Dorothy Parker Makes My Heart Sing

As you probably know, I like Dorothy Parker. I even named my cat after her.

But you may or may not know that I hate "On the Road." I think it's an awful book, with awful writing, that it's about absolutely nothing, and that it doesn't deserve 1/100th the respect it gets. And I think the other "great works" of that movement are no better.

Well, recently a brilliant friend found some Studs Terkel interviews on CD, one of which was with Mrs. Parker, from 1959. She had this to say:

Studs Terkel: Chicago was invaded last week by three Beat Generation poets—

Dorothy Parker: Ah yes.

ST: —and would you mind, since you read a great many books, this is part of your job for Esquire, your feeling about seemingly outspoken poets, writers, who represent this.

DP: I don’t know what they’re speaking out about. I know they’re speaking, they’re speaking all the time, as we sit here, at least they’re putting something down on paper—it isn’t writing—but it’s something they’re doing. But I don’t know what they’re so brave about. You read their books, and the description of their lives, it’s so monotonous, the things they do. And I don’t know why they’re so revolutionary, that was all done a long time ago.

ST: So you feel there’s nothing new really that they’re saying.

DP: Nothing at all. The Beat Boys I don’t think are saying anything on Earth except “look at us, aren’t we great.” I don’t think the Beat Generation is worth much worrying about. I should say, oh very soon, in the very near future, they’ll be as forgotten as Mahjong.

If only she'd been right about their being forgotten!

Marmal is the Sometimes

It's been a rather long time since I've posted anything, and this is a good one.

My Mini-Book is out! Download it! Then print it! Then read it! Hurray! The ketchup is amazing!

Book Nominees for 2006

And the winners are... Haruki Murakami and Seth Kantner!

Here they are, the nominees for best book of 2005:

Ordinary Wolves	Seth Kantner	Fiction
Tender Bar, The	J.R. Moehringer	Non-Fiction
Arthur & George	Julian Barnes	Fiction
Never Let Me Go	Kazuo Ishiguro	Fiction
Kafka on the Shore	Haruki Murakami	Fiction
Saturday	Ian McEwan	Fiction
Assassination Vacation	Sarah Vowell	Travel