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13 September 2005
The Haunting of Hill House By Shirley Jackson. That's what I am reading at the moment (for the third time.) What about you?
I took a mental health day from work today, so I alteranted between three books: Killing Yourself To Live by (my main man) Chuck Klosterman [fuck you. Chuck-haters!], Looking For Mary by Beverly D'onofrio, and Samaritan by (my other main man) Richard Price). I also watched a cool Bewitched rerun where Esmerelda conjured up George Washington.
Then I listened to "The Free Electric Band," a great song by Albert Hammond. If I do the Hot Buttered Flannel mp3 blog, that song will be the first entry.
It's a lazy day, i-banger. I just wasn't in the mood to tap a keyboard with an aching back.
Side note: I had an ex-girlfreind who when I told her about my literary cross-pollination, said "that's neurotic, jon." Two years later, she called me, first to reminisce about our *cogh* exploits, then to ask me if I owned any Black Sabbath records. When I said I owned a few, she warned "that's a way for Satan to sneak into your ind when you're not looking." I took it under advisement, but as of yet, have declined to built a cranial razor-wire fence.
Perdido St. Station, for the second time. (this time, i read them The Scar first, then Iron Council, then Perdido--it's incredible the way he wove into Perdido people and situations he used in the later books)
Charles de Lint, Onion Girl. I just finished this book by Elizabeth Willey I really, really liked but the library didn't have any more of hers, damn damn damn.
Right now I'm reading some Sophocles and Virgil. It's for a humanities survey course I teach, so it's not for fun.
I'm listening to a book, though. And that's kind of fun. And crap. Had to drive up to Massachusetts last week for a funeral and a friend gave me a Richard Russo book-on-tape for the long ride. I haven't finished it yet, so I listen to a bit every night.
It's a madcap tale about a middle aged novelist/professor ... and it's terrible. It reads very much like every story I've read by an undergraduate/graduate creative writing student writing about the life of an undergraduate/graduate.... It's literary and academic masturbation.
Mountolive (Alexandria Quartet #3) by Lawrence Durrell. And Movie-Made America: A Cultural History of American Movies by Robert Sklar. And back issues of The Walking Dead by Robert Kirkman et al. (for a review).
The Sparrow. It was recommended to me back in 2000 but I never got around to it. Since I kept seeing it mentioned in the book threads on MeFi I thought it was about time to finally read it. I'm not very far into it yet, but it's good so far.
Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Buddhism. Dorky, maybe. I've been interested in Buddhism for a quite a while but unsure of where to start researching. Anyway, this is exactly what I needed.
Have you made it to the scene where the two girls are in beds next to each other and the lights go out again? It's been much imitated but is the original shudder scene. Had to actually leave the book and leave the room for awhile.
Just finished Introducing Buddhism (nice one, deborah), and am choosing a new book from the shelf. Likely either Blink, Hegemony of Survival, or No Time. Or I may forget all that stuff and just go for Vonnegut's Timequake.
Sergio Leone: Something to Do With Death, by Christopher Frayling. I'm a huge (HUGE) fan of spaghetti westerns, not just by Leone, but his Once Upon A Time In The West is in my top five films of all time.
It's gonna take me awhile to read this, though... this sucker is something like 600 pages, and I only get to read one or two nights a week.
Someone gave me a copy of The Haunting of Hill House just this summer, actually... I can't wait to read it.
Warlock by Oakley Hall, an epic western that was apparently Thomas Pynchon's favorite novel when he was in college (according to the introduction he wrote for Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me).
The Jesus of Heresy and History by John Dart. An interesting little guide to the Nag Hammadi texts, but Dart's style can be terribly jarring (somewhat scholarly works don't usually have this many exclamation marks).
Hocus Pocus also sucked, but I still think Bluebeard is a masterpiece.
i finished a bunch of venitian and roman set things, the confederacy of dunces is not for me right now as i'm not in some larky 60's mood (they both return to the liberry)
old new yorkers are the thing
and all the special issues i skipped.
and organizing All the detrius
oh dust my eternal enemy
intertia fails us both-- [currently moving all my furniture as i cut off hanks of hair]
I'm reading Karl Marx by Francis Wheen. You might think a biography of Marx would be pretty heavy going but it's entertaining stuff, there are even a few good laughs in there.
I'm also reading a guide to programming in Ruby as I'm currently trying to decide if I should spend more time with the language.
I was just thinking yesterday that it has been a while since I've read We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson, which is one of my favorites.
Right now I'm reading books for a couple of bookgroups I'm getting paid for, which really keeps me readind. Proust for one, the USA trilogy and Manhattan Transfer by Dos Passos for the other. For fun I'm reading Three Wogs by Alexander Theroux, which is so well written I almost shit myself reading it. It's really funny, too.
No Country For Old Men, Cormac McCarthy, rereading it actually. Last night I read outer dark and finished some book about Mexico that someone sent in to see if we wanted to do the paper back. It was ok. McCarthy is my main man though.
And, oh, how I wish I could print or reproduce it here because it's not free content on their site, but in the new New York Review of Books, there is a letter from Iranian journalist/political prisoner/recently hospitalized hunger-striker Akbar Ganji to his former teacher Abdolkarim Soroush, "perhaps the most influential religious reformist thinker of his generation."
It is a rare publication, particularly for a review like The NYRB. Unlike most articles, which are commentary or description of current or historical events, this is an actual primary source historical document (well, we can only hope it'll be historical -- it could be suppressed, Ganji killed, and history unchanged -- it is Iran).
My hair stood on end as I read it. The title The NYRB gave it (or, who knows, maybe Akbar Ganji gave it) looks like a conscious allusion to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Letter From a Birmingham Jail. One can only hope it'll have a similar impact.
The electronic version sitting on my desktop is burning a hole in my post-it.
I find myself somewhat envious that you're reading Hill House ... its a great book and I think that Jackson is one of the great but underrated American writers of the 20th century.
Vonnegut on the Daily Show. Yikes. I wish I'd read this last night, I would have tivo'd it.
I'm currently reading an ARC (advance reader's copy) of Bob Spitz's The Beatles - A Biography. I'm perhaps a bit under halfway done -- they just visited America for the first time. I've been writing about it some on my LJ if you want to know more.
Currently reading Flashman's Lady (Fraser) and Motherless Brooklyn (Lenthem).
Hugh: I loved Finley's World of Odysseus. You may wish to peruse another in the NYRB series, War and the Iliad, which includes Simone Weil's "The Iliad or the Poem of Force" as well as a great essay by Rachel Bespaloff (in many way's a better reading than Weil's, though the larger argument belongs to the latter).
Have you made it to the scene where the two girls are in beds next to each other and the lights go out again? It's been much imitated but is the original shudder scene. Had to actually leave the book and leave the room for awhile.
I just finished it again. And yeah, the book messes with your head. So far it is the ONLY book that can creep me out. If I do not read a book for a couple of years, I forget almost everything about it and so while I might remember the ending of the book, the majority of the content feels fresh when I read it again. I curse my memory at times, but this is one way that it is actually a benefit.
I wish I could find another book that captured terror so well - most of the supposedly scary books people have reccomended to me have left me bored. For one thing, anytime books begin to rely on violence or gore it takes me out of the story for some reason. Quite a few King books have been ruined for me because of that.
I just finished Battle Royale by Koushun Takami and now my husband is reading it. It is about a class of 42 students (15 year olds) stranded on an island and forced to do battle unto death. I loved the plot and many of the fight scenes but found the translation rather clumsy and stilted. Also, the Japanese names are somewhat difficult to keep straight. But my husband is loving it and has no problem with the style. After he finishes it we plan on renting the movie which is said to be controversial.
He just finished The Prestige by Christopher Priest and past it on to me with some reservations. It is about the on-going skirmishes between two British magicians at the turn of the century. There are some style problems, some muddled writing, but I am enjoying the magical story line.
As to Shirley Jackson. I adore her and love much (but not all) of what she wrote. In addition to her fine horror novels (which includes The Sundial) she also wrote very humorously about her family which you can find in the collection The Magic of Shirley Jackson.
Last week my husband and I were playing "Who would you like to be?" and I said Shirley Jackson. She had a great old house, kids, professor husband, and well-regarded professional life. Her short story "The Lottery" is considered by many to be the finest American short story ever written and it is widely read in the classroom. The only problem is she died relatively young-- 47 I believe-- from heart failure. She passed away in her sleep.
I'm eager to hear more about Finley's book. I was just thinking about it in the shower this morning because I've been totting up all of the NYRBclassics that I've read and loved and toying with the idea of putting up a website to spur me to read and review them all. It's a great series, but I've mostly read the fiction.
SLOG-Yes, Life Among the Savages is one of my faves as well. Whenever I read it I have a kind of yearning for that particular kind of suburban childhood, and I wish she were my mother.
I think Jackson smoked about 3 packs a day, which may have contributed to the heart failure.
Secret Life of Gravy, there's a Battle Royale book? Well whaddyaknow, I only knew the film which is great - if you are into blood-gushing japanese gore-flicks (which I am.) Awesome.
I caught him on The Daily Show last night and I remember thinking "I hope I am that sharp mentally when I get to be his age." Then I realized I am no that sharp now, so there is no chance.
He also made a much briefer appearance on this week's Real Time with Bill Maher.
omiewise, Raising Demons was the sequal to Life Among The Savages.
Papercake, I'm hooked on sudoku as well, ever since our paper started running them daily. One more thing to be shoehorned into my schedule.
Finally, I accidentally ended up with two copies of The Magic of Shirley Jackson which includes 11 short stories, The Bird's Nest, Life Among the Savages and Raising Demons. Anybody interested in a trade can reach me at: laurajane.spoon at
gmail.com
Fuck you too, jon. Chuck Klosterman could neither write nor think his way out of one of those little bags the bodega gives you for your beer. He is fake from top to bottom.
SLOG: Dying in your sleep isn't so bad, and maybe dying at forty-seen is okay if you've had a better forty-seven years than most people, which it sounds like she has.
Omniwise: I like your idea. The only NYRB classics I've read are the Simenon's, and they are so wonderful that I've bought some others, though I've yet to get to them.
Save for VF, I've been on a mysteries binge: Simenon, Winspear, Cara Black, plus the MacDonalds Ross and John. I'm thinking I should write a mystery and working on a essay bout detective fiction, so it's both fun and work. Besides, no matter how bad mine turns out, it'll be so much better than Cara Black's _Murder in Belleville_.
Dame- Have you read Jan Willem von Wetering, the Amersterdam cops series? My favorite mysteries. So laid back and calm, so much gin drinking, so many cafes.
I'm also reading The Sun Always Shines for the Cool/Midnight Moon at the Greasy Spoon/Eulogy for a Small Time Thief by Miguel Piñero. I recommend it, highly.
And I can't imagine what you have against those little bodega bags, dame. Though lacking in elegance, they ooze functionality. Not only do they keep your malt liquor a "secret," they keep broken glass off the pavement after your 40 slips from your drunken butterfingers.
They got plenty of elegance the way the old school 50 year old plus puerto ricans (the dudes who wear purple shorts, white socks pulled to the knee and mesh Newport gimme tank tops), all folded perfectly to the rim of the can, all perfectly creased, it always made me think of how a nurse would make a bed in the fifties, hospital corners.
Hugh: Nothing against the bags. Just saying Klosterman couldn't get out of a paper bag that small, much less one of those hulking grocery store ones. (Also, please start a neat pics thread today. I have lots of tedious work to do.)
Omnie: I haven't. But that sounds about my speed. I'm definitely more interested in detective fiction that foregrounds the (dare I say existential) tragedy of humanity, rather than the sort that is just about good and wicked people. The Chandler, Ross MacDonald tradition as opposed to the Hammet, Jim MacDonald one. Winspear falls in the first category too, but the inital mystery, _Maisie Dobbs_, is less a mystery that a cheesy novel wrapped in a mystery as thin as greasy wax paper. The second was better.
Then there's Sherlock Holmes–style mysteries, which I just plain hate. "I figured it out because I am brilliant and know everything." Those are the wish fulfillment mysteries.
Divine_Wino: I haven't read any Crumley, but from that quote he seems to be more in the Hammett tough-guy camp. Not for me so much. Anyway, I've only ready twenty Simenon mysteries, and there are something like seventy-two. Yum.
Oh, and it isn't a fight if it's Jon and I. Especially since he knows I hate Klosterman.
I'm definitely more interested in detective fiction that foregrounds the (dare I say existential) tragedy of humanity...
No that's Crumley all over, it's got some of the tough guy stuff, but it almost always inverts it, punishes the tough guy stance and reveals the (dare I say) emptiness and nihilism at the core of it, then goes on to revel in it. Nobody wins kinda thing, but I hear ya.
Yeah, I guess the nihilism is to an extent what I avoid. I like Simenon and Winspear because it's almost always clear that the fuck-ups are a result of people blindly and stupidly trying to get on with their lives, but not be wicked, and circumstance and luck intervene to result in utter cruelty. Like I just saw _Ace in the Hole_ (aka _The Big Carnival_) and that was like the perfect tragedy. As Thackery would say, "Vanity Fair--O, Vanity Fair!"
But I'll give one a gander. 'Cause you're no dope.
Right on, actually "No Country for Old Men" by McCarthy, is more or less this:
...almost always clear that the fuck-ups are a result of people blindly and stupidly trying to get on with their lives, but not be wicked, and circumstance and luck intervene to result in utter cruelty.
dame, no offense, but it would be impossible for you to get Klosterman, mainly because he's writing for me, not you. And if the internet is any indication, Chuck-bashing has become quite fashionable among the hipsterati. But I am nothing if not fiercely loyal in my likes.
You mean he's writing for people who don't care about the quality of writing as long as it says what they want to hear? Or are you saying you're as much of an eternal adolescent as he is?
Look, I'm willing to admit there are things you know more about than I do. Writing, however, does not happen to be one of them.
(And that's a charming insinuation that I only dislike Klosterman due to my zombie hipsterism, but it's crap and you know it.)
are you saying you're as much of an eternal adolescent as he is?
Well, duh.
And that's a charming insinuation that I only dislike Klosterman due to my zombie hipsterism, but it's crap and you know it
I'm not insinuating anything. But it's tough to deny that bashing him has become very fashionable. I kinda figure that a guy who touches that many nerves without trying is onto something. And Fargo Rock City is a book that needed to be written. He's not trying to be Michel Foucalt, he's not even trying to be Lester Bangs. He just some mook who lucked into a job where he can get away with spinning theories about Kiss all day. Good for him.
And I know almost nothing about anything worthwhile. Why are you even listening?
And I know almost nothing about anything worthwhile. Why are you even listening?
Dude, you started this little firestorm with your "fuck all the Klosterman haters" nonsense. I would have been happy to let it go (because as much as I don't like him, I don't think he's enough of a threat to be worth great amounts of attention), but being "fucked" deserves a response, especially when it's from someone as anti-intellectual as you.
He's not trying to be Michel Foucalt, he's not even trying to be Lester Bangs.
You mean he's not trying to write like he actually has an inkling of how to use words?
He just some mook who lucked into a job where he can get away with spinning theories about Kiss all day. Good for him.
Uh, no. He's some shitty writer with a tired shtick who makes money because people like you are more intersted in seeming "down with the downtrodden" and "standing up to the hipster hordes" than in actually using your brains for something useful.
You are for more of a poseur than all the people you put down, jon, and it's really fucking boring after a while. I know you mean well, but maybe you should read something that would challenge you to see how the flaws your rail against are your own.
It is so tiring that you always assume everything I disagree with you on is due to hipster zombiedom. I didn't know that Klosterman-bashing was popular, because I hadn't come across and I don't spend much of my time finding out what shallow hipsters think.
But you enjoy liking things just because people hate them--something most people grow out by the time they're sixteen. Maybe that's why you assume other people didn't get past that reactionary bullshit either.
Me? I've got my own brain and dislike things based on my experience and nothing else. So fuck you, Mr. Being Common Makes Me So Much Better.
And that's it for my defense, I'm happy to talk about detective novels, though.
Uh, no. He's some shitty writer with a tired shtick who makes money because people like you are more intersted in seeming "down with the downtrodden" and "standing up to the hipster hordes" than in actually using your brains for something useful.
Actually that's not my interest at all. Everything, I like, I like sincerely. I was actually quite stunned to find out how much some of the stuff I love(music, books, TV, whatever) was reviled. I'm merely defending my turf most of the time.
I know you mean well, but maybe you should read something that would challenge you to see how the flaws your rail against are your own.
Most of the stuff that people constantly tout as challenging and smart bores me to tears. YMMV. Life's too short to treat the pleasure of reading like a homework assignment one is obligated to do, so I go with what I know. No shtick involved (although it is fun to see people lose thier shit, although I'm still stunned at the level of hostility some things are greeted with).
The only reason I found out about Klosterman bashing is that a simple google search on the man reveals boatloads of hostile pieces. I just wonder what the hell the guy did to deserve such hostility.
I've got my own brain and dislike things based on my experience and nothing else.
Same here. Why are you so hostile to the idea that the same process led two very different people to different conclusions? Vive la differance.
When I was in second grade, I came home and told my parents that one of my teachers sucked. Scandalized, my father asked me, "do you know what 'sucks' means, [Hugh]?"
"Sure, dad. It means 'sucks shit,' right?"
"Oh, uh, sure, [Hugh]. Sucks shit, right. Carry on, then."
---
Foucault sucks.
So does avoidable nastiness. But as long as it "isn't a fight..."
It really isn't a fight, Hugh. No matter how much I infuriate dame, the next time she sees me, she's all smiles and freindliness. I'm not sure why "correcting," my ideas is so important to her. But she seems to have fun, so...
(thought: maybe she uses me as an intellectual tackling dummy. something to parctice on for more serious debates)
And aside from passages quoted in other books, I've never read Foucoult or any of those bums. Every time I've tried, they make my head hurt, and like I said, life's too short. I'm not in school, so I don't have to read him for a grade, so what's the point. One of the great joys of adulthood is being able to consume whatever cultural products you want.
also meat and beer products and wearing your socks pulled up mad high even though it's clearly a bad idea. I'll take the freedom of adulthood over the irresponsibility of childhood anyday, decreptitude, grin reaper, wage earning, having to have good manners and all.
and "Rock You Like a Low-Level Tropical Storm," "Rock And Roll Until a Reasonable Hour (and Party On Convenient Days)," "We're Not Gonna Take It (Unless of Course, You Ask Nicely)," and "Alumminum Fist."
You guys made me laugh with your crazy and irreverent reimaginings of polite hair rock songs. It reminds me of that hit by Bartleby and the Scriveners: I'd Prefer Not to Take It (Anymore). It was Dee Snider's first band.
No lesson, but I do have a Cormac McCarthy anecdote.
A reporter acquaintance of mine (who has since gone on to attain some renown) had a thing for Cormac, lived near him, and tried for many months to get an interview.
Problem is, he doesn't do interviews.
So, she decided to go through his trash and write about that.
She did, but no one would publish it. (A couple of big magazines liked, but were afraid they'd get sued.)
Corn bread scraps, side meat, greens, broken jar of whiskey, five "rung" shotgun shells, one scrap of paper that said, "all the ,uglysmellyhuggy pretty horses", bottle of metamucil.
I'm sure he's a great writer, but whatta first name to be saddled with. Makes me think of this guy.
So, she decided to go through his trash and write about that.
A nutjob named A.J.Weberman did the same thing to Bob Dylan quite often in th 70's. Dylan apparently found him and kicked the shit out of him. I don't blame him.
It's because I still have hope that you aren't the stupid poseur you pretend to be, jon. (And Hugh, if you have problems with the fight take it up with the gauntlet man.)
I'm not a poseur, at least no more than anybody else. I may very well be stupid, but that's a whole other story. We just have very different perspectives on things, and nothing's gonna change that, so it's best if we listen to eachother, rather than try to change eachother.
And for the record, the "fuck you, Chuck-haters" was a pre-emptive strike (and more or less a joke) since every other time I've brought his name up online, there's been a shitstorm of chuck-hatin'.
my husband likes Klosterman and was amused by your little Chuck-War. He just finished reading Killing Yourself To Live but was lukewarm on it.
He also adored Cormac McCarthy's Border Trilogy, but the newest one, not so much. Me, I hate McCarthy as much as I hate Hemingway-- which is to say a lot.
Right now he (the husband and reading buddy) is urging me to read the new Bret Easton Ellis, Lunar Park, which he enjoyed immensely
my husband likes Klosterman and was amused by your little Chuck-War. He just finished reading Killing Yourself To Live but was lukewarm on it.
I'll admitthat Kill Yourself... the least interesting of Chuck's books so far. But Fargo Rock City is brilliant, especially if you were or are a metalhead (let me guess, mr. SLOG is/was..Tell him I've met Chuck and he was freindlier than any author I've ever met at a reading before, but that might've been the Destroyer jersey I was wearing. He signed my book "Jon, Go Home and listen to Music From The Elder, Chuck).
I've never read Cormac McCarthy and have no plans to. I do urge everyone (especially women) to read Ladies Man by Richard Price. I will not stop until someone here reads it and reports back to me.
McCarthy is nothing like Hemmingway, much more like Faulkner, but I would never ask anyone to read anything they didn't want to. I understand your husbands distaste for the new one, but I like it. Tell him to read Suttree if he hasn't already, that's the best one of all, I think.
Jonmc,
You'd probably not like McCarthy, but I will, as always back you up on the Richard Price.
Sadly, I missed this thread until muddgirl referenced it, so perhaps others will see it too and there'll be more discussion here. With that in mind, I'm reading Other Criteria: Confrontations with Twentieth Century Art by Leo Steinberg which, so far, has been some of the most enjoyable art criticism I've read in a while. I have a copy of On Bullshit on loan which I'll be reading shortly. It's so small I imagine I'll be able to give that back soon. I received a copy of Years of Rice and Salt from the interlibrary loan (and was so excited!) but I noticed before checking the book out that the first 20 pages were missing so I had to put another copy on hold. Boo.
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