts with the promise of a birth. It is a deft flip and the tone of the book reflects that change.
So far (obviously, I've only read this one) it isn't quite as strong as My Struggle, but it is also nice all by itself. The short 500 - 1000 word chapters focused on one subject remind me a bit of a blogger or my hit-and-miss attempts to complete 750 words at 750words.com. It seems like an writing exercise done by someone who knows how to write....more
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