Classic or Dud: Chuck Klosterman

If you disagree with Atlas Shrugged, it basically means you disagree with the concept of “being great.”

what a douchebag.

The Franzen reference is worse, though, because I think about how someone coming up to be saying something similarly negative about Loveless would just get a 'hey, that's fine' statement from me. Is my love for that album not justified in his eyes because I don't see fit to go into that ridiculous kind of defense he demands for his love objects? Fuck it.

Animal Farm by George Orwell (Signet, $8). No one has ever written something so brilliant, so concise, so insightful, and so charming all at the same time.

"Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs" really feels like the thoughts of a guy who's spent a lot of time at the end of a couch watching too much tv, listening to the "cool rock" (and everything else) on the radio, and arguing with his roommate about ridiculous subjects that have no bearing on reality.

With that mindset, you end up ascribing a lot of personal importance to whatever's going on at the time, but you quickly end up realizing that it's going to be replaced by something else in short order. There's not really a strong sense of foundation or history, more about the here and now. Klosterman's sitting downstream from the guys who are idolizing the influential "greats" that stand the test of time, so he only ends up with the end product.

I'd imagine his writing has changed over the last few years, but that's my impression. Even the Rand thing fits in -- huge, romantic notions of greatness, without the thought that someone's probably already done all this and thought it through. It's all about the spectacle and the emotion.

Its ironic, yes?

I enjoyed SD&CCP overall, the Ayn Rand thing makes sense but that's part of his sort of juvenile appeal I suppose. I think ppl in this thread are really making a bigger deal out of him than need be, as if he's TRYING to change the world or something. His self-deprecation is appreciated, he's wrong a lot but whatever. Its an enjoyable read, trashy and entertaining.

He managed to articulate my own fascination with "Saved By the Bell" very precisely. However I would say the worst essay in the collection is the piece toward the end about how Vanilla Sky is actually a "good" movie because well... actually it's not and in discussing cinematic discourse on the nature of reality Klosterman gets way off point. He doesn't seem to have a point in the essay other than not exactly sure why everyone hated the movie but him. If anyone else has read it, then they might possibly concur with me that Klosterman's enjoyment of the film is completely predicated on his own stated attraction to actress Penelope Cruz.

Still, it's a shitty movie.

Myself, I'd go for Diaz since she's livelier and exhibits far more 3 dimensional sexiness in personality than Cruz does in her wooden performance. Though, in her defense, Cruz doesn't really speak english and her getting cast in Hollywood films has more to do with the spread in maxim than because of her good performances in spanish-language films. Regardless of the geeky debate I'd like to have with Klosterman on the subject of diaz vs. cruz and their respective on screen hotness...it's a shitty movie.

I haven't read "Fargo Rock City," which is what made his name, but I can appreciate that he gave voice to some kind of Midwestern its-only-rocknroll-buddilikeit populism. Fine. But the things of his I have read, magazine pieces here and there, just aren't interesting. That's his biggest problem. He introduces no new ideas, he traffics in watery received wisdom, and there's a prickly defensiveness underneath the golly-gee regular guyisms that makes him less likable than he thinks he is. I guess he shouldn't annoy me so much -- who really cares, right? More power to him for making a living at it.

Except that I can't help seeing some connection between his bogus, resentful anti-"elitism" and the bogus, resentful anti-"elitism" peddled by the Bush administration. Both seem calculated to appeal to people who want to be assured that it's OK not to know very much about anything, and to cast aspersions on knowledge itself. Which is maybe a heavy seabird to hang around the neck of Chuck fucking Klosterman, who's probably a Kerry Democrat for all I know and is certainly whole solar systems of magnitudes of malignance removed from Dick Cheney. But still, he annoys me.

(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!!