A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

Read in the Aughties. Found it *insufferable* and conceived a deep and abiding loathing for the dudebro who wrote this. I tried two other books by him, What Is the What (um, who the hell asked you, white guy? actual African writers tell it) and Zeitoun (liked it a lot, and of course it turns out 1) he took other peoples' work and 2) Zeitoun was no angel at all); and that was that.

So I saw someone on Goodreads' review, ordered up a Kindlesample to refresh my memory, and:

I did not enjoy this exercise in self-aggrandizing pointlessness.

I disliked so very much about this book. The grating self-awareness, the oh-I'm-so-clever stream of consciousness asides, the indescribably tedious discussion of his magazine work. But the heart of the book, the story of Eggers and his young brother trying to be each other's whole family after the death of their parents, is genuinely sad and funny all at once, a difficult feat to accomplish. I wish he'd stuck to telling that story instead of trying so hard to make me think he's a staggering genius. This book made me realize how much I resent authors playing around with style before they've proved to me that they can just tell a sory in an effective way. I just want to say, "You're not too smart for traditional prose if, say, Jane Austen isn't. If you have something to say, say it. Impress me with your grasp of language, not your ability to posture."

L'opera super-accessoriata di un formidabile concessionario

Eggers in una precedente vita è probabile facesse il venditore porta a porta. Forse dei Folletto della Vorwerk, oppure di assicurazioni. Nella prossima vita invece, potrebbe reincarnarsi in Aldo Busi, che in un'intervista confidò di essere il migliore scrittore mai esistito al mondo.

Tolti i veli e i drappi troppo “sugosi” dell'autocompiacimento e dell'autocelebrazione, che vi avverto, oltre che nel titolo ritroverete:

nella Prefazione
nei Ringraziamenti
tra le righe
nel libro da pag. 0 a pag. 369

quel che rimane è la trama. Ma è un dettaglio.
Partendo dalla fine, la presa di coscienza di un adolescente catapultato decisamente prima del tempo nel fantastico mondo delle responsabilità degli adulti, potrebbe essere il frutto di una storia che copre l'arco di 20 minuti, o di 20 anni. Ma sono bazzeccole, quisquiglie, pinzellachere che si dimenticano facilmente insieme agli sforzi del protagonista di tenersi a galla.

Ciò che invece attira e colpisce sono casomai i suoi monologhi infiniti, i suoi flash geniali e la forza persuasiva delle sue seghe mentali.

Così, alla fine vien da chiudere il libro, con la stessa espressione con cui si esce da un concessionario d'auto. Fischiettiamo felici, giocherellando con le chiavi della nostra auto super-accessoriata. Ma nell'attimo in cui stiamo per aprire la portiera, se vediamo riflesso, il viso rubicondo del concessionario che alle nostre spalle sorride beato e ci fa ciao ciao con la manina, ci sorge il sottile dubbio che ci abbia fregati. Sarà vero?

Ho aspettato molto prima di affrontare il primo libro di Eggers.
E lo attendevo al varco il nuovo genio della letteratura statunitense, il ragazzino che aveva fatto gridare al miracolo fior fiore di recensori.
Ero bello carico quando ho iniziato la lettura. Non mi sarei fatto fregare.
I primi capitoli sono un pugno allo stomaco, poi Eggers arriva e ti dice: "bè, che fai, vuoi passare tutto il tempo su queste pagine a piangere? Non pensarci nemmeno, vieni con me che ci penso io!".
Se non indulgesse a rimirarsi allo specchio sarebbe un cinque stelle lusso.

Heartbreaking? Kind of. Staggering? Yeah, in a couple different senses of the word. Genius? Well...

It's that David Sedaris, kind-of-a-memoir sort of thing. It's about him, and also about his younger brother, Toph, and about what it's like to be young, and afraid. I still think it has one of the best titles ever, even if it doesn't entirely live up to it.

These things, details, stories, whatever, are like the skin shed by snakes, who leave theirs for anyone to see. What does he care where it is, who sees it, this snake, and his skin? He leaves it where he molts. Hours, days, or months later, we come across a snake's long-shed skin and we know something of the snake, we know that it's of this approximate girth and that approximate length, but we know very little else. Do we know where the snake is now? What the snake is thinking now? No. By now the snake could be wearing fur; the snake could be selling pencils in Hanoi. The skin is no longer his, he wore it because it grew from him, but then it dried and slipped off and everyone could look at it.
And you're the snake?
Sure. I'm the snake. So, should the snake bring it with him, this skin, should he tuck it under his arm? Should he?
No?
No, of course not! He's got no fucking arms! How the fuck would a snake carry a skin?

It's taken me two years to get around to reading this much-hyped modern classic. In that time, I have put up four shelves, had intercourse over twenty times, eaten nine scones, and met one Scottish celeb. His name will not be published here, as he was rude about my purple-brown shirt. Fool.

Dave Eggers is preoccupied with heart-rending human dramas of Promethean magnitude, as his follow-up books What is the What and Zeitoun attest: he is that long arterial cord thingie linking the heart with the mind.

So it's hard to review such a maddening and addictive, charming and twee, frenetic and furious, hilarious and infuriating novel as this. Compared to his follow-up work, this memoir is light and breezy. The adventures of a recently orphaned lower-middle-class writer, building his reputation for literary innovation while raising his kid brother Toph, are hardly dripping with the pain and suffering of Valentino Achek Deng.

Yet Eggers writes in a such a dazzling and strange way, you can't help but marvel at his literary magic. I left the book feeling slightly cold, however, somewhat overly aware of this book's artifice: the self-conscious asides reveal a jarring truth about the book-being-a-book that makes it hard to connect with on a visceral level. I think Eggers undermines himself, and in the final analysis, this impedes upon its lasting power.

Still. We like Dave, do we not?

This is probably #1 on my list of books that I love but will never recommend to anyone.

Reading this memoir 20 years after it was published, I will not fault anybody for rolling their eyes at Egger's self-indulgent hijinks and immediately dismissing this book -- maybe even as soon as they read the title -- as a masturbatory work of staggering self-aggrandizement. It's obvious that Eggers is parodying himself, his own intellect, and memoirs in general, but (and this is a criticism I've often seen of David Foster Wallace's writing) I get why people think that the whole self-awareness shtick is nothing more than the literary equivalent of an 8-year-old being able to juggle three balls at once. Cute, but unimpressive.

Well, to hell with those haters! They're just jealous that they can't juggle as well as that 8-year-old can.
Kidding aside, it is very rare to find a memoir whose prose is this raw, this energetic, and just so utterly full of life. Eggers is very honest about everything -- his feelings about his family and friends, his self-importance, his flaws, his fears, his desire for attention, his delusions of grandeur as a "parent" and as a writer -- and he is able to write about all this in a manner that is constantly hilarious and yes, at times heartbreaking.

I get that an excess of introspection (and irony) is often conflated with pretentiousness but in the case of this book, it really does work beautifully (for the most part).

This book was difficult for me to start and eventually I skipped most of the preface and was relieved to find it became much more interesting.

The illness of his mother and subsequent details of his father leave bitter memories in the reader’s mind. I doubt I will ever get the descriptions out of my head of his mother spitting into her half moon and her bloody noses. In that way I say Eggers is quite good at wrenching the gut of his readers.

The obsessive thoughts are like a naked confession laid out for the entire world to see. The majority of this book reads like a stream of consciousness from an arrogant self-righteous twenty-something male – which is what it is at times – regardless of the fact that he is raising his brother. “It’s unfair. The matchups, Us v. Them (or you) are unfair. We are dangerous. We are immortal.” His view of his superiority in a mediocre world kept me flipping pages long into the nights when I feared sleep would ruin the ambiance of the book.

One of my favorite parts of this book is during the MTV interview when he tells everything and is embarrassed by nothing that the interviewer now knows. On page 188 when he states, “It seems precious for one, two seconds. You have what I can afford to give. You are a panhandler, begging for anything, and I am the man walking briskly by, tossing a quarter or so into your paper cup. I can afford to give you this” I was completely captivated. “Yes, yes,” I wanted to shout! For all these reality shows in the world today and the fascination with other people’s every waking moment, what do you have? If only Dave Eggers made it onto that show.

I love Eggers’ psychosis, the constant worrying that someone will harm or kill Toph, that everything that can go wrong will and somehow always knowing that it’s all fine. We are all guilty of times of insane thoughts that persist and persist.

The end of this book gave me chills. I was almost moved to riot in the streets and might have done so if I were younger. I have read some negative reviews of this book and I think readers need to keep in mind that it's written from a 20 something perspective - those compulsive, often dark and philosophical 20s where the whole world is a mess and you have all or none of the answers. Eggers lived; he parented, protected, and molded his brother and he spoke of things like an eager child waiting to put his mark upon the world. I was fascinated with this book from beginning to end.

Finally, some thoughts to ponder for my Echelon friends: Did any of you wonder what Jared thought as he read this book? I’ve never contemplated another reader’s thoughts while working my way through a book before, but I couldn’t stop wondering which elements spoke to Jared. I saw him everywhere in the text and speculated on what could have been inspiration for him. The ending reminded me of Jared’s lyrics and his energy. I see him on stage giving absolutely everything – pouring himself into every moment. I believe he is driven by a desire to leave his mark upon the world. He is a performer, an actor, an artist, playing a game with the world. This self-proclaimed vampire is such because he feeds on us, on the energy we give him, but at the end of the night, he is just a man who raises his arms out in every country in front of the masses to make a statement that could be screaming: “Don’t you know that I am connected to you? Don’t you know that I’m trying to pump blood to you, that this is for you, that I hate you people…oh when you're all sleeping so many sleeping, I am somewhere on some stupid rickety scaffolding and I'm trying to get your stupid fucking attention I've been trying to show you this - what do you want how much do you want because I am willing and I’ll stand before you and I’ll raise my arms and give you my chest and throat…” (Eggers, 2000.)