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4.0 AVERAGE
4.0 AVERAGE
Funniest book I've read in years. Learned a little about D.H. Lawrence, a lot about Geoff Dyer, and, weirdly, a lot about myself.
"One way or another we all have to write our studies of D.H. Lawrence."
"One way or another we all have to write our studies of D.H. Lawrence."
funny
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
fast-paced
dark
funny
lighthearted
reflective
medium-paced
Really enjoyed about 90% of this book, but then he started going on about Camus and Nietzsche and I lost interest for a week. I shovelled through the rest on Saturday and accidentally took a nap less than a page before the end. Ooops. Kind of a sour ending to an otherwise really great read. I identified with the narrator (I won't say the author) a lot, although my own experiences are much milder and more internalized, easily overcome. Reminded me of Barnes's Flaubert's Parrot but with much more self-scrutiny and less literary somersaulting (I guess?). A great and hilarious cautionary tale, in spite of the repetition and the anger.
--
"The perfect life, the perfect lie, I realised after Christmas, is one which prevents you from doing that which you ideally have done (painted, say, or written unpublishable poetry) but which, in fact, you have no wish to do. People need to feel that they have been thwarted by circumstances from pursuing the life which, had they led it, they would not have wanted; where the life they really want is precisely a compound of all those thwarting circumstances. It is a very elaborate, extremely simple procedure, arranging this web of self-deceit: contriving to convince yourself that you were prevented from doing what you wanted. Most people don't want what they want: people want to be prevented, restricted. The hamster not only loves his cage, he'd be lost without it. That's why children are so convenient: you have children because you're struggling to get by as an artists -- which is actually what being an artist means -- or failing to get on with your career. Then you can persuade yourself that your children prevented you from having this career that had never looked like working out. So it goes on: things are always forsaken in the name of an obligation to someone else, never as a failing, falling short of yourself."
--
"The perfect life, the perfect lie, I realised after Christmas, is one which prevents you from doing that which you ideally have done (painted, say, or written unpublishable poetry) but which, in fact, you have no wish to do. People need to feel that they have been thwarted by circumstances from pursuing the life which, had they led it, they would not have wanted; where the life they really want is precisely a compound of all those thwarting circumstances. It is a very elaborate, extremely simple procedure, arranging this web of self-deceit: contriving to convince yourself that you were prevented from doing what you wanted. Most people don't want what they want: people want to be prevented, restricted. The hamster not only loves his cage, he'd be lost without it. That's why children are so convenient: you have children because you're struggling to get by as an artists -- which is actually what being an artist means -- or failing to get on with your career. Then you can persuade yourself that your children prevented you from having this career that had never looked like working out. So it goes on: things are always forsaken in the name of an obligation to someone else, never as a failing, falling short of yourself."
This is such a fun book. I don't often believe people when they say they laughed out loud because a book was funny but this book made me laugh. Admittedly, once it was about a fart joke, but the rest was just about the painfully accurately described brain of a procrestinator, so horribly aware of his own shortcomings and self-sabotage that it spoke to me on many levels. I recognise myself in Dyer, but also in Dyers description of Lawrence, because that was, of course, the topic this book was actually supposed to be about. I think it is clear that Dyer is very self-aware and I'd love to read more (non-fictional) works of his.
4.5 STARS
4.5 STARS
I went into this hoping for an exploration of the perpetual indecision that comes with writing. Instead, I wanted to punch him for the sheer self indulgence of it.
He lost me right around page 5 "When all you have to go on is your own desires, then life becomes considerably more difficult." Prick.
He lost me right around page 5 "When all you have to go on is your own desires, then life becomes considerably more difficult." Prick.
Struggled with this initially, found the use of repetition quite grating. Definitely grew on me though and found the author's constant state of irritability amusing a lot of the time. Definitely really well written for the most part and glad I read in the end. Don't think this will prompt me to read a lot of D.H.Lawrence - not that that's the point...
There are few things more satisfying than finishing a book, especially a long-standing book, who you have hunkered down and sweated out and fought with and poured over and quoted and become bored with. Such is it with this book which, only moments ago, I completed after something like a month and a half of reading. And it only weighs in at 230+ pages.
Funny, insightful, at times dreadfully dull, at others wildly intoxicating, Dyer's book about writing a book about D.H.Lawrence is my first exposure to either writer, and lead me to the fundamental realization that Dyer is magnificent and D.H.Lawrence is dull.
Strangely, though, I think Dyer would approve.
Funny, insightful, at times dreadfully dull, at others wildly intoxicating, Dyer's book about writing a book about D.H.Lawrence is my first exposure to either writer, and lead me to the fundamental realization that Dyer is magnificent and D.H.Lawrence is dull.
Strangely, though, I think Dyer would approve.
Geoff Dyer is crazy. I mean it in a good way. In fact better: I mean - he’s crazy in a way you want people to be crazy. Yes. Let’s face it we want (some) people to be crazy. In a way we want to be crazy that is. But we do. Don’t deny it. In a world where no one is crazy (in a way we want them to be crazy) it would be so boring. That world will be like a world without writers like Geoff Dyer. I’d rather not live in such a world. I’d rather live in a world where Geoff Dyer is -- and is crazy in a way we want people to be crazy.
I picked up Out of Sheer Rage, out of sheer coincidence. Okay, honest now. I picked it up, because I got it at a bargain price. This crazy scholarly study of D. H. Lawrence, would hardly have meant anything to me, as I had/have not read Lawrence. Not a single line. But after reading OoSR, I want to go and read Lawrence -- some of him at least -- and go back and read OoSR again. But even if I don't do it (read Lawrence), I may go back and read parts of OsSR again.
Absolutely funny and highly philosophical, this is my Dyer #2. And the queue has a few more, and growing. And I hope, one day, I write such a scholarly study of Dyer as he has done of Lawrence!
I picked up Out of Sheer Rage, out of sheer coincidence. Okay, honest now. I picked it up, because I got it at a bargain price. This crazy scholarly study of D. H. Lawrence, would hardly have meant anything to me, as I had/have not read Lawrence. Not a single line. But after reading OoSR, I want to go and read Lawrence -- some of him at least -- and go back and read OoSR again. But even if I don't do it (read Lawrence), I may go back and read parts of OsSR again.
Absolutely funny and highly philosophical, this is my Dyer #2. And the queue has a few more, and growing. And I hope, one day, I write such a scholarly study of Dyer as he has done of Lawrence!