mark's review of The Catcher in the Rye > Comments
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Maciek
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Jul 01, 2011 03:17am
Good one Mark!
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mark wrote: "thanks elizabeth & kelly. love both of your reviews on this one."I do not like that Kelly does not like this book but I do like her review. Something about books like this, love it or hate it, brings out some really good writing on the subject.
definitely!i really like kelly's review because it reminds me of how i used to feel about the novel at one point in my life.
Yeah, I've tried to go back and do something more thoughtful with that review but my inner 16 year old will not have it. Maybe in a few years I'll be able to beat her down. :)
thanks stephen, brian, ian!brian - welcome to my life. all summed up in 6 neat little sections.
ian - only 4 years and a couple months until age 45 and another installment on this review!
kelly - even if you don't ever change it, your review is awesome because it honestly captures exactly what you were feeling at the time.
This is your masterpiece! To complete it though, you ought to have a child. Just 14 more years you'll have a fucked-up teenager yourself and you get to write your 55th year review of this book. That'll be a fun read for all your fans here!
Inspiring review. I was tempted to nudge my rating to 5 stars as a result but I really should re-read the book before I commit to such an intractable decision.
LOL! This is a terrific review! I believe the 15 year old part was an accurate representation of you.
thanks aloha.michael, i'm wondering how long we've known each other. you may be one of the few folks i've known on-line who has seen me through three of these time periods!
That's a good question (even though you didn't ask a question. I asked myself a silent question which means that I'm pretty much talking to myself now). I'm going to guess we've known each other since right around summer 2001?
ah. so i met you the summer right before my 31st birthday. 2-and-four-fifths worth of journal entry time! i have nephews who are younger than our friendship. that's a funny thought.
LOL I haven't read The Catcher in the Rye (yet) but I enjoyed your clever review, Mark!It brings to mind a project I tried to get my closest friends into doing with me when I was 19. I came up with this idea that my friends and I would each write an essay about what we thought of life, what it is to be 19 or 20, what we expected of the future (and what we thought we'd be doing in it), and so on. I modified the idea a bit so that one friend who was really into photography could do a photo-essay, while another could compose a song (since he was a budding musician). The idea was to repeat the exercise every 10 years so as to document how we had changed (or not) since we began the project.
Sadly, I found myself to be the only one enthused with the idea so it never got off the ground. I wish it had.
Joel wrote: "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Up_Series"The UP Series shares some similarities with my idea - in the sense of capturing the moment at different periods in a person's life - but it is different in that the documentary maker is to some degree moderating or selecting what is significant, whereas we teenagers (later 29 year-olds, thirty-nine year-olds, and so forth) would've been the ones deciding what was significant for us at the time.
I'm only 16 now, so I can't quite relate with the whole review...but I love it! I hope I don't end up hating the book when I'm 20 though! :P I read it at 15 and I felt just the way you did...except I had a sort of fear of cuss words so I didn't express myself like you ;]
thanks aleyna!it is easy to scorn the book when in college, reading/learning about all the various literary movements, different (and sometimes more sophisticated) writing techniques, different kinds of transgressive literature, etc. backlash against more traditional kinds of writing, classic and modern, is easy when being exposed to so much that is different and maybe more stylistically challenging or with more nuanced, ambiguous messages.
but it is just as easy to love it again when realizing (later, for me) that awesome writing is awesome writing, no matter what the style or genre or movement or whatever. especially when the message is one that is so heartfelt and timeless.
well, i suppose it is true that my review is quite lengthy. more importantly, the breadth, or some may say, the width of experience on display could be considered a challenge to perhaps wrap a mind or hand around. but not to worry, i am an at-first gentle reviewer, and am happy to introduce my concepts slowly, an inch at a time, until the reader has adjusted to the magnitude of the review itself. and then, hopefully, pure pleasure awaits. so far at least, i have had no complaints.
Hmmm. A good review is always something to be admired or even envied, of course. But, when writing your review, do you ever find the ink flowing from your pen more freely than at other times? Or do you find your thoughts issuing forth in such a mad rush that you find yourself without enough paper to contain them all?
you are sadly correct, Greg. sometimes when writing a review, if the object of the review is one that is particularly pleasing or intriguing...sometimes the review does indeed seem to finish itself, all too quickly, without me even realizing. in my mind at least, i envisioned a much more in-depth and long-lasting review. i may t hen attempt a return to the experience, with the faint hope of recapturing that original surge of reviewing excitment. alas, i usually find that the magic has become rather limp at that point. but let us not talk of such sad things!
I have to agree with you, Mark, that in-depth and long-lasting reviews are much more preferable. That said, I've heard that some people can only write a sustained review while on one drug or another. However, I think one's true passion for a book can only come out when it is unfiltered by drugs or, indeed, any other kind of barrier to the transmission of one's thoughts.
i wholeheartedly agree. i prefer to write my reviews in a fairly lucid state. however, this is not to say that when writing reviews that i do not often contemplate other matters, or provide a separate, perhaps imaginary context. i find it makes the experience of writing a review one that lasts all the longer. it often allows the review to remain "in depth". hopefully, to the satisfaction of all.
One of the best "book reviews," if this time-lapsed soliloquy may be so called, that I have ever read.
Really wonderful review, even though I have not had the same experience of the novel you've had. Or have I...? We'll see when I turn 40. :)
Really clever. I love the different styles you use across your reviews and this one was particularly good
Great epistolary expose. Bril, bril, bril. (now, what exactly is a wake and bake? purple warrior /love pudding stuff? we are divided by a common language, you know). As to the midlife crisis, hadn't thought of it in those terms, but been there, I'm collecting the T shirt as we speak. You put it very nicely though. Maybe a reread of catcher in the rye will round off the experience. In the meantime, there is, however, a perverse kind of self fullfilment in wallowing in misery and doubt.
