Good Mysteries
This weekend on a trip to the New College of Florida, the most excellent Alexis Orgera and I got into a mini-discussion of our love for a good well-written mystery novel, one that asks more questions than it answers, and that doesn’t necessarily open and shut doors as much as it does fund eerie intricate descriptions and aura with a subtle pull that keeps you running along inside it. It seemed hard to think of a lot of books that fall into this category, though I recommended two I’ve loved in the past few years, Freidrich Dürrenmatt’s The Assignment (which I copped from a recommended list by the also mystery-making master Brian Evenson), and Jose Saramago’s The Double.
The Assignment is particularly interesting for its form, in that it is a set of chapters that are all one sentence, written to correspond with the movements of a piece of music that he composed the book to, I believe in a very short time, and yet the intricate form and wonderful sentences never falter from being a page turner. Saramago’s work as a whole, even when not based on premises so mysterious as the one in The Double (a man becomes obsessed with a minor character in a series of films who looks exactly like him, who he then begins to trace).
There is also Robbe-Grillet, and some of Paul Auster (I particularly love the mapmaking and patterns in the New York Trilogy and Oracle Night) and Dennis Cooper’s books have a distinguished mysterious pull. I am trying to think of more, here without my books.
What are some great mystery-style novels, pulp or literary, or ones that use that constantly updating confusion/terror/detective narrative drive to fuel their heart?
What Else is New?
Matt Taibbi has the best review so far of Going Rogue: “Sarah Palin–WWE Star.”
Nerve.com had one of their rare fits of being amusing- “Sex Advice From D&D Players.” (via Boing Boing)
Dennis Cooper’s got a spotlight on Garden, Ashes by Danilo Kis.
Ben H. Winters is at Slate, talking about how he wrote Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters.
Penguin has named the ten “essential” classic books (a kind of best of the best of their Penguin Classics line), and made dopey little trailers for each of them.
David Haglund on Javier Marias.
Oh, and our own Chelsea Martin is interviewed at The Rumpus.
Advertising should create spectacle, not story.
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k6PSbUl_68k
Friday Fuck Books, Let’s Us All Fall.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3ZSXlNvAiI
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6m2lfk4Bm34
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utjyI3WpGNg
Don’t name names.
Sometimes I’ll read through a post here and read the comments, and someone will tell a story about an unnamed authors weird/bad/inappropriate behavior and I’ll think, “Man, who the hell did that?” And I’ll want the commenter or poster to name names. Tell me who did that weird/bad/inappropriate thing.
But names won’t be named. And I’ll think, “Aw, c’mon. Why not? What are you afraid of? Go on. Name the name!”
Someone else will ask for names to be named. Someone will say, “C’mon. Be honest. Just tell us who did that thing. It’s in the interest of open communication!”
And that’s about the time when I realize: bullshit. My desire to have a name named has nothing to do with open communication. It has nothing to do with honesty. I have one—and only one—motivation. I may come up with justifications after the fact, but I have one motivation.
I like gossip. That’s it. And everyone else does, too. We can mask our desire for names to be named in all sorts of higher-seeming justifications. But we just want to gossip.
So, fuck it. Don’t name names. We don’t really have any good reason to want them. And when we pressure you, cajole you, or try to make you feel like a coward for not naming names, remember that we’re completely full of shit. Don’t fall for it.
(Apologies for feeding the troll. Happens often enough, though.)
Dear Bob Dylan, Just When I Think I Can’t Love You More Than I Do Already, You Go And Do Something Like This
via Brooklyn Vegan, with a hat tip to my friend Maggie. Set the video to fullscreen if you’ve got a lick of sense.
Crunk-okov
Life posted a bunch of photos of Nabokov goobin’ around back in the day. [via Rake’s Progress] Seems like a guy worth hanging around.
For some reason all I see is Jimmy Chen.
Hopefully this comparison will encourage Jimmy to parody the pictures by getting his partner to snap some shots of him in action. It’d be something to live for. Jimmy?
Jimmy?