(no subject)

[proximoception]

Murakami's the heavy favorite (over Munro) to win this year's Nobel.

On the strength of 1Q84.

What the fuck?

Seriously - while I'm eternally mad at people who make high claims for There Will Be Blood or Donnie Darko these make perfect sense next to the total madness of even a vaguely positive assessment of that book.

Comments

[grashupfer.livejournal.com]

This is even better than I hoped. The one thing I would disagree about -- the narrator in a lot of Wallace sounds exactly like many of the manic, college educated people of my age that I know. That voice says things sometimes exactly as I feel but better than I could say them. When I picked up Infinite Jest when the paperback came out in 1997 or whatever, I couldn't believe it. That has worn off as I have read more and grown up some. But I still hear the voice every day in people I encounter. Like the majority of people. Where we differ maybe because I agree with everything you wrote.

[proximoception.livejournal.com]

Come to think of it there were one or two Wallace-y people in most of my grad classes. Mostly dudes.

Maybe worse in the Northeastern elite schools, where the stiff competition terrifies you into projecting that you already know everything?

I try not to think what I was like at twenty. Probably pretty awful. But probably not in that particular way.