In the near future MixedMetaphors.net is going to be taken down for significant server upheaval. Of course, a more savvy techie would be able to do all my planned changes in about ten minutes, though I'm expecting at least a full weekend of hard core tinkering. The end result won't actually be noticible to you, the reader, except perhaps for a slight bit of added speed. But on my end it will reduce the computer clutter under my desk. Anyway, good luck to me. There's alwasy the chance that I completely fry my machines.
January 2005 Archives
I've just decided that I want my first child, regardless of gender, to be named "Metaphor". I think that's a pretty name.
My girlfriend got me this book for our one and a half year anniversary, a date I unfortunately forgot. She knows I'm a big fan of previous Lethem novels, and, as you can see by the completion dates, I managed to read "Men and Cartoons" very quickly, which was a relief after the incredibly long "Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell".
These short stories are good, though don't have the same depth as his novels. Though, frankly, not all his novels have the same depth as his novels. His two most recent publications (excluding a short illustrated novella and a book of book reviews), "Motherless Brooklyn" and "Fortress of Solitude", are really fantastic and I definitely recommend them.
Thoughts on Lethem:
1) Lethem is one of a few authors who made the transition from science fiction to critically acclaimed literary fiction, though even his science fiction was always strange and philosophical rather than mainstream.
2) He likes comic books, and there seems to be a trend with some 30-something authors and comic books (Chabon, Moody, and Lethem for a few examples). I suppose that the glory days of comic books were the 60s and the 70s and those authors are relying heavily on comic book themes in their writing. It's brought on somewhat of a renaissance of narrative fiction, mostly lead by Chabon. It seems like a bit of a rejection of the semi-comic-absurdist McSweeney's movement, which itself was a rejection of the super realistic unplotted New Yorker literary scene. Though, it's interesting, because Chabon launched his first "plot" offensive through an issue of McSweeney's he edited, because McSweeney's is apparently self-aware enough to host its own counter-movement. Anyway, Lethem is riding this wave (well, he's a part of the wave, not just a rider) as it is the perfect time for plotted, narrative fiction to critically excel, and critics who would not have previously given the time of day to anything even remotely sci-fi or fantasy are now willing to consider things like "Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell", the "Lord of the Rings" movie, "McSweeney's Mammoth Treasury of Thrilling Tales", and the like.
3) Some authors are just better at long fiction, some at short. While Lethem's short stories (as I said) don't have the same depth of character and meaning as his better novels, they are still well done and worth reading. Lethem has the interesting technique (in both his novels and short stories) of showing a character at three different points in his life. So you get a glimpse of childhood, and then college, and than post-college (which often involves working at a college - I wonder what sort of non-college life experience Lethem has). These three glimpses obviously are connected, usually because these are the three times the protagonist interacts with some other (metaphorical?) character. It doesn't quite give a whole portrait of the protagonist, but what it does do is paint three strokes across time as opposed to one. I kind of imagine that all the protagonists in these stories could be one person, just a combination of three moments pulled from the same person's life and leaving the rest blurry. It works and I like it.
This book came highly recommended by the esteemed Sidey.com. Okay, actually, that's not true. I borrowed it from him one day when I saw it sitting on his coffee table and I believe he specifically warned me that he was not recommending it because it was a little slow. Well, my final judgement of the book is as follows: it was a little slow. Really. It's very, very long. Much longer than necessary. And while I found the story very interesting and thing it was well written, I didn't really find myself significantly engaged or excited by the book until the last third. Perhaps the excitement of the end of the book was due to the immense amount of build up in the first two thirds, but I just can't say it was worth it.
Two interesting things I want to discuss about the novel. First of all, I kept reading reviews of the book that referred to it as "Harry Potter for grown-ups". I find that sort of a strange thing to say, because based on the number of copies of Harry Potter books sold (i.e. more than any other book ever), the reality is that Harry Potter is Harry Potter for grown-ups.
Second, it's gotten universally good reviews, and while I don't necessarily have a problem with that, I just feel there is this weird fantasy double standard going on. This novel is, clearly, fantasy, though it is literary fantasy. And I just have this idea that critics are enjoying the chance to give a fantasy novel positive reviews, because they feel that it's okay that it is fantasy because it is dull fantasy. Anyway, I'm reading to much into it, I know.
Anyway, I tend to finish whatever I start reading beginning to end (with the exception of short story collections) though I may not have gotten through this book had it not been the only thing I'd brought with me to read on a business trip.
What IS MixedMetaphors.net? Or, do you mean to ask, what ISN'T MixedMetaphors.net? Or, rather, what is MixedMetaphors.net NOT? Perhaps you mean to ask what ISN'T MixedMetaphors.net NOT? These questions could be answered easily, but it would be even easier to not answer these questions, to instead wave a piece of string and distract your attention and hope you don't notice that I never even attempted to answer these questions, although not minding so much if you notice because I'm really hoping that you don't realize you never even asked these questions in the first place, and, in fact, not really caring if you noticed that or not, because in reality I'm trying to distract myself from realizing that no one is even reading the unasked and unanswered questions anyway. Yes! That is what MixedMetaphors.net is. It's an attempt to distract myself from realizing that others don't care, an attempt to distract others from realizing that I don't care, and an attempt to revolutionize the very concept of what it means to be a human being through the subtle yet canny use of metaphor... mixed metaphor. Anything less will be considered a total failure.
This is a true story that happened to my brother's friend in Seattle. He was out walking his dog one evening when he witnessed a fight going on a block away. The strange thing was that there were a bunch of other people watching but not doing anything about it. One of the men pulled out a gun and shot the other, sending him to the pavement and killing him. The dog started barking, and some of the people turned to look, so my brother's friend ran away. He went to the police and told them what had happened, and the police were concerned that he was a witness to some sort of gang or organized crime violence. Later the police informed him that there was someone going around the area with his picture looking for him. The police put a cop outside his house to protect him while they investigated the crime. Then, a few days later, a man knocks at his door: it's one of the guys who was watching the shooting! How did this guy get past the cops? My brother's friend runs out the back door of his place but another guy is waiting for him there and grabs him. He's sure he's about to be killed. Then the guy says to him, "Hey, buddy, I'm the director of that film you saw. We've been looking all over for you." It turns out that my brother's friend had wandered onto the scene of an independent film. He and his dog had been captured by one of the cameras. The director actually liked the effect of having a lone bystander and his dog in the cut, but needed to find him and get his release to use him in the movie.
Quiz: Where was this urban legend first told?
Answer:
A) Someone's legal will replaced by a fake will bequeathing total inheretence to the identity thief.
B) Fraudulent purchase of 2004 Indiana State Fair 1,115 pound award-winning "World's Largest Boar".
C) Someone mistakenly arrested for slave trading.
D) Four hundred thousand dollar second mortgage taken out on somebody's house.
E) Victim discovered that someone attended a university using his stolen identity and graduated with a C average.
F) Child was rejected from a prestigious prep school because two people showed up pretending to be her parents and claimed that, as Wiccans, the school would need to make some serious changes in order to support their religious beliefs. I'm not actually sure how this technically classifies as identity theft, but it's an interesting story.
G) Entirety of victim's mail, including paychecks, directed to another address for over a year before victim mentioned it to anyone, including her husband.
True: A, C, D, F, G
False: B, E
I was just kidding when I said that a previous post was the second part of a three-part series on interesting words, but lo and behold, here is the third part of the three-part series!
A long time ago (July 2004) MixedMetaophors.net briefly touched upon negative words (such as "inane") that have no positive counterpart (such as "ane"). Well I stumbled upon a clever article in the online journal, "The Quaker Economist," which lambasts this concept, refered to as the "delinquent positive". I'd like to pretend that I wrote the humorous rant myself, but that would be dishonest and MixedMetaphors.net has high ethical standards. Since I can't really add to the humor of that letter, I'll let you read it for yourself (scroll down a bit to find the relevant section).
In case you are looking for a simple list of delinquent positives, here are all the ones included in the article:
deplored / plored
disdain / dain
disputed / puted
deprived / prived
decieve / cieve
distracting / tracting
disgusted / gusted
uncouth / couth
discard / card
indispensable / dispensable / pensable
indiscreet / discreet / creet
delete / lete
deny / ny
defiance / fiance
disturb / turb
distraught / traught
deteriorate / teriorate
decay / cay
decrepit / crepit
demolish / molish
destroy / stroy
inertia / ertia
detain / tain
disheveled / sheveled
inebriate / ebriate
and, of course,
delinquent / linquent
The article did not mention our previous contributions of:
inane / ane
nonchalance / chalance
Today I am participating in an eight and half hour meeting to discuss identity theft insurance. It's the latest coverage craze to sweep the nation: insurance to protect you in the event that your identity is thefted.
Picture this: A large employer, as a benefit to its employees, arranges for a carrier to provide an identity theft insurance product to anyone who wants it. The carrier collects personal information from all the employees who apply for the coverage and puts this information in a big billing list. The carrier then proceeds to lose that list and everyone who signed up for the product has his or her identity stolen. Well, at least they had insurance.
I'm not saying this actually happened.
This conference call has begun with an hour long presentation about how identity theft happens and who is at risk and who is doing the theft and how extremely difficult it is to recover from it when it happens to you. I'm not sure how much I'm at liberty to discuss, but all I know is this is some scary stuff and I want identity theft insurance now. Of course, not from the theoretical carrier described above.
Today I bring you the second part of a three-part series on interesting words. NPR had a story this morning about a new book called "In Other Words: A Language Lovers Guide to the Most Intriguing Words Around the World". The book lists words from other languages and cultures that are difficult or impossible to translate into English and then attempts to translate them into English. I'll be purchasing the book, but at the moment the only words I can provide as examples are the ones in the NPR story, so you can click the link above if you want to know what "Meraki" or "Litost" mean.
I haven't quite finished reading all the short stories in this collection but I've moved on to other books so I'm going to post here anyway. The fact that I only ready 13 out of the 16 short stories is not because of a problem with the book - sometimes it is simply difficult to plow through an entire short story collection in order regardless of quality.
Helprin's work is stately and grand. His characters are almost always stirringly dignified, with impeccable memories of weighty pasts and the most honest of intentions as they try to keep the world pure. Sometimes I feel as if he is writing of a world as he would like it to be rather than the world as it is, and sometimes I feel that he is simply capturing the more beautiful parts of the world other writers ignore. Either way, in a day when literature tends towards the baser parts of society it is nice to read something of such unabashed nobility.
For example, one story follows a group of builders and painters and stonemasons, etc., who refurbish a woman's apartment for free because she lost her husband on 9/11. It's a quite wonderful story. Is it believable? Well, the way Helprin tells it, I know I at least want to believe it. This story showcases another element that makes his writing impressive, he manages to describe the detail of everything in such a way that it seems immense and beautiful. The woodwork and the stone carving and the carpeting and the doors... he wants to make it perfectly clear how perfectly perfect this universe is and he succeeds.
In the past I've loved his novels told from the first person (such as "Memoir from Antproof Case" and "A Soldier of the Great War") but I've had problems with his novels told from the third person (which I won't list here because it is too much effort and, besides, I don't like them). Since his writing is sometimes just too much to believe, when a novel is in the first person there is always the fine line between reality and the narrator's perception of reality. In third person there the reader loses that justification and the prose often comes across as arrogant. I don't have that problem with his short stories mainly because there isn't enough time for his stretches of reality to get to me.
I've stumbled upon a curious and interesting blog called Double-Tongued Word Wrestler" maintained by a lexicographer for the Oxford University Press in NYC. The site lists new or fringe words, and it's an amusing place to see what words are lurking on the edges of the language. Recent entries includes such terms as "chones" (underwear), "duckshove" (to pass the buck), and "metric butt-load" (no explanation necessary).
My girlfriend and I were discussing the familiar playground taunt, "Liar, liar, pants on fire." Apparently, she used to conclude this with "Stick your head in doo-doo." I can't remember how we used to wrap up this clever rhyme in my New Jersey elementary school days, but I can assure you it wasn't like that. Possibly something about hanging oneself with a telephone wire, which, frankly, is quite disturbing. In my attempt to recollect the proper termination of the quip, all I can think of are ridiculously high-brow phrases no child would ever understand, let alone utter. So, here they are:
Liar, liar, pants on fire
Immolate yourself upon the funeral pyre.
Liar, liar, pants on fire
Rebel against the corrupt Bush empire.
Liar, liar, pants on fire
Your base antics fill me with ire.
Liar, liar, pants on fire
Tales of your dishonesty will be intonated by a satanic choir.
And while we're at it:
Made you look, made you look
Stole your mother's pocketbook
Turned it in, turned it out,
Turned it into a symbol for man's cruelty to man.
Trick or treat, smell our feet
Give us something good to eat
If you don't, we don't care
We will ultimately get our revenge when you suffer the agony of watching us poor street urchins starving to death on your lawn, knowing all the while you could have done something to prevent this awful tragedy.
No one writes to the colonel. Seriously, no one writes to him. Why can't just one person write to him? I'd be so less depressed. I'd write a goddamn letter to the colonel if it would do any good. "No One Writes to the Colonel" has got to be up for some sort of "most depressing novella" award.
I have a problem with GGM. You see, I first read "One Hundred Years of Solitude" back in 1999 and I was instantly struck by the novel, convinced it was the best book I'd ever read, no, the best book anyone had ever read. I still sort of feel that way about it, actually. I then read "Love in the Time of Cholera", also a wonderful book, but not quite as brilliantly amazing as OHYOS. And, alas, it was all downhill from there. No other Marquez book could live up to OHYOS. This is not because Marquez is an inconsistent writer, it is because, let's face it, he managed with OHYOS to write ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS EVER WRITTEN. When you have the synergy of an amazing author and the right moment and the perfect inspiration/muse/luck/whatever you want to call it, literature can transcend genre and become something like OHYOS. This doesn't happen often. You can't fault Marquez for not writing the best book ever written every time he writes a book. But, despite that, I'm always a little disappointed when I read one of his books and it isn't the best book ever written.
Suffice it to say, "No One Writes To The Colonel and Other Stories" isn't the best book ever written. It's not bad. It's just not the best book ever written.
The title novella is, as implied earlier, quite depressing. The Colonel who no one writes too is an old man who has been abandoned by his government. He played some sort of crucial role in some sort of war (I'm not exactly sure I understand the history) and has been owed a pension his whole life. He is convinced that one day the pension will come. The only thing more important to him than surviving is his honor. All this combines to an even more depressing conclusion.
The rest of the stories are good, though not entirely memorable, as it has been about a week and a half and I can't think of much to say. The picture he paints of South America is pretty amazing and I should probably, at some point, learn something about South American history or else my entire knowledge of the continent will be bits and pieces I have gathered from Marquez's magic realism.
