I'm sure most of you have read this by now, but I can't help but wonder what Lucy Ellman was expecting when she picked up Palahniuk's new book:
What the hell is going on? The country that produced Melville, Twain and James now venerates King, Crichton, Grisham, Sebold and Palahniuk. Their subjects? Porn, crime, pop culture and an endless parade of out-of-body experiences. Their methods? Cliché, caricature and proto-Christian morality. Props? Corn chips, corpses, crucifixes. The agenda? Deceit: a dishonest throwing of the reader to the wolves. And the result? Readymade Hollywood scripts.
So not only has America tried to ruin the rest of the world with its wars, its financial meltdown and its stupid stupid food, it has allowed its own literary culture to implode.
I doubt she could have expected much but come on! This is Chuck Palahniuk we're talking about here. The guy has made a pretty nice career out of this type of formula and performs in front of fairly large crowds everywhere he reads, all hoping for him to make them pass out. He hands out blow-up dolls for prizes. He's not trying to save the novel or the book review or literature as a whole. He's trying to entertain, to titillate, to make you line up for his next book and possibly his next movie (which comes out in September).
I've always been on the fence when it comes to Palahniuk. I do enjoy his shtick from time to time, but I mostly relegate him to a category of writers I refer to as the "discount paperback" writers. I don't go out and buy these writers' books when they first come out. I'll wait until I see their books show up on the discount table or at the used book shop. But when I do sit down to read Palahniuk, I don't all of sudden froth at the mouth and condemn all of American culture because of its Kings and its Crichtons and its Palahniuks. I do that when I see yet another dancing/singing/nose-picking talent show on yet another network or another sequel to another movie that should have never been made in the first place. Or when Madonna puts out another album.
Chuck's book Diary is really quite well-written. Creepy, suspensful, AND literary.
Posted by: Bill Ectric | June 10, 2008 at 09:26 AM