Great Mistakes

I finished reading Deadstream, and it has easily secured itself as the worst thing I've ever read.  I don't even know what would be number 2, because I've never read anything before that was written so poorly that it made me angry.  And I think I know why.  I did a little research on Xlibris, the publisher who had ostensibly paid this guy to print his book, and discovered that they don't sign contracts with authors , but they charge for any crazy zealot on the street to have his manifesto printed.  Needless to say, they do not copy edit.  So we can all rest assured that a book like this would never be published by any respected publishing house.  That said, if you find, it read it.  But don't buy.

Also, anyone who opts to take the "knowledge is power" road over the "ignorance is bliss" option must read A People's History.  I've only read the first two chapters and feel a great weight of guilt.  Guilt for our treatment of the original inhabitants of this land upon arrival and for the long period (1619 -1863) during which we depended on slavery (that's 244 years of legal slavery, 147 years and counting of emancipation.  Not a great track record for a country whose first major political document states that "all men are created equal").  Also, in the earliest years of our colonization, the first settlers were struggling even to survive.  They occasionally resorted to cannibalism.  It was those first slaves brought over in the early 17th century that saved them.  It is stirring to discover just how heavy and deeply-rooted the foundation of slavery is, upon which the American empire is built.  Zinn cites that, in Virginia, at the end of the 17th century, one-twelfth of the population were slaves.  By 1763, it was fifty percent.  He asserts on the first page of chapter two that "there is not a country in world history in which racism has been more important, for so long a time, as in the United States." (23)

Books by the Foot!

I just saw an ad here on my very own blog for "Books by the Foot." It's for designers trying to fill a bookshelf for aesthetic purposes or to make some jackass's spare room look like an office. I bet they've got some pretty interesting titles...

Memoriam

Whelp, two of the authors I mentioned in my post on Tuesday died on Wednesday. Howard Zinn, author of the People's History of the United States (among many other works) at age 87, and J. D. Salinger, author of Catcher in the Rye (among many other works) aged 91 years. It is fascinating to me that these two magnificent Americans, each making a huge impact on American culture, and each having made some impact on the other, will be eternally bound in sharing their date of death, despite one being a notorious recluse and the other an outspoken political activist. As a small token (and in keeping with humanity's tendency to appreciate someone's work after they've passed) I'll be moving these two works to the top of my list. The remaining 30 pages of Catcher, which I started two years ago, and the remaining 671 pages of History, which I bought this summer and by which I am terrified.

So watch the Upright Citizens Brigade episode entitled "The Little Donny Foundation" and listen to the song "Down" by Pearl Jam to honor these two great men.

Start with a Bang

In my attempt to work my way through a wall of accumulated books (a small wall. A modest wall) I naturally decide to start with my most recent acquisition: A novel by Bradley T. Platt from the small publishing house Xlibris, entitled Deadstream. It is by far the most poorly-written book I have ever read. Apart from occasionally omitted apostrophes (which is sin enough) the tense changes constantly. The narrative is in past tense, but every scene of dialogue is in present. Either this is a really bizarre and ineffective choice, a casualty of trying to overhaul an entire draft from one tense to another (with grave oversights), or neither author nor editor knows the rules of tense. In certain instances, the tense changes midsentence. "...she says in disbelief as she felt the words blurt out." (56) This is the sort of thing that gets ironed out in a peer workshop for a 100-level creative writing class. I will also point out how poorly that same passage is phrased. How do you feel words blurt out? And do words even blurt? I'd say a person blurts words: words don't blurt themselves. This book is full of irritating errors like this.

It was the low-quality British literature being shipped overseas the the New World that upset James Fenimore Cooper into becoming the first American-born novelist, and look what that made him: famous enough for American couples 200 years later to name their sons Cooper. Perhaps in the year 2200, "Harpe" will be a mildly popular boys name, and all because I spitefully wrote a response to a book I didn't like.

One can hope.

It was my grandmother who lent me this book, which deals with heroin trafficking into Michigan through Canada and a boy whose mother commits suicide. I think it was the fact that the author is Michigan-born and living in Chicago that made my grandma think of me. This is what I take away from reading it: if this can get published, anyone can get anything published if they are persistent.

In Here's the Kicker: Conversations with 21 Top Humor Writers on their Craft by Mike Sacks, Ben Karlin (writer for the Daily Show and the Colbert Report) writes, "The best advice I ever received was from my first boss at the Onion. He believed you needed three things to be successful in comedy, but I think it applies to almost anything. First, you need natural talent. Second, you need skill development. Third, you need ambition. Everyone's ratio is different, but the most successful people have all of them. It helps to have a fourth thing, too, but I don't know what it is." (147) Maybe it's good grammar.

Gettin Bizay

To my handsome, vivacious, and - above all - faithful readers,

We've walked through the fire together here at TBWCYL, and during its regal 2-month tenure, you've doubtless found yourselves healthier, wealthier, stealthier and no less than 2x more attractive than you've ever been before. It will satisfy you to hear that after 60-days of atrophy and one night of sleepy retooling, this blog will resume changing your life. In the coming months, I hope to enable all of my readers to leap on top of one-story buildings.

My new format is inspired by the 50-some books and plays I've collected over the years and have either never read (Papillon, Live from New York, Leaves of Grass), have started reading and abandoned (Purple Hibiscus, Catcher in the Rye, Cures), or am currently reading (Mountains Beyond Mountains, Kill Your Idols, The People's History of the United States [oof]). As I bushwhack through these volumes on my bookshelf (also including Bob Dylan's Chronicles, the Truth that Leads to Eternal Life, and the Complete Works of Shakespeare) I will regale you with quotes, criticisms, Earth-shattering insight and deep emotional responses, all the while grappling with my own insecurity as I struggle to get my book of dirty crosswords and my Holocaust "memoir" published.

It'll be like Bridget Jones' Diary meets the New York Times Review of Books.

So don your waders and trudge with me through my swamp library. What do you have to lose (other than time wasted reading yet another potentially-worthless blog)?