Lazy Self-Indulgent Book Reviews

It’s fine, okay?   LEAVE OUR WRITERS ALONE WITH YOUR EXPECTATIONS.

I think we have, as a nation, this sense that if you wrote a great novel, you should churn another one out at some point.

SO MUCH WRONG WITH THIS.

First up, we’re obsessed with this notion that hard work pays off.  Well, it does, if you’re building a bridge.  And, of course, if you’re already writing a great novel.

But you should write a novel because there is a STORY you feel COMPELLED TO TELL.  You can’t say to yourself, man, I’d like to write a novel.  And then sit around, like, thinking of what to write about.  That’s fucked.  Don’t do that, it’ll be shit.

If you, in your lifetime, are compelled to tell one extraordinary story, that’s FUCKING INCREDIBLE.  WE SHOULD HAVE A STATUE ERECTED IN YOUR HONOUR.

Like, fucking Flaubert, man.  If he had been living on the Upper West Side in the 1980s, people would be all, “you know, since “Madame Bovary” he hasn’t done a thing?  He’s out teaching at Iowa now, can you imagine?  So sad.”

That’s bullshit.  CONSIDER DAVID FOSTER WALLACE, okay?

People think various things about “Infinite Jest.”  Me, I think the man was a genius, and the book was genius.

SO HE WRITES THE BOOK, and then taught writing, and occasionally GRACED THE UNIVERSE with articles on lobsters and Roger Federer, and we, ungrateful fucking harpies, were all:

BUT WHEN WILL HE WRITE ANOTHER BOOK LIKE INFINITE JEST?

FUCK YOU, AMERICA, YOU DIDN’T DESERVE DAVID FOSTER WALLACE.

Sorry, I get really mad about this.