Last year I spent an enjoyable week reading several of Christopher Lasch’s books. Lasch was a late 20th-century history professor best known for his 1979 polemic The Culture of Narcissism.
I like this point: "the book could’ve had more respect for the reader’s time." I think a lot of books fall into this category. I remember trying to read Bret Easton Ellis's American Psycho when it first came out and not being able to finish it, because it was just page after page of the same. I tried again years later with the same result. As you say about The Sleepers, the book stopped surprising me. All the same, it's become a kind of literary landmark, representing a generation and a time. Perhaps The Sleepers, as certain reviewers predict, will have the same relatively long life. The book has certainly got people talking. Thanks for the review.
I like your comment, but I will say, I am very fond of American Psycho! Admittedly I listened to it in audiobook, where I feel like sometimes tangents and asides are less annoying
I recently watched Bunuel’s film The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, which is hostile art that subjects you to two hours of the absolute nothing of six boring characters exchanging banalities. The point being that they’re boring.
Bunuel laughs in his audience’s face, “Haha you thought I was going to give you a movie, you thought I had something to say. You rubes, you absolute morons. You sat through this for nothing.”
It’s just a totally facile stunt. Art whose whole point is to say nothing is just, it’s just not a point worth making.
In this case, I don't know if it's meant to be an assault on the reader: I think this book feels is in on the joke. That's why it works--the reader also feels superior to Dan, Eliza, and Mariko. I just question whether that feeling can sustain an entire book.
I saw it in the theater, which is the ideal way to experience it--no breaks, no phone. I have a high tolerance for boring movies (love Ozu etc) but by the last twenty minutes I was rocking back and forth in my seat and grabbing my head in agony. I first described it as claustrophobia cinema.
You're right the comparison doesn't quite track. I think when I commented I was reacting mostly to the dialogue you quoted, which out of context anyway, man, I don't think I could have made it through a whole book of that.
Thanks, this is a very helpful review that finally addresses some concerns I had hoped others would consider earlier. This particularly stood out to me as important information:
>But it’s also just very clear from the resulting scene that this is exactly what he’s thinking. The two of them are in perfect harmony; they fully understand each others’ desires and positions.
>As a result of this complete understanding that exists between Dan / Eliza and Dan / Mariko, the dialogue tends to take on a very stilted quality. It’s extremely on the nose: every conversation has some purpose, and they talk exactly to the point.
This is a pattern that grates on me in grimdark fantasy as well, where it's common, and I have been unable to ignore it ever since RS Bakker's Prince of Nothing series skewered it (and flat-out symbolically crucified it, in a climactic scene that ranks among the most existentially horrifying I've read in fiction). The crucial issue for me as a reader is that when people with hearts actually understand each other well, they don't find it hard to break these Lasch-type patterns.
I can't suspend disbelief that people would actually be so correct about one another and still be so helplessly adrift. Instead, the believable narratives incorporating this pattern are those like Julian Barnes's The Sense of an Ending where the helpless omniscience in the narrator is a delusion that depends crucially on the narrator's isolation. I plan to read The Sleepers, but I'm concerned that I'm going to find Gasda is writing well from inside a miserable delusion rather than describing it well and wisely from outside.
That's really astute. I agree that if people understand each other so well, then they probably wouldn't be so trapped! And if they're trapped and helpless, it's probably in part because they lack understanding
Mmm. My life is kinda like this. I'm a xanax and two pinot gris's into a standard evening of my mid-life depression, so a little slow; but I adored Lasch about a decade ago. And the reactionary think pieces and - what is the non-fiction version of a novella? - extended essays like Kristin Dombek's 'Selfishness of others'. All great as popular non-fiction, but lacking a superego, means lacking 'character' and all the things that pertain to 'a' character; which can be a challenge for the character driven form.
I was fond of Lasch as well. Just question how well his diagnoses apply to myself and to people I actually know. Obviously they're an extremely good description of all kinds of people I dislike and don't know--but those people are somewhat immaterial to my day-to-day life.
A thoughtful, measured review from a writer I've come to trust to have a finger on the pulse of new lit, alt lit, bad lit, good lit -- without ever pigeonholing or making those broadstrokes characterizations. Always admire your sophistication and attentiveness. (I also appreciate you linking to my review!)
Thank you! This means a lot. I've enjoyed doing these front-list reviews, and I really love being a part of the broader discussion about all these books.
Sometimes I feel this is a consequence of trying to emulate the 19th c European fiction and late Russian lit too which are very dialogue heavy in their approach.
I could never finish anything written before 19c. Chaycer and Beowulf did my head in. Apologies I am typos galore with no energy to hit backspace so often
If you're sniffling in the spring, you probably have allergies. If a piece of contemporary fiction doesn't work, it's probably just bad writing. Sometimes the most obvious diagnosis is also the right one.
It seems a great irony, one of many, that, after finishing The Dead, we may weep for Gabriel and Greta and all the rest (Eveline earlier haunts me more than any Dubliner). We lament Joyce's judgment on them. We care for those characters. We want to say you've been asleep, wake up. You can save yourself, country, etc. The Sleepers are truly dead. We want to see them buried, silenced; to nail their coffins shut.
I like this point: "the book could’ve had more respect for the reader’s time." I think a lot of books fall into this category. I remember trying to read Bret Easton Ellis's American Psycho when it first came out and not being able to finish it, because it was just page after page of the same. I tried again years later with the same result. As you say about The Sleepers, the book stopped surprising me. All the same, it's become a kind of literary landmark, representing a generation and a time. Perhaps The Sleepers, as certain reviewers predict, will have the same relatively long life. The book has certainly got people talking. Thanks for the review.
I like your comment, but I will say, I am very fond of American Psycho! Admittedly I listened to it in audiobook, where I feel like sometimes tangents and asides are less annoying
A lot of people love the book. I should try listening to it.
I recently watched Bunuel’s film The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie, which is hostile art that subjects you to two hours of the absolute nothing of six boring characters exchanging banalities. The point being that they’re boring.
Bunuel laughs in his audience’s face, “Haha you thought I was going to give you a movie, you thought I had something to say. You rubes, you absolute morons. You sat through this for nothing.”
It’s just a totally facile stunt. Art whose whole point is to say nothing is just, it’s just not a point worth making.
Now I kind of want to experience this movie.
In this case, I don't know if it's meant to be an assault on the reader: I think this book feels is in on the joke. That's why it works--the reader also feels superior to Dan, Eliza, and Mariko. I just question whether that feeling can sustain an entire book.
I saw it in the theater, which is the ideal way to experience it--no breaks, no phone. I have a high tolerance for boring movies (love Ozu etc) but by the last twenty minutes I was rocking back and forth in my seat and grabbing my head in agony. I first described it as claustrophobia cinema.
You're right the comparison doesn't quite track. I think when I commented I was reacting mostly to the dialogue you quoted, which out of context anyway, man, I don't think I could have made it through a whole book of that.
It's better in context, but...yeah.
I mentioned your critique of Lasch in a piece I wrote about The Sleepers - I had exactly the same thought!
Excited to read it!
Thanks, this is a very helpful review that finally addresses some concerns I had hoped others would consider earlier. This particularly stood out to me as important information:
>But it’s also just very clear from the resulting scene that this is exactly what he’s thinking. The two of them are in perfect harmony; they fully understand each others’ desires and positions.
>As a result of this complete understanding that exists between Dan / Eliza and Dan / Mariko, the dialogue tends to take on a very stilted quality. It’s extremely on the nose: every conversation has some purpose, and they talk exactly to the point.
This is a pattern that grates on me in grimdark fantasy as well, where it's common, and I have been unable to ignore it ever since RS Bakker's Prince of Nothing series skewered it (and flat-out symbolically crucified it, in a climactic scene that ranks among the most existentially horrifying I've read in fiction). The crucial issue for me as a reader is that when people with hearts actually understand each other well, they don't find it hard to break these Lasch-type patterns.
I can't suspend disbelief that people would actually be so correct about one another and still be so helplessly adrift. Instead, the believable narratives incorporating this pattern are those like Julian Barnes's The Sense of an Ending where the helpless omniscience in the narrator is a delusion that depends crucially on the narrator's isolation. I plan to read The Sleepers, but I'm concerned that I'm going to find Gasda is writing well from inside a miserable delusion rather than describing it well and wisely from outside.
That's really astute. I agree that if people understand each other so well, then they probably wouldn't be so trapped! And if they're trapped and helpless, it's probably in part because they lack understanding
Mmm. My life is kinda like this. I'm a xanax and two pinot gris's into a standard evening of my mid-life depression, so a little slow; but I adored Lasch about a decade ago. And the reactionary think pieces and - what is the non-fiction version of a novella? - extended essays like Kristin Dombek's 'Selfishness of others'. All great as popular non-fiction, but lacking a superego, means lacking 'character' and all the things that pertain to 'a' character; which can be a challenge for the character driven form.
I was fond of Lasch as well. Just question how well his diagnoses apply to myself and to people I actually know. Obviously they're an extremely good description of all kinds of people I dislike and don't know--but those people are somewhat immaterial to my day-to-day life.
A thoughtful, measured review from a writer I've come to trust to have a finger on the pulse of new lit, alt lit, bad lit, good lit -- without ever pigeonholing or making those broadstrokes characterizations. Always admire your sophistication and attentiveness. (I also appreciate you linking to my review!)
Thank you! This means a lot. I've enjoyed doing these front-list reviews, and I really love being a part of the broader discussion about all these books.
Sometimes I feel this is a consequence of trying to emulate the 19th c European fiction and late Russian lit too which are very dialogue heavy in their approach.
Surely you mean 19th c? There aren’t that many important 18th century novels.
I could never finish anything written before 19c. Chaycer and Beowulf did my head in. Apologies I am typos galore with no energy to hit backspace so often
Sorry iPhone and tremor problems with hands. Yes 19th c European fiction.
Been waiting for this!
Thanks for this.
About halfway through it.
I’m enjoying it.
I keep chuckling at things.
Thank you!
If you're sniffling in the spring, you probably have allergies. If a piece of contemporary fiction doesn't work, it's probably just bad writing. Sometimes the most obvious diagnosis is also the right one.
It seems a great irony, one of many, that, after finishing The Dead, we may weep for Gabriel and Greta and all the rest (Eveline earlier haunts me more than any Dubliner). We lament Joyce's judgment on them. We care for those characters. We want to say you've been asleep, wake up. You can save yourself, country, etc. The Sleepers are truly dead. We want to see them buried, silenced; to nail their coffins shut.
I like books where the characters talk drunk and high
this is really well done criticism
Thank you!
I like that veiled, covert quality you highlight in the play. It would be nice to see such a play live.
I know! I'd love to see some of Gasda's plays in person. Something to think about when next I'm in NYC.