American Plastic

[meikle at mail.utexas.edu]

        I don't usually toot my own horn, especially not at someone else's
expense, but can't avoid responding to Paul's friendly notice about
Fenichell's book "Plastic."  I also have a book on this most Pynchonian of
substances, called "American Plastic:  A Cultural History," published last
year by Rutgers University Press.  It costs an appalling $49.95, but any
good university or large public library should have it.  Some style page
guy for the "NY Times Book Review" didn't get it, but "Nature" gave it a
rave, and it's won a minor award.
        Gravity's Rainbow got me started thinking about plastics, and it
took ten years to research and write once I finally settled down to it.
There's a section on Pynchon, pp. 293-301 (Fenichell doesn't mention him),
but the whole book is essentially an academic's secret homage to the
master.  See also the sections on "Synthetica" and on Norman Mailer, and
the chapter on nylon.  If you like those, then read the whole damn thing.
I'm not saying it's for everyone, but my dentist couldn't put it down.
        I'm reviewing Fenichell's book for a national magazine.  It has an
error on every page (some of them howlers), and has no ideas to disturb the
flow of cliches, inaccurate longwinded anecdotes, and bad puns.  Coupland
and Mailer gave it jacket blurbs, which led me to pick it up
enthusiastically (looking for a different perspective).  Either Mailer was
having a bad day or they paid him well, for Fenichell mangles Mailer's
position on plastic and even misquotes him twice, chopping up one of his
long sinuous riffs into three short sentences for easy reading.
        Please read what I say about TRP before flaming me for shameless
commercialism on the list.  I'm genuinely interested in any feedback.  And
tired of the dumbing down of publishing that Fenichell's book represents.

Cheers,
Jeff Meikle