Tag: genna rivieccio

Criticism, Essay

Christian Kracht’s Eurotrash: Another Bret Easton Ellis-Style “Romp” That Examines the Guilt of Privilege—and How That Guilt Ultimately Serves Nothing But the Status Quo

If Christian Kracht’s debut novel, Faserland, was considered a “rip-off” of Bret Easton Ellis’ general style, Eurotrash would also like to submit itself for consideration. After all, its autofiction genre is very much in keeping with what Easton Ellis did for 2005’s Lunar Park (back when “metafiction” was the chicer word to use). And while most people associate BEE with Less Than Zero (which also, … Continue reading Christian Kracht’s Eurotrash: Another Bret Easton Ellis-Style “Romp” That Examines the Guilt of Privilege—and How That Guilt Ultimately Serves Nothing But the Status Quo

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Book Review, Criticism

Perfection: Not So Much an Attack on Millennials as the Things That Shaped Their Formative Years—In Other Words, the Internet

From the very outset of Vincenzo Latronico’s fourth novel (and the first to be translated to English), Perfection, there is a simmering contempt that’s always waiting to boil to the surface, but never does in quite the direct way one might have ordinarily expected before emotional suppression and passive aggression became de rigeur. A description that can, in effect, describe what it means to be … Continue reading Perfection: Not So Much an Attack on Millennials as the Things That Shaped Their Formative Years—In Other Words, the Internet

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Criticism, Essay

Why Emerald Fennell’s Adaptation of Wuthering Heights Is Such a Hot-Button Issue for the Stodgier Side of the Literary World Right Now (And Why It Shouldn’t Be)

It’s not any kind of “shocking revelation” that what’s left of the “book business” is mostly in shambles. And that what it takes to “monetize” literature in the present is a decidedly “bread and circuses” approach. Never was that made more apparent than the advent of “BookTok.” However, with Emerald Fennell’s latest film, a “version” of Wuthering Heights (that she opted to put in quotation … Continue reading Why Emerald Fennell’s Adaptation of Wuthering Heights Is Such a Hot-Button Issue for the Stodgier Side of the Literary World Right Now (And Why It Shouldn’t Be)

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Criticism, Essay

Michael Douglas Movies Document a “Crisis of Masculinity” Trajectory, Or: Jessa Crispin’s What Is Wrong With Men Answers That Question and Then Some

It’s no secret at this juncture that there has been an ongoing “crisis of masculinity.” What that means, ultimately, is that most hetero men can’t fathom why their continued performance of outmoded masculine “ideals” aren’t translating and/or attracting women in the present. Enter Jessa Crispin to explain it all via the films of Michael Douglas, in a book titled What Is Wrong With Men. With … Continue reading Michael Douglas Movies Document a “Crisis of Masculinity” Trajectory, Or: Jessa Crispin’s What Is Wrong With Men Answers That Question and Then Some

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Essay

Slightly Under a Year of (Not So Much) Rest and Relaxation: The Coin

*Note: the narrator of The Coin will be referred to as The Palestinian Narrator, and the narrator of My Year of Rest and Relaxation will be referred to as The Blonde Narrator. Among the blurbs on the back of Yasmin Zaher’s debut novel, The Coin, Alice Slater writes that it is a “sordid Moshfeghian gem that revels in the squalor of NYC.” Yes, much as … Continue reading Slightly Under a Year of (Not So Much) Rest and Relaxation: The Coin

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Essay

Maybe The Most Remarkable Element About Misery Now is the Notion That a Writer Could Have a Stalker

Although Stephen King created Annie Wilkes, it was Rob Reiner who truly brought her to life by making the executive decision to cast Kathy Bates in the 1990 adaptation of the novel. For while it was screenwriter William Goldman who recommended the then relatively unknown theater actress for the part, it was Reiner who had the final say in greenlighting her for the role (which … Continue reading Maybe The Most Remarkable Element About Misery Now is the Notion That a Writer Could Have a Stalker

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Essay

What the Philip Roth Thanksgiving Passage in American Pastoral Gets Wrong

There has never been a more fraught (to use understatement) time to be Jewish in the United States. Never a time when it was so politically weaponized for a “with us or against us” purpose (one such example being the “pro-Israel” defense of, “You’re antisemitic if you don’t support it”). And even saying something as simple and straightforward as that could be deemed as an … Continue reading What the Philip Roth Thanksgiving Passage in American Pastoral Gets Wrong

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Essay

Everything Is Copy: The Nora Ephron, and Now, Lily Allen Philosophy

As the discussion surrounding Lily Allen’s fifth album, West End Girl, continues to set tongues wagging, it bears reminding the masses that Allen is hardly the first woman to speak so candidly about the dissolution of a marriage as a result of a cheating husband (though, in David Harbour’s case, the fact that he managed to still cheat by violating the rules of his open … Continue reading Everything Is Copy: The Nora Ephron, and Now, Lily Allen Philosophy

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Essay

Most Writers Can Relate to Wednesday’s Aversions to Being Edited

In many ways, writing is the act of saying I, of imposing oneself upon other people, of saying listen to me, see it my way, change your mind. It’s an aggressive, even a hostile act.  -Joan Didion While Tim Burton’s interpretation of Wednesday Addams (Jenna Ortega) in, what else, Wednesday can be more than occasionally too mawkish for comfort, there is one thing he and … Continue reading Most Writers Can Relate to Wednesday’s Aversions to Being Edited

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Essay

Do Not Come for My Em Dash

Considering that very few news items generate an interest in literature, the ongoing conversation about whether or not an em dash is the ultimate telltale sign of AI-generated writing has been especially notable. Not just because it’s marked a clear line between those who are fans (a.k.a. devoted users) of the em dash and those who are not, but because, of all the telltale signs … Continue reading Do Not Come for My Em Dash

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