Vollman on Sayles' Moment in the Sun

[Tom Beshear]

Where did you find Vollmann's remarks? I assume it's part of a full review. 
He's getting a reputation (at least to me) for writing some bracingly 
negative (and mixed) reviews. Reviewers are too damn polite, so I'm happy to 
see Wild Bill go his own way, as usual.

Pynchon may do some of the same thing in Against the Day, but it's eased by 
being satirical.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "rich" <richard.romeo at gmail.com>
To: <pynchon-l at waste.org>
Sent: Tuesday, August 09, 2011 2:23 PM
Subject: Vollman on Sayles' Moment in the Sun


"Sayles is an exemplar of angry compassion. His corresponding defect
is heavy-handedness, as in his relentlessly parodic imagining of a
white-power march in Fayetteville, which a Wilmington belle finds “so
beautiful” at the exact instant that a horse defecates. It’s as if he
distrusts our ability to keep track of his sympathies. His
undiscriminating hatred for the ruling class renders its members
pasteboard characters. Furthermore, he is addicted to preposterously
coincidental meetings and surprise kin relationships (which impressed
me in his 1996 movie Lone Star but not here). His story windups
sometimes emit a sentimental whiff."

can't say that I disagree and in a weird way one could accuse Against
the Day of same. Vollman for all his faults as a writer at least in
the Seven Dreams books never goes for that romantic rebel shit.

rich