Dead Wood with Woodpecker
Nov. 25th, 2006 09:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
catalyst2Sorry, that should have been "Still Life with Woodpecker". I know when I am in a trouble when I find the jacket quote (which, if Tom Robbins was thinking at all, should know is an insult) more amusing than anything in the book. The quote (apparently from an unnamed British critic) is "Tom Robbins writes like Dolly Parton looks". For me, I translated this as meaning that Robbins' writing is overblown, looks pretty at a distant but very forced close up and is the product of a deliberate manipulation and exaggeration of something which is rather ordinary at heart. And that that's OK - if that is all you are looking for.
Don't get me wrong, Robbins is a writer with a wonderful turn of phrase:
"Albert Camus wrote that the only serious question is whether to kill yourself or not. Tom Robbins wrote that the only serious question is whether time has a beginning and an end. Camus clearly got up on the wrong side of bed, and Robbins must have forgotten to set the alarm."
and
"Somewhere between champagne and tequila is the secret history of Mexico, just as somewhere between beef jerky and Hostess Twinkies is the secret history of America"
but story? meh! characterization? meh! people I want to know more about? me! improved my knowledge of the world? meh! posed questions that make me consider my view of the world? meh!
Don't get me wrong, Robbins is a writer with a wonderful turn of phrase:
"Albert Camus wrote that the only serious question is whether to kill yourself or not. Tom Robbins wrote that the only serious question is whether time has a beginning and an end. Camus clearly got up on the wrong side of bed, and Robbins must have forgotten to set the alarm."
and
"Somewhere between champagne and tequila is the secret history of Mexico, just as somewhere between beef jerky and Hostess Twinkies is the secret history of America"
but story? meh! characterization? meh! people I want to know more about? me! improved my knowledge of the world? meh! posed questions that make me consider my view of the world? meh!
