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constanceI feel sure that I've mentioned before that I love to read, right? :D That I have a houseful of books and acquire more on a weekly basis, that I never feel the need to join those book-a-week communities because the idea of not reading/rereading fifty books a year is completely foreign to me, even if I rarely feel comfortable talking about them for fear of trying others' patience.
There are books I like and ones I am indifferent to and a few I simply loathe, but I'm rarely intimidated, once I open the covers, into not finishing. David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest nearly defeated me, though. It's a gigantic book, and it's dense and heavily endnoted, which is fine, except that I read and read without getting pulled in. (In fact, the only thing that kept me reading past, say, page 150, was the knowledge that it's A Certain Friend's favorite book and having started it I felt embarrassed not finishing it, on her account.) I read, I say, and read and read, flipping back and forth between the end notes, getting increasingly annoyed with David Foster Wallace for being so apparently willing to sacrifice everything worthwhile in his novel to his obsessive love for his own voice.
I remember the exact moment when that feeling changed for me, too, when it became clear to me that what I was reading was not so much a young man's thousand-page sploogefest (or do I mean spoogefest?) as what I am thinking is The Great American Novel made manifest. I can't tell you what that scene is without issuing some serious spoilers, but after my epiphany I settled in eagerly; and I am becoming increasingly aware as I read that this is possibly the finest instance of one of my own bulletproof kinks that I will ever see.
(Do you remember bulletproof kinks? Te, I think, is the one who first talked about them in conjunction with fandom. She was referring to porn when she put the term forward, but I think it can be applied in a more general sense, too, to any concept or scenario which will move you unbearably every time you read it (no matter how mediocre its execution).)
My bulletproof kink centers around what I've come to think of as a new and peculiarly American form of tragedy, built around a group of people, all bright and funny and/or quirky, whose primary impetus seems to be engaging, and who fail, utterly or maybe just barely, to engage, almost every time they try. The overshots and undershots and near-misses, everyone terribly, frighteningly isolated and nearly irreparably damaged because of it, which makes the rare connections, when they do come, all the more poignant and dear, and throws the misses into sharp relief.
Okay, I've got off-point here. My points are these:
(1) I am reading Infinite Jest. I am enjoying it very much. If you feel the urge to read, hang in there. It is worth any effort you put into it.
(2) Do you have literary bulletproof kinks? What are they?
There are books I like and ones I am indifferent to and a few I simply loathe, but I'm rarely intimidated, once I open the covers, into not finishing. David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest nearly defeated me, though. It's a gigantic book, and it's dense and heavily endnoted, which is fine, except that I read and read without getting pulled in. (In fact, the only thing that kept me reading past, say, page 150, was the knowledge that it's A Certain Friend's favorite book and having started it I felt embarrassed not finishing it, on her account.) I read, I say, and read and read, flipping back and forth between the end notes, getting increasingly annoyed with David Foster Wallace for being so apparently willing to sacrifice everything worthwhile in his novel to his obsessive love for his own voice.
I remember the exact moment when that feeling changed for me, too, when it became clear to me that what I was reading was not so much a young man's thousand-page sploogefest (or do I mean spoogefest?) as what I am thinking is The Great American Novel made manifest. I can't tell you what that scene is without issuing some serious spoilers, but after my epiphany I settled in eagerly; and I am becoming increasingly aware as I read that this is possibly the finest instance of one of my own bulletproof kinks that I will ever see.
(Do you remember bulletproof kinks? Te, I think, is the one who first talked about them in conjunction with fandom. She was referring to porn when she put the term forward, but I think it can be applied in a more general sense, too, to any concept or scenario which will move you unbearably every time you read it (no matter how mediocre its execution).)
My bulletproof kink centers around what I've come to think of as a new and peculiarly American form of tragedy, built around a group of people, all bright and funny and/or quirky, whose primary impetus seems to be engaging, and who fail, utterly or maybe just barely, to engage, almost every time they try. The overshots and undershots and near-misses, everyone terribly, frighteningly isolated and nearly irreparably damaged because of it, which makes the rare connections, when they do come, all the more poignant and dear, and throws the misses into sharp relief.
Okay, I've got off-point here. My points are these:
(1) I am reading Infinite Jest. I am enjoying it very much. If you feel the urge to read, hang in there. It is worth any effort you put into it.
(2) Do you have literary bulletproof kinks? What are they?
no subject
Date: 2007-01-20 08:49 pm (UTC)Literature is actually a little tougher to define. I think of it by genres rather than by plot line. I am fond of almost anything set between the wars, the harder boiled the better. I'm a sucker for crackling dialogue and telling sartorial details; Raymond Chandler owns my heart on these.
I'm also devoted to career girl stories. The Best of Everything, Scruples, even Valley of the Dolls push all my "plucky girl in the big city" buttons. Lately I have been meditating about why I don't think that The Devil Wears Prada and other recent Chick Lit books are really the same, but I haven't formulated enough thoughts for a real post yet. I could watch reruns of That Girl until my eyeballs fall out.
Another genre that often intersects with career girl stories is the group-of-friends joint Bildungsroman. Valley of the Dolls actually falls into this realm, though of course the real doyenne is The Group. In a more modern vein, Lace is a good example with a clever premise, or Loose Change or Braided Lives for a slightly more intellectual angle.
I may be reading in the gutter but I'm looking at the stars.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-21 12:53 am (UTC)I don't talk too much about my particular fanfictional and/or sexual BKs (there's a fair bit of overlap there) these days, either, though I was much more open about them when I'd first found fandom and was delighted by the presence of all those kindred spirits. Anyway, I respect your right to keep yours secret and safe.
Hahaha, what a fine flock of novels you've rounded up! Some I know and some I don't, and a couple, Lace for example, I read so long ago that I only remember the absolutely luridest parts of them. (I do remember Lili very fondly, though.) I'm a big Philip Marlowe fan (I first picked him up when I read S.J. Perelman's parodies long ago, but Chandler is a writer you don't really forget. And I agree that chick lit doesn't belong in the same class as the old standbys as, say, Princess Daisy (my personal Krantz favorite, though I do like Scruples and okay I am tired of italicizing so you'll have to bear with me Mistral's Daughter as well. Thinking about it now, the only explanation I can come up with as to why they ought to be separated is that potboilers or no, the old standbys feel epic and substantial in a way that the chick-lit doesn't. Does that make sense?
I'm rambling here, and so I'll stop. :D This is why I tend to try not to talk too much about books -- I get all incoherent and bugeyed and talk with my arms waving.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-21 02:26 am (UTC)I'm still scratching around for my ideas for a full post, but I'd say the big difference in the Chick Lit gals is that they are so ambivalent and gutless. Krantz's women know what they need to do, how they have to use all the ancient tricks that women have learned over the centuries to get ahead (and that we will, by the way, get to learn at the same time, except how to tie an Hermes scarf like a Frenchwoman, which we must still only imagine). Also, while romance is always part of the happy ending of a Krantz novel, it's not the primary motivator. The women create their own success, and getting a man is just one part of that. You know, like the heroes of regular (male) stories.
Also, Judith Krantz used to write for Vogue. She gets all the lifestyle stuff in exquisite detail. Danielle Steele tells you that things are luxurious; Judith Krantz show you what luxury is and helps you feel like an insider who will be able to recognize it in her own life.
Now tell me more about these Perelman parodies of Chandler. I just stumbled in through Dashiell Hammet. Also, try Cornell Woolrich if you like that stuff.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-23 01:27 am (UTC)Ah, you put it so well, the difference between the girl-in-the-wide-world novels of twenty years ago and today's chick-lit. And I agree that Mistral's Daughter is the best of Krantz's novels, not just epic but moving and thoughtful as well. But I can't help it: I adore Princess Daisy because it was one of the first grown-up novels I ever read by sneaking it out of my mother's bedside table, and I have a special fondness for it, for that reason.