Review
THE PARIS REVIEW BOOK FOR PLANES, TRAINS, ELEVATORS, AND WAITING ROOMS
by the editors of the Paris Review
Picador, 379 pp.
Review
CREATED IN DARKNESS BY TROUBLED AMERICANS: THE BEST OF McSWEENEY’S HUMOR CATEGORY
edited by Dave Eggers et al.
Alfred A. Knopf, 227 pp.
The Paris Review was founded in 1953 because two young writers – Peter Matthiessen and Harold Humes – were sick of reading literary criticism. A year later they invited a Cambridge student named George Plimpton to be its editor, and he held that post until his death in 2003. For 50 years, The Paris Review has published the kind of fiction that Jonathan Franzen described in a recent New York Times feature on Alice Munro. Franzen uses Munro to chart the ascendancy of the "pure short-story writer." His shortlist of contemporary masters – all found in The Paris Review Book for Planes, Trains, Elevators, and Waiting Rooms – includes Raymond Carver, Lydia Davis, Joyce Carol Oates, Joy Williams and Munro herself.
This is a substantial collection, and most of the pieces require a good pause from the daily grind. The "Elevator" section provides a respite of page-turning poetry. Jim Carroll’s "Heroin" is followed by "Referred Back" by Philip Larkin, circa 1958. The characters of both poems are motionless in their rooms, trying to prove Pascal’s theorem that all our troubles arise because we cannot stay quietly indoors. Larkin concludes, "Truly, though our element is time, /We are not suited to the long perspectives/Open at each instant of our lives."
In the Planes section, an early Philip Roth story, "Epstein," is full of the Jewish-American verve that Roth is famous for. Alice Munro’s 1986 story "Circle of Prayer" is followed by newcomer Karl Iagnemma’s "On the Nature of Human Romantic Interaction." This section’s charm is more than mere serendipity. The editors have put these stories side by side. Read this, they say, then read that.
Created in Darkness by Troubled Americans might be the title of just about any recent collection published in the land of Nod. It weighs in at a very light 227 pages. This is holiday reading. Hangover reading. Stay-in-bed reading. Of the 76 submissions, there isn’t a standard short story among them. The first 50 pieces feature a lot of short screenplay-style excerpts with lists thrown in. Then there’s a separate section at the back of the book for more lists.
And if you find these lists funny, Created in Darkness is for you. In "Words That Would Make Nice Names For Babies, If It Weren’t For Their Unsuitable Meanings," Stephany Aulenbach writes, "For Girls: Angina… Calorie… Feta… Uvula," and "For Boys: Caftan… Raunch… Rennet… Fellatio."
"Not Good Titles For Romantic Films," includes "Cat on a Hot Iron Grill… The Horse Renderer… It’s Congenital!… Limbless in Seattle… Filthy Dancing… Drugstore Cow."
Then there’s "Actual Academic Journals Which Could Be Broadway Shows If They Had Exclamation Points Added!" which contains "The Henry James Review!… Modernism/Modernity!… Radical History Review!" The list goes on until at last we reach, "Zygote!"
My mid-winter favourite is Elizabeth Miller’s "Featured Menu Items at the Existentialist’s Café," which includes "Pasta cooked like hell…. Gnocchi and nothingness" and the pièce de résistance, "pâté made from a duck that hates you."
On the same page is "Introducing the New Cereals" by Amy O’Leary and Adam Weitz, which features, "Cracklin’ Monkey Bran… Booty Loops… Abominations of the Raisin… Sweet Jesus Flakes… Oat Tolerance… Honey Bunches of Malaise" and "Morning-After Muesli."
After the book appears to be over, there is one more list, "Alternate Titles Proposed For This Book," which includes "Whimsical is the New Weightiness… How Can it be Irony When it is Exactly What You Expected?… 667: The Neighbor of the Beast."
McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, where most of these missives were first published, has found the web’s sweet spot for chic geeks. Lord of the Rings buffs may get a kick out of "Unused Audio Commentary by Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky, Recorded Summer 2002, For The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, DVD (Platinum Series Extended Edition), Part One." I found it hard to finish this boring 10-page riff, but the title still makes me laugh. Maybe this is the real gold Dave Eggers is digging in McSweeney’s: reading is optional.
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