Problem Books I

When I read the New Yorker, I am stunned by the accomplishments of their fiction writers. They have obviously amassed, synthesized, processed, analyzed, judged, considered (add to this many more descriptive verbs) what seems like the entire cannon of western literature, as well as every academic and philosophical trend that has seen the light in the last 4,000 years (from mimesis and catharsis to Freudian analysis as it shows up in the literature of the fantastic, as some diverse examples). But being stunned is not the same as being impressed, or more importantly, moved. Their short stories (I like short stories!!) often leave me feeling like a dried up well. The memory of tears, of release, of nourishment lingers, but nothing comes up, no matter how deeply I look inside the sterilized vignettes. They are so well schooled, so highly conscious, they know not to write a DaVinci Code at all costs, they know not to imitate Turgenev, Tolstoy, Flaubert, Proust, or anyone else. But they are so overpowered by the influence of culture, of academia, of the world outside, that I wonder, “but what of the author, but what of the reader?” What are we to make of these post-post modern tales of foreigners in New York eating spaghetti alone—in a bowl—because the authors could not clarify their own desires, their needs, or perhaps, because they forgot their own humanity, forgot to breathe, under the weight of the books, the history, of the whole world. This is the first example of a trend in literature that if not worrisome, is somehwhat tragic. I do not desire any sugar coating (see the next page when I move back to Coelho), but neither do I approve of being choked by the cyncism, ego, self-loathing, and failure to dream, to evolve, that characterizes so much of our “best” literature. I appreciate the style of these works, yes I do. I respond to the colors, the atmosphere, the cleverness, the ambientation, and the intelligence. But intelligence is left off when you stifle someone with your purportedly high and mighty thoughts, and remove your hand in precisely the moment when the reader has been convinced of their doom.