12 Holiday Gifts That Writers Will Actually Use

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December 5, 2011 | 4 books mentioned 41 6 min read

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coverIn “Aren’t You Dead Yet?”, one of the stories in Elissa Schappell’s new collection, Blueprints for Building Better Girls, the narrator, an aspiring writer, receives a black, leather-bound journal as a gift from her best friend. Although she loves the look of the journal, she never writes in it. When her friend discovers this, he’s angry, and even accuses her of slacking off:

I tried to explain that I hadn’t written in it because I loved it so much and I didn’t want to ruin it. The pages were so nice, and sewn in, you couldn’t just rip them out. Whatever stupid thing I wrote down would be in there permanently.

This passage reminded me of the many beautiful blank journals I’ve received over the years, journals I’ve never used. Whenever I fill up one of my trusty spiral notebooks, I go through the stack and tell myself I’m finally going to start using them. But then I think of sullying those pristine, unlined pages with my half-formed thoughts, and I feel as guilty as the narrator in Schappell’s story.

Unfortunately, the same guilt intrudes on many of the other lovely writerly gifts I’ve received. At the risk of sounding ungrateful, I confess that I have a lot of nice pens I never use, because I’m afraid of chewing on them; a lot of classic novels I haven’t read because I feel guilty about not having read them; and a lot of inspirational writer’s guides I never read, because what if I’m not inspired?

None of these gifts are offensive, and no one will begrudge you for giving them. But they are boilerplate gifts. Writers get blank journals for the same reasons that teachers get mugs, assistants get flowers, and grandmothers get tea. If you want to give the writer in your life something he or she will truly adore, here are twelve ideas:

1.  A Cheesy New Bestseller

covercoverOne of the best presents I ever got was The Nanny Diaries. I really wanted it, but there were over 300 people on the library’s waiting list (I live in New York), and I wasn’t going to shell out $25 for something I was unlikely to read twice. The funny thing is, I never told my roommate that I wanted to read The Nanny Diaries. She just guessed that I had a secret craving for it. Of course, it can be as hard to gauge your friend’s taste in pop culture as it in high culture, but it’s better to guess wrong in the pop culture arena, because your friend is more likely to exchange it for something she likes better. Whereas, if you give her Gravity’s Rainbow, she’ll keep it for years out of obligation.

2.  Good lipstick

Writers are often broke. If they have $30 to spare, they are going to spend it on dinner, booze, or new books. Not lipstick. But writers are pale from spending so much time inside and could use some color. Make-up can be a tricky gift because it suggests that you think your friend’s face could use improvement. That’s why it’s important to go to a department store make-up counter and buy something frivolous and indulgent, like a single tube of red lipstick or some face powder or blush in a nice-looking case.

3.  Foreign language learning software

Most writers wish they knew more languages. It can also be relaxing to be rendered inarticulate in a new language, in that it offers a real break from personal expression, nuance, and irony. At the same time, learning a new language sharpens your native tongue, and expands your vocabulary. It’s sort of like cross training. Although language classes with live instructors are generally more effective than computer programs, I prefer software because it allows me to take the class on my own time and at my own pace.

4.  A Bathrobe

John Cheever famously donned a suit every morning in order to write. But as Ann Beattie recently revealed, and as a generation of bloggers already knows, most writers wear awful clothing while they are working. Help your writer friend out by giving her a beautiful robe to cover up her bizarre ensembles. Even if she already has one, she probably hasn’t washed it in a long time, and could use another.

5.  A Manicure

I bite my nails, especially when I’m writing. I’ve noticed that a lot of other writers have suspiciously short nails, too. Manicures help. Also, manicures get writers out of the house—and off the internet.

6.  “Freedom”, the internet-blocking software

“Freedom” is a computer program that blocks the internet on your computer for up to eight hours. I don’t understand why it’s effective, since it’s relatively easy to circumvent, but as soon as I turn it on, I stay off the internet for hours at a time. (There is also a program called “Anti-social”, which only blocks the social parts of the internet, like Facebook and Twitter.)

7.  Booze, coffee, and other stimulants

Find out what your friend likes to drink and buy a really nice version of that thing. Wine can be tricky, but we are living in an age of over-educated clerks, so don’t be afraid to ask for help. If your friend is a coffee or tea drinker, find out how he brews it and buy him really good beans or tealeaves. Even better, find out what cafe he frequents and see if they sell gift certificates.

8.  Yoga Classes

Yoga does wonders for anxiety, depression, and aching backs, three common writerly afflictions. Most yoga classes also incorporate some kind of meditation practice, which is also very helpful.

9.  A pet

In a recent Atlantic blog post containing advice from world’s most prolific writers, a character from one of Muriel Spark’s novels is quoted, describing why cats are good for writers: “If you want to concentrate deeply on some problem, and especially some piece of writing or paper-work, you should acquire a cat… The effect of a cat on your concentration is remarkable, very mysterious.” Another prolific writer, Jennifer Weiner, recommends dogs on her website, where she’s posted a list of tips for aspiring writers. Dogs, she explains, foster discipline, because they must be walked several times a day. Furthermore, Weiner notes, walking is as beneficial for the writer as it is for the dog: “While you’re walking, you’re thinking about plot, or characters, or that tricky bit of dialogue that’s had you stumped for days.”

Obviously, a pet should not be given casually, or even as a surprise, but it’s worth considering, especially if you hear of an already-trained dog or cat that needs a new home.

10.  Freezable homemade foods: casseroles, soups, breads, and baked goods.

This is a potentially Mom-ish gift, but if your friend is on deadline, a new parent, or just far from home during the holidays, a home-cooked meal could be a lovely gesture. I emphasize freezable because it should be something that you make at home and leave with your friend to eat later. If you can’t cook, buy a pie.

11.  A hand-written letter

I know how corny this sounds, but many writers, especially fiction writers, still get a fair amount of rejection notes via the U.S. mail. You can easily make your friend’s day by sending an old-fashioned, chatty letter or even just a holiday card.

12.  The Gift, by Lewis Hyde

cover The Gift examines the role of artists in market economies, taking the lives of two major American poets as case studies. It’s the perfect antidote to all the earnest, helpful guides that aim to teach writers how to be more publishable, saleable, and disciplined. Where most writing guides make writers feel they could succeed if only they were more productive and efficient, The Gift argues that productivity and efficiency are market-based terms that have little meaning in gift economies, which is where many creative writers exchange and share their work. Another way of putting it is to say that The Gift makes feel writers feel less crazy.

Bonus: 10 MORE Holiday Gifts That Writers Will Use

(Image: Project 365 #263: 200911 Kept Under Wraps… from comedynose’s photostream)

is a staff writer for The Millions and the author of Home Field. Her short stories have appeared in The Southern Review, The Carolina Quarterly, and The Chattahoochee Review, among others. Read more at hannahgersen.com or sign up for her newsletter here.

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Winners, Declared: A Take on The New Yorker’s 20 Under 40 by One Under 40

Lists
October 20, 2010 | 4 books mentioned 3 5 min read
Maybe there are not enough lists in the world. In that spirit, now that the entire series has been published, I address The New Yorker’s “20 under 40,” by refining it down to an even thinner and more rarified number.  Is this possible, the reader may ask—or prudent?  Why not try, I say to the first question, and prudent, who knows: if it were a contest, the following are those I would declare winner and runners up.  But it is not a contest, and perhaps all this choosing actually reflects is one reader’s head and heart.  So let me ask: fiction, fiction, what do you make of me? 5.  Nicole Krauss “The Young Painters” (from Great House) After viewing a painting in the bedroom of her male acquaintance, a married New York City writer makes use of a tragedy that befell him in childhood: two close friends of his, the creators of the painting, were fed sleeping pills and burned to death in a forest by their suicidal mother.  With the proverbial fine-toothed brush, Krauss’s story succinctly unknots the psychological effects of necessary borrowing in the life of a writer. We move from initial obsession (“In the taxi home that night, I continued to think about that mother and her children: the wheels of the car softly rolling over the pine needles on the forest floor, the engine cut in a clearing, the pale faces of those young painters asleep in the back seat, dirt under their fingernails.”) to a sort of catharsis (“[It was] as if by writing about them I had made them disappear.”) to the beginnings of reckoning (“In her work, the writer is free of laws.  But in her life, Your Honor, she is not free.”). Rendered as testimony in a courtroom, Krauss’s story probes questions of guilt and innocence in the imaginative life both slyly and directly.  Like the hook to a catchy song, this one rekindled in my mind days and weeks after I had first read it. 4.  Daniel Alarcón “Second Lives” “People talk a lot these days about virtual reality, second lives, digital avatars.  It’s a concept I’m fully conversant with, of course.”: the younger son of South American parents compelled to return from Baltimore years before his birth due to an expired visa narrates the story of his older brother’s immersion in America, where old Baltimore friends agree to take the older brother into their Birmingham, Alabama home in the 1980s—and how his now distant family south of the equator struggles with what to communicate to him. Alarcón takes on the human side of heavy socio-political realities with a light hand.  His narrator whose words, at times, seethe with resentment sees in the memory of his older brother a bully whose tactics mirror the dark side of a seductive, all encompassing American mythos: Just before he left, he’d warned me with bared teeth, frightening as only older brothers can be, not to touch a thing.  In case he came back.  If I were to change anything, Francisco said, he’d know. “How?” I asked. “How will you know?” 3.  C.E. Morgan “Twins” (subscription required) Scope is something I admire in fiction, the willingness to address a wider world through the restricted window of a short story, and Morgan’s premise is rich with scope: twins, one light skinned (Mickey) and one dark (Allmon), born of the same black mother, navigate the perils and thrills of childhood while longing for their far off Irish American father. “Twins” opens with the kind of wide-lens portrait of a city (in this case Cincinnati) that's found in the novels of Balzac, but zips in, just as quickly, on the vibrant, vulnerable lives of the characters.  Of Allmon, Morgan writes: “He learned to wait before he knew what waiting was, learned to want before he had the words to want with.” Neither does she eschew the lyrical, a style which perfectly matches the kind of longing her characters harbor: “Look,” his father said again, and [Allmon] looked and all he would remember later was the river like a snake, and barely the city at all—but what a city!  A queen rising on seven hills over her Tiber, forming the circlet of a crown.  A jagged cityscape of steel and brick and glass, with its own bright nightless burn and, beyond it, the fretful, historied amplitude of Kentucky, that netherworld.  This was Cincinnati—the capital of pork, the first truly American city—sprawled before the eyes of two little boys under the momentary aegis of one Mike Shaughnessy… 2.  Chris Adrian “The Warm Fuzzies” More than the others on this list, Adrian’s fiction is funny.  There was no dearth of funny to be found among the “20 under 40” (Gary Shteyngart, Joshua Ferris, Karen Russell, Wells Tower), but Adrian’s funny registered as somehow the most original and otherworldly—even if his protagonist happened to be as recognizable as a teen in a Christian family rock band.  (Or is that not recognizable?) One in a series of black foster siblings, a boy named Paul, or Peabo, takes up the tambourine in the rehearsal garage of the Musical Carter Family of Virginia Beach, Virginia. Within days, middle daughter Molly finds herself involved with the newcomer in an episodic, after hours interpretive dance-off that verges on the inappropriate.  Molly attempts to reconcile the Peabo of daylight with the Peabo of night: There was the boy who had sneaked into her room to offer up the little dance for her interpretation, and then there was the boy who arm-wrestled with Craig and did algebra equations for fun with Colin.  She could understand if there were two boys in him, since she had felt there were two girls in her, one for the regular voice that said regular things about people and one that spoke a language made up only of cruel insults.  If she stared in the bathroom mirror long enough, she thought she could catch that other girl’s features super-imposed in brief flashes upon hers… 1.  Dinaw Mengestu, “An Honest Exit” (from How to Read the Air) The son of an Ethiopian refugee delivers an off-the-cuff account to his privileged students in an Upper West Side classroom of his father’s passage from Ethiopia to a Sudanese port town to Europe, England and America, making free with factual veracity.  The students are enthralled: As I walked home that night I was aware of a growing vortex of e-mails and text messages being passed among my students.  Millions of invisible bits of data were being transmitted through underground cable wires and satellite networks, and I was their sole subject and object of concern.  I don’t know why I found so much comfort in that thought, but it nearly lifted me off the ground, and, suddenly, everywhere, I felt embraced.  As I walked down Riverside Drive, with the Hudson River and the rush of traffic pouring up and down the West Side Highway to my right, the tightly controlled neighborhood borders and divisions hardly mattered. I found Mengestu’s story to be haunting in the way of Krauss, thematically poised in the way of Alarcón, visceral and sweeping in the way of Morgan, and, well, maybe not quite as funny as Adrian.  But it didn’t have it to be.  Echoing real life incident, such as the case of Joseph Ellis, a history professor at Mount Holyoke who claimed to have served in the Vietnam War while teaching it to his students, or, more dubiously, the memoirs of James Frey, Mengestu relays how spinning fact into fiction can bring light to the lives of young minds. Broadly put, The New Yorker appears to favor stories about great divides and mixed identity.  Conveniently, there is something endemic to these boundary lines, their reinforcement or blending or blurring, that literary fiction speaks toward well. So, with mine listed above, I invite you to cite your own favorite short stories from the past year, New Yorker endorsed or no.  Because, of course, there were many worthy others; the New Yorker list just makes for all it was ever meant to be: a starting point.  We can call the one that follows “The Infinite under the Same All Embracing Sky.”
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A History of Magic: A Children’s Librarian Reflects on Harry Potter, and Offers a Post-Hogwarts Syllabus

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July 27, 2007 | 4 books mentioned 3 10 min read
As the media phenomenon du jour, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows has put pressure on the commentariat to provide Potter-related context or controversy - anything to get readers to spend a few minutes with us, rather than J.K. Rowling! And herein lies a danger: in our zeal to ride Harry's coattails (broomstick?) to glory, we Muggles are tempted to wave a wand over our own preconceptions and imagine them transfigured into news. In that vein, an article in last week's Washington Post provoked our interest here at The Millions, while contradicting my own sense of how the Potter books function within the enchanted kingdom of childhood. I specifically remembered Cynthia Oakes, a middle-school librarian at the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools, telling me some years ago about a book her students had gone wild for, and recommending I check out Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. Hoping to get some ground-level perspective on Pottermania, I got in touch with her (which wasn't hard; she's my mother-in-law) and asked if she'd mind revisiting the Potter books in a bit more depth. I had misplaced my Quick-Quotes Quills, but she graciously consented to be interviewed through the magic of email. [Editor's note: Scroll down to view Oakes' post-Hogwarts syllabus.]Opening the Chamber of Secrets"There is a wonderful bookstore in Hyde Park," Oakes told me, "57th Street Books, where my colleagues and I often go to buy the latest children's and young-adult titles. The children's buyer at the time, author Franny Billingsley (The Folk Keeper), told us that there was a new British fantasy novel out, and the word in England was that it was wildly popular. We bought a copy, read it, liked it, recommended it to a couple of kids, and put it on our summer reading list. By the end of the summer, the idea of our introducing anyone to Harry Potter was beyond laughable. That's how quickly it became a phenomenon. Kids told kids, who told other kids, who told still more kids - and that was that."Initially, adults were out of the loop - which was great! It was remarkable, from my point of view, to see any book capture these kids' imaginations and hearts so completely." Oakes offered some further context: "This was right around time that the term 'digital natives' was being coined. As school librarians we were being led to believe that the future, and especially our future, lay in the Internet - that students were no longer interested in print. Then the iPod came out; once again, we were told that the future lay in digital whatever... and suddenly our middle school library alone had to buy seven copies of Sorcerer's Stone. All copies were instantly checked out and the hold list was huge."Then kids learned that the sequel was out in England. It was unprecedented to have them beg their parents to plan summer vacations to the UK around the publication of a book. One family, who actually did vacation in the UK that summer, brought back a copy of Chamber of Secrets. We ended up buying four copies of the next two installments. After that, kids were buying the books for themselves so we didn't need to invest quite so heavily in order to provide access. We now have two shelves of the library devoted to six titles. I'm not sure if we'll need to buy more than one copy of the latest book, since the sales of this title have been astronomical. I can assure you that no other series even come close to it in popularity."Apropos of families vacationing across the pond, Oakes said she couldn't generalize about any connections between the books' success and social class. But as Chicago's Lab School is a well-regarded private school, she could attest to the books' strong appeal to upper-middle class, affluent kids. That appeal, she noted, "doesn't seem to be contingent upon gender or race."A Hogwarts of the Mind"I think what makes these books so seductive," Oakes told me, "is that the world Rowling has created is a world kids really, really, really want to live in. Actually live in, not just imagine living in. They want to eat the candy, ride the train, wear the uniforms, own the brooms, play the games, study the magic, get mail from the owls, look at the maps, and spy from the folds of an invisible cape. Who wouldn't want to be a member of the Weasley family? And who wouldn't want Ron, Hermione, or Harry for a friend? Or Hagrid for a teacher? I am always amazed at how even a 14-year-old will still harbor the secret hope that Hogwarts is real." Oakes remembers "being quite surprised when a fifth-grader confided in me that he was not able to get the spells to work. He wondered what he was doing wrong and he looked so forlorn while furtively whispering all this to me."From a literary point of view, I'm not the first person to observe that these books are unique in combining the most popular of children's literary genres into one rollicking story: horror, sports, adventure, school story, fantasy, romance, animal fantasy, family problems, etc. That gives them appeal among a broad array of readers. In addition, they are page-turners for kids who love plot-driven books and have satisfying characters for kids who prefer character-driven novels. It doesn't hurt that the central character is a misfit without parents... a key ingredient to most successful children's lit. What child, tethered to family and home, wouldn't love to step through a magic portal where she instantly becomes the hero of the universe?"One must also remark on their unusual length. A 900-page kids book? Unheard of. And equally rare is a sequel that doesn't have an 'our-story-so-far' component. Rowling rightly acknowledges the depth of her fans' understanding of all the previous books by jumping right into the thick of the story. It is very difficult to read Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban without having read Sorcerer's Stone and Chamber of Secrets. And if you are starting with Book Seven, forget it!"Dark Art"My experience has taught me that kids will rarely choose to read a book that isn't entertaining and will avoid an instructive book as if it had spattergroit," Oakes continued. "This isn't to say that they avoid books with ideas. I harbor the belief that they prefer them. The Potter books are entertaining, but darkly so. They deal with real evil - Voldemort is crueler than the cruelest classmate. Harry has to wrestle with whatever part he may have played in his own parents' death. Thoughtless actions in these books have far-reaching and horrific consequences."This is also more psychologically nuanced fantasy world than many contemporary books offer, with every character suffering from his own particular character flaw. Yet a truly noble and ethical solution to every problem is always apparent. I believe that our kids long for that sort of clearly delineated ethical world.They are discovering that the adults around them, much like Dumbledore, are not perfect. They want their friends, just like Ron, always to return to them. And they want Harry to make the right choices (perhaps because if he does, then they will). The books instruct, then, in the way the best books do: by allowing the characters to fail. Whether or not the Potter books are helping to define anyone's moral universe, I can't tell. But contrary to the opinions of some commentators, they surely aren't destroying anyone's moral universe..."She ventured a critique: "I know the books are flawed, and most of the books - certainly Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, could have used a seriously talented editor. Or just an editor." Still, she said, "They are remarkable. It's not popular to admit it, but when I read the first book I had to get up at three a.m. to finish it. As an unreconstructed bibliophile, of course I love these books... I am a fan."Fresh out of veritaserum, I tested the truth of this last assertion by asking Oakes some targeted questions. Her favorite character? "As a woman and an educator, I have to love Professor McGonagall." Favorite villain(s)? "The dementors. I've certainly run across my share of soul-suckers and they scare me to death." Favorite setting? "I love Hogwarts and wish that I worked there. It has an amazing library and I would love to recommend books to Hermione. And have her recommend a few to me! Not to mention the fact that I'd get to hide from and/or fight trolls, death-eaters, and so on."Ordinary Wizarding Levels (O.W.L.s)"Most assuredly there is a social aspect to the Harry Potter phenomenon," Oakes said. "Kids sit around for HOURS discussing all the ins and outs of the books. They join online discussion groups, download podcasts, and know every website devoted to Harry. They create group Halloween costumes. In fact, fans were so enthralled by the books that they rushed into the library (en masse) the second, the very second, the cover art for Book Seven had been revealed. We had to display it at the circulation desk. (I mean, our credibility would have taken a serious nose dive if we hadn't.) Then, they congregated around the printout of the cover and discussed THAT for hours."I asked her if kids outgrow Harry. "Some students lose interest (or say they do), but a remarkable number do not. I overheard many conversations in the high school hallway prior to Book Seven that centered around horcruxes, Harry, and death. Our high-school librarians have all the Potter books on the shelves. The fifth grade to whom we recommended the first book graduated last year. So most of these kids grew up reading Harry Potter. I've watched high-school students sneak back into the middle school library to keep up on their favorite series books and their favorite authors. And I say, good for them!" No Argus Filch, my mother-in-law."As for the hoopla," she said, "the books have been very good for children and for young-adult publishing... Their sheer popularity forced The New York Times to create a children's literature bestseller list. (Ha!) These days our kids are reading just as much as - if not more than - they did before."As we'd discussed, "J.K. Rowling came at a crucial moment... However, I do wish the publishers would realize there isn't going to be another Harry Potter and ease up on all the fantasy that's coming down the pike. I worry that really good young-adult novels are getting overlooked. The hoopla has also turned off many new young readers. Whereas the initial impetus to read the books came from kids, there's now a huge media machine cramming those same books down our collective throat."Flourish and BlottsI asked Oakes if she could elaborate on "the good stuff" by furnishing Millions readers with some recommendations for post-Hogwarts reading. "Middle schoolers love serial storytelling," she said. "That is part of the success of the Harry Potter books. I can think of many recent series that have met with remarkable success: the Alex Rider series, the Warriors series, the Princess Diary series, the Eragon series, the Spiderwick Chronicles - to name a few off the top of my head. Students will request the next book in the series sometimes months in advance. Because of Amazon.com, they know approximately when the book will be published. We librarians are forced, more than ever, to stay on top of things. However, I can think of no other book or series that would compel students and parents to attend a midnight party in order to obtain the sequel. That is purely a Harry Potter thing. We've had kids counting down the days to publication since December."I would love for kids to love J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, because they are such elegant writers. Certainly there are kids who read Tolkien and Lewis, and often prefer it, but it doesn't follow that a Potter fan is automatically a Bilbo Baggins fan. Tolkien is much harder to read, for one thing, and the works of C.S. Lewis don't feel as contemporary as Rowling's do. The latest, coolest reading trend amongst my students is graphic novels."When recommending a book to Potter enthusiasts, Oakes always asks, "What part of Harry Potter is your favorite part? The school, the family problems, the sports, horror, the magic...?" Then, she says, "I come up with some titles based on the answer. It's surprising to me how often students want to read about boarding schools and about all things English... and I can't resist recommending the great contemporary English author Hilary McKay. Read The Exiles and see if you can stop reading the rest of her work. It's not fantasy, but it is quintessentially English."She went on to offer a post-Hogwarts syllabus of fantasy books:Young Adult/Older ReadersUrsula K.Leguin. The Earthsea Cycle. (A quest series with wizards and dragons.)Patricia McKillup. The Riddle-Master of Hed. (A quest series with wizards and mysteries.)Garth Nix. The Abhorsen Trilogy. (A dark fantasy that features necromancy and romance.)Philip Pullman. His Dark Materials. (Parallel worlds that collide in Oxford. As much science-fiction as fantasy.)Middle ReadersLloyd Alexander. The Chronicles of Prydain. (A quest series with an oracular pig; highly recommended byThe Millions.)Eoin Colfer. Artemis Fowl. (Contemporary magic which relies on technology. Spies!)Diana Wynne Jones. The Chronicles of Chrestomanci. (Parallel worlds; magic; families in all their dysfunction and glory.)Jenny Nimmo. Children of the Red King. (Wizards go to a school quite different from Hogwarts!)"Many kids don't want to be perceived as Potter groupies," Oakes noted. "It's interesting, though, how many will reluctantly pick one of the books up, then get sucked right in to the world Rowling has created. It is almost impossible to resist the spell of the Potter books. Having said that, I'll be very curious to see how they age."
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| 4 books mentioned 3 10 min read
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The Magic Building Where English Majors Work: Making Sense of Creative Writing’s Job Problem

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September 10, 2014 | 4 books mentioned 22 9 min read
When is the right time to tell aspiring writers about their job prospects? In graduate school? Before they even apply to graduate school? Or sooner than that even—in their first creative writing class? Never? Let them Google it because it’s just too depressing otherwise?
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| 4 books mentioned 22 9 min read
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41 comments:

  1. I like the article, but it should be titled “12 Gifts to Give Your Female Writer Friend” cause I don’t think my best friend would enjoy lipstick and manicures and bathrobes because he’s a guy. Great ideas for my girl friends though.

  3. What’s weird is that the men I see in my nail shop always come in wearing fabulous looking bathrobes, AND bright pink lipsticks! Just gorgeous.. Although I don’t know if any of them are writers….

  4. I wholeheartedly love this list. I’ve never had a manicure, but I certainly wouldn’t turn one down. And I do need a new bathrobe… (this is painting a really lovely picture of myself. I better stop while I’m ahead.)

    But I also love having a billion little journal and notebooks stashed around. I like that the hardcover ones stand up to my abuse, and while I will use unlined pages, I do like lines better.

    Though feel free to just pass along the booze and coffee. It will never go to waste.

  5. I really wouldn’t want any of these things. Maybe the booze, and that internet blocking thingy, but I don’t need any more booze. When I saw “Gifts that Writers Will Actually Use” I thought I was gonna read about stuff like pens. Or cool paper. Or a cool new app that makes my prose purple. I need a good pen. I’m always looking for a new, good pen. Manicure, not so much. My cuticles are just a mess. And I would rather have the $10 Steinbeck complete works advertised on this page than any crappy best seller. Just saying. This list is more kind of funny in that ironic, I’m-writing-this-cause-I-know-it’s-funny way. And nothing make me more Grinchy than our tired old friend irony.

  6. This is a brlliant list. I’ve just tweeted it as I’m on a deadline for Monday and want my frozen Christmas pressies now!

  7. I LOVE it! My addition to the gifting list is: 4″ heel, Donald Pliner thigh-hign boots. You’ll look fantastic and your feet won’t hurt sitting in a chair. When you need inspiration, just throw those babies up on the desk and let inspiration flow… unless you write children’s books… then it would just be wrong.

  8. I liked this, not because I’d want anything on the list except the yoga class but because it made me feel more apart of something where I thought I was being so utterly abnormal. See the good in negativity you did keep the interest of the readers/writers enough to gain a comment. That in my journal is always a good sign

    Happy Holidays

  9. I never realized how much of a normal writer I was until I read this. I do the exact thing with journals–I buy TONS of them, but can never sully their pages with my mundane words. Also, the nail-biting. I broke the habit of regularly biting my nails many years ago, however when I write a nail always finds its way to my teeth.

    Thank you for this brilliant article.

  10. Brilliant! This is an excellent way to ask your friends and relatives for the gifts you want, Hannah. I’ll have to craft a “12 Gifts That Stevens Will Actually Use” article immediately and see if The Millions or if Stevens Quarterly has room for it before the holidays.

  11. Lame! I love fancy blank books. If they seem too pristine for ordinary musings I use them for dream journals. Yoga classes and handwritten letters are great, but all the rest of these gifts range from sad to insulting in my book. Lipstick and manicures? Really? Here is a news flash: my nails are kept extremely short to help me type faster. Also, I use the Internet for research. If I’m going to be distracted, blocking the Internet isn’t going to help. I’ll be distracted by a book, or by something that needs to be done in the house, or (negating #9) a cat.

    More appropriate gifts for writers: a massage, a wrist brace for carpal tunnel, an ergonomic chair or a stability ball, an ergonomic/split keyboard, better lighting (if this is something their office lacks), editing services, a publishing contract.

  12. What a fun post! Very creative. I especially like the meal idea — while I love to cook, there have been days when I just don’t want to stop writing to figure out what’s for dinner. One of the best “writerly” presents I got was from my sister-in-law, who stuck $20 in a card and said to use it for pizza some night when I didn’t feel like cooking.

    And I’m with Monica on the massage — that’s one of the most awesome presents ever for someone who spends hours hunched in front of a computer.

    Thanks for the entertaining post!

  13. Hmmm…I’m sure many saw the title and thought it would be flasks, scotch, slippers, cigars, shiny black pens, and leather notebooks for some dude who wears sweaters with elbow patches. I admit it. I did.

    I just read a many-part gift guide for hikers, mountaineers, travelers, etc in which all but one part tilted towards men in apparel, and the lonley woman’s section was called “gift guide: snow goddess”. (To give them credit, some items in the non-goddess section came in men’s and women’s versions, but not many). Perhaps it’s a little moment in which we can be honest about the way things are and why lipstick and manicures seemed out of place for us — Hannah didn’t follow the rules. Gift guides that are suppose to be non-gendered (i.e. for writers, geeks, outdoorsy types, urbanites, athletes, etc.) must consist of only items that are man-appropriate, but if any or some items are a little on the feminine side, the list needs to be labeled for women. And includes loads of pink text and photos of shiny things and further indication it is only for women.

    I’m thankful Hannah didn’t represent it for men or women in particular and it wasn’t titled: “12 Holiday Gifts That Writing GODDESSES Will Actually Use”. And I’m thankful that some of you were crankypants about it, because it increased my awareness about my own assumptions.

    It also made me really REALLY want to ask for fancy lipstick for Christmas.

  14. Animals should never, ever, be given as “a gift,” not even if the recipient is actively looking to add one to their life. A decision to care for a living creature is serious business and should be left up to the person taking on that responsibility. If you give your friend a book she doesn’t like, she can exchange it or give it away; it’s not quite that easy if you give her a cat or dog. Animals are not “one size fits all,” and, sadly, shelters are full of unwanted pets thoughtlessly given as gifts.

  15. There is a typo in this article, which is kind of ironic, since it bears advice for writers and those who love them.

    (In case you hadn’t spotted it: “Although she loves the look of journal, she never writes in it.”)

  16. I love fancy blank books too. I have a hard time writing in them – except when I buy a fancy journal to record my daily diabetes stuff. Then I feel I deserve them because they record the crappy side of my life.

    I’m always happy to receive books, gift cards from a book store, and gift cards big enough for two for dinner.

    Flowers. I love flowers. I love flowers any time. I don’t need an occasion. They just make me happy.

  18. I have trouble writing in fancy journals at first. I usually have to carry them around for awhile and get used to them. But once you take the plunge and starting writing your thoughts down (no matter how trivial), there is no turning back. Once you finish with them they preserve much better than spiral notebooks, and they look way more cool on your bookshelf.

  19. Love it. I want all of these things. Except for a pet. I have too many. (And they do nothing for my concentration. I guess I’m petting them wrong.)

  21. …and if you can’t write ’em a letter, buy em a subscription to a zine, some of which are reliably quarterly and arrive in greeting card sized envelopes!

    Also…I had a moment thinking that a 14 year old of my acquaintance was a published author until I remembered he spells his Lewis Louis.

  22. Pingback: (More) Gifts for Writers | I Should Be Writing

  24. Any writer worth the ink in their pen would end your lovely friendship via text! These gifts might be delightful for a high-schooler who just won an inter-school short story contest but for the rest of us who contemplate our raison d’etre hourly, save your money! Here’s why…

    ‎1. A Cheesy New Bestseller: Only if you’re trying to remind us of how mediocre we already feel. The lone exception might be Jacqueline Susann’s ‘Valley Of The Dolls.’
    2. Good Lipstick: Only if you’re buying it for Thomas Pynchon or Julian Barnes. In which case, call me I’d like to be there for the unwrapping.
    3. Foreign Language Learning Software: I can barely master the English language nevermind trying to say ‘verisimilitude’ in French or Swahili.
    4. A Bathrobe: Contrary to popular belief, Michael Douglas PLAYING a writer in The Wonder Boys gave us all a bad rap.
    5. A Manicure: That’s right up there with ‘Dress to Impress’.
    6. Internet Blocking Software: Take away the internet and prescriptions for Zoloft will skyrocket. Don’t let the drug companies win!
    7. Booze, Coffee & Stimulants: Wrapping and putting a bow on it would just be hypocritical.
    8. Yoga Classes: Pain and suffering are all we have left.
    9. A Pet: Fine. But if there’s only one beer left in the fridge, I’m not sharing!
    10. Freezable Homemade Foods: We’re writers not handicaps or invalids.
    11. A Hand-written Letter: If you promise to write in the voice of a suicidal narrator from 1874, feel free!
    12. A Copy Of ‘The Gift’ By Lewis Hyde: I have 7 copies all of which I’ve never read so you tell me.

  25. Pamela August Russell would benefit from having all these gifts, especially reading her 7 copies of The Gift.

  26. Even if it’s true I wouldn’t use it, I’d rather get the blank journal.
    These maybe are perfect gifts for some specific writer – that’s to say the author of the article.

  27. I was given a blank journal for my birthday back in HS. My then boyfriend gave it to me and wrote “for your first masterpiece.” The pressure in that phrase kept the book blank for many, many years. Finally I started putting clever clips and quips in it. I still get blank journals and I buy them for friends, but I’d rather not get them.

    The rest of the list is delightful and inspired.

    Michelle

  28. Pingback: Friday Links | Nadria Tucker

  29. LOVE this list! I already posted it on my Facebook account with specifications regarding lipstick (Bobbi Brown of course.) And although I wholeheartedly agree with #7, “Booze, Coffee, and other stimulants” I feel strongly that pills should also be included (had to add that to my Facebook post.)

    And considering that I’ve had on the exact same outfit since Sunday #4 (bathrobe) also struck a chord with me.

    Brilliant list! And to the person who said this list wouldn’t apply to guys, that’s because I imagine their list would be quite short (booze & women.)

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  33. Wow. I really liked how this list showed a real sense of how gifts should be chosen with the giver in mind. And the comments are all, but I wouldn’t like that! Nobody’s getting all ten, OK! And Hannah seems to have the pay attention to what people actually like and use down.

    But to add, manicures are good for short, natural nails people, you just have to find a place that understands natural nails and does no polish manicures. It’s good to go just to see how a professional does things. Manicures are great as pick me ups, horrible as a weekly expense and time sink. My gift for natural nail pals is OPI’s Nail Envy in Matte. It’s a clear non-shiny nail strengthener. Nails get stronger, but you don’t look like you’re wearing polish. Works for men, too.

  34. I just got around to reading this and I love it. There are some grinchy so-and-sos on this comment thread, which is also kind of delightful. Hopefully someone turns those frowns upside down with a festive new stability ball.

  35. i bought “the gift” as a gift to myself. it’s fabulous!
    great list, i especially need a manicure…i bite my cuticles when concentrating. Also, a bathrobe would be perfect. you should see how i write. oy vey.

  36. I think it’s a good list, but as I’ve been sitting in front of the computer writing all day, I think I’d add “massage” to the list to make it complete, and maybe “ergonomically sound chair” and “chiropractor gift certificate” (do they have that sort of thing?).

    Thank you so much for “freedom” and “anti-social”, of which I was unaware until I read this. I’m not waiting for someone to give me these–I’m getting them, now, in the hope I might save myself.

    Hope you get everything on your list, and then some.

  37. Pingback: Gifts for Writers | Blog, by Shannon
  38. Pingback: Gifts for Writers « LB Writes

  39. For everyone complaining that the list didn’t have pens, cool paper, etc. Let me go on record as saying–DO NOT buy a writer pens or notebooks. Ever. I am so picky about my pens and notebooks, it just takes up space. I won’t use the cool pens or the nice notebooks if they aren’t “right”. Just like you shouldn’t buy a carpenter a new hammer because it “looks nice”, don’t buy me pens or notebooks. PLEASE.

    I think it’s a nice list. Yes, some of the items are women-centric, but things like yoga are for dudes, too. Especially if those dudes have back pain. Bathrobes are definitely for dudes…my husband wears his bathrobe a hell of a lot more than I wear mine.

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Notable Articles Screening Room

Ten Books to Read Now That HBO’s Girls Is Back

Notable Articles Screening Room
January 10, 2013 | 4 books mentioned 18 9 min read
The first moment I saw that one giant word “GIRLS” flash across the screen in all caps, I became utterly, hopelessly enamored of Lena Dunham’s HBO television show. Yes, I know the endless criticisms, both reasonable and totally unreasonable. No matter. The show speaks to me like no other television show currently on air, and I am beyond excited that it is back for a second season on Sunday. But while Dunham’s lady-centered wry comedy may be singular in today’s television line-up, the world of literature is home to a multitude of books with the same appeal as Girls, books that feature a certain kind of female protagonist (usually one coming of age) or a certain kind of female narrator (pointed, self-deprecating, and ultimately wise). These are books that -- like Girls -- explore what it is like to be young and hungry -- hungry for love and hungry for sex, but most of all, hungry for recognition and hungry for adulthood. Ultimately, the girls in these books, like the girls of Girls, are hungry to become the women they will one day be. And yes, of course, the girls in question here, both on the show and in these books, are privileged enough that they are not literally hungry. Many of them are also privileged enough to live on their own in New York and to be more concerned with opportunity costs than financial costs. And yes, the girls in these books -- like on the television show -- are all white. I am not white (or at least I’m only half), but these happen to be the books that have jumped out at me, that made me feel as if something of my own life had been understood and articulated in a way that was both illuminating and reassuring. I welcome your suggestions for other books in the comments. How Should a Person Be? by Sheila Heti: Many comparisons have been made between Heti’s novel and Girls, the most titillating of which obsess about both projects’ frank depictions of sex and shadows of autobiography. Less titillating but far more important are their shared concerns about the process of becoming an artist and also the intricacies of female friendship. The fictional Sheila and her best friend Margaux ostensibly fall out over a yellow dress, and Hannah and Marnie ostensibly fall out over the rent/Marnie buying a book by Hannah’s nemesis/which one of them is “the wound,” but really, both fights are ultimately about boundaries, both artistic and personal. It’s no surprise that Sheila and Margaux patch things up (though I won’t spoil how), and we have yet to see where things go for Hannah and Marnie, but both brutally honest portrayals do full justice to the complexity of a crumbling friendship, whether it’s eventually resuscitated or not. The Fallback Plan by Leigh Stein: After graduating from college (with an oh-so-useful theater degree), 22-year-old Esther Kohler moves back home with her parents in suburban Illinois, where she takes a gig babysitting for the neighbors in order to pay her parents rent on her childhood bedroom. She quickly becomes involved with her charge’s father (shades of Jessa), as well as a Very Handsome friend her own age (complete with awkward -- completely, terribly, realistically awkward -- sex scene). Stein’s wry voice shines through the entire short novel, especially in the pages involving the Littlest Panda, a creation of Esther’s imagination that she wants to turn into a Chronicles of Narnia-inspired screenplay. There is, of course, more to Esther’s lethargy and indecision than meets the eye, but her (and Stein’s) self-aware take on the self-pitying recession-grad generation is compelling reading even without the eventual reveal about Esther’s backstory. The Dud Avocado by Elaine Dundy: The protagonist of Dundy’s 1958 novel is Sally Jay Gorce, a 21-year-old American girl, straight out of college and living abroad for two years on her uncle’s dime. The cult classic was widely praised (by the disparate likes of Ernest Hemingway and Groucho Marx) when it was originally released, and attained cult status anew when NYRB Press reissued it in 2007 (and not just because of the nude figure on the cover). Of all the girls on this list, Gorce seems most like the proto-Girl -- a girl who is self-avowedly “hellbent on living,” getting herself into (and out of) escapade after escapade during her time in France. Many of Gorce’s misadventures involve a heavy dose of slapstick, starting on page one with our introduction to our heroine, who is sitting at a Parisian bar having a morning cocktail, wearing an evening dress because all her other clothes are at the cleaners. The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Volume 1: 1931-1934 by Anaïs Nin: When Hannah’s diary got her into a mess of trouble, she probably took comfort in the tradition of great literary diarists before her, of whom Anaïs Nin is the reigning queen. In Volume One (of the six expurgated adult diaries), Nin talks freely -- one might say obsessively -- about Henry Miller and his wife June, her psychoanalysis, and her relationship with her father. But you don’t read Nin’s diaries for the plot points so much as the arcs of emotion and insight, as well as the searing descriptions of her friends and their relationships, (sound familiar, Marnie and Charlie?). Still, Nin perhaps has more in common with Jessa than with Hannah, as in this entry, reminiscent of the Jessa-ism that is possibly the most famous line from Season One of Girls: “Psychoanalysis did save me because it allowed the birth of the real me, a most dangerous and painful one for a woman, filled with dangers; for no one has ever loved an adventurous woman as they have loved adventurous men…I may not become a saint, but I am very full and very rich. I cannot install myself anywhere yet; I must climb dizzier heights.” Then again, Jessa would never be caught dead “journaling.” The Lone Pilgrim by Laurie Colwin: In this collection of stories, the women are farther along the path to adulthood than Hannah and her crew -- many are married, own homes, have stable careers -- but they are no less lost. These are stories about new lovers and ex-lovers and the complexities of romantic love in all its forms, stories in which the women seek love as a form of stability but also rebel against the expectations of a relationship. In a turn that Jessa would appreciate, one of Colwin’s young female characters gets married in order to prove that she’s serious-minded, but meanwhile maintains a constant low-level high throughout the courtship and marriage. Beyond their thematic overlap, the stories are linked by Colwin’s diamond-sharp prose and emotional acuity. At the end of the collection’s eponymous story, Colwin writes of a woman who has married the man she loves and whose life appears to be in place, “Those days were spent in quest -- the quest to settle your own life, and now the search has ended. Your imagined happiness is yours…It is yours, but still you are afraid to enter it, wondering what you might find.” I Was Told There’d Be Cake by Sloane Crosley: Crosley’s first collection of essays covers well-trodden 20-something-living-in-New-York ground, mostly having to do with a privileged class of horrors: the horrible first boss, the horrors of getting locked out of your apartment, the horrors of moving (from one Upper West Side apartment to another), the horrors of being a maid-of-honor. Still, Crosley’s sardonic and self-aware take on those seemingly unremarkable rites of passage elevates them to true moments of insight and recognition. Not to mention laugh-out-loud (or at least smile visibly) lines like: “People are less quick to applaud as you grow older. Life starts out with everyone clapping when you take a poo and goes downhill from there.” And as we know, Dunham loves a good bathroom scene. Hannah Horvath couldn’t have said it better herself. The Group by Mary McCarthy: When The Group was first published in 1963, Norman Podhoretz dismissed it as “a trivial lady writer’s novel,” the kind of criticism that has dogged female artists -- and has already, unsurprisingly, been hurled at Lena Dunham -- throughout time. Of course, McCarthy’s novel, which follows a group of eight female friends after they graduate from Vassar and move to New York City in the 1930s, is anything but trivial. At the time it was published, The Group was considered revolutionary -- it was banned in Australia while simultaneously spending two years on The New York Times bestseller list. A full 50 years after its publication (and 80 years after the story’s events), the novel’s satire-tinged account of the women’s lives offers a nuanced portrait of love and sex and birth control, marriage and divorce, childbirth and breastfeeding, professional ambition and thwarted dreams, and the fluctuations of female friendship. The Girls’ Guide to Hunting and Fishing by Melissa Bank: This collection of linked short stories centers around Jane Rosenal, who, like so many intelligent young female protagonists, works in publishing in New York City. The collection does not exactly follow Jane’s personal search for love, though her love life figures largely in the stories; instead, the stories act more like a romantic education, as Jane observes and interacts with different forms of love as she makes her way from teenager to young woman to adult. Last in the collection, the title story descends into rom-com territory, though Zosia Mamet might be able to work the same miracle with its one-dimensional material -- a discussion of The Rules and a final moral to Be Yourself -- as she has with the hilarious but terribly flat character of Shoshanna. Still, Bank’s sprightly prose and sympathetic voice run through all the stories, making for an engaging, enjoyable read. Emma by Jane Austen: Lena Dunham has said that Clueless ranks among her influences, and there would be no Clueless (and perhaps no Hannah Horvath) without Jane Austen’s original meddlesome, egotistic, incredibly flawed heroine, Emma. While Hollywood would have you read Emma as a straight rom-com -- and Emma as an unimpeachable heroine -- it’s better read the classic novel with the same lens of dramatic irony that the discerning viewer applies to Girls. Hannah is not supposed to be a character who makes all the right decisions; we root for Hannah, but we do not necessarily agree with her every move. In Emma’s case, the close reader cannot necessarily even root for her by the end; if you pay attention, Emma is revealed to be much closer to the original Mean Girl rather than the perfect innocent portrayed in the movies. Just like Hannah, Emma is clueless; we can only hope that by the end of Girls, Hannah will have grown up more than Austen’s beloved-but-actually-kind-of-terrible protagonist. Crazy Salad: Some Things About Women by Nora Ephron: Although a few of the essays in Ephron’s landmark collection are somewhat prohibitively dated (the ones concerning Watergate, in particular, rely on a detailed knowledge of the scandal that is unlikely in 2013), most are as relevant today as they were when Ephron wrote them 40 years ago. The best known in the collection, “A Few Words About Breasts,” tackles standards of female beauty that would ring all-too-true for Hannah (remember that cruel scene in which Jessa and Marnie bond by laughing about how small Hannah’s breasts are?). Ultimately, though, the collection’s real legacy is its examination of the Women’s Movement, a reminder -- all-too-relevant in today’s political atmosphere -- of the struggle for the gender equality (or at least semblance of it) that many 20-something women have simply grown up with. In the final essay of the collection, Ephron offers a piece of wisdom that might benefit the girls of Girls as they continue on with their belated coming-of-age: “I was no good at all at any of it, no good at being a girl; on the other hand, I am not half-bad at being a woman.” Image Credit: Wikipedia
Notable Articles Screening Room
| 4 books mentioned 18 9 min read
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Lists

The Perils of Reading Pregnant

Lists
May 20, 2011 | 4 books mentioned 27 5 min read
When I was engaged to be married, I lost my mind.  I'm aware that sounds hyperbolic,  but that's really how it felt: as if my mind had abandoned me,  slipped through my ears when I wasn't looking, to be replaced with something that I didn't recognize or trust.  I was so nervous all the time, my mind skipping from one terrible and scary thought to the next, that reading became almost impossible.  Do you know how many stories there are about bad marriages? During this fraught time, I tried to read an Alice Munro story in the bath.  What story, I have no idea (clearly, I blocked it out), but it was about a woman who kills her husband.  I couldn't finish it because I began to fear--to believe, actually--that I was in danger of killing my own future husband.  Oh, how my Intended laughed when I voiced these fears!  He wasn't afraid of me and my murderous capabilities!  He eventually talked me down from my nonsense ledge, and got me laughing along with him.  But I was still too afraid to finish the story. That was five years ago.  I've since retrieved my mind, gotten and stayed married, and returned to reading.   Thank goodness.  Sometimes, I imagine all the great and beautiful books I must have missed during my engagement, and the loss sends a shiver of regret through me. Last fall, when I found out I was pregnant, I waited for the mind-losing anxiety to descend on me once more.  It didn't.  (Or, I should say, it hasn't yet.  I do have five more weeks to lose my mind for old time's sake!)  Because I feel as normal as can be expected when you're growing a human being inside of you, I've noticed that other people experience anxiety for me.  They don't want me to carry anything, not even a carton of orange juice.  They want me to sit down already!  They want to give me more water, a glass of milk, a pint of ice cream.  And they don't want  me to read just anything.  More than once I've had a person recommend a book to me, and then say, "Oh, but don't read it now.  Not while you're pregnant!"   Apparently, people's protective urges extend beyond the body of the mother-to-be, and into her reading life.  If literature is clogged with unhappy marriages, it's certainly also darkened with dead babies and the complex melancholy of mothers. So, as either a warning to other mothers-to-be, or as great "Fuck you!" to all the people who keep telling me to keep things light as I carry my child to term, here's a list of non-friendly pregnancy books.  Read at your own risk... Rosemary's Baby by Ira Levin: I admit, I haven't read the novel, but I love the movie, starring the bewitching Mia Farrow.  I have purposely kept my blonde hair very short these last 8 and a half months because I appreciate the cinematic allusion, though I have one friend in particular who urged me, early on, to grow out my locks.  "It's not funny!" she said. "What kind of message are  you sending?"  How about this: Every pregnant woman wonders, at least once, if she's got the devil's spawn growing inside of her. The Hand That First Held Mine by Maggie O'Farrell: This is the next novel I'm going to read, despite my sister Heidi's warnings that I should wait until after my baby's born. O'Farrell's novel, which my sister could not put down, and which made her sob at its ending, follows two stories--one about a woman in post-war London, and one about contemporary parents in that same city.  There's apparently some childbirth trauma.  Lots of blood, my sister said.  She also told me to avoid Year of Wonders: A Novel of the Plague by Geraldine Brooks.  The deaths--deaths, plural--in this novel still haunt her. An Exact Replica of a Figure of My Imagination by Elizabeth McCracken: Every morning I awake to the spine of this powerful and painful memoir, which I chose as one of my favorite books of 2008.  It sits on the shelf by my bed, right next to Nox by Anne Carson and Skippy Dies by Paul Murray.  (That's a lot of death to wake up to, I realize).   McCracken's story of raising a child after the stillbirth of her first is all the more terrifying and moving because it's true, and because she speaks of trauma and grief in a distinct, unflinching, and sometimes even funny way.  I keep wondering if this book might mean more to me on a second read, now that I am pregnant, now that I know firsthand what I could lose, what and whom I would mourn.  Such a book reminds me not to take this time in my life lightly; it reminds me that I'm already a mother. Arlington Park by Rachel Cusk: This novel is about one day (a la Mrs. Dalloway) in the posh lives of British mothers.   The unhappiness of its characters is so delicately and expertly rendered that it, at times, grows oppressive.  These are women who feel unconnected to their husbands, their kids, their lives. Such a book makes me fear the very phrase Sippy Cup. We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver: Shriver's brilliant and dark novel is narrated by Eva, whose son Kevin is guilty of carrying out a Columbine-style high school killing.  It's a grim but often very funny narrative of maternal ambivalence, and it's certainly a mind-fuck for any mom-to-be.  Eva articulates every single dark thought a pregnant woman would be wise to avoid (For instance:  "What if my child grows up to be a murderer?" And, "What if I don't love him?").  Here's a taste of the sharp prose, most likely to be left out of the highly-anticipated film adaptation with Tilda Swinton, due out this fall: Meanwhile, I came to regard my body in a new light. For the first time I apprehended the little mounds on my chest as teats for the suckling of young, and their physical resemblance to udders on cows or the swinging distentions on lactating hounds was suddenly unavoidable. Funny how even women forget what breasts are for. The cleft between my legs transformed as well. It lost a certain outrageousness, an obscenity, or achieved an obscenity of a different sort. The flaps seemed to open not to a narrow, snug dead end, but to something yawning. The passageway itself became a route to somewhere else, a real place, and not merely to a darkness of my mind. The twist of flesh in front took on a devious aspect, its inclusion overtly ulterior, a tempter, a sweetener for doing the species' heavy lifting, like the lollipops I once got at the dentist. We Need to Talk About Kevin is so far my favorite book of the year.  I read it when I was about four months pregnant, and as I did so, I prayed I was having a girl (She might be anorexic, I thought, but she probably won't be a serial killer.)  Turns out, I'm having a boy.  Ha!   Shriver's novel is the most memorable book I've read in a while. And also, um, the most frightening. What novels do you recommend a pregnant woman avoid?  Tempt me...
Lists
| 4 books mentioned 27 5 min read
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Notable Articles Reviews

Modern Life is Rubbish: Tao Lin’s Taipei

Notable Articles Reviews
June 5, 2013 | 4 books mentioned 97 10 min read
When I began to read Taipei on my morning commute, I wondered if I had been lobotomized in the night. On the way back home, I wondered why someone who hates words would take the trouble to arrange so many of them in a row. The following morning, I wondered, Why does he hate me?, the way people wonder about playground bullies, or terrorists. Why does he inflict upon me his "framework-y somethingness," his "soil-y area," "the salad-y remains of his burrito"? Why does he take away my joy? When I received this novel in the mail, I did not understand that Tao Lin was a name I had seen before, during a hazy period several Internets ago, when I was learning about Fat Acceptance and Tracey Egan Morrissey was still called Slut Machine. Later, I recognized the name as something observed in unread Gawker headlines (and unread Millions pieces, as it turns out). I report this so you will know that when I began reading Taipei, my loathing was pure. The novel opens and we follow a writer named Paul as he drifts around Brooklyn waiting for his book tour to start. We are with him as he sort of goes through a breakup, sort of goes to parties, sort of "works on things" (sometimes in quotation marks, sometimes not), definitely purchases little lots of groceries contrived as though to generate maximum annoyance ("organic beef patty, two kombuchas, five bananas, alfalfa sprouts, arugula, hempseed oil, a red onion, ginger"), definitely wiles away the hours in awkward communing with pseudo friends "[he was] peripherally aware of a self-conscious Matt slowly creating guacamole"), and definitely upsets his mother. The subject also has excruciating interactions with a series of distressingly underemployed young women. Paul noticed Laura looking at his pile of construction paper and said she could have some if she wanted, and she focused self-consciously on wanting some, saying how she would use it and what colors she liked, seeming appreciative in an affectedly sincere manner -- the genuine sincerity of a person who doesn't trust her natural behavior to appear sincere...Laura exited a few minutes later, meekly holding her tambourine and shaker and some construction paper. "I see you 'got in on' the construction paper," said Paul in the sarcastic, playful voice he used to recommend Funyuns the night they met, but with a serious expression. "Good choices, in terms of colors. Good job." "You said I could have some," said Laura hesitantly. Everyone's ages are recorded, as if in a hipster police blotter: "After the reading Lucie, 23, introduced herself and Amy, 23, and Daniel, 25, to Paul and Mitch, saying something about her and Amy's online magazine." I say this novelist hates words, because the novel reads as though it were the result of strict parameters imposed by a perverse contest, or the edict of some nihilist philosophy, to use as few interesting words as possible. Tao Lin seems to aspire to a prose I can only describe as "affectless." When an adjective is required, and sometimes when it is not, Lin often adds a "y" to a noun (see: "soil-y"). Some traditionally formed adjectives and adverbs are enclosed in quotation marks; I believe to communicate the overarching theme of the book, which is that the majority of Paul's powers of observation are absorbed in the business, not of something so studied as introspection, but of prolonged self-gazing from an external vantage. His quotation mark tactic achieves this effect, but it also communicates an embarrassment about words and what they can represent or mean. He reached outside his blanket and pulled his MacBook "darkly," he felt, toward himself, like an octopus might. It was 12:52 a.m., almost three hours since leaving Angelica Kitchen. Laura, to Paul's surprise, had emailed twice -- a few sentence fragments apologizing for her awkwardness at 11:43 p.m., a paragraph of elaboration at 12:05 a.m. Paul emailed that he understood and liked her and thought she was "cool." She responded a few minutes later, seeming cheerful. After a few more emails she seemed almost "giddy." They committed -- earnestly and enthusiastically, Paul felt -- to get tattoos together tomorrow. If Lin is too arch to use the word "giddy" stripped from the safety of quotation marks, he spares no length, no number of unremarkable words, in the service of communicating how his character is feeling. These boring sentences are demarcated from the other boring exposition sentences by their length and the number of commas, which imbue the novel with an arrhythmia that somehow also succeeds at being monotonous: He imagined his trajectory as a vacuum-sealed tube, into which he'd arrived and through which -- traveling alone in the vacuum-sealed tube of his own life -- he'd be suctioned and from which he'd exit, as a successful delivery to some unimaginable recipient. Other narrative choices indicate either a fundamental laziness that precludes finding interesting combinations of words to describe things, or a concerted effort to describe the world of Paul using minimal "literary" embellishment (both possibilities arrive at the same place in terms of transmitting insight or aesthetic pleasure to the reader). Even the conceit of listing ages seems like a careless shorthand to describe people without really describing them, though this strategy conveniently reveals, later in the novel, that Paul's authorial fanbase is all younger than he (sometimes inappropriately so: e.g., "Calvin, 18, and Maggie, 17, seniors in high school," with whom Paul and his girlfriend Erin do lots of drugs and swim in the hot tub in Calvin's "mansion" -- quotation marks original -- in Ohio). After the initial deep, anxious loathing I felt for the novel, a germ of grudging appreciation made itself felt. Paul's drug use in the novel begins with what seemed to me like a your-parents-wouldn't-like-it-but-don't-call-the-helpline usage -- an Ambien here, an Adderall there, a Xanax. Eventually, though, Paul and his friends launch into sustained drug abuse. When the drugs began to flow (MDMA, LSD, mushrooms, heroin, Xanax, Klonopin, cocaine, Oxycodone, Methadone), I thought the novel began to excuse itself for its awfulness, namely because it now had a Problem I could recognize. The characters seemed destined for emotional or physical trainwreck, and this immediately made them more interesting. The "affectlessness" made sense too; if you were writing about the observations of a person who was usually on a mess of downers, the adjectives might be the first to go. Your characters would also make a lot of totally inane remarks, as Maggie here, while swimming in Calvin's parents' pool on mushrooms: "What if we were all obese right now?" This kind of dialogue was conveyed with extreme accuracy and represents some of the "best" parts of the book. After Paul and Erin make the surprising choice to get married in Las Vegas ("'I don't get it, at all,' said Paul. 'It's what people do. This is what people want.' 'It seems really insane,' said Paul."), together they shamble around Brooklyn, and embark on a regrettable "honeymoon" to Taipei to see Paul's parents, and ingest an amount of drugs that I think would make your nervous system fall out and/or prompt your parents (or somebody) to call the police. They feel the drugs' effects and shamble further around Taipei fast food restaurants, recording themselves for an ongoing series of YouTube videos of themselves on drugs. Throughout this sojourn they display the kind of drug- and pretension-heightened honesty that is not exactly honesty, and that is the very opposite of the generosity and warmth I believe are necessary to sustain human relationships. I began to think that this might be a sad novel -- because of drugs, this guy, who already seems paralyzed by a steroidally muscular self-consciousness, is wasting his life, alarming the fast food employees of Taipei with his utter, utter malarkey, breaking his parents' heart, and annoying the shit out of me while he does it. But, like the other promising problematic things in the novel -- like Paul's relationship with his family, with girls, with friends, with self, with work, or the amount of time he spends in Whole Foods -- the novel refuses to pathologize his drug use, even though that is a time-tested way to engage the reader. Speaking of inane remarks, reading Taipei came as close as anything can come to putting me on mute. I suddenly began hearing my own voice when I spoke within earshot of others, particularly people older than I. On the BART platform, I heard myself say "It was, like, not what I was planning to have happen," and my voice trailed off as I became conscious of the poverty of my spoken expression, how much I must sometimes sound like the people in Taipei ("'I feel like I'm unsarcastically viewing this as a major ordeal,' said Calvin.") I was born the year after Tao Lin; hearing our shared idiom come out of my own mouth, I realized that some of my loathing for this book is very personal. There is a fearful recognition of those things I want most to cleanse from my self-presentation, and self. This realization brought another weak florescence of respect for Tao Lin. First, I tested the idea that he was mocking all our imbecilities and modes of expression, but rejected it as false because I can't imagine that someone occupying the role of cultural critic would be able to stand recording all these encounters, unless he was able to take a lot of Xanax and not remember doing it, the way I manage airplanes (this is not, I suppose, totally out of the question). I next considered that this author might have made a radical and thus laudatory commitment to capturing things as they are or seem to him, no matter how egregious, or egregiously boring, they look on the page (and possibly because they do): Laura complimented Paul's hair and level of "casualness" and, going partially under the table, held a candle toward Paul's shoes -- which from Paul's above-table perspective felt stationary and storage-oriented as shoeboxes -- asking what brand they were. "iPath," said Paul. "I can't see. What are these?" "iPath. The brand is iPath." "I like them," said Laura. "iPath," said Paul quietly. Could Tao Lin be... post-shame?, I wondered. Philip Larkin jumped to mind, "High Windows:" 'When I see a couple of kids / And guess he's fucking her and she's / Taking pills or wearing a diaphragm, / I know this is paradise"). This association, however, was actually what caused me to finally reject this hypothesis as well: Tao Lin might freely record things that seem humiliating to me, i.e., sounding like an idiot, but his sex is the sex of The Truman Show. When the panties come off, the camera, narratively speaking, looks politely away. All we hear about it is that it happens, its location, and duration. One might perceive this as another form of cultural or personal critique: for someone very focused on the self and what the self is feeling, and how many drugs to put in the self, sex is one of the first normal human priorities to be abandoned. But then we read a conversation Erin and Paul have in Taipei, when they ask one another for opinions and "critiques" about their prowess. While Paul says that sex is not "that big of a thing" for him, Erin still reassures him, and us, that he's "good at everything" and "[keeps] it interesting" and that she "[has] orgasms...regularly." It feels a sterile, cowardly way to treat sex from a radical cataloguer of human experience. I felt it necessary, back there, to mention the initial purity of my loathing, because after Googling around, lighting up new links and links long dark, the loathing quickly becomes sullied and amplified by outside influences. I even found a rejection of my more charitable positions toward Tao Lin from the horse's mouth: Entertainment Weekly asked, "While you were writing this book, you predicted that it’d be your 'magnum opus.' Did that pan out?" and Tao Lin answered: "Yes, in that I didn’t save anything for a future book. I used, as source material, everything I know or have felt or experienced, or could imagine knowing or feeling or experiencing, up to this point in my life." Then at Thought Catalog, I was treated to a first-hand account of "What It's Like To Be In a Tao Lin Novel": I’ve always wondered what it was like for people friendly with, like, Hemingway and whatnot. These authors, like Tao, write pretty closely to their personal experience... I will treasure this book for the rest of my life not because my friend wrote it, or because it’s the best book ever written (goddamn is it good, though), or because I’m in it and so are a lot of other people I care about, but actually because of a scene I’m not even in. Six simple lines of dialogue. --“You said you only go to like one party a month. But you’re at almost every party,” [said Daniel]. “This isn’t normal at all,” said Paul. “Before we met I probably did less than one thing a month.” “Why do you think that is?” “Probably because I met people I like.” Daniel hesitated. “What people?” “You, Mitch, Laura... Amy,” said Paul. “I’m going to the bathroom.”-- Gah. (I don't mind airing my loathing, because Tao Lin seems like he can take it. In Taipei, he anticipates it: "He read an account of his Toronto reading, when he'd been sober, describing him as 'monosyllabic,' 'awkward,' 'stilted and unfriendly' within a disapproval of his oeuvre, itself vaguely within a disapproval of contemporary culture and, by way of a link to someone else's essay, the internet.") My loathing was never pure, of course. Not really. I think that really great writing is bracing, and makes you feel like making something of your own, either another piece of writing, or a joyful noise unto the Lord. Then there are things you read, a little less great, that don't make you feel one way or another, creatively speaking. Then there is a small, deadly class of book that make you never want to set pen to paper again. Tao Lin's novel is a grave case of this latter kind, where you are faced with the consequences of writing down all the things you do or think. What if they sound like this? Colorless, witless, humorless. Picking out individual passages cannot express their cumulative monotonous assault on the senses. The good thing about Taipei, if you're like me, is that its characters will make you want to hug your lover, have a baby, go to work, call your mom. But maybe you'll rethink that novel, that personal essay. In the cold ruthless scheme of things, that might not be such a bad thing. But it makes me look upon this novel as dangerous and threatening to life, like as the anti-choicer looks upon the abortionist. Last week I participated in an online survey about ethics in book reviewing. One of the questions asked something like, "Is it okay to review the book of someone to whom you are aesthetically or philosophically opposed," and I think I answered "Yes," although I think the correct answer is "No," or possibly "I'm not sure." The next day, I saw (on Twitter) an assertion by no less a person than Joyce Carol Oates that reviews should include a minimum of opinion. I am not sure what all of this means for my ethics or my prospects as a book reviewer. But I'll say it: It is my opinion that this novel is awful, and I am aesthetically or philosophically opposed to it. Likely it comes from some hypocrite-lecteur-mon-semblable-mon-frere place, but Taipei brought out all of my conservative instincts. Only a real codger would say this, but if this is the output we can expect from one of our bright young things, we're fucked.
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