This is a small book one could carry in their pocket and may want to. It is comprised of 300 phrases of one to maybe 4 sentences. Each is form of aphorism - but not a cliche with a hint of condescension like The Early Bird Catches the Worm. These are idiosyncratic, darkly funny, wise from a place of humility. Things like:
Each works on their own. But as you read them, they collectively have an arc, a personality. She discusses why she pursues this distilled form of not-poetry vs. a long-form novels or other writing she has been steered to. She makes oblique references to having a serious illness (an immunodeficiency disease she wrote about in a memoir), then being a mother and wife. I definitely felt the 300 arguments chronicling a consciousness, an identity emerging and gaining wisdom. I suspect that a woman would find some deep truths and insights in this book and love it for reasons only available to me on the outside. But I love it for what I got out of it.
Each to their own I guess but the ones included in your OP sound like something a pissed-off teenager would write. Those examples don’t make me want to read any further.
Hey no worries. YMMV and all. It feels like I didn’t do a good job, because it certainly doesn’t come across as juvenile. I was trying to show a couple of the crass / funny ones.
I heard about it on NPR and other places I like, and it reviewed well. An essayist I like, John Jeremiah Sullivan, blurbed it. I gave it a shot and found it really good.
And no worries either way. Literature and art more widely speaks to different people in different ways. If it works for you, it works for you and it may well be something that others will find meaningful. If so…more power to them.
(My perennial cultural blindspot is jazz, I hate it whilst fully appreciating others find great joy…so it goes.)
Well, from my woman’s perspective, and based only on the excerpts you’ve offered here, I think I would get nauseous reading this book from all the eye rolling I’d be doing. Silly twit, I’d be thinking if I was in a charitable mood. Stupid twat, if I was having a bad day.
Do you have any other examples from this book to suggest this wisdom you found so compelling?
Ah, that’s better. The description about depression rings true.
Sometimes that’s difficult to express even to oneself.
Today in the ambulance, the paramedic was asking me about what medical conditions I had. I mentioned the diabetes and the high blood pressure. But I didn’t even think to list clinical depression until she asked about my meds.
Btw, I have a chest cold that triggered the all time mother of asthma attacks. The hospital wanted to keep me overnight. But I have a ninety year old mom at home who can’t be left alone that long.
Didn’t mean to hijack. I’m just cursing the fates. I’m glad you found a book that speaks to you Wordman. Thanks for the kind thought after my snottiness.