In lieu of his next masterpiece, ’Non-Fiction’ is a collation of ‘pieces’ which Chuck Palahniuk (most infamous for writing Fight Club), our hero, has published elsewhere. These are true stories, found in publications ranging from L.A. weekly and the Independent to Bikini Weekly. These are the stories of Marilyn Manson, of Juliette Lewis, a day at the Testicle Festival, life aboard The USS Lousiana, and in the homes of eccentrics who really do live in castles, with moats and everything. And there’s incites into the workings of one of… fuck it… THE writer of our generations mind and life. Sometimes he’s on research trips, or telling fans at signings that there isn’t a local Fight Club and at others revealing the joy of author Amy Hempel’s minimalism and how you should never meet your heroes. He’s letting us in and letting us meet him for what feels the very first time. You should always meet your heroes like this. Never stalk them.
The reason Chuck is my hero is not because of his brutal honesty or the image-hung rhythm of his words, nor his Bukowski’ish crudeness, but simply because of his understanding. It’s a philosophical understanding of the human condition, the illogical logic of existence, and it’s nothing new, philosophers have been stepping back and talking this jazz for years, but for the first time this understanding has been made accessible and exciting, ready to be rammed down the throats of the [to be diverted] mainstream. But without the drab earnest tones of Douglas Coupland. Chuck’s humanisation of the wordy nether-region gazing world of the punker, hippier sides of Social Sciences is what’s going to save the world, in the same way Anthony Burgess could’ve and Bill Hicks would’ve.
Book of the year. For sure.
Note: Some editions of this book go under the name ‘Stranger than Fiction’
Chuck Palahniuk - Non-Fiction
Nice to see someone writing with such passion about such a cool writer, I really enjoyed the article and will definitely buy the book as a result. However, to slag off his main contemporary just for the sake of it with such a feckin' stoopid choice of adjective (just looked up "drab" in the dictionairy, to enchance my understanding of the word, it means "dull, uninteresting"- just as I thought) is sooo darnright silly.
I know people who don't like Coupland- fair enuff. Their main criticism of him is that he's too "nice and optimistic", all his stories have heart-warming happy endings which, they say, is cheesy and unreal. Other people also dislike his obsession for soundbites and pop-culture references- they say it's like he's a geek trying to be cool. I disagree with both schools of thought but can see why people hold these opinions.
I cannot see, however, how he could be viewed as "dull, unintersting" by even the most cynical non-fan. Especially one that digs Chuck.
Doug and Chuck are not in competition, it aint some Robert Smith versus Morrissey 'take your sides and draw your handbags' scrap (Moz wins everyday though imho- Robert Smith's just a Liza Minelli wannabee), their ideas and writing CAN co-exist and I happen to think they compliment each other.
I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume your use of the word "drab" was just a spontaneous thing that you didn't think through properly. I can completely dig that, my own lexical choices can be painfully innappropriate and very, very silly at times. However, if you can explain to me articulately and thoroughly why his musings are "drab", I'll happily stand corrected, even though I will surely disagree.
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Thanks for your kind words.
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We are the least inquisitive of all the animals. Fact. Take dogs for example: a dog barks, tastes and sniffs everyfuckingthing it can and it revels in the intensity of the senses, the smellier, the tastier the better. If the postman is scared the dog loves it. If the little kid from next door gives it attention and pets it and playfights with it, the dog has a Result.
We are not like that. Most of us stay in the comfort zone and just let things happen. Happily subordinates, leaving the pulling of the strings, the engineering of progress and the assumption of power to those who are mainly unworthy and sometimes downright evil.
This lack of generic questioning and pro-activeness in the best of our species is seriously dangerous. There's too many fuckin evil self serving cunts in positions of power and those that aren't 110% evil are inept, charmless thickheads (bush and blair most obviously). Why oh why don't the intelligent, incadescent, pure-hearted champions (and there are plenty out there) seek power? This disconcerting paradigm must end soon or the whole world will instead.
This is precisely what Coupland shows us through the journey Karen, Richard et al go on in the book. They have to be forced by God into assuming responsibility for the world. If the apocolyptic scenario never happenned they'd still be living the same fucked up lives instead of going on the mission they embark upon at the novel's close.
I'm sure you'll have read this one, cos it was my own starting point and is the most famous of his books. If so, read it again without the blinkers and you too may find the epiphany you're looking for.
Other great Doug books include All Families are Psychotic, Hey Nostrodamus! (which reduced me to tears with it's final chapter) and my personal fave Miss Wyoming (a nice and pretty modern love story, with some serious sci -fi/conspiracy theory shit interwoven)....
Chuck Palahniuk - Non-Fiction
And this is where the internet SHOULD come in. In the information age, knowledge is power and ultimately, peoples undoing. The trouble is, the internet is too vast, with too much information, too much conflicting information and too little filtering. Everything is ultimately more lost than ever before. Yet there are a lot of new philosophers I've read bits by over the past few years, talking about the new power struggles in an age where entertainment is much more reflective and socially responsible and that sport, cinema, libraries and music are like the new churches, a trillion new sects - and where the revolutions and social centres used to be, now there is marketing messages rather than goodwill to all men and redemption.
And on one side of the spectrum we have Arnie in 'power' (tho it does seem like all politicians are currently rendered powerless, tho not as powerless as the voter in a democratic system based on celebrity and little to no mainstream comprehsion of politics), and on the other, Micheal Moore with his books'n'movies. There's very little inbetween, very little of substance to hook into, that makes sense on an everday level...
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Politicians are a lot more powerful than anyone outside the political world can comprehend. They have their 'surface functions' of being figureheads, legislators, decision makers and mouthy sods, but then also there's the whole influence factor. The further up the heirarchy a politician goes, the more access they have to the most powerful people.
Just consider the names that have been in and out of Chequers since 1997! Imagine if any of the aforementioned "intelligent, incadescent, pure-hearted champions" had ease of audience with such luminaries!
Could you imagine what might happen if somebody of this description sat down with oil magnates and press barons and world leaders to preach altruism and benevolence? I'm sure something of enourmous positivity and wonder would be the result. That aint gonna happen when self obsessed, dour, sour pusses like Blair, Brown and Prezza are running the show here in Blighty and when the choice is Kerry (dumb) or Bush (Dumber) in Yankland.
As powerful as the arts are (the most obvious modus operendi for the virtuous) in helping shape social-political evolution, the posibilities of the truly virtuous infiltrating the political world have yet to be unlocked. Altrusim, benevolence, idealism and Good (as romantic concepts) have indiginously been symonymous with the arts yet society, human nature and the world at large still isn't as Good as it should or could be (it's a feckin' country mile off). I can count the truly great, awe-inspiring, world changing politicians on 1 maybe 2 hands ( folks like Che, Atlee, Churchill, MLK would be in the premier league, the likes of Benn and Burke would be in the coca-cola championship, I'm sure I've missed a few as well), but imagine the ease with which you can count the cunts (Hitler, Stalin and Thatcher head the list there).
Who knows what would happen if the worm turned? I wanna see the incandescent heroes in politics and power AS WELL AS the arts. This is the only way to create a world we can all be proud of...
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The key is to realign the context with fight club style inspiration and then organisation is the other key... blah. It's all too many compromises for most people, they'd rather be right than acheive anything...
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Democracy aint the bad guy, the undereducated electorate is. The Arts are doing a lot to educate people right now (one such rudimentary example is Michael Moore's literary and film successes). And in terms of future generations, the British education system is getting a little better with the recent 'Citizenship' framework (a series of compulsory classes that tries to educate kids about socio-cultural and political stuff).
"It's all too many compromises for most people, they'd rather be right than acheive anything... "
Exactly, which makes them just as bad as the corrupt politicians. That's the thing with most intelligent, good-hearted people; they are scared of compromise and upopularity.
What's worse? A virtuous person having to compromise themselves and their beliefs in order to stop evil bastards from running amock and having all the power or the selfish and unscrupulous controlling the world like they do now? Compromise is a small price to pay in exchange for power being placed in the right, trustworthy hands.
As Edmund Burke once said, "the only thing neccessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing"....
Chuck Palahniuk - Non-Fiction
I hope I find the last section redeeming.
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What do you mean by "uniformly flat, textureless manner"?
Sounds more like Jilly Goolden decribing a crap wine than a critique of storytelling :)
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I dig what you mean about Coupland's characters seeming "digital" or manufactured though. They are never truly believable human beings cos in reality we are far less remarkable and profound and don't lead as interesting lives. However, this melodrama of characterisation is imperative cos it accentuates the actuality of our own human characteristics to create a powerful social-satire. "Digital" they may be, but the feelings and actions they display are achingly human.
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Gen - I just checked out your art site, very nice.
I'm glad I've found someone else who likes Juno Doran, I based a lot of my art A-level around her Black Paintings and in the years since I haven't heard her name mentioned.
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worth getting hold of just for his short story, though some of the others are good too
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Chuck Palahniuk - Non-Fiction
For what it's worth I've failed to get into Palahniuk, although (predictably) I've only actually read "Fight Club". For me, at least, Fincher's movie was something of a minor modern classic, but - much as I wish I could say the same for the novel - Palahniuk just wasn't able to grab me. I mean, I enjoyed it and everything, but it all seemed a bit style-over-substance - punchy prose and shock-tactics are okay so long as you've got the characterisation, dialogue, etc. to back it up, and - whilst Palahniuk was solid enough in these departments - I felt the lack of any real ideological or emotional insight (besides half-arsed armchair philosophy) was where it ultimately suffered.
That's nitpicking, though, I guess - I'd certainly be open to reading more from him...
Re: Chuck Palahniuk - Non-Fiction
Invisible Monsters is probably his best work for me, but I love everything I've read of his so far. If the rumoured film of Survivor ever happens, perhaps that'll extend his appeal to people who can't/don't read for whatever reason.
Am I alone in finding him very, very similar in some ways to Kurt Vonnegut? Although he's a little more anarchic, both of them have a real rhythm to their writing and seem to see the world in a very similar way.
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Chuck Palahniuk - Non-Fiction
incites/insights
who can tell the t'difference baby?
Chuck Palahniuk - Non-Fiction
Chuck Palahniuk - Non-Fiction
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Chuck Palahniuk - Non-Fiction