i wanted to love both of these books…especially because three or four different people recommended them to me after hearing about/reading the hearts of others…i’m still not sure why though…well, i know why…
do you remember that bowling pin table lamp you made in 8th grade shop class…no one ever said, wow you made that…you would really like the eames chair…it’s got wood in it too…
that’s what reading these books was like for me…
Winterson’s Written on the Body has the faint scent of Literature to it…maybe it because she’s British…they make english sound like a whole ‘nuther language…maybe it’s because the book’s narrator is an unnamed and genderless first person voice…or maybe it’s because of passages like this…
“Louise, in this single bed, between garish sheets, I will find a map as likely as any treasure hunt. I will explore you and mine you and you will redraw me according to your will. We shall cross one another’s boundaries and make ourselves one nation. Scoop me in your hands for I am good soil. Eat of me and let me be sweet.”
beautiful language…successful language…yet a bit ambitious for my taste…it fairly screams…LOOK AT ME I’M WRITING…it’s language for the sake of language…it’s not language in service to storytelling…
the good news is that i gave this book a chance…somewhere around page 30 I was hooked and found that when Winterson got around to telling the story of the central love affair…i found it thoughtful and moving…
and then she lost me again…i won’t reveal the plot device that ruined the second half of the book for me…i’ll just say that i wanted to throw the book against the wall…
oddly, i’m pretty sure i’ll be rereading Written on the Body…there’s a lot here i can learn from…
i could say the same thing for J. Eric Miller’s short story collection, Animal Rights & Pornography…except that i probably won’t be rereading this one…
these powerful, devastating, stories are…not for anyone who can’t stomach frank and direct descriptions of…incest, rape, animal slaughter, and being married to a stripper…to name only a few…seriously…
good storytelling should be harrowing…make your innards tighten in knots…something is at stake in these stories and…without being gratuitous or heavy handed…they don’t let us forget it…
i might not read this book again, but you can be sure i will seek out more of Miller’s writing…it would be difficult to convince me to pick up something by Ms. Winterson…
