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3.81 AVERAGE
3.81 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
reflective
medium-paced
I started off hating this book, kept going until it levelled out at about three stars, then towards the end when the attention redirected itself towards women, hit a pretty solid low for me. Felt like it conflated a lot of things so different they were basically on separate planets into one scale. Didn't land for me.
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Possibly because I'm from Seattle and of a similar age, this book really connected with me. It's part discussion of horrible people, part soul-searching at how we/humans consume media made by horrible people, and partly just a look at being an artist/creator in the world. It's very good, probably 4.5 stars with my locality bonus.
3.25/5 actually
this is a decent book, however i would argue - along some other reviews - that it is advertised wrongly even by the author herself. she speaks in great lengths of the "i" turning into a "we" - it says so on the cover, too. however this isn't a "we" book, this is an "i" ("her") discovery. she tries to find a way to deal/cope with loving art by bad artists. this is not only apparent in the language the author uses throughout the book (again, i came across the "we"/"i" often enough - it got tideous, as if she had to convince herself that the usage of "we" is legitimized when repeated often enough) but also by the representatives she chose of "bad people."
as another review pointed out, the author assumes you know. the "bad acts" done by "bad people" are not at the center of this book. neither is their art, mind you. i found this to be especially true when reaching the chapters that asked "am i/are women monsters for leaving their children?" it is here where i find her true questions being asked and where her discovery journey needed to take place. these chapters are deeply vulnerable and - her being a memoirist, as she calls herself - make the most sense for the format of the book.
my favorite chapter given how the book was initially advertised is her analysis of nabokov and "lolita."
while i understand that "monsters: what do i, claire dederer, an author, do with what i deem to be great art by bad people that i chose for this?" is not a great title, it would have been true-r to the nature of the book.
if anything, this book has proven to me again that, as art being deeply personal and subjective, you cannot expect someone else - for all that matter a random author - to tell you (me) how to (not) separate the art from the artist.
this is a decent book, however i would argue - along some other reviews - that it is advertised wrongly even by the author herself. she speaks in great lengths of the "i" turning into a "we" - it says so on the cover, too. however this isn't a "we" book, this is an "i" ("her") discovery. she tries to find a way to deal/cope with loving art by bad artists. this is not only apparent in the language the author uses throughout the book (again, i came across the "we"/"i" often enough - it got tideous, as if she had to convince herself that the usage of "we" is legitimized when repeated often enough) but also by the representatives she chose of "bad people."
as another review pointed out, the author assumes you know. the "bad acts" done by "bad people" are not at the center of this book. neither is their art, mind you. i found this to be especially true when reaching the chapters that asked "am i/are women monsters for leaving their children?" it is here where i find her true questions being asked and where her discovery journey needed to take place. these chapters are deeply vulnerable and - her being a memoirist, as she calls herself - make the most sense for the format of the book.
my favorite chapter given how the book was initially advertised is her analysis of nabokov and "lolita."
while i understand that "monsters: what do i, claire dederer, an author, do with what i deem to be great art by bad people that i chose for this?" is not a great title, it would have been true-r to the nature of the book.
if anything, this book has proven to me again that, as art being deeply personal and subjective, you cannot expect someone else - for all that matter a random author - to tell you (me) how to (not) separate the art from the artist.
informative
reflective
medium-paced
dark
emotional
informative
medium-paced
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
fast-paced
Bijzonder! Als ik heel eerlijk ben stapte ik denk ik vooral in voor de juicy verhalen van kunstenaars die nare dingen hebben gedaan. Maarrrr aangezien het veel meer een filosofische ontdekkingstocht is dan een soort compilatie aan voorbeelden moest ik even schakelen. Uiteindelijk vond ik het een inspirerende leeservaring, en sinds ik het uit heb merk ik dat er veel is blijven hangen. Sowieso interessant om bij jezelf na te gaan hoeveel je geeft om biografie (van makers, maar ook überhaupt van de mensen in je leven)
informative
reflective
medium-paced