July 5th, 2010 / 8:06 am
Book Reviews
Tao Lin Tao Lin Tao Lin Tao Lin Richard Yates Richard Yates Richard Yates Richard Yates
I’m baffled by the back cover of my Richard Yates galley. The relationship between the book’s two main characters–one, the Tao figure, 22, and the other 16–is described three times, in three separate paragraphs, as “illicit,” a heavy-handed enforcement of theme which should hold truck with the novel itself: one would expect, going in, that the scandal which supposedly holds the weight of the novel would actually sustain itself as a scandal. Which happens to be so little the case that it’s kind of funny, this negation of the back cover, and is a fascinating, if unintentional, way of diverting expectations: by Richard Yates failing totally in self-description.
The real book has little, in the end, to do with an “illicit love affair,” at least on my reading; instead, it signifies a deepening, widening and inversion of Tao’s already-honed formula–bored vegans emptying themselves out in the midst of everyone being an asshole–which in this book exposes itself as not exactly formulaic, but as a form, crystallized and repeated, finally reaching its limit, the zero-point at which the tranquility which has always marked Tao’s work becomes its opposite.
In Richard Yates, the bored vegans donning neutral facial expressions–Dakota Fanning and Haley Joel Osment–are themselves the assholes, the lunatics, the destructive forces who are paradoxically almost too self-reflexive, too consumed with themselves, to understand on how profound of a level they’re ruining one another’s lives, and with what intensity they embody precisely the blinkered, “fucked” subjectivity from which they want to be kept safe. Whereas in Shoplifting from American Apparel, Sam was so “cleansed” and emptied that he could welcome whatever happens as what must be, Dakota and Haley, though they evince the same values as Sam, use those values (or, well, Haley, the Tao character, specifically does) to police one another’s lives. They eventually become so embroiled in their relationship that they can’t see beyond it enough to even desire an improvement–or to even see the latter as claustrophobic in the first place. All that Haley wants is Dakota, but his Dakota is only himself. Here is the underside of the “objectivity” scrawled across Tao’s work: to become God, and, loving, to love only what is yours. To love whatever says your name, which is only to love your name. It’s lonely up there.
All of this is, of course, delivered neutrally in the third-person, here a really curious and complex technique. Most of the time we get a melancholic and “twee” mood from Haley and Dakota’s conversations, from what they say and how they say it, and from how they process the events that interrupt or challenge their relationship (for instance, Dakota Fanning’s “overprotective” mother, the novel’s most empathetic character, who is confined to its periphery and drowned out)–a mood for which, for better or worse, one can now rely on Tao, but here he’s undermining and almost mocking that expectation while still fulfilling it. Because, after the first half of the book, that mood is only ever accompanied by the chilling knowledge, the unsaid of what we’ve read, that this mode of relating, vibrant and youthful in its way, is costing these characters their youth. It’s jarring and truly sad, in a wholly new and kind of breathtaking way for Tao, to become caught up in the love between Dakota and Haley, to witness them save one another, only to realize, again and again, that they will be the end to one another, the only thing one another ever loved–or, even worse, could love.
It would be easy to say that Richard Yates is Tao Lin’s best book yet. Others have said it. Plainly, however, it’s not–Richard Yates only proves that Tao’s work, as it should, undoes any pretensions to “best” or “worst.” Each book of Tao’s compounds and confounds the books that have come before it; each book both supplements Tao’s formula and claims that there is none, that Tao’s writing is not formula, but revision and sabotage at once, and of what source material, well, who knows. Who cares, really. Shoplifting from American Apparel is poise achieved deep within the noise of whatever; Richard Yates is the noise, so loud that it goes unheard, coiled at the very heart of that poise.
Tags: dakota fanning, Haley Josel Osment, richard yates, Tao Lin
Oh, good. Before the jump, I thought you were going to take Tao’s dick out of your mouth for once. Whew. Same old b.s.
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July 5th, 2010 / 11:55 amAlec Niedenthal—
James, I’ve never written about Tao before. Richard Yates is one of two books I’ve read recently that are coming out or have just now come out, the other being Witz. So it’s either Tao Lin or Joshua Cohen. Take your pick.
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July 5th, 2010 / 1:24 pmMorningstar—
Uh, I’d take Cohen. Easy choice there.
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July 5th, 2010 / 2:00 pmAlec Niedenthal—
I meant because it’s such a common complaint that we’re covering them too often.
July 5th, 2010 / 12:39 pmmarshall—
Haters seem to always hate the “dickriders”/”stans” worse than the Big Guy himself. Let it go, bro… Learn to be Zen like Tao.
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July 5th, 2010 / 6:31 pmDonald—
James “implies that he would suck inferior dick on principle” Brolin
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alec this review made me interested in reading the book.
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July 5th, 2010 / 1:20 pmMike Meginnis—
Yes. Maybe this will be the time I manage to read Tao Lin.
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July 7th, 2010 / 2:33 pmJordan—
Report back — old people want to know.
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I like the cover. Dunno if I’ll like the book. Never read anything of Tao’s except like, two poems. But the cover makes the guys face look like a vagina face. Or that he is ripping open his face. Not sure if there is an explicit difference. What I can tell you is right now I am watching SPLICE and one of the characters is having sex with a genetically hybrid’d creature. It went unexpectedly erotic. I’m kind of grossed out….
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July 5th, 2010 / 5:23 pmAlec Niedenthal—
I loved Splice.
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i loved this review. tao has no formula but an ever-expanding proof about unlikely existence & how ‘fucked’ it all is. i could staple together all of tao’s work and read it through, not feeling any solid break in character, not because he is repetitious or unoriginal or bases everything off of himself, but because he knows all too well the epitome of ‘i’m lost & too tired to do anything about it.’
haters keep hatin’. it’s like a chinese finger trap.
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fuck tao lin!!! lol!!
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July 5th, 2010 / 8:54 pmmarshall—
lol
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herp da derp derp derp
who the eff reads reviews anymore
fuckin they’re all just corporate sponsored ads or artsy circle-jerks, bro
‘eff this shit’ to HELLLLLL bro
nah man nah
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July 6th, 2010 / 4:51 pmsteve—
yah fuck reviews
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I want this book so bad right now
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I also liked this review but I don’t see how haley joel osment could have a neutral facial expression without all his melancholy showing though. He has such a troubled look. I blame bruce willis, maybe this is explained in the book. Also I think it’s a very rare thing that all tao’s books are totally different. Maybe that’s why everyone seems to hate him
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think i might write a book called ‘bret easton ellis’
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I enjoyed this review, Alec. Good job.
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http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/swimsuit_issue.png
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I really appreciated this post. It seems like you reacted to a lot of the same things in RY that I did, but also gave me a lot of new things to think about. I feel like this review enhanced my understanding of the book, which I finished a week or two ago but have been spending *a lot* of time thinking about since then. It really got under my skin.
Despite the fact that Melville House seems to be pushing it as a mashup of “An Education” and “Lolita”–it’s actually a devastating, and largely sexless, little book. “Morbid” is a word I keep coming back to when I think about it, though I’d be hard-pressed to apply it in any kind of literal way. Like all Tao’s work, there’s an aesthetic rigor that’s not necessarily obvious, or, better put perhaps, is not obvious in the way and for the reasons in which it would seem to be obvious. But here more than perhaps anywhere else I felt like the aesthetics were amplifying or enforcing the ethics of the work, which made for an at times highly unpleasant–though thoroughly enrapturing–reading experience inasmuch as the general ethical issues raised–and the particular ethics of the individual characters–are ambivalent and somewhat deranged.
To the author’s major credit, he seems to actually see all of this and wish for it to be seen. It would be easy to mis-read the book as lacking in self-awareness, a refusal to question itself, but it seems to me that one reason that the story can be told with utter dispassion is that the author believes said story to be self-interrogating and self-indicting–to tell the story is to invite an inquisition of the one who tells it. This seems to be more or less in keeping with what I know of the work of Richard Yates (which is admittedly not a whole hell of a lot) but it’s also in the vein of that other, earlier arch-minimalist, Ernest Hemingway, who was both more morbid (hey!) and much funnier than he’s typically given credit for. I forget if or how Richard Yates appears in “Richard Yates” (maybe somebody mentions The Easter Parade at some point?) but it’s very early on in RY that HJO is found reading a biography of Hemingway. Without speculating on which Hemingway books the author or the character might have been thinking of (if any) I will share that RY put me in the mind of the Hemingway of the non-war short stories, such as “The Sea Change”, “The Light of the World”, and most of all “Hills Like White Elephants.”
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July 6th, 2010 / 1:26 amzusya17—
i mean it when i say i’d really like for this book to be good. but everything i’ve heard about it so far is making me think that it’s required of the reader to want to be famous to enjoy the read. anyone have a pdf they can send me? i kind of live on a mountain and don’t get paid anything for doing so.
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July 6th, 2010 / 2:55 pmDonald—
I would also hugely appreciate any PDFs that anyone could offer, as I live in England and don’t get paid anything for doing so.
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July 6th, 2010 / 3:29 pmSaduharu Mandingo—
You are going to give yourself a hernia, young man.
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‘Richard Yates is the noise’
cool, this sounds really promising
good review
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Alec, while I haven’t had the opportunity, of course, to read R.Y. yet, your intelligent, elucidating and accessible review certainly peaked my interest and pried open the crack a bit wider on an author who might be, to some, inaccessible and, to others, misunderstood, and to yet others revered or reviled, depending on the individual.
I likewise appreciated your words, Justin, if for no other reason (although, of course, you’d provided plenty of others) your invocation of Hemingway, whose work, in my frank opinion, is incomparable; I applaud your giving the proverbial “shout out” to how funny his work can be. As for the sobriquet “minimalist,” I fear, in ways, that this is a misnomer for his craft, for I’ve yet to read another author who could pack so many facets into each, particular word.
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Someone needs to tell Tao to aim higher. But that’s not a very smart thing to do. And all of you seem smart.
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using “lolita” to describe tao’s work—fucking lol.
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Tao Lin is a good writer who doesn’t afraid of anything.
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July 6th, 2010 / 3:20 pmd—
He is are thus that too is.
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July 6th, 2010 / 3:41 pmmarshall—
I got an RY galley, but I accidentally the whole thing.
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It is true that the jacket copy seems to have almost nothing to do with the pages between the covers.
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HTMLgiant should refrain from talking about Tao Lin for one month and replace those posts with Nick Antosca talking about A Sport and A Pastime.
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July 6th, 2010 / 4:31 pmjh—
I did not know that Nick Antosca posted directly before me.
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July 8th, 2010 / 9:21 pmNick Antosca—
Pleasing.
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reading these things makes me feel like i want to be really moderate, like reactionary moderation, like i’m reacting to the people who are being reactionarily moderate about their opinions, like the voice of reason or something (lol), post-reactionary moderation moderate. no voice of reason or something. can’t figure out why i said “voice of reason” so many times just now
i really like tao lin’s writing, a lot. i look forward to reading ry. i think i thought this just now: “unapologetically like tao lin(’s writing).” seems confusing to me. seems like that isn’t relevant. ‘tao lin sympathizer.’ i don’t know, seems like he is someone who writes (well) (terribly) who is (clever) (a media whore)
i personally feel like he writes well and is clever and maybe a media whore but in an entertaining way
i feel mildly amused by the existence of these comments. i’ve read 10-20% of them. seems like i will check back later to see if anyone has posted after me with higher levels of interest. ok
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July 6th, 2010 / 6:17 pmmarshall—
semicolon blog, damn
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I trimmed my pubes today. I think I went a little too crazy.
It’s kinda like stubble now. Tao Lin, how do you trim your pubes, if at all?
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July 7th, 2010 / 10:01 amtao—
triple-blade razor
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July 10th, 2010 / 2:02 amjonny ross—
damn
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Have you read anything by Wes Eisold? Do you like him or any of his bands (American Nightmare/Give Up The Ghost, Some Girls, Cold Cave, XO Skeletons)?
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July 7th, 2010 / 12:52 pmmarshall—
I didn’t know that dude is in Cold Cave. Weird.
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July 7th, 2010 / 1:48 pmtao—
i haven’t read anything by that person
i think i’ve listened to some of those bands, i don’t remember what i thought about them
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Um
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dgaf
tao lin says shit and i like it
ill steal this book
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