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A review by fiendfull
Pop Song: Adventures in Art & Intimacy by Larissa Pham
4.0
Pop Song: Adventures in Art & Intimacy is an exploration of love and art, and how both make you feel. The series of essays charts, loosely, a relationship: how Pham became the person she was when she met this lover, only referred to as "you" throughout, what happened during their relationship, and how it ends. At the same time, the essays also consider other areas like trauma and belonging and explore various artistic forms and media, including painting, photography, and music.
Memoirs and essay collections (this is a hybrid, really) that combine the personal with reflections on particular artists or works are something I only occasionally read, but I do like the ability to learn about and explore particular works of art whilst also getting the insight of something more personal. I don't know much about most of the artists and forms discussed in Pop Song (there's a bit about Anne Carson which is more of my area), but I enjoyed reading about Pham's reactions to and thoughts of them. I also found the 'intimacy' element, with the melancholic 'you' being spoken to, very effective, bringing the sense you get from poetry and songs that you don't quite know the 'you' being referred to is or how much an image of them is being constructed.
If I'm honest, I was drawn initially to the book by the title "Pop Song", which perhaps didn't give me quite the right impression of the book going into it, but this is an interesting sequence of essays exploring emotion in art and life.
Memoirs and essay collections (this is a hybrid, really) that combine the personal with reflections on particular artists or works are something I only occasionally read, but I do like the ability to learn about and explore particular works of art whilst also getting the insight of something more personal. I don't know much about most of the artists and forms discussed in Pop Song (there's a bit about Anne Carson which is more of my area), but I enjoyed reading about Pham's reactions to and thoughts of them. I also found the 'intimacy' element, with the melancholic 'you' being spoken to, very effective, bringing the sense you get from poetry and songs that you don't quite know the 'you' being referred to is or how much an image of them is being constructed.
If I'm honest, I was drawn initially to the book by the title "Pop Song", which perhaps didn't give me quite the right impression of the book going into it, but this is an interesting sequence of essays exploring emotion in art and life.