UK Comics Shop Orbital hosts a podcast interview series called “Orbital in Conversation.” In the most recent episode, Orbital Events manager Chris Thompson speaks with renowned literary author and current comics scribe Chuck Palahniuk about Fight Club 2 and Palahniuk’s take on the various strengths and weaknesses of the comics medium. If you’re a structural reader, I highly suggest […]
My name is Mia Lipman, and I never made it through Infinite Jest. In fact, you couldn't pay me enough to read most of David Foster Wallace's fiction to the end.
Go ahead—revoke my literary credentials. I'll pretend to understand. But if I've learned anything from working as an editor and critic for the past dozen years, it's that the world is too rich in great writing for me to finish a book I'm not enjoying. The next one in the stack is always right there, batting its Garamond eyes.
That said: The Cult of DFW has a point. Wallace's writing was rich, his brain a diamond mine, and his early death left a gaping hole in modern thought. Many of his essays were masterful, especially this one, and he was hot in the way a man in coveralls with dirt under his nails can melt college girls into butter and sugar.
I have a bias against footnotes, coupled with an inherent distaste for ponderous tomes that extends to the Russian masters and horrified many of my professors—but that doesn't mean I don't get it. Wallace was a mad genius cut from the classical self-destructive mold. He did what poets seek to do: interpret the intangible in a way the rest of us can't begin to imagine but can immediately recognize. I saw him read once in a church in San Francisco; he looked like a lumberjack and seemed to be gently spoiling for a fight. Nobody could stop staring.
Today would have been David Foster Wallace's 50th birthday, and it's a damn shame he's no longer here to practice his craft. Lord knows his work spoke volumes, even if it didn't always speak to me.
As it happens, another mind bender was born the same day DFW shuffled on this mortal coil: Chuck Palahniuk, who's still very much alive. The author of Fight Club and Damned uses one word for every hundred of Wallace's, but their writing shares an inability to be categorized or, thus far, successfully imitated.
Often hailed by adjectives like "eccentric" and "transgressional," Palahniuk's fiction is so bizarre and otherworldly that I've never quite understood its widespread popularity. Except when he pulls off lines like this: "It's green the way a pool table with green felt looks under the yellow 1 ball, not the way it looks under the red 3."
Again with the poetry. Again with a raised glass, even from those of us who earn our keep by finding chinks in the armor.
Happy 50th, David and Chuck. I don't get it, but I absolutely get it.
People love books. Some people show their love by recommending books to friends and family members, others start websites to share their love of stories to the world. There are also people out there who want to show their love for their favorite books daily, wherever they go, to whomever they meet. Publishers Weekly found the top five books that inspired the most tattoos. This is devotion.
5. Fight Club by Chuck Palaniuk
Fight club resonates with people who are anti-authority and Tyler Durden is their hero. This one tattoo is an iconic image because Tyler was, among other things, a soap maker.
4. The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery
The watercolor images inspire many tattoos but also the appreciation of the world’s beauty and wonder. This tattoo is of the prince himself.
3. Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
This book reminds us of our childhoods and we grow up so fast, that maybe it’s a symbol of who we were as children: wild, carefree and full of imagination. This is tattoo is of Max in his iconic wolf outfit.
2. Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
There are a lot of tattoos of Alice in Wonderland out there. There are quotes, images and the cast of characters are depicted frequently: Alice, The Mad Hatter and especially the Cheshire Cat. Here is a depiction of the tree, the cheshire cat and a few other characters.
1. Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnetgut
This classic novel of war and time travel resonates with people in the mantra “So It Goes,” which represents the owner’s coping with worry or loss. Here is a tattoo of the mantra on someone’s wrist, which is where people usually get the tattoo, oddly enough.
Did I mention being a Vampire sucks? Well it does. ROYALLY!
I had my fight with that freakazoid Brad Pitt wannabe this week. And I'm still healing from it. I trained like some kind of bite-fighting olympian for the last two weeks for that match because I knew that wack-job was getting all pumped up watching 'Troy' and 'Interview with a Vampire'. So I knew it wasn't going to be easy to beat him.
Man - a bunch of crap went down this week!
First, I got an update on 'The Dummy Who Can Not be Named'. Dad filled me in during one of his usual unannounced pop-ups.
SPAM's starting to gather an army of other people who also hate the name Anton. The wacko calls them Anton Eaters. That maniac is really starting to piss me off! I mean, how humiliating would it be to be taken down by someone called
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That's Most Excellent! Thanks Helena!
I'm a totally phonies and haven't read from the beginning, just found your bloody blog today! :D<br /><br />So, life sucks for a vampire? Who da thunk it?<br /><br />Looks like your Vamp-Fu is awesome. Brad Pitt never had a chance.
I forgive you. ;)
Bite Club? Haha, brilliant! Brought a smile to my face.
The "wax on" bit made me laugh. I think I'm having some nostalgia. I'm going to have to go watch that movie again...