First off, are you all reading Dorothy Snarker? You know how gay men comment on pop culture a lot? (shut it, they do) Well, this is a gay lady and she is HILARIOUS and has provided me with hours of reading material. And even though I don't watch Glee, I find myself fascinated by some kind of two-characters-didn't-kiss-or-did-they controversy over what constitutes kissing, part of the argument of which involves what she calls "The Great Neck Nuzzle of 2010." Love. LOVE. And best blog name award, it goes to her.
Sorry. Right. Book blog. But HILARIOUS NEW BLOGS, I am so fond of them.
I haven't been reading this week, due to having the toothache and the headache and the stomachache and other body part + ache combinations. Also the general problem of me being addicted to things like Tumblr and staying up too late looking at them and then just sitting there like an especially lumpy lump at work the next day, too filled with a general malaise of dumbness to even open my Kindle for PC app.
American authors. How about we talk about American authors. Guess what I didn't study in college? Ok, lots of things, but those especially. I did 19th century British and French lit, and when I asked if I could take one American lit class and have it count for my major, the head of the Comparative Lit department said "NO THEY ARE DIFFERENT CULTURES YOU STAY AWAY -- GO READ MORE BALZAC."
Add to that my high school's horrible English Department, and I've read pretty much nothing of what I'm supposed to read. Here are the authors I think of when I hear about American authors:
Hemingway
Faulkner
Updike
John Irving
Jack London
Emerson
And...others. I guess. I've pretty much covered the ladies, because I'm a ladyist, and I've read enough Steinbeck (although is there ever really enough, people?), plus James, Twain (gag), and Hawthorne. But American lit is SO DOMINATED BY DUDES. Particularly in the 20th century. Shouldn't that trend have been reversed? Where are all the Literary Giantesses for America in the 20th century? Whenever I hear about the authors in the above list, I think 'Omg they just sound so BORING.' Because they're all Guys. Not guys, Guys. Just...men sitting around with their three-quarters-empty glass of whiskey, talking about how some two-dimensional female character screwed them over, and then moving on to how they used to go fishing with their father.
That's how I imagine all of Hemingway's novels.
At least with 19th century novels by British dudes, you have characters saying "What-ho!" and adjusting their cravats and the like. THAT I will read.
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