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Glenn Sumi's Reviews > In Praise of Messy Lives: Essays
In Praise of Messy Lives: Essays
by Katie Roiphe
If, as people say, Katie Roiphe’s a love-her-or-hate-her writer, then place me in the love camp. Or at least squarely in the like and admire camp.
Throughout this highly readable and of-the-moment collection of essays, she’s clear-thinking, articulate, amusing and sharp. It’s no surprise that one of her subjects is Susan Sontag; she’s quickly becoming her generation’s premier cultural critic.
Whether analyzing society’s obsession with the TV series Mad Men, recounting the ways in which women writers are indebted to Joan Didion, or exploring why being a single mom (she’s one herself) has become the 21st century’s scarlet letter, Roiphe is frank, fearless and always sensitive to lazy, knee-jerk liberal attitudes.
The book is divided into four parts: personal essays, literary criticism, essays about current culture and musings about the internet.
The handful of essays about the internet seem slight (a day-by-day account about not being online? Really?), and the piece about harried New Yorkers trying to get their kids into good schools isn’t very original. (Aside: a publication date on these essays would be helpful.) And the editor in me also squirms at seeing “interesting” used so frequently as an adjective.
But Roiphe’s perceptions are frequently brilliant. Above all, she’s a first-rate literary critic. Her essay on incest in recent novels is depressing and dead-on, and her piece contrasting sex scenes in novels by the old guard white male establishment (Roth, Updike, Mailer, Bellow) and the new generation (Chabon, Franzen, Kunkel, Eggers) is refreshing and insightful.
She also walks the walk. After pointing out that Didion skimps on personal revelations in her work, she herself comes across clearly and not always flatteringly in a beautifully honest piece about sleeping with a good friend’s boyfriend in college.
And a haunting essay about a trip to Vietnam and Cambodia with her (now ex) husband explores the uneasy connection between East and West, tourist and subject and seller and the person sold to.
In Praise Of Messy Lives deserves lots of praise – and readers.
by Katie Roiphe
If, as people say, Katie Roiphe’s a love-her-or-hate-her writer, then place me in the love camp. Or at least squarely in the like and admire camp.
Throughout this highly readable and of-the-moment collection of essays, she’s clear-thinking, articulate, amusing and sharp. It’s no surprise that one of her subjects is Susan Sontag; she’s quickly becoming her generation’s premier cultural critic.
Whether analyzing society’s obsession with the TV series Mad Men, recounting the ways in which women writers are indebted to Joan Didion, or exploring why being a single mom (she’s one herself) has become the 21st century’s scarlet letter, Roiphe is frank, fearless and always sensitive to lazy, knee-jerk liberal attitudes.
The book is divided into four parts: personal essays, literary criticism, essays about current culture and musings about the internet.
The handful of essays about the internet seem slight (a day-by-day account about not being online? Really?), and the piece about harried New Yorkers trying to get their kids into good schools isn’t very original. (Aside: a publication date on these essays would be helpful.) And the editor in me also squirms at seeing “interesting” used so frequently as an adjective.
But Roiphe’s perceptions are frequently brilliant. Above all, she’s a first-rate literary critic. Her essay on incest in recent novels is depressing and dead-on, and her piece contrasting sex scenes in novels by the old guard white male establishment (Roth, Updike, Mailer, Bellow) and the new generation (Chabon, Franzen, Kunkel, Eggers) is refreshing and insightful.
She also walks the walk. After pointing out that Didion skimps on personal revelations in her work, she herself comes across clearly and not always flatteringly in a beautifully honest piece about sleeping with a good friend’s boyfriend in college.
And a haunting essay about a trip to Vietnam and Cambodia with her (now ex) husband explores the uneasy connection between East and West, tourist and subject and seller and the person sold to.
In Praise Of Messy Lives deserves lots of praise – and readers.
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Reading Progress
| 03/29/2014 | marked as: | currently-reading | ||
| 03/31/2014 | marked as: | read | ||
Comments (showing 1-2 of 2) (2 new)
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Suzy
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Apr 05, 2015 11:30AM
this looks like something I'd like!
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Suzy: Yes, it's worth checking out! As with any collection, not every piece is gold. But Roiphe's a shrewd literary and cultural critic. (I haven't read her controversial The Morning After, and likely won't.) I also find books of essays or stories often make nice palate cleansers in between big books.
