Chris Via > Status Update

Tobias wrote: "Thank you so much, Chris! Wonderful video essay. I've had Vollmann on my radar for years, and I still have yet to crack the Europe Central sitting on my shelves, but your words made me order a copy..."

Thanks, Tobias! I hope you enjoy the start of Vollmann's prolific and intelligent career.

As for the Ercolino, I cannot argue with your assessment. Suffice it to say, I am a sucker for (1) synthesis; (2) frameworks; and (3) neologisms. I don't doubt or discredit his massive debt to LeClair and Karl, both of whom I love (I pull them and others into my little book on large works of art, GESAMTKUNSTWERK: FROM PANPHILIA TO MNEMOPHOBIA: a study of Proust, Mahler, and Bergman ). As for my specific citation of the tenuous argument, I am referring to Ercolino's meager defense of authorial self-indulgence. Why he feels he needs to defend that, I don't know--I guess he's just trying to be fair to all views or something. In my view, it is the self-indulgent works that I like most. If an author has the audacity to indulge in their craft, I want to experience it too. In general, I want books that don't play it safe or pander to populism.

You know, I hadn't made the Bakhtin connection, but you've opened my eyes there.

Thanks so much for starting some conversation!

Tobias wrote: "Chris wrote: "Tobias wrote: "Thank you so much, Chris! Wonderful video essay. I've had Vollmann on my radar for years, and I still have yet to crack the Europe Central sitting on my shelves, but yo..."

Ah, Denmark! I've been through there via Copenhagen many times on my way to Sweden. Lovely country, lovely people--Denmark.