Nabokov, Hemon, Kis, and a tiny splash of Pynchon

[John Carvill]

Apropos of not too much, thought I'd share this with the list. It's a
great article on Danilo Kis by Aleksandar Hemon. Usual apoogies apply if
this has been posted before.


Reading Danilo Kis by Aleksandar Hemon 

http://www.centerforbookculture.org/context/no9/hemon.html


I only became aware of Kis from hearing Hemon mention him repeatedly in
interviews as a writer he's very fond of. You know the story with Hemon?
A Bosnian visiting Chicago in 1992, with 'tourist level' English, gets
stranded there and watches on TV his hometown of Sarajevo being shelled.
Stuck in the US, he learns English, famously claiming to have run
through Nabokov's books underlinging every word he didn't know, then
assidiously writing these and their meanings out on index cards,
appropriately enough. Had a very good book of short stories published
around 2001, 'The Question of Bruno', one of which sort of got expanded
to form the novel 'Nowhere Man'. There's lots available online re. Hemon
(see below). But very little indeed on Danilo Kis, who folk who like
Pynchon (and/or Borges) really should check out.

I read 'Garden, Ashes' and having finished it, immeditely went back to
the start and read through it again. Re-reading books is pretty common
for the likes of us Pynchon fans, I know, but immediate re-reading is
surely rare? I really wanted to quote a passage but I lent my copy to my
Dad, and Kis's books aren't search-inside-able on Amazon.

Here's Hemon on Kis:

"His books are not page-turners, whose pages one keeps turning in search
of something to read, but page-gazers--one keeps going back to the same
page, compelled to go deeper and find more below the surface of words."


Here's a not bad write-up on Hemon:

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/09/25/1064083123967.html?from=sto
ryrhs

"Hemon also seems to have learned structural tricks from the Eugenides
school of US fiction writers who believe that postmodern theory, while
it should not be ignored, is best incorporated into aesthetic practice
by implication - rather than by literally reproducing the edicts of
Jacques Derrida or trying to sound like Thomas Pynchon."


And in amongst an article about writers' hairstyles by Zadie Smith:


"'You talk to me of these various opportunities," he says, yanking the
steering wheel, taking a sharp bend like a Duke-of-freaking-Hazard," -
and certainly, I could use some more money - but I say this to you: can
I still play football three times a week? Can I still play football
three times a week? You look at me with your monk's face, full of an
infinite pity, yes, but without understanding, loosened from the
realities of this life like a boat that has slipped its rig and floats
in the bay.  Because you know the truth as I know it. The aesthetic,
political, journalistic, academic opportunities afforded a writer in
these Unites States of America -  all of them are sadly incompatible
with playing a game of football, three times a week.' 

He speaks like that. The most elegant English you will hear in these
United States of America. He makes you want to puke." 

http://www.eyeshot.net/zadie1.html

A-and:

"For Sascha, Chekov beat Stanislavski 2-0, but then again, Tolstoy beat
Chekov 3-2, and on the other side of the world DeLillo beats Pynchon 1-0
every time they play, while, as far as he's concerned, everyone in the
English writing team post 1960 should do the world a favour and remain
on the bench."


Finally, the start of Nowhere Man:

Had I been dreaming, I would have dreamt of being someone else, with a
little creature burrowed in my body, clawing at the walls inside my
chest--a recurring nightmare. But I was awake, listening to the mizzle
in my pillow, to the furniture furtively sagging, to the house creaking
under the wind assaults. I straightened my legs, so the blanket ebbed
and my right foot rose out of the sludge of darkness like a squat,
extinguished lighthouse. The blinds gibbered for a moment, commenting on
my performance, then settled in silence.

I closed the bathroom door and the hooked towels trembled. There was the
pungent smell of the plastic shower curtain and disintegrating soap. The
toilet bowl was agape, with a dissolving piece of toilet paper in it
throbbing like a jellyfish. The faucet was sternly counting off
droplets. I took off my underwear and let it lie in a pile, then stepped
behind the curtain and let the water run. Wee rainbows locked in bubbles
streamed into the inevitable, giddy whirl, as I fantasized about melting
under the shower and disappearing into the drain.

I went down the stairs, carrying a mound of dirty laundry, careful not
to trip over the inquisitive cat. I put the laundry on top of the
washing machine, which shuddered as though delighted, and pulled the
rope pending in the darkness--cobwebs sprung into the air around the
bulb. I had to wait for the spin to throttle to a stop before I could
put my laundry in the machine, so I followed the cat into the other
room. There were boxes full of things that must have been left by the
tenants--who might they have been?--who used to live in one of the
apartments: wallpaper scrolls, a broken-boned umbrella, a soulless
football, a bundle of shoes with crescent soles, a pictureless frame,
skeins of anonymous dust. Back in the laundry room, I transferred the
sodden clothes of the upstairs people to the dryer, then loaded the
washing machine. In the other room, the cat was galloping around and
producing noises of struggle, pursuing something I could not see.

Full excerpt:

http://66.249.93.104/search?q=cache:XsIqzrUeqZMJ:www.powells.com/biblio%
3Fshow%3DHARDCOVER:USED:0385499248:8.25%26page%3Dexcerpt



Cheers
JC

John Wilmot penned his poetry 
riddled with the pox 
And Nabokov wrote on index cards 
at a lectern, in his socks 
St. John of the Cross he did his best stuff
imprisoned in a box
And JohnnyThunders was half alive
when he wrote Chinese Rocks

Nick Cave, 'There She Goes My Beautiful World'














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