Writers You Can't Stand. And Why... (1 Viewer)

C

Charles

author: henry miller

why: rambling. incoherent. boring.

'Tropic of Capricorn' was the first book i ever bought and subsequently returned to Barnes n Noble. It was preposterously bad. The abstract stream was semi-interesting for a few pages, but quickly got old. I flipped to the middle of the book, and once i realized the insufferableness was to continue for another 100 pages at least, i went scrambling for my reciept. I went back and exchanged it for 'Absence of the Hero'. Ironically, there is an essay in there titled 'Henry Miller lives in Pacific Palisades and I Live on Skid Row, Writing About Sex'. One of the paragraphs begins: "You know, I wonder if henry miller is really all that good." Buk goes on to describe him as a "very dull fellow, indeed"

i couldn't agree more.

correction: 'Tropic of Cancer' was the book I returned. Not 'Capricorn'. though something tells me it was equally as shitty.
 
Michael Szymczyk. Author of Toilet.

Anything I could say about it would sound like a bad pun or like I was trying to be funny. But this book is bad - really bad.


It has four 5-star reviews on Amazon. One by Charles Bukowski himself. So what do I know?
 
I think Joyce is boring as hell but I've read everything he ever wrote (with the exception of Finnegan's Wake which I made it partially through). Really can't say I can't stand him but there was some odd hairshirt thing going on there with my continuing to read him. Those I can't stand are probably those I was forced to read due to class assignments. Profs had a habit of having orgasmic fixations with writers I wouldn't read even if a book of theirs was setting by the toilet and I was taking the longest shit ever known to mankind.​
 
I bought a book of Raymond Carver's short stories, I even managed to read 6-8 of them. That was one book that I didn't feel good about donating to a local charity shop. Which I usually do with books I've read, but I wonder who bought it after me. (Poor thing).
 
Stavrogin said:
Profs had a habit of having orgasmic fixations with writers I wouldn't read even if a book of theirs was setting by the toilet and I was taking the longest shit ever known to mankind.
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Speaking of classics, in my opinion that, Stavrogin, was a classic line. And I agree, Finnegan's Wake was rough. After I finished it, (still not sure why I did) my first thought was " Really, all that time and effort for this, really?"
 
2nd that. classic line. and quite possibly the worst insult you could ever give a writer. well done. had a good chuckle there.
 
informal said:
Naked Lunch. What the fuck (?). Has anyone enjoyed this or at the very least even appreciated it?
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Yeah, same here. I didn't particularly think much of that book. It got better near the end but man, I almost gave up on that one.

Apart from Keroauc, the beat writers don't really do much for me...and with his work I prefer his childhood recollections (Visions of Gerard, Maggie Cassidy, Doctor Sax) over the beat-era ones (Dharma Bums, Subbterraneans) On the Road was an exception. That I remember (haven't re-read it) made a big impression on me at the time.

Regarding Henry Miller, I very much enjoyed Tropic of Capricorn. The endless talk about his sex life got a bit tiresome after a while, but in between that I was pretty powerful/enjoyable read. I liked his outlook in that book, but that's all I've read of his so far.
 
informal said:
Naked Lunch. What the fuck (?). Has anyone enjoyed this or at the very least even appreciated it?
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Some bits and pieces are funny in their own weird way, I think. For instance, the part about Dr. Benway, and the part about the man who taught his asshole to talk. You can probably find Burroughs reading the Dr. Benway "routine" on Youtube. He's also reading it on the CD called "Spare Ass Annie", together with the talking asshole bit, and other stuff. Maybe one needs to hear Burroughs read them in order to find them funny.

bospress.net said:
Read Junkie by William Burroughs for more of a straight up narrative. Naked Lunch cannot be appreciated if read in one sitting. You need to take small bites.
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Yes, Junkie is straight narrative, and so is Interzone, which is a collection of short stories. I like both.
You're right about Naked Lunch, and since it is'nt a novel but a collection of "routines", as Burroughs called them, you can easily read it in small bites. I believe Burroughs once said you could start reading anywhere in the book. You did'nt have to start with page one, and that's true because the "chapters" are not connected to one another.
 
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bospress.net said:
Read Junkie by William Burroughs for more of a straight up narrative. Naked Lunch cannot be appreciated if read in one sitting. You need to take small bites.
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Still haven't read Junkie, the only book i read from Burroughs was Naked Lunch, and just loved it right away, there's something so raw about it, and the humor is so wicked and twisted, i will definitely re-read it but in order to have a better understanding, because i appreciated right away, but admit it's a challenging book, one has to go with a open mind, i guess. Despite this i still think it was such fun book, in grotesque way, like a wonderful elaborated nightmare.
 
well i tried to conquer the franzen book 'freedom' recently. i needed to know what all the fuss was about. i fought valiantly but was forced quit somewhere around page one million. i just couldn't go another page. only so much time in a day and so many other books of reasonable length to read...
 
esart said:
Kerouac is overrated in my opinion. Throw rotten fruit if you will. I don't care.
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No, even as a fan I have come to kinda agree with you. I find that while driving some of his best work, that the idealism and sentimentality was his undoing. I love a lot of his work but there's a certain naivety to some of it that isn't particularly helpful (for me at least - i'm esp. prone to idealism) That's why on the other hand Buk is such an inspiration. I find his outlook on life more helpful and truthful. The whole go-getter, out-for-kicks ethos that possesses Keroauc's early work...while being attractive, just doesn't hold up in life as long as Buk's more realist outlook. Just reading his final novel the Big Sur is enough to demonstrate how it can all end.

I still like Keroauc - but not as much as I once did.
 
I read him before Buk and it was like night and day. I believe I liked it when I read him at first, but once I read Ham on Rye, it was as if Kerouac was a poseur or something. It didn't seem genuine to me anymore. That's just me.
 
I'm still fond of Kerouac but he was best read, at least for me, when I was younger - a dalliance between Archie Comics and Dostoevsky. I can grow old reading Bukowski.
 
I like most of Kerouac, but his PIC (last novel) is just embarrassing. Just reread ON THE ROAD and it is much, much better than I remember from a first reading in the 1970s.
 
Dharma Bums, Subterraneans and Desolation Angels were important books to me, in that I got into a genre that was unlike what I had been reading (Camus, Dos, Kafka, etc.). Soon after, one of the guys I had discussed Kerouac with turned me onto Buk. So there's that too.
 
I too am a little baffled at the success of Kerouac but some say the same to me about Bukowski...then I spit at them! But no really...

Opus Pistorum by Henry Miller was the best thing he wrote, the rest is just crap.
 
Anaïs Nine's journals are incredibly overrated (specialy the 40's-50's parts). Boring. The story of a upper class girl who wants to become a "dirty and sensual bohemian", but the game doesn't works.
She became famous by frequenting Miller, Artaud and writting some provocatives and sexuals novels. But I find his style and stories really poors.
 
Martin Amis is another one I don't understand the hype about. I've read two of his novels now (Money and London Fields). The former was slightly better but I only really finished both out of sheer bloody-mindedness.
 
Rekrab said:
I like most of Kerouac, but his PIC (last novel) is just embarrassing. Just reread ON THE ROAD and it is much, much better than I remember from a first reading in the 1970s.
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I picked up On the Road in a second hand store for 25 cents and I am rereading it as well. Pure magic, and so much better the second time around especially if you've been around for a long time. :wb:
 
It's harder to think of writers I can't stand than writers I just didn't take to. Then again, it's easiest to think of other writers I like.
 

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