michal k-c > Recent Status Updates

something that this does really well (and something i think Pasolini fails at in directing Salo) is it shows how boring nazis really are (instead of eccentric masochistic parodies à la Salo). just a bunch of professional managerial class losers who will never understand their own psychosis because, to manipulate that one Sartre quote, ideology is other people

if your husband constantly monologues like a particularly cultured Bond villain then you should probably take that as a sign

actually incredible what Davis can do in the space of a paragraph

forget Chekhov’s gun; this is Johnson’s gun and we’re firing it immediately

his description of Poe’s interests recalls Deleuze + Guattari’s bits on stratification which is cool. honestly surprising that the psychoanalysts never paid more attention to Lawrence

The Strength of God is simply one of the best american short stories. i don’t make the rules just enforce them

what a nice small town. or maybe there’s something sad about it and the people living there..

used to be your carpenter was a civil war veteran who stabbed his own uncle in a skirmish with the confederacy. good luck finding a handyman these days who won’t talk your ear off about charli xcx or euphoria

excited to spend some time with my old friends in winesburg, ohio

Henry Green summer continues

no surprises here: pasolini is really good at describing people who are covered in dirt

remembered just now that Bloom included Pasolini in the western canon. gotta re-read that

i think it is time for a gritty reboot of neorealist masterpiece I Vitelloni

that Portnoy backlash really ate at Roth clearly lol

so far this is Roth hitting all of his typical beats but with the precision and force that made him one of the most famous american novelists of his time. feel like this will be a new fave

never really thought of Flaubert as a comic novelist but he really hit this one out of the park

Flaubert foresaw the death of expertise and the rise of armchair experts and said “wow that’s going to be funny when just anyone thinks they are a doctor because they read an article once.” and guess what! he’s right! it is funny!

most of my notes for this book say something like “overwritten” but it’s not bad, per se

so far the prison seems pretty pleasant. definitely better than being in the trenches in WWI. don’t see what the big deal is

i am levelling an accusation of collaboration with reality at Mr. Samuel Beckett

to struggle against the tragic arc is to succumb to it. good advice from Alain

last summer i was quoted in a piece in the Atlantic (lol) for saying it was David Foster Wallace summer, that it was post-cringe summer. perhaps i was wrong about the DFW part, maybe it has and always will be Henry Green summer

when Knausgaard mentions a familiar name like Geir for the first time in a volume it’s like how i imagine Marvel fans feel when like antman or whoever gets a cameo in avengers

“Do you like jazz?”
I shook my head. “I’m afraid not.”

finally the truth comes out

Karl Ove feeling some disappointment at becoming a book critic since that’s not really a “writer” — surprised he doesn’t mention that around that time some of the most interesting critics/reviewers were also great novelists (Gass, Updike, etc)

pretty solid chapter charting the different kinds of violence from Sorel through Benjamin to Bataille, but so far no word on The Sun

Karl Ove mentioning he didn’t get into Sonic Youth until Goo came out reminded me of why his books are so popular — he has completely unremarkable taste. couldn’t be bothered to listen to the much more interesting Daydream Nation, but the commercial success Goo was what piqued his interest. in spite of this he, like most of us, still believes that his taste is refined

Guston died doing what he loved — eating dessert

it's fun to catch Karl Ove's non-linear progression. here, as a young man, he nervously tells an acquaintance he does like jazz. In book 2, as an adult man with children, he rails against jazz to the reader because some Swede beta male he has no respect for puts it on at a child's birthday party. This is just the kind of detail that keeps struggleheads coming back for more

i need to know if Karl Ove ever read Anti-Oedipus