ken_bookhermit's reviews
1289 reviews

Breakfast at Tiffany's is the first novel where I watched the film first prior to reading it. I used to be so stiff about reading books first before watching films because I was afraid of the liberties directors take when making novels into film. I thought it would inform my reception of the text too much, and it does. But not in a bad way. If anything, seeing the scenes omitted from the film in the text makes me wonder and critique it instead.

All in all, the novel interests me far more than the film does. The oblique references to not-Fred/Buster/Paul Varjak's possible non-heterosexuality makes it more compelling than the film's direct hetero-ness. The discrepancies in the ending also made the novel infinitely better for me. It may be the 1960s, but dear Hollywood, not every film needs to end with a damn kiss.

As an aside, the film's implication that Paul has a sugar mommy confuses me. Is it possibly to parallel Holly and her stream of sugar daddies? At this point, who knows. But that would be interesting to explore at a later date.

—I love you, I whispered to all, to none.
—Love not lightly, I heard him say.

A synthesis of Just Kids and Woolgathering, M Train echoes the life and constant journey of the artist-writer paired with Patti Smith's introspection, mythical language, and spiritual imagination. The importance she places on artifacts, the books she read, the malaise of the writer that is all too familiar to me. Like Just Kids, Smith mourns more of her losses, and I sympathize, if only for the imminence of my loss, yet to come.

I lost myself in the purview of her language. I believed the existence of everything she wrote about. In some moments, I wanted to dream like Smith does, but instantly regretted it. I love how I dream. I will never relinquish the image of the love of my life, in a print dress spattered with yellow flowers, bursting into my room to tell me, in my delirious, sleeping state, that it is snowing outside. Not even for a prophetic cowpoke.

The impression of this book fluctuates between enjoyment and apprehension. My capacity to view self-destruction could only go so far, and Anna crossed it ten times over. For someone so passive, or someone who considers herself as a passive character, the events that happened with her as the centre of said events speak otherwise.

The framing device of Anna's therapy sessions are brilliant. I enjoyed those bits. But when Anna is on her own, taking action of her own fate (despite her belief that she's not in charge of anything), I worry about her. It's intense, her desire for self-harm. So much so that I couldn't keep reading past a certain point. Also hence the low-ish rating. It's not particularly a flaw of the novel itself, but rather my lack of patience in dealing with people who just don't seem to care.

Amazing how a book I read about on a passing article from The Guardian can ensconce me in a reading state, only a few steps away from the bevelled edge of the pit of reader's block. The novel narrates a summer of misspent youth, the indelicate manner of questioning sexuality (and its criminalization) and characters that exist, but then didn't. This particular plot point, vague and crammed in, just so Art can frame his growth, his coming of age into not needing the people he had known in the single summer of his life, felt unsatisfying.

As a whole, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh engages the reader with its descriptions, the pacing, not too wrought nor is it too slow. The pretentiousness I read about in relation to the novel does not stand out far too much. But rather, the references to things (mostly towards literature) strained a little. The influence of On the Road and The Catcher in the Rye are present, without a doubt, what with Art's doubted sexuality and the throwing around of the word 'bisexual' but having it mean nothing, but in terms of aesthetics and parallels, The Great Gatsby is also there.