Classic or Dud: Chuck Klosterman

(This is the same sort of quick claim that either would debate endlessly, too.)

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/faceoff/040817/part1

http://espn.go.com/i/magazine/new/simmons_klosterman_white.jpg

I bought it after reading an excerpt on The Real World that I loved, but in this thread a lot of people who's opinions I trust are really going to town with the Klosterman hate and I'm wondering if I shouldn't even waste my time with it.

Though this line of thinking:

I suppose my problem is that not only can't I understand why anyone would waste their time watching Saved by the Bell, I feel a degree of contempt for the way it seems Klosterman is determined to make this into a badge of honor.
Probably also I do this sort of thing myself, and it seem there's a pretty strong element of defensiveness in his stance; criticism is instantaneously diverted because he already KNOWS it's "low culture."

-- daria g (daria_gra...), August 28th, 2003.

does not appeal to me at all.

How large is your car?

-- latebloomer (posercore24...), March 11th, 2004.

I STAND BY THAT STATEMENT.

I read a chapter or so of his new book at the bookstore, I think it's a lot better than his previous efforts. Other than that, I stand by about everything I've said.

i'll readily (and i'm sure he will too) admit he's no master writer, and i think that's 1/2 his appeal is to say up front- i'm not very good at this, but i'll try. and it works, for the most part.

i don't get all 'teh h@t3' on him...

now, if someone can tell me where Mark Leyner is, i'd be much appreciative.

yikes! you really think so? or that he thinks this? i never got that from him. i only read his esquire column (or is it gq?), but i never got that vibe. he knows how to write for one thing. he has journalistic skills up the wazoo. i actually liked his val kilmer piece in the last gq (or was it esquire?) i could never write that kinda thing in a million years.

i think he CAN write but, like scott said, gets bogged down in the 'insights' category. but, said 'insights' can be pretty funny, too!

i guess my thing is i don't get why so many dislike him SO much.
hell, i'm shocked that this many people even cared he writes!

boy, that eggers boy can write!!

i rest my case against both klosterman and kid a. (i'll let espn classic slide.)

It's just that he's gotten there by -- at first -- playing a sort of critic, the culture critic for people who aren't super-engaged with culture or criticism. (That is populist, I guess; it's how Roepers are born.) And he has a lock on a core audience, and a lucrative one -- guys who read Maxim at their friends' houses but Details at home, these sort of regular-guy young professionals who watch sports and enjoy New Pornographers and are shopping for good plasma-screen TVs because they're buying condos with their girlfriends, and they play video games and genuinely like to think about stuff (just not all the time) and spend lots of time on Metacritic and ESPN.com and buy lots and lots of DVDs and liked The Matrix because of its "interesting philosophical underpinnings." The more highbrow among them will see Klosterman as a regular dude, like them; the less highbrow among them will see him as a kind of intellectual type, but palatable and down to earth about it.

And he serves that audience decently -- his big forte isn't being "clever" so much as being conversational and engaging and digestible. (He's also really good at magazine features, just in terms of craft -- entertaining, readable, vivid, etc.) But of course this means that those of us who pay attention to culture in what we think of as "serious" ways will have to be slightly offended by him, this guy who's taking fairly uninteresting culture-views and packaging them for people who aren't necessarily in our circle. It's hard to complain, though, especially as he travels away from being seen as any sort of "critic" and becomes basically just a columnist, which is the honest vision of what he's up to.

Seriously, though: the Roeper of ten years from now, basically.

that's the most sympathetic take on him that i can basically agree with. sometimes i feel bad for how much he irritates me because i sort of think he's probably not a bad guy. and you're right about his audience -- which is still a niche audience, but it's a lot bigger niche than someone like, say, kogan or your-favorite-critic-here appeals to. i have met klosterman fans, the kind of people who would stand in line for 40 minutes at a booksigning for him, and they're totally fine. i tell them i can't stand klosterman and they just kind of laugh, they don't get mad about it or anything. which just makes me feel worse for badmouthing him.

as a member of his generation, though, i would like to file a complaint with cnn.

xpost: his 'snakes on a plane' column made him sound like the andy rooney of this year.

"The problem is that a lot of the subjects those publications cover, a lot of society has no relationship to. They've never listened to Yo La Tengo records. They haven't seen the films that are supposed to be important."

Or perhaps the problem is that Klosterman, a man who claims to be a writer about culture, has obviously never actually read the New Yorker or listened to NPR?

The problem is that a lot of the subjects those publications cover, a lot of society has no relationship to. They've never listened to Yo La Tengo records.
The problem is that a lot of the subjects those publications cover, a lot of society has no relationship to. They've never listened to Yo La Tengo records.
The problem is that a lot of the subjects those publications cover, a lot of society has no relationship to. They've never listened to Yo La Tengo records.
The problem is that a lot of the subjects those publications cover, a lot of society has no relationship to. They've never listened to Yo La Tengo records.
The problem is that a lot of the subjects those publications cover, a lot of society has no relationship to. They've never listened to Yo La Tengo records.
The problem is that a lot of the subjects those publications cover, a lot of society has no relationship to. They've never listened to Yo La Tengo records.
The problem is that a lot of the subjects those publications cover, a lot of society has no relationship to. They've never listened to Yo La Tengo records.

"He's a small white man in a world of tall black men. He has no choice but to run around in circles trying to not get pounded. That's the only way he can possibly survive out there. He represents white, middle-class America being introduced to the dangers of the ghetto kids; you have no other choice but to run away from them. Now don't even get me started on why Ichiro represents the overachieving Asian kid in math class!"

this paragraph is fucking gross.

"The problem is that a lot of the subjects those publications cover, a lot of society has no relationship to. They've never listened to Yo La Tengo records. They haven't seen the films that are supposed to be important."

isn't this basically Chuck Eddy's schtick? To engage middle-American culture head-on and take it seriously (no matter how fucking trite or offensive or downright bad it is?)