Take a photo of a barcode or cover
screen_memory 's review for:
Eden Eden Eden
by Pierre Guyotat, Roland Barthes
Eden Eden Eden? More like Boring Boring Boring.
Guyotat? More like Blahblahblah.
"...written...in a language of startling innovation," Foucault says. "Most original write alive," Stephen Barber says. Hey, cool, he invented a new lexicon. His language is refreshing and invigorating. Wow! But how is it handled?
I will say that Guyotat's prose has a way of delivering the reader into the immediacy of the action, but, dear God, it's nearly 160 pages of prostitutes and whores fucking, and in Eden's distinct style which becomes exhausting to read after a while (I won't post an excerpt here; search for an excerpt of the book online). There were a few pages of soldiers torturing an Algerian, busting open his face and sodomizing him with objects, that was both exhilarating and disturbing and produced just a faint intimation of sickness in my stomach--scenes like this being what I expected what with the novel taking place in Algeria during their civil war. But there is not one scene bearing any similitude to this one. It denigrates into Wazzag's, a male prostitute, misadventures with numerous whores and "drillers" with whom he has sex.
I would have been pleased had Eden met with a similar fate as Guyotat's Prostitution--only an excerpt has been translated into English, giving us some twenty-five pages of Guyotat's as-of-yet unpublished novel. Twenty to thirty pages would be plenty for what instead was an exhausting 180-page trudge through clumsy and disjointed perversion, made additionally difficult by the book's frustrating language.
The book is out of print and rather expensive, so anyone looking to get into Guyotat through this book may want to acquaint themselves with the style through the various excerpts online and determine whether or not you could negotiate with 180 pages of the shit. A good starting point for Guyotat? I'm not sure. I also dropped quite a bit on Tomb For 500,000 Soldiers which I will begin the day after this writing. After Prostitution and this book, I am praying Tomb makes up for the hefty price I paid for both it and Eden.
Guyotat? More like Blahblahblah.
"...written...in a language of startling innovation," Foucault says. "Most original write alive," Stephen Barber says. Hey, cool, he invented a new lexicon. His language is refreshing and invigorating. Wow! But how is it handled?
I will say that Guyotat's prose has a way of delivering the reader into the immediacy of the action, but, dear God, it's nearly 160 pages of prostitutes and whores fucking, and in Eden's distinct style which becomes exhausting to read after a while (I won't post an excerpt here; search for an excerpt of the book online). There were a few pages of soldiers torturing an Algerian, busting open his face and sodomizing him with objects, that was both exhilarating and disturbing and produced just a faint intimation of sickness in my stomach--scenes like this being what I expected what with the novel taking place in Algeria during their civil war. But there is not one scene bearing any similitude to this one. It denigrates into Wazzag's, a male prostitute, misadventures with numerous whores and "drillers" with whom he has sex.
I would have been pleased had Eden met with a similar fate as Guyotat's Prostitution--only an excerpt has been translated into English, giving us some twenty-five pages of Guyotat's as-of-yet unpublished novel. Twenty to thirty pages would be plenty for what instead was an exhausting 180-page trudge through clumsy and disjointed perversion, made additionally difficult by the book's frustrating language.
The book is out of print and rather expensive, so anyone looking to get into Guyotat through this book may want to acquaint themselves with the style through the various excerpts online and determine whether or not you could negotiate with 180 pages of the shit. A good starting point for Guyotat? I'm not sure. I also dropped quite a bit on Tomb For 500,000 Soldiers which I will begin the day after this writing. After Prostitution and this book, I am praying Tomb makes up for the hefty price I paid for both it and Eden.