Rip Kurt Vonnegut

[JSHamm 9]

Yes, that is what i'm saying. And i'm NOT claiming NOT to be pretentious myself in doing so.

easy peasy. understood.

[BWToth 0]

easy peasy. understood.

That last was part was half joking. Obviously I see the hypocrisy in my statements.The real question then is are you not being pretentious in calling out dirtydutch for being pretentious in calling someone out for being pretentious?Fine line between pretension and...whatever the way to say what you're saying is without being pretentious.

[JSHamm 9]

That last was part was half joking. Obviously I see the hypocrisy in my statements.

Hey, did you know Kurt Vonnegut died? He was so fucking old.-Jazz Hands

[timwakefield 68]

<------- Memorial asshole avatar.

[Shimmering Wang 1]

I think we should expound upon this.I find it to be common that people who 'shun' other people due to their pretention are actually pretentious themselves. But perhaps pretention is a prerequisite for making light of another person's pretentions. So in reality someone who is pretentious in your 'your' eyes is only one level LESS pretentious than you.

My friend and I developed what we call "The Theory of Levels," and it applies directly to ignorance, pretentiousness, and people motivated by image.Interesting.But your point is still pretty stupid, though I won't get into it.

[pokerinc 0]

Baer's got one trilogy out now, Kiss me judas, penny dreadful, hell's half acre, with a fourth unrelated book to be released at any time.Topic wise it's completely bizarre noir, writing wise he's shocking good. Books 1 and 3 at least are excellent. Book 2's very good but kind of a side-bar to the main story.Just finished contortionist's handbook by craig clevenger also worth while.

[speedz99 145]

And Dutch you want tough authors go Will Christopher Baer. To reccomend him to someone is to admit you're slightly crazy, but he's scary good.

Baer's got one trilogy out now, Kiss me judas, penny dreadful, hell's half acre, with a fourth unrelated book to be released at any time.Topic wise it's completely bizarre noir, writing wise he's shocking good. Books 1 and 3 at least are excellent. Book 2's very good but kind of a side-bar to the main story.

Sounds like he's not for me...I don't like surprises.

[navybuttons 15]

Yep. That's what I figured.Are you the guy that finds a band nobody has ever heard of, like their stuff, tell everyone how cool and original their music is, then, when they get on the radio and grab a little piece of success, you immediately start trashing them as no talent hacks?I bet you do.

against me! was one of my favorite bands after their first two seven inches (the third is the only amazing thing they did that year), now i think they blow goats nuts, so definitely guilty of this.never gave a **** about vonney. still don't. i was more hurt when derrida died, but i didn't even really care then. dutch, you have your MFA? not that academic or even more pretentious than MFA students?(i fall into the latter.)

[Dirtydutch 8]

Yep. That's what I figured.Are you the guy that finds a band nobody has ever heard of, like their stuff, tell everyone how cool and original their music is, then, when they get on the radio and grab a little piece of success, you immediately start trashing them as no talent hacks?I bet you do.

I own an Aerosmith t-shirt.My statement was pretty non-serious. My big bit in real life is I joke around about being a super stuffy lit-******, while not really even knowing that much. But the reality is I know a lot about it, I know a lot of other lit-posers; and most Vonnegut fans have no clue what good writting is, don't fully understand what they're reading, and only chose to be Vonny fans because you can fire through one of his books in one sitting.

[Dirtydutch 8]

against me! was one of my favorite bands after their first two seven inches (the third is the only amazing thing they did that year), now i think they blow goats nuts, so definitely guilty of this.never gave a **** about vonney. still don't. i was more hurt when derrida died, but i didn't even really care then. dutch, you have your MFA? not that academic or even more pretentious than MFA students?(i fall into the latter.)

Actually, I dropped out after one year. I can't STAND the academic world. That's where the real posers are. They're more pompous than I am, but they're 100% serious, have no sense of humor, their writing is horrible, and most of them are pretty poorly read, in all honesty.

[navybuttons 15]

Actually, I dropped out after one year. I can't STAND the academic world. That's where the real posers are. They're more pompous than I am, but they're 100% serious, have no sense of humor, their writing is horrible, and most of them are pretty poorly read, in all honesty.

most Vonnegut fans have no clue what good writting is, don't fully understand what they're reading, and only chose to be Vonny fans because you can fire through one of his books in one sitting.

do you see it yet?***spoiler below***you're probably a little delusional when it comes to where the pretension lies. my experience is that people who think the academic world is not ready for them are the ones who sucked. you would probably love the programs at brown, notre dame, and university of chicago. instead you take the easy way out. obviously there are people who hate the academic world who are great (read Zach Wentz), but they are the exception IMO. maybe you're the exception. for someone who says he hates the academic world so much you seem to do a good job of letting it/your hatred of it define you. this leads me to believe that you are not the exception. DUCY?goodluck.

[Dirtydutch 8]

do you see it yet?***spoiler below***you're probably a little delusional when it comes to where the pretension lies. my experience is that people who think the academic world is not ready for them are the ones who sucked. you would probably love the programs at brown, notre dame, and university of chicago. instead you take the easy way out. obviously there are people who hate the academic world who are great (read Zach Wentz), but they are the exception IMO. maybe you're the exception. for someone who says he hates the academic world so much you seem to do a good job of letting it/your hatred of it define you. this leads me to believe that you are not the exception. DUCY?goodluck.

You're reaching, kid. I'll come back te this, Thrashers are about to drup the puck.

[BWToth 0]

My friend and I developed what we call "The Theory of Levels," and it applies directly to ignorance, pretentiousness, and people motivated by image.Interesting.But your point is still pretty stupid, though I won't get into it.

Well, I'm interested about this. I've often thought about this but never 'developed a theory on the matter'How does your theory related to mine...and is yours just as dumb? or are you up a level of pretention from me?I mean, this whole line of conversation is why I dislike the whole literature, too cool for school, indie-kid crowd. Although I did used to wear some pretty tight jeans in my day.Although I do think my 'point' has some validity and can be logically analyzed. Whether it's stupid is beside the point.

[Dirtydutch 8]

Anyway, Navy, (a) I don't "think the academic world is not ready for [me]." I'm not by any stretch a talented writer, which is why I don't write for a living. Your guess that I'm "defined" by my hatered of the lit. aca. community is baseless.

obviously there are people who hate the academic world who are great (read Zach Wentz), but they are the exception IMO. maybe you're the exception.

...And the sentiment is growing, building a movement. The Aca.-Lit world is destroying Lit. Fiction. Publishers pretty much sign no one but kids coming out of big CW programs, who have the backing of big-name professors. This wouldn't be a big problem if any of them had anything to write about. But, they don't, only a handful of 20something CW majors ever have, their books suck, the critics eat them of, as they're trained/conditioned to, no one buys them (because of the sucking), and they're dropped after a book or two. And so goes the cycle of trying to manufacture "Wiz-Kids."

[BWToth 0]

I'm curious as to what you think the cause of this is....wouldn't odds say that with the ever growing population a larger number of truly great writers would be coming out?

[Dirtydutch 8]

I'm curious as to what you think the cause of this is....wouldn't odds say that with the ever growing population a larger number of truly great writers would be coming out?

I don't think the novel draws the most talented writers anymore. Screen writing has grabbed a lotta' guys who would be great (Charlie Kaufman be the first who comes to mind). There will always be people writing great stuff, but the backing goes to the wrong people, and the lit comunity almost enjoys the whole hip, underground image that comes with the fact that no one reads that stuff, and that writers only write for critics. It's why we have such a huge "intellectual" gap between reading communities; the Da Vinci/Spy novel crowd, and the kinds of people who can't wait for the latest Jonathan Safran Foer book. There's no one really championing the few guys who write stuff that's enjoyable, smart and honest.

[BWToth 0]

I don't think the novel draws the most talented writers anymore. Screen writing has grabbed a lotta' guys who would be great (Charlie Kaufman be the first who comes to mind). There will always be people writing great stuff, but the backing goes to the wrong people, and the lit comunity almost enjoys the whole hip, underground image that comes with the fact that no one reads that stuff, and that writers only write for critics. It's why we have such a huge "intellectual" gap between reading communities; the Da Vinci/Spy novel crowd, and the kinds of people who can't wait for the latest Jonathan Safran Foer book. There's no one really championing the few guys who write stuff that's enjoyable, smart and honest.

But I don't think CW majors are reading Da Vinci Code...That's what I'm saying....who are the fake wiz kids getting things published? And aren't he people that read Jonathan Safran Foer inspired themselves?

[Dirtydutch 8]

But I don't think CW majors are reading Da Vinci Code...That's what I'm saying....who are the fake wiz kids getting things published? And aren't he people that read Jonathan Safran Foer inspired themselves?

THey ARE JS-4 (Jonathan Safran Foer). Ray LeMoine, Jeff Neumann, and Donovan Webster, Nell Freudenberger, Uzodinma Iweala, et cetera.

[Dirtydutch 8]

(Iweala being the most horrible)

[Dirtydutch 8]

(See also every half-wit college kid pimping their generic, crappy political books on The Daily Show, for non-fic.)

[navybuttons 15]

(a) please don't abbreviate so much.

Anyway, Navy, (a) I don't "think the academic world is not ready for [me]." I'm not by any stretch a talented writer, which is why I don't write for a living. Your guess that I'm "defined" by my hatered of the lit. aca. community is baseless.

even talented writers can't write for a living. william vollman and pynchon are the two names whose writing i respect and make a living solely writing. however, it should be noted that vollman is by far the most prolific writer/journalist in the country and pynchon won the sickest grant/prize in the world and has a successful wife. i was mistaken in assuming you thought you were a great writer with an ego and for that please accept my apologies. in regards to the being defined by your hatred to academia i think we see things differently. i am completely indifferent to pretty much everything, and so would never hate the academy. they just don't apply to me. they'll never change literature to a level which would rise an emotion in me.as such they are the fly on my wall, and i view slightest response or interest in its goings as a mark on one's definition.

...And the sentiment is growing, building a movement. The Aca.-Lit world is destroying Lit. Fiction. Publishers pretty much sign no one but kids coming out of big CW programs, who have the backing of big-name professors. This wouldn't be a big problem if any of them had anything to write about. But, they don't, only a handful of 20something CW majors ever have, their books suck, the critics eat them of, as they're trained/conditioned to, no one buys them (because of the sucking), and they're dropped after a book or two. And so goes the cycle of trying to manufacture "Wiz-Kids."

i don't really get what you are saying here, but i have a few thoughts on what i think you are getting at. why do you care what the critics say or what the best sellers are? books like christine schutt's "florida" still get published, the literary mag "the third bed" still goes on, etc., and if all those small goings on are not enough to be content then you'll probably forever disappointed. also, you seem to have these undertones in your posts that you know what good literature is and others don't. it's as though you are qualified to give any definitive voice on works, people's motivation's, and other's comprehension. as a student of post-modernism you should see the fault or hypocrisy in this. it comes down to me not giving the slightest thought to what you seem to care about though we would probably agree 100% if i did.i'd be really surprised if you really hated the works coming out of and the programs at the MFA programs i mentioned earlier (brown, ND, UOC).to qualify this post i will note that i understand that i'm full of **** and oftentimes a hypocrite (most notably when i went to my then girlfriends MFA goings on). i should also note that i'm drunk (have been for the last week, for the last year) and tonight you just happened to catch me after a day where i got my friends vike script re-filled.

[Dirtydutch 8]

why do you care what the critics say or what the best sellers are?

You don't care at all about the heath or economy of an art you love? I care a lot. For one, it's telling that no one's buying literary fiction. Can we really just blame this on massively plummeting intellect of the entire world? The nihilist in me really wants to believe it, but in reality I'm just not buying it. Some of it can be attributed to television, but not everything. Less than half the male American population actively reads. I can't remember what the lit.fic. numbers are, but I think it's less than 5% of that. As for the critics, are you kidding? You don't think critical and academic bias toward something sways writers and publishers – what they publish, what they promote? Think of the great books that aren't written because on some level the author knows some retarded, fake p.-mod. jerk-off session will be more likely to impress the critics. I guess if no one cared, I wouldn't. But they do. There's no way to know the effects for sure, but I'm sure they're pretty huge, and certainly bigger than the "none" you seem to believe.

also, you seem to have these undertones in your posts that you know what good literature is and others don't. it's as though you are qualified to give any definitive voice on works, people's motivation's, and other's comprehension. as a student of post-modernism you should see the fault or hypocrisy in this.

I certainly think I have better taste in lit than anyone else on the form, but I realize that there's still some subjectivism at play, and I think you're projecting a little, there.

[ShakeZuma 585]

I'm pretty sure that if mk posted in this thread, the pretentiousness level would be so unbelievably high that it would explode, spewing pretentious out unto the world much like that ghost trap box that blew up in ghostbusters.

[BigDMcGee 3,352]

as much as I love a good pretentiousness argument, can we clear this thread of that clutter. Kurt Vonnegut was one of those gateway authors for me. One of the ones that I read that took me from genre fiction into literary fiction ( along with Orwell). While I liked some "literary" works before Vonnegut, I never really loved them. I never felt a deep psychological, emotional and philosophical connection to an author like I did with KV. I became obsessed with his work, and plowed through it. At his worst, he was still incredibly witty. At his best, he revolutionized the art form. I can't understate what a landmark book I think Breakfast of Champions is. I understand that KV was an accessible writer, so a lot of "posers" or what ever read him to seem literary, but so what? Hopefully they got something beautiful out of it. Alot of literary fiction is very difficult reading , written for a very limited audience. I think KV's egalitarianism while at the same time maintaining artistic integrity is the miracle of his work. I think our society is having an increasingly short attention span. I think TV is part to do with it, but the internet is accelerating this short attention span at an amazing rate. this was the first internet forum I ever really ventured into, and when the Krablar thread was one of my first posts, one of the things that I was shocked by was the complaints about how long the post was, and that people skipped it because of it's length. I mean, it was all of a page, page and a half of most lit. fiction, and people couldn't be bothered with reading it. I don't necessarily think this short attention span is evil or the mark of the intellectual down fall of western society. It just is. I personally don't care about the motivation of a KV fan, why they read it and what image they want to present, that has no bearing on his genius. I just want his works to be read and last as long as possible, because I think they are, if anything, even more relevant to contemporary life.

[RhinestoneCowboy 2]

I'm pretty sure that if mk posted in this thread, the pretentiousness level would be so unbelievably high that it would explode, spewing pretentious out unto the world much like that ghost trap box that blew up in ghostbusters.

Yup.

as much as I love a good pretentiousness argument, can we clear this thread of that clutter. Kurt Vonnegut was one of those gateway authors for me. One of the ones that I read that took me from genre fiction into literary fiction ( along with Orwell). While I liked some "literary" works before Vonnegut, I never really loved them. I never felt a deep psychological, emotional and philosophical connection to an author like I did with KV. I became obsessed with his work, and plowed through it. At his worst, he was still incredibly witty. At his best, he revolutionized the art form. I can't understate what a landmark book I think Breakfast of Champions is. I understand that KV was an accessible writer, so a lot of "posers" or what ever read him to seem literary, but so what? Hopefully they got something beautiful out of it. Alot of literary fiction is very difficult reading , written for a very limited audience. I think KV's egalitarianism while at the same time maintaining artistic integrity is the miracle of his work. I think our society is having an increasingly short attention span. I think TV is part to do with it, but the internet is accelerating this short attention span at an amazing rate. this was the first internet forum I ever really ventured into, and when the Krablar thread was one of my first posts, one of the things that I was shocked by was the complaints about how long the post was, and that people skipped it because of it's length. I mean, it was all of a page, page and a half of most lit. fiction, and people couldn't be bothered with reading it. I don't necessarily think this short attention span is evil or the mark of the intellectual down fall of western society. It just is. I personally don't care about the motivation of a KV fan, why they read it and what image they want to present, that has no bearing on his genius. I just want his works to be read and last as long as possible, because I think they are, if anything, even more relevant to contemporary life.

Nope.