The DH and I used this as our dinner topic last night. He immediately mentioned War of the Worlds and Time Machine.

His contribution was that WWI was the genesis of some types of modern horror (see James Whale as an example) including the beginnings of an apocalyptic outlook. Usually people think of the gas attacks, and the fact that localities were assigned together so whole towns could be wiped out, but strategic bombing was developed in WWI. The ability to destroy a civilian center from high altitude, with no possibility of defense had a definite psychological impact (although not as big as the implementors hoped).

The ability to destroy a civilian center from high altitude, with no possibility of defense had a definite psychological impact (although not as big as the implementors hoped).

I had an art history class in college that spent a good long time on the impact of WWI on art - and the reprise of danger from the skies as a topic (Max Ernst & Picasso being her main displays)... both from gods & angels (anything winged, actually) as well as man-made sources. Her point almost to the word matches your DH's, Raq.

Since Spook Country is listed as "on hold" online at my library, and since I DO NOT have an email indicating that it's being held for me, I have to assume I'm somewhere down on the list. Pooh.

I think I'll just pick up Blood Music tonight and ask where I am on the wait list.

I liked Water for Elephants so much that DH read it as soon as I'd finished - which is quite unusual here at Chez Bee. Turns out we don't share a lot of books - only Harry Potter and anything by Dan Simmons. The end of Elephants = best payoff ever. Go read it. Get a smile. And then run off with the circus, why doncha?

Steph, I want to thank you for pimping Kiki Strike. I picked it up on Tuesday (while buying the newest Stephenie Meyer book for the kid) and I'm loving it! So fun!

A Reader's Manifesto: An attack on the growing pretentiousness of American literary prose.

I don't know how I'm supposed to take that seriously when the writer says things like: "...she seems unaware that all innovative language derives its impact from the contrast to straightforward English."

Really? All innovative language follows that rule? Isn't that more like a formula? Which is to say, not innovative?

eta: Jesus! Then the negative comparison of Cormac McCarthy to Ken Follett. Yeah, Cormac needs to take a clue from Ken. That'd make his novels better.

And this presumption:

We have to read a great book more than once to realize how consistently good the prose is, because the first time around, and often even the second, we're too involved in the story to notice. If Proulx's fiction is so compelling, why are its fans more impressed by individual sentences than by the whole?

Just seems nutty to me. I know plenty of people read primarily for plot, but that's extremely reductive to hold every novel to that standard.

eta: Here's another sweeping generalization that seems insupportable: "But novels tolerate epic language only in moderation."

Tolstoy? Tolkien? Melville? Pynchon? We know them for their moderation?

Oh, good, I'm not alone in finding modern "literature" turgid.

Then the negative comparison of Cormac McCarthy to Ken Follett. Yeah, Cormac needs to take a clue from Ken. That'd make his novels better.

Oh god.

The language needs to be right for the story. If every novel read like Hemingway, it would be a pretty boring book world.

Tolstoy? Tolkien? Melville? Pynchon? We know them for their moderation?

Tolkien would have been improved by it... ugh. Can't stand his stilted, awkward, get to the POINT prose. It's like those 500,000 word epics on FF.net, but with less sex. Hate him so much, even though he had interesting stories buried in that fucking mess of prose.

That said, wow, the anti-intellectualism in that article just shines right through. Maybe those damn kids with their polysyllabic words and quirky yet evocative way of putting things had better get off her shiny little suburban lawn.

That's right: "strangled, work-driven ways." Work-driven is fine, of course, except for its note of self-approval, but strangled ways makes no sense on any level.

I'm not sure what she's not getting here. To me, that sentence evokes the feeling of being so tense that your voice tightens, and so wrapped up in your work that it's a choke chain you can't stray far from.

Feh.

And, yeah, "Gun's going off." stuck with me like whoa, but Brokeback Mountain (the story) as a WHOLE left me weeping like a baby AND admiring the writing skill. These are NOT mutually exclusive things.