GIRLS talk (the Lena Dunham thread)

a beautiful blend of art and commerce

Dunham was well-cast on this week's Adventure Time (in a certainly-recurring role)

s.clover assuming you meant "[Marnie]'s concerns [about Africa]" I agree 110% and suspect that Hurting didn't like it due to blissful ignorance of what ~young ppl~ are ~really like~

didn't like it/didn't get it

it's not so much attacking the entire concept of political commitments as it is casually referencing an archetype that will be groan-inducingly familiar to anyone who has attended an american university in the last 10-20 years (maybe 30? but S.Africa feels like a different sort of intervention). the added turn of the screw (Marnie feeling bad because she WASN'T that archetype in college) makes it funny

sorry if it wasn't clear -- its the whole gq/sellout/stop writing thing that i can't believe people are on board with.

its not even remotely true that a corporate copywriting job stands in the way of someone who actually wants to write, and hannah getting taken at all seriously on this is another "wow this show is out of touch" moment.

of the top of my head, yates, and gaddis had ad-industry jobs directly, and pynchon wrote tech manuals all of which had a salutory impact on their style. magnus mills (less famous of course) famously built fences and then was a bus driver. etc.

Sure and TS Eliot was a banker, William Carlos William was a pediatrician

But all these references are to previous generations of writer

I definitely feel like there's a certain type of NYC creative who probably attended a few Occupy Wall Street sessions, shouted along with the People's Mic, buys local and shuns Wal-Mart, works as waitstaff

And just absolutely shudders at the mention of the word 'corporation' and 'corporatespeak' and lambasts Complex for being a Heineken ad delivery service

To be clear, a certain type of NYC creative Millenial

george saunders was a technical writer

I don't think the show is legitimizing Hannah's viewpoint on this matter at all - I mean she capitulates at the end, and I absolutely laughed when the editor didn't take any of Hannah's shit

It's just trying to be descriptive - and the failing in this show lately is not so much the Millenial trends it's seeking to categorize, it's the really squeezed and constricted way it tries to write them

Wallace Stevens was an insurance executive and refused to leave his job to teach at Harvard

ok, so the disagreement is just if the show legitimized hannah's viewpoint at all. i thought the way they did the bathroom freakout was very sympathetic to her, but eh.

Isn't the inference that the job at GQ will make hannah so comfortable earning money copywriting that she won't have the time/energy/inclination to do "proper" writing? I mean, wasn't that explicit in the fact that all of her co-workers admitted they'd essentially given up their "serious" writing while at the GQ job?

Yeah but you don't need a job at GQ to have that happen

I'm gonna write seriously every day *wakes up and types ilxor.com into my browser window, doesn't move for 12 hours*

Oh no, I do understand. When I started taking on subbing shifts, to help pay the rent, one of my new co-workers was really sniffy when I said I also "wrote". In fact, I think he even said, "Yeah, you won't much longer." (Which I'm glad to say hasn't happened, but I can see the lulling allure of a full-time not-writing job swallowing up all energy and ambition to write).

I dunno. I identified w/Hannah in that scene, and also wanted to clobber her when she told the editor she didn't want to work there forever. I also identified with her having disposable income for the first time when her pay check came in.

the anxiety that your corporate job will take up so much time/energy/effort that it prevents you from doing your dream creative stuff is a real anxiety. just because wallace stevens did it doesnt mean you will. sterling have you really never encountered this?

the fact that all of her co-workers admitted they'd essentially given up their "serious" writing while at the GQ job

I didn't believe that. It made her decision too simple. Art or Mammon? Hmm, which shall it be? In reality people do both. I suppose I've never believed her memoir sounded good or necessary so I found her puritanical response especially hard to take.

And of course choosing Art means mooching off her parents and Adam's grandmother (who pays for the apartment iirc) so it's noxious to look down on paying gigs.

It is noxious but that doesn't mean it isn't a Thing That Happens In Brooklyn

In reality people do both.

In reality SOME people do both. A lot of people eventually give up on the Art in favour of Mammon, and that's fine.

And of course choosing Art means mooching off her parents and Adam's grandmother (who pays for the apartment iirc) so it's noxious to look down on paying gigs.

Agreed. But I've always thought the power of Girls - and why its so often misinterpreted by its critics - is that it's unafraid to present characters making mistakes and following bad advice and fucking up and generally being awful. It would be noxious for Hannah to look down on a paying gig, but she often does noxious things.

Also, I could barely stand to watch her interview Patti Lupone, as she was so awful at it. It was excruciating.

the anxiety that your corporate job will take up so much time/energy/effort that it prevents you from doing your dream creative stuff is a real anxiety. just because wallace stevens did it doesnt mean you will. sterling have you really never encountered this?

― max, Tuesday, February 25, 2014 9:21 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i agree its a common anxiety. i just also think it is a callow and misplaced anxiety and the show gave it too much creedence. again, characters that feel this way are reflective of how ppl actually feel. but its an artistic decision on the part of the show to make this one seem like a real issue that needs to be confronted while obv marnie's africa thing was just played for laughs, etc. hannah's character has been a grab-bag of anxieties. only some of them we're asked to really identify with.

like 龜 otm that its not a paying gig or not that stands between ppl pursuing creative endeavors, its whether they actually want to do these things, or just want to be a person who is the type of person that does these things, and landing yr first corporate gig can make _that_ question more pressing.

the anxiety that your corporate job will take up so much time/energy/effort that it prevents you from doing your dream creative stuff is a real anxiety. just because wallace stevens did it doesnt mean you will. sterling have you really never encountered this?

― max, Tuesday, February 25, 2014 9:21 AM (32 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Totally.

I really identified with her in that scene and when she got home and was like I need to write for three hours Zzzzzzzzzzz because that's basically me every single night for the last 15 years.

I don't think the show is implying that it's the corporate gig's fault -- Hannah's anxiety is stems from the possibility that she might actually prefer a paycheck, free snacks and constant positive feedback to the risks of being a writer.

^^^ this. and i think hannah as much wants to be the sort of person who writes, as to write. i don't think the show necessarily suggests she's a great writer.

Also the scene where she marches into the editor's office giving these self-important reasons for quitting and the editor is just like "Ok, peace, can you send in the next interviewee?"

That scene was also excruciating. In a good way?

the anxiety that your corporate job will take up so much time/energy/effort that it prevents you from doing your dream creative stuff is a real anxiety. just because wallace stevens did it doesnt mean you will. sterling have you really never encountered this?

O to the T to the M

great episode

Marnie singing again, too good

love marn

the bathroom crying :(

and lol her hug with that stupid girl in the street was priceless

awkward. but awesome.

oh god that hug was so funny

^^^ this. and i think hannah as much wants to be the sort of person who writes, as to write. i don't think the show necessarily suggests she's a great writer.

― you are clinically deaf and should sell you iPod (stevie), Tuesday, February 25, 2014 10:02 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I think it's strongly implied that shes a vapid writer. Her deceased editor mostly liked her willingness to write in an uncomfortably revealing way about sex and drugs and stuff. Her writing was considered lurid more than anything else I think.

She's really good at the CQ job tho

http://i57.photobucket.com/albums/g215/misscrew/deardiarybook.jpg

This reads like an Onion article by a guy mansplaining how to fix Girls:

http://popwatch.ew.com/2014/02/27/girls-dunham-meta-entertainment-geekly/

pretty sure marnie's friend mispronounced "dgaf"

Kind of struck us recently that the Brooklyn they live in is oddly sanitized even for present-day Brooklyn. I mean you never seem to see working class or poor people or immigrants in neighborhoods that still have a fair number of working class and poor people and immigrants. It just seems odd to me -- even 25-year-olds who live in a "bubble" in Brooklyn still tend to at least see/encounter people from other walks of life or w/e. You also never see a homeless person, and there's never the slightest specter of unsafety anywhere.

so much to answer for

hurting otm. i saw this really scary guy in brooklyn recently. he was walking on the same street that i was walking on.

this is kind of my favorite season so far tbh

Yup

This is one of the most embarrassing things I have ever read (could not get through it):
http://www.bkmag.com/2014/03/03/a-man-among-girls-adam-driver/

I mean you never seem to see working class or poor people or immigrants in neighborhoods that still have a fair number of working class and poor people and immigrants

Woody Dunham

yeah actually the next thing we talked about was how Woody Allen movies are similar in that regard

I liked this last episode, but somehow they always pull the trick of making the show's cynicism and it's sentimentality seem cheap and hollow. of course the sisters fight over the ring, and of course they vow to spend more time together. a really aimless season so far.