Great stuff by Chabon:
It is in the nature of a teenager to want to destroy. The destructive impulse is universal among children of all ages, rises to a peak of vividness, ingenuity and fascination in adolescence, and thereafter never entirely goes away. Violence and hatred, and the fear of our own inability to control them in ourselves, are a fundamental part of our birthright, along with altruism, creativity, tenderness, pity and love. It therefore requires an immense act of hypocrisy to stigmatize our young adults and teenagers as agents of deviance and disorder. It requires a policy of dishonesty about and blindness to our own histories, as a species, as a nation, and as individuals who were troubled as teenagers, and who will always be troubled, by the same dark impulses. It also requires that favorite tool of the hypocritical, dishonest and fearful: the suppression of constitutional rights.
Damn, Mike rocks. I'm having one of my occasional "green with jealousy of Ayelet" moments. He's just so damned cool, in every way.
I'm rereading Kavalier and Klay at the moment. It's just as brilliant the second time around.
I compared it to Homicide at PF...but it so reminded me of something, I was like "I've read this..." But no, it was Pembleton's whole "Everyone's guilty of something" thing. And I'm gonna be writing on my walls any second, huh?
I've read The Pact by Jodi Picoult. It was a good story, but a tad melodramatic, I thought. I always mean to try another of hers, but never know where to start. I may pick up the new one once it hits paperback.
The Chabon piece is wonderful. Tina, thanks for sharing it.
Yeah...he's so brilliant. I need to read K&K...I've only read "Wonder Boys" but it really cracked me up.
I'm not sure if this article has been linked before, but it seems to spell out some of Deb's arguments against anonymous reviews at Amazon.
If I'm putting words in your mouth, Deb, please let me know, and I'll edit or delete! I thought it was an interesting article, personally.
Jess, it wants a registration.
How weird -- it doesn't want one from me. (I was going to try buffista/foamy and salon/tabletalk to see if either of those worked.)
It won't let me in without a registration, either.
