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dthulter 's review for:
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
by Dave Eggers
I get why people might hate this book. It is not really great for anybody looking for a particular plot, or particularly attached to a sense of linear continuity. It is not recommended for anybody obsessed with accuracy of events in memoirs. That said, this is definitely one of my most favoritest reads ever.
I just finished this book for the second time- this time in audio-book format, masterfully presented by Dion Graham. I was wondering if it would still be one of my favorite books after I listened to it close to a decade later.
It is. It so very much is.
I don't want to try and be too insightful here. Dave Eggers does a fantastically hilarious job of dissecting the themes and symbols within his book in the Prologue.
What I do want to say is that what really strikes me about Eggers' AHWOSG over and over, what makes me feel like I want to carry a copy of this book around like a stuffed animal that I can cover my face with when I feel scared- is that I identify with the language: the stream of consciousness dictation of his consciousness comes off as more than just familiar to me. This book is the first and only time I have ever seen my mode of existence, the content of my own internal ticker-tape, translated onto the page.
Dave Eggers hit the nail on my head?
The events of this book, for me, are secondary to the frantic, insecure, disturbed, distracted and self-obsessed, frothing cognitive swells in the mind of the author- who is ever scrambling and scraping at the walls of every experience for some sort of cathartic climax- for the ecstasy of completion.
It is because I identify with the voice of the author so very strongly that I feel so attached to this book. For that reason, I recommend it to nobody, because if any of you fuckers like it too, that just makes me feel less and less and less special.
I just finished this book for the second time- this time in audio-book format, masterfully presented by Dion Graham. I was wondering if it would still be one of my favorite books after I listened to it close to a decade later.
It is. It so very much is.
I don't want to try and be too insightful here. Dave Eggers does a fantastically hilarious job of dissecting the themes and symbols within his book in the Prologue.
What I do want to say is that what really strikes me about Eggers' AHWOSG over and over, what makes me feel like I want to carry a copy of this book around like a stuffed animal that I can cover my face with when I feel scared- is that I identify with the language: the stream of consciousness dictation of his consciousness comes off as more than just familiar to me. This book is the first and only time I have ever seen my mode of existence, the content of my own internal ticker-tape, translated onto the page.
Dave Eggers hit the nail on my head?
The events of this book, for me, are secondary to the frantic, insecure, disturbed, distracted and self-obsessed, frothing cognitive swells in the mind of the author- who is ever scrambling and scraping at the walls of every experience for some sort of cathartic climax- for the ecstasy of completion.
It is because I identify with the voice of the author so very strongly that I feel so attached to this book. For that reason, I recommend it to nobody, because if any of you fuckers like it too, that just makes me feel less and less and less special.