Thursday, December 15, 2011
Sunday, December 11, 2011
redirection
The Field Reader has moved to a different blog platform
Find new posts by visiting: http://fieldreader.tumblr.com/
Find new posts by visiting: http://fieldreader.tumblr.com/
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
To Explain
So to perhaps to be more clear, the post that was written yesterday in response to a review in the New York Times regarding the new Biography of Kurt Vonnegut:
Read said review: So It Goes
basically, all I would like to say now that I have calmed down some is this:
Kurt Vonnegut deserves better than what sounds like a crappy biography and a review of that biography that doesn't question the validity of saying his popularity is all hype and no one reads him anymore... I mean really! First off, I read him for the first time in the early 90's and his books changed my life for the better, I also know plenty of other people in my generation who would say the same thing. Though I do think his books are best read during one's teenage years, it is absurd to say that because his themes mostly appeal to teenagers, he is not a "serious" or "important" writer (young adult themes never hindered JD Salinger from being welcomed into the pantheon of great American literature). I will also admit that Vonnegut is not a "master stylist" of the written word. His novels are intentionally crude worlds, constructed in such a way to expose social hypocrisies that are saved from nihilism because at their heart is always a strong love of humanity. As an artist, he might have more in common with later punk ethos, but as a writer, he has much more in common with George Orwell and Mark Twain (two writers he frequently cited as primary influences) than the majority of writers of in his generation. At his best, Vonnegut deserves to be considered among the best of post World War II American writer/public intellectuals, at his very worst however, his work is still a hell of a lot better than the likes of John Updike whose pretentious, navel gazing novels celebrate the trails and tribulations of everyday bourgeois life among the New York Times literary crowd.
So there.
Read said review: So It Goes
basically, all I would like to say now that I have calmed down some is this:
Kurt Vonnegut deserves better than what sounds like a crappy biography and a review of that biography that doesn't question the validity of saying his popularity is all hype and no one reads him anymore... I mean really! First off, I read him for the first time in the early 90's and his books changed my life for the better, I also know plenty of other people in my generation who would say the same thing. Though I do think his books are best read during one's teenage years, it is absurd to say that because his themes mostly appeal to teenagers, he is not a "serious" or "important" writer (young adult themes never hindered JD Salinger from being welcomed into the pantheon of great American literature). I will also admit that Vonnegut is not a "master stylist" of the written word. His novels are intentionally crude worlds, constructed in such a way to expose social hypocrisies that are saved from nihilism because at their heart is always a strong love of humanity. As an artist, he might have more in common with later punk ethos, but as a writer, he has much more in common with George Orwell and Mark Twain (two writers he frequently cited as primary influences) than the majority of writers of in his generation. At his best, Vonnegut deserves to be considered among the best of post World War II American writer/public intellectuals, at his very worst however, his work is still a hell of a lot better than the likes of John Updike whose pretentious, navel gazing novels celebrate the trails and tribulations of everyday bourgeois life among the New York Times literary crowd.
So there.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
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