[wheeee, teenage discontent, baby!!1]
Jun. 15th, 2006 01:34 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
reenkaOkay, I haven't actually finished reading more than 30-some pages of it yet, but I can already tell 'King Dork' (by Frank Portman, he of the Mr. T Experience aka MTX) is a brilliant novel. No, no, seriously completely brilliant. If it ends up like Stephen Fry's 'The Liar', I shall be extremely upset, but I doubt lightning strikes... oh, nevermind, it's probably worth reading just for the appendix of terms at the end and the bit about atheists and the Bible and hippies :D
I mean, it must be said that I'm a sucker for teenage alienation and/or sarcastic coming-of-age novels (but only when done well!! ...because there are so many of them, after all), but this just had me laughing twice or three times every paragraph and sometimes pretty much at myself, which is an extra bonus. I actually loved 'The Catcher in the Rye' as a teenager, which probably makes me painfully predictable, but I can still roll my eyes at myself as well as anyone, and this book helps :D
Sometimes, you know, you just start reading and you can tell the author is brilliant company & witty as fuck and it just doesn't let up, and that kind of thing is gold, so I had to proselytize as soon as possible, obviously. Also, it promises to turn all weird & supernatural and stuff, so there's that.
You know what my pretty much favorite kind of first-person or third-person-limited narrator is? Well, it's exactly this type: funny and harsh and relentlessly perceptive, but also vulnerable and poignant as an afterthought of sorts. It makes me feel like the book is an experience in itself, like you're hanging out with that person and they're telling you stuff they'd never actually say if you met, which is a big reason why I love reading, after all. This book has just the kind of runaway, exhilaratingly wicked honesty that makes me relish... I dunno... being able to know people.
(Though I wish I could meet people like that-- could have met them when I was their age-- and also be just as honest with each other, but. I think the fact that the protagonist barely speaks even to his best friend is fairly typical. Sometimes I feel that this is the true higher function of literature-- to help bridge the gap that we can't merely through speaking about "factual truth". Perhaps, also, it's only through the stylization and veiling of fiction that certain truths can become tame enough to endure head-on. In real life... I mean... it's sad, but we're always aware of the boundaries, either respecting or crossing, right? And some people even have boundaries against fictional characters-- maybe even most people. Maybe it's not even too common to have this sort of raw open connection when reading things you may very well like-- maybe people weren't built for it. Eh. Depressing or for the best? Who knows.)
In an odd way, I suppose I have to conclude if I -did- meet a real-life King Dork, I wouldn't really realize it, and I definitely wouldn't understand as clearly. By nature, people hold these things back about themselves, don't they? Even with their very best friends. It's just impossible, they would think, and yet in fiction it isn't. We can and do completely 'get' a protagonist because of the limited scope of a novel as compared to life itself. Perhaps sometimes an intentional limit to complete understanding is what enables it.
I mean, it must be said that I'm a sucker for teenage alienation and/or sarcastic coming-of-age novels (but only when done well!! ...because there are so many of them, after all), but this just had me laughing twice or three times every paragraph and sometimes pretty much at myself, which is an extra bonus. I actually loved 'The Catcher in the Rye' as a teenager, which probably makes me painfully predictable, but I can still roll my eyes at myself as well as anyone, and this book helps :D
Sometimes, you know, you just start reading and you can tell the author is brilliant company & witty as fuck and it just doesn't let up, and that kind of thing is gold, so I had to proselytize as soon as possible, obviously. Also, it promises to turn all weird & supernatural and stuff, so there's that.
You know what my pretty much favorite kind of first-person or third-person-limited narrator is? Well, it's exactly this type: funny and harsh and relentlessly perceptive, but also vulnerable and poignant as an afterthought of sorts. It makes me feel like the book is an experience in itself, like you're hanging out with that person and they're telling you stuff they'd never actually say if you met, which is a big reason why I love reading, after all. This book has just the kind of runaway, exhilaratingly wicked honesty that makes me relish... I dunno... being able to know people.
(Though I wish I could meet people like that-- could have met them when I was their age-- and also be just as honest with each other, but. I think the fact that the protagonist barely speaks even to his best friend is fairly typical. Sometimes I feel that this is the true higher function of literature-- to help bridge the gap that we can't merely through speaking about "factual truth". Perhaps, also, it's only through the stylization and veiling of fiction that certain truths can become tame enough to endure head-on. In real life... I mean... it's sad, but we're always aware of the boundaries, either respecting or crossing, right? And some people even have boundaries against fictional characters-- maybe even most people. Maybe it's not even too common to have this sort of raw open connection when reading things you may very well like-- maybe people weren't built for it. Eh. Depressing or for the best? Who knows.)
In an odd way, I suppose I have to conclude if I -did- meet a real-life King Dork, I wouldn't really realize it, and I definitely wouldn't understand as clearly. By nature, people hold these things back about themselves, don't they? Even with their very best friends. It's just impossible, they would think, and yet in fiction it isn't. We can and do completely 'get' a protagonist because of the limited scope of a novel as compared to life itself. Perhaps sometimes an intentional limit to complete understanding is what enables it.
