NWR: Side argument - Jonathan Franzen, great or shit?

originally posted by Tristan Welles:
originally posted by Yixin:


I don't get Auster.
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I usually refrain from stating a similar opinion, as many well-read people enjoy his novels. For me they are 300 page exercises in solipsism.
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Ditto for Roth. But neither is ornate, which gives their solipsism a different flavor. Falcons rather than peacocks.

One could make a claim, perhaps glibly, that all literary fiction is necessarily solipsism since it is solitary work, lonelier than a long distance runner, imaginations plugging away daily at their desks, unburdening themselves upon an anonymous and invisible public. Unlike, say, a classical composer or a playwright, who also work in solitude, but can witness performances. It is perhaps this distance from the reader that condemns the fiction writer to a kind of solipsism, even if it is empathetic, generous, and deeply humane.
 
originally posted by Rahsaan:
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
What I had in mind, and should have put more clearly, is that both (Rushdie frequently, and McEwan in his quite over the top Nutshell, and somewhat in Atonement) revel in their command and are rather show-offish about it, whereas writers like Philip Roth and Paul Auster (currently reading the latter's masterful 4321) have as much command, yet never revel in, never flex for the sheer sake of the flex.
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I understand that on an intellectual level, but not sure I can see how it plays out. Unless it means that Roth is much more plot driven, which may explain why I never took to him before. (Although I have thought about trying again)
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Hmmm, to me these four seem more or less equally plot-driven, so I didn't mean that. I meant the actual language, the words chosen to serve their fertile imaginations, going from the more baroque (Rushdie and sometimes McEwan) to the drier, more spare, more functional (perhaps), more instrumental (perhaps). A little bit like some cliché dualities (Catholic v. Protestant, Dionysian v. Apollonian, etc.).
 
originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
I agree with your spy professor, though I would add a couple of other Greene's to the list, Our Man in Havana (probably too funny for him to think it was great) and Gun for Sale (probably too noirish for him to include).
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RIP Bruce Rosenberg.
 
Philip Larkin (1922-1985)

Annus Mirabilis

Sexual intercourse began
In nineteen sixty-three
(which was rather late for me) -
Between the end of the "Chatterley" ban
And the Beatles' first LP.

,,,
 
originally posted by Tristan Welles:
originally posted by Yixin:


I don't get Auster.
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I usually refrain from stating a similar opinion, as many well-read people enjoy his novels. For me they are 300 page exercises in solipsism.
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Yeah, Auster gives me the creeps.
 
Paul Auster is brilliant, and sometimes too brilliant for his own good. Some of his stuff is just a miserable slog, and some of them are gripping page-turners but then as soon as you're done with them you can't figure out why those weren't miserable slogs, too. But some of them are legit masterpieces.
 
I am finding Auster's latest - 4321 - pretty amazing, but it is a bit of a slog (as was reading all seven volumes of Remembrance of Things Past). But if anyone starts reading it, pm me for a suggestion on what to do to avoid multi-strand confusion.
 
Just finished Rushdie's latest, The Golden House, absolutely brilliant. There's a slight campiness that annoys, like mildly salient v.a. That, and displays of unnecessary erudition keep it from greatness. But I found it for the most part highly entertaining, zeitgeisty (gender identity issues and the neo-right), and absolutely magisterial in language command and plot design.
 
originally posted by Jonathan Loesberg:
When McEwan is good, he is very good, but he can have his own form of ornateness. I am not a big fan of Chesil Beach or, for that matter, Atonement. But I did like Enduring, Saturday, Sweet Tooth, the Children's Act and almost all the early novels.
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Just finished The Children Act and loved it. Pushed more buttons than On Chesil Beach. The dignified testimony of the Jehovah's Witness father, the oh-so-English phrasing and logic of the judge's verdict, the characterization of the mercurial adolescent, all magisterial.
 
That is promising, maybe I will return to the McEwan world.

I just finished Sellout by Paul Beatty, which I really really enjoyed. So much dazzling language, and on a personal level I really appreciated the range of humorous references. Although I wonder how broad the public is for appreciating that range. Perhaps I should just enjoy being on the inside for once, like a Dubliner from the early 20th century reading Joyce.
 
originally posted by Rahsaan:
That is promising, maybe I will return to the McEwan world.

I just finished Sellout by Paul Beatty, which I really really enjoyed. So much dazzling language, and on a personal level I really appreciated the range of humorous references. Although I wonder how broad the public is for appreciating that range. Perhaps I should just enjoy being on the inside for once, like a Dubliner from the early 20th century reading Joyce.
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Yes. Infinitely better than the much more hyped Underground Railroad.
 
Just finished Milkman by Anna Burns, winner of last year's Booker. The language takes a little bit of getting used to, but it's absolutely snsational.
 
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
Just finished Milkman by Anna Burns, winner of last year's Booker. The language takes a little bit of getting used to, but it's absolutely snsational.
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O,

I have "Milkman" in my wicker basket of to-read books. Can't wait!

Another recommendation; a tale of provocative self awareness in the midst of self duplicity (time and hindsight) is Magda Szabó's "The Door." Astonishing in its quiet revelations. Superb.

KG
 
originally posted by Christian Miller (CMM):
FWIW, A Brief History of Seven Killings blew me away in 2017.
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I liked this one too. It makes me wonder if I should get his most recent novel even though I am not a big fan of that genre.

I think Rebecca Maccai's Great Believers does all that Franzen means to do with much less huffing and puffing. I recommend it.
 
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