J. went to Belgium for a conference and I promptly started forgetting to take my pill and stopped doing the housework—and that gives you an unshaven Veteran’s Day on the couch with the dirty dishes and coffee mugs and sweaters and guitars all over the place staring at the novel you started and thinking, what a stupid novel, what a stupid fucking novel, this was a bad idea from the beginning and the execution has made it worse, its only merit is being short, or projected to be short; but first it has to be done, and then to discover you threw away a year’s writing on a terrible idea, the setup for a bad joke, a premise that would be excusable only in a comic book or rock opera—but if I ditched it then my self-respect would have to hinge on literary criticism or teaching, and those sure are bad bets. Or we must give up the notion of self-respect! Along with the analytic-synthetic distinction and the distinction between an organizing conceptual system and a neutral material to be organized! I suppose the consequence of that would be spending the day in the bathtub.
Or, we must give up the notion that self-respect can only be derived through our academic & professional accomplishments. Easier said than done, I admit.
Game point!
but a gem of a blog post!
"what a stupid novel, what a stupid fucking novel"; sublime.
If only novels about stupid novels weren't generally stupid themselves...
you got some kinda problem with comic books?!?
Well, I'm perfectly happy to concede the problem is mine and not the comics'. Sometimes I'm told I haven't read the right ones.
the right ones involve lots of capes, generally
