a cluster of over-generalizations

man, it is really easy to hate people in classes. usually i enjoy a good Pretentious English Major Thought-Joust, but today was nearly unbearable. (tangent: the woman with whom i take issue, to begin with, wears frosted pink lip gloss, every class, at 9:30am. FROSTED. if it were 1999 and she had a lisa frank trapper keeper, i would be absolutely burning in envy, but in 2011, it's sort of sad and misplaced. like girls who regularly wear white eyeliner, or use under-eye concealer that is about eight shades too light for their skin tone.) to promote anonymity, i wont say what class it is exactly but suffice it to say it is a medieval literature class. we'll call this woman "Sasha", because i imagine her mother must have been one of those women who wanted her daughter to be as annoyingly feminine as possible, from the get-go. Sasha is sort of sweet in that she tries hard, but is inarticulate and sort of stupid. i'm an asshole, whatever.

usually only her visage (and infuriatingly high baby-voice that seriously HAS to be a conscious decision, enacted to seem more feminine, even though she just sounds creepily infantilized) bothers me, but today she offended the entire pantheon of English Gods. I already knew I hated whatever she was about to say because she started with "i mean, so like kind of going off that...". that sentence is a precursor to vague, redundant comments, and nothing else. usually sentences beginning with that go a bit like this:

"so like, kind of going off that, i almost feel like Shakespeare like wanted to like make people think about like, maybe Gertrude knew that Claudius killed King Hamlet!"

...

Check out that criticism. You've done it again, Oscar Wilde.

Anyway, that's not what Sasha said today, but something far worse. Basically, she suggested that medieval/early modern literature is sub-par compared to more modern and "relatable" works of literature. I'm paraphrasing here... "like, i just feel like modern literature is just so much more meaningful". Of course you do, Sasha, because you were born in the late 20th century and you are a product of your culture and era, which invariably favors literature it has produced, especially versus literature from other time periods which we perceive as outdated and inaccessible.

After a tangible silent groan, one classmate responded, asking for a specific example of "modern literature" of which she spoke. i was really hoping she'd say something truly horrible, like Stephenie Meyer, but she said something that somehow pissed me off more. She said "Like, Jonathon Safran Foer or something".

It was obvious that Sasha thought she had shut everyone up by citing an author she perceives as the apex of original, modern literature. She preened in a self-satisfied way, proud of herself for sticking it to those uppity other English majors who never dreamed she'd be so intimately knowledgeable of this titan of literature. this makes me mad because she thinks, apparently, that Safran Foer is the T.S. Eliot of the 21st century. i also got excited because i think Safran Foer's novels (Everything Is Illuminated and Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close) are overly sentimental, suffocatingly nostalgic, excessively detached self-indulgent fodder. i shared this with the class. i went on to share how Safran Foer's writing style is exactly why i don't love modern literature as a whole. it should be noted that when i say modern literature, i actually mean what critics call postmodern literature, which is marked by metafiction, intertextuality, irony, paranoia, etc.

i don't want to attack postmodernism because generally it is awesome. however, there is something going on in literature with that, i-feel-so-alone-in-this-crowded-room, at-least-one-of-my-parents-is-heartless-and-now-i-can't-love, i-can't-reconcile-the-drudgery-of-menial-daily-tasks-with-my-inner-pain, brand of self-indulgence and i think it's boring.

it can be done well, i think (see: American Beauty). but it can also go horribly awry while getting by because it sounds good. and yes, Safran Foer is a good writer; he can turn a phrase and his sentences are beautifully written. i just think the content and latent stylistic narrative is tired.

to exemplify what exactly i hate about this style, i've included a passage of Safran Foer's.

“Her life was a slow realization that the world was not for her and that for whatever reason she would never be happy and honest at the same time. She felt as if she were brimming always producing and hoarding more love inside her. But there was no release. Table ivory elephant charm rainbow onion hairdo violence melodrama honey…None of it moved her. She addressed the world honestly searching for something deserving of the volumes of love she knew she had within her but to each she would have to say, I don’t love you.” –Jonathon Safran Foer, Everything Is Illuminated.

i mean, yeah, it sounds good. and it makes you go all, omg me too! It's simultaneously understated and overly dramatic. if that makes sense. look, i can do it too!

His lover had only ever known his lie-and when he found himself letting the truth slip through his teeth, he knew she would only hear the music from the parlor. she held onto her naivete as steadfastly as she could, committed to her own airy understandings in life- the understanding that the tea would always be sweeter than she would prefer to take it.

okay, that's horrifying and shitty, but am i even remotely making a point? shakespeare is a bad ass because he literally changes the way your brain works.

Safran Foer, in this instance, is a reflection of the most annoying type of literature (for me at least). literature didn't use to be so annoyingly self-indulgent. i mean, obviously definitions of "self-indulgent" vary. and yeah, my argument is pretty flawed. but really, pink frosted lip gloss?

a poem.

Account

Czeslaw Milosz

The history of my stupidity would fill many volumes.

Some would be devoted to acting against consciousness,
Like the flight of a moth which, had it known,
Would have tended nevertheless toward the candle’s flame.

Others would deal with ways to silence anxiety,
The little whisper which, though it is a warning, is ignored.

I would deal separately with satisfaction and pride,
The time when I was among their adherents
Who strut victoriously, unsuspecting.

But all of them would have one subject, desire,
If only my own—but no, not at all; alas,
I was driven because I wanted to be like others.
I was afraid of what was wild and indecent in me.

The history of my stupidity will not be written.
For one thing, it’s late. And the truth is laborious.