November 13, 2009
Sloppy Shorthand
This article in The Guardian was a bit weird. Now, usually I’m all down with not maligning women’s fiction, but popular fiction is popular fiction and Melissa Bank is not George Eliot, and I felt as though Harriet Evans was trying to tell me otherwise. But what Evans was trying to tell me is not the point here, rather that in her piece, she practices what I’ve come to call the sloppy shorthand of literary referencing.
She includes Dave Eggers in league with a number of other male writers who write “about how many women the protagonists have slept with, how many drugs they’ve done, what a crazy nihilistic time they’re having in London / New York.” Now, I’ve not read the other writers she mentions, but then I don’t think Harriet Evans has read much Dave Eggers either.
Eggers does get tarred as something of a postmodern show-off by readers put off by his 2000 memoir A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. To his credit, however, he wrote that book nearly a decade ago, and in the years since has created some terribly creative fiction and nonfiction (and has blurred boundaries between the two, and become a philanthropist, and written a movie I loved, and another that people are obsessed with, and countless other really amazing things, and he’s done them well and with genuine class). Also, I thought A Heartbreaking Work… was remarkable for numerous reasons.
All this to say that Dave Eggers is sloppy shorthand for a male writer with flimsy chops who appeals to an idiot public.
Similarly, Zadie Smith. In fact, one of the commenters on Evans’ pieces mentioned Smith, but that post has since been removed for being offensive. And there really is something about Zadie Smith that brings out offensive comments like no other writer since Margaret Atwood. Which is strange. Perhaps I can understand how a reader might not like White Teeth, for example, but I’m at a loss to explain how one wouldn’t be somewhat impressed by its construction. I thought it was a fantastic novel, and was similarly moved by On Beauty, and I’ve found Smith’s literary criticism to be the most compelling and fascinating I’ve read.
But it seems that Zadie Smith is sloppy shorthand for a girl writer who people like because she’s pretty.
Then, there’s Margaret Atwood, but I’ve talked about that before. Definitely Margaret Lawrence, who is unfairly derided by readers who weren’t old enough when they read The Stone Angel or The Diviners. I suppose we could even include Shakespeare on this list, as people who’ve read just one or two of his plays can hold the strongest opinions on his oeuvre.
And poor John Irving, of course, perpetually accused of an obsession with wrestling, weird sex and bears.
Anyone else?
November 7, 2009
Lizzie Skurnick for President
In “Same Old Story“, Skurnick writes: “But that’s the problem with sexism. It doesn’t happen because people — male or female — think women suck. It happens for the same reason a sommelier always pours a little more in a man’s wine glass (check it!), or that that big, hearty man in the suit seems like he’d be a better manager. It’s not that women shouldn’t be up for the big awards. It’s just that when it comes down to the wire, we just kinda feel like men . . . I don’t know . . . deserve them.
The conservatives are right: affirmative action is huge blemish on the face of our nation. And until we stop giving awards to men who don’t deserve them over women who do, we’re sunk. Because our default is to somehow feel like Philip Roth’s output is impressive while Joyce Carol Oates’ is a punchline. Our default is to call John Updike a genius on the basis of four very wonderful books and many truly weird ones, while Margaret Atwood, with the same track record, is simply beloved. Our default is to title Ayelet Waldman’s book, “Bad Mother,” while her husband’s is “Manhood for Amateurs.” Our default is that women are small, men are universal. Well, I know men get sensitive if you call them small. But gentlemen, sometimes you are.”
November 2, 2009
A tough time with popular fiction
Perhaps I’ve finally gotten clever, or the world’s gotten dumber, and I’m not sure which, but either way, I am having a tough time with popular fiction. Last Thursday, once again, I had to abandon a novel for being complete and utter crap. For being sloppy, poorly edited, not completely making sense, being implausible, and patronizing in that it was expecting me not to notice. At first, as I was struggling through, I put it down to the last three books I’d read before it having been difficult but also extraordinary, and maybe popular fiction in general just doesn’t bring the same return on investment. But no, actually. I’ve read some fine popular fiction this past while, that might not have demanded much of me as a reader but it didn’t ask me to kindly avert my eyes while it turned into a train wreck of a book either.
I feel that as a writer myself, who has written two significantly flawed (albeit not without their virtues but still, there is a good reason they’re unpublished…) novels, and many utterly awful short stories, maybe I’m just better attuned to a crappy book than the average reader. “Oh, I see what the writer did there,” I find myself thinking, and I wonder: why didn’t an editor pick up on this? Or do they still have editors? Perhaps they disappeared when the bottom fell out? And if so, could someone please get them to come back?
This post is far more grumpy than my usual fare, but I was annoyed. My reading time is hard-fought for these days. As I’ve noted already, I’m trading my daughter’s development of positive sleep habits for time to read, as I allow myself to be napped on, but her naps don’t come easy. And how will I answer when she grows up to ask me what I have to show for the shitty novels for which she sacrificed the ability to fall asleep anywhere but on her mother’s chest?
Or maybe I’m just crazy. Because I go searching the internet to validate my opinions, and I find that crappy novel of the day has received a glowing review in the New York Times (though never, I note, from Michiko Kakutani). And when I do blog searches, I find readers loving the stuff. There is usually a note, also, that says, “Would be great for book clubs.” Which, really, says nothing very good about book clubs.
I don’t think I’m crazy though. The UK papers tend to hate the books I do, and there is always a dissatisfied blogger for every enamoured one. Which goes to show, I suppose, that we all expect very different things from the books we read, but sometimes I do wish readers might expect a little more. And that editors would too, and publishers, and authors of themselves?
But, as Caroline Adderson once wrote (and I love this quote): “”Of course, the best antidote to the disappointment of the literary life is to read.” And I managed much consolation with a weekend spent with The Sweet Edge by Alison Pick and Tokyo Fiancee by Amelie Nothup, both of which I can earnestly recommend.
October 31, 2009
Dreams that Glitter
Something has changed during the two years since I was last in England, and I suppose you can blame it on what I now hear referred to as “the global economic shakedown”. It was unprecedented: I scoured the 3 for 2 tables at Waterstones, and could not find anything I wanted to read. One entire table was taken up by that Jane Austen zombie book and various take-offs of the same idea. There were a few good books, but I’d read them already, but all the rest were completely uninspired/uninspiring. And even those at full price seemed to mainly be the umpteenth volume of various celebrity autobiographies.
At the airport, we had pounds to burn, so we checked out WH Smith before our flight left. Their discount display was hilarious, and I really should have taken a photo. Books being promoted were as follows: Brick Lane, Catch 22, something by Enid Blyton, The Life of Pi, Fahrenheit 451 and Captain Corelli’s Mandolin. It was the time-warp book promotion, and certainly nothing to get excited about.
When I lived in England, I could easily be cajoled into even a 6 for 4, no problem. All the books I wanted would be the ones on sale, and I’d be longing to read them after reading reviews in various newspapers’ respective stand-alone books sections. These books were irresistible, particularly with the discounts. And discounts are cheating at book-buying, I know, but I was looking forward to a little indulgence.
October 29, 2009
Its own mythology
“Every family in which children are read to, and where books are part of the furniture and the reading of them part of life, must have its own mythology, one that has arisen out of early books. Characters become companions, they help form the imagination, they people a child’s inner landscape. Alice in Wonderland and the White Rabbit, the Red Queen and the Caterpillar were far more to me than invented characters in a storybook. They still are. Looking at the children’s picture books now, I realize that they are my books too, they became as much part of my inner landscape as of theirs.”– from Howards End is on the Landing by Susan Hill
October 26, 2009
Simon Le Bon blogs books.
Well, it’s no secret that I love Duran Duran, but I just don’t talk about it very often. Mostly because I don’t like to brag about my mean acoustic version of “Rio”, in which I wail about her making me feel alive, alive, alive. But I’m pleased that Melanie at The Indextrious Reader has unearthed this gem of a link, which is nearly as good as Art Garfunkel’s books list: Simon Le Bon blogs books on the band’s website. To check out his picks, go here, click on “writing”, and then “Simon’s Reader”. Really, what we’ve all been waiting for.
October 25, 2009
Flying Babies and Books
Once upon a time, a plane journey meant I’d get a whole book read, and a magazine or two. In-flight movies were for chumps, and I was the annoying person whose reading light was shining bright when you were trying to sleep. And then I had a baby.
And I’ve had a baby long enough to have a good idea of how much reading I’d get done in transit. Whereas before, I’d bring at least four novels and a magazine (because, I mean, what if we had to make an unexpected stopover at an airport without a bookshop?), I brought just one book this time. And I’ve also had a baby long enough to be pleased to get just the first three stories in Birds of America read during our flight.
Thankfully, we went to visit the grandparents, which is the closest thing I’ll have to a vacation from motherhood for quite some time. So I got two issues of the London Review of Books read, finished Birds of America, and read the wonderful Howards End is On the Landing. On the flight home, I began The House in Paris by Elizabeth Bowen, and got about 60 pages in, mainly because I read while jumping up and down, rocking Harriet in her Little Star Sling. On the whole, I am very satisfied.
Reading aside, flying with babies is hard work, but I really can’t complain, considering the moms I saw flying alone with two children. Harriet was pretty good, didn’t scream substantially too much of the time, airline staff and other passengers were really kind, helpful and accommodating, and having a baby makes the whole world a really friendly place. Once arrived, we had a really wonderful time. Harriet never adjusted to the time change, and went to bed at midnight every night, and while this made her grumpier and grumpier as the week went on, it’s been no trouble getting her back on track at home.
And I’ve got to get back on track too. Since my last “I’m not buying books” post, I think I’ve bought about seven more books. But no more, of course. I’m done, but it does mean I’ve got some serious blogging to do, and more reading to do, and then I’ll go and read some more.
October 20, 2009
Sean Penn
In the last few weeks, I’ve found “Sean Penn” used twice as a metaphor for manic behaviour: in Douglas Coupland’s new novel Generation A and Lorrie Moore’s story “What You Want to do Fine”. This is remarkable because a) didn’t Sean Penn stop self-destructing in about 1989? funny that this remains a touchstone, and b) if I’ve found two, there must be more. I will be on the lookout from here on in. Perhaps he really could end up with his picture in the dictionary under “crazy”.
October 15, 2009
A Tyrannical Poltergeist
“There is a sense in which all novels are ghost stories: fictional characters are translucent phantoms, which readers believe in (or don’t); readers lurk in the presence of characters, spying on their most intimate moments, eavesdropping on their innermost thoughts. And however thoroughly the novelist establishes her characters’ motivations, however robustly she forges her chains of cause and effect everything that happens ultimately does so at the whim of the writer. Certain things have to happen for the narrative to progress… Every novel is haunted by a tyrannical poltergeist, in the form of its plot.” from “Poltergeist: The Little Stranger” by Thomas Jones, London Review of Books 9 July 2009
October 7, 2009
Some links
DoveGreyReader reflects upon reflecting upon reading (after reading Susan Hill’s Howards’ End is on the Landing, which has joined my bookish wishlist and I will probably buy it when we go to England next week, along with all the other books I’ll probably buy when we go to England next week. Too bad everything is my weakness, huh?). At Inklings, the first interesting article in ages I’ve read about e-books. Salon de Refuses lives on in academia! The misadventures of The New Quarterly at Word on the Street. Dionne Brand is Toronto’s new poet laureate. Hilary Mantel on being a social worker.
