2000: Me Talk Pretty One Day, David Sedaris

For 2000 I read Me Talk Pretty One Day, by David Sedaris, a work of humor mostly in the modern observational style (by the end of the book, think a gay Greek Seinfeld raised in North Carolina but self-exiled to Paris).

The book is (deeply?) divided into two sections, One and Deux. Part One is a series of anecdotes describing his upbringing in North Carolina, his family members' quirks, but most of all his various inabilities to fit into society's expectations--of masculinity, proper speech (he receives speech therapy from a woman "for whom the word 'pen' had two syllables", and even his own views of himself as a sensitive and creative artist. I think his account of his meth-fueled descent from traditional art school, where he had no talent, into more and more surreal forms of Dadaist-type 'art', are the most reflective and show the power of satire to attack even more devastatingly than a perfectly-formed logical argument. Light accounts of his various odd jobs in recovery from this low point chronicle his adoption, via a Communist furniture-moving collective, as an urbane New Yorker.

Part Deux, on the other hand, seems to descend into pettier stabs at American and French society. Sedaris moves with his partner Hugh to France and finds himself unable to grasp French well enough to communicate (the source of the title); but while his adept avoidance of his speech impediment as a child, using large, impressive words to avoid the letter s, was endearing, his avoidance of French conversation and culture seems tiringly juvenile. His observations seem to lose their reflective layer, which was disappointing as I was looking forward to his observations on the difficulties of comparative language. I am, however, willing to admit that I read Part Deux in a fairly different mood than the first section, which may have contributed as much as any slide on the author's part.

When Sedaris is on top of his game, he reads a modern Twain of sorts--it's that good, that enjoyable, that funny.

2000

In the year 2000...

There are a decent number of books out with possibilities:

Angels and Demons, Dan Brown
Me Talk Pretty One Day, David Sedaris
The Measure of a Man: A Spiritual Autobiography, Sidney Poitier
Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi
The Prayer of Jabez: Breaking Through to the Blessed Life, Bruce Wilkinson
Omerta, Mario Puzo
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, J.K. Rowling
A Heartbreaking work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers
The Beatles Anthology
The Oldest Girl in the World, Carol Ann Duffy
Odyssey, tr. Stanley Lombardo
Purgatorio, tr. W. S. Merwin
Jersey Rain, Robert Pinsky

I'm going to go with Me Talk Pretty One Day.

Half Done?

Books.
Stacks of books.
Strewn stacks of books, threatening to suffocate the undone laundry, picked up, perused intensely but for a moment, tossed down and forgotten as the phone rings...

My reading has been really sloppy lately. I pick up a book, read it for a bit, and put it down to go do something else; when I come back, I'm just as likely to pick something entirely different up. Worst of all, I've been skipping around in the same books and not putting them away when I finish, languishing in some re-reading purgatory. The small rotation of books in my bedroom skews eclectic (Watchmen-Florida Herbs and Herb Gardens-The Order of Things eclectic) and haphazard, even for me. I'd like to pretend this is some aberrant stage in my reading life, that I was once an orderly consumer of books, but it's a lie. Many of my friends read voraciously; in addition, I read omnivorously, not so much like a man bringing a five-course dinner to its intended telos as a man discovering the all-you-can-eat buffet for the first time.

Thinking to tame the beast, I set out to order my liber-al life by means of a reading journal, a blog with the three-pronged purpose of making me finish books, start new ones after that, and refine some writing skills while I'm at it. It made the most sense to set out with a list of books, to keep things moving along. I painted grand pictures in my head of one insignificant man's encounter with the Great Books of All Time list, a journey epic in scope and brilliant in juxtaposing the authoritative list of the editors and the noble prose of the authors with the subjective ramblings of the reader. One problem.

I couldn't find a list I liked. Seriously, do you believe that there were 100 great American novels written in the 20th century? How seriously could you take a poll that put the entire Harry Potter, Ayn Rand, or L. Ron Hubbard canon in the topmost slots?

Granted, I was being entirely too picky, but the vision in my head just couldn't be satisfied--echos of an undergraduate writing career--and I decided to strike out entirely on my own.

So for a theme, I'll be taking a journey back in time through the 20th century, one year and one book at a time.

Come with? I'm not looking, at least not at first, to say anything significant or grand about what I read; the idea for reading is simple progress, and for writing, steady practice. I'd be happy to authorize another user on the journey. If you want, you could read the same books, different ones, or even start in 1901 and work your way toward me in 2000.

Don't sweat saying no; I know the project is pretty crazy. Even just a regular glance at my ramblings or an occasional comment would be fantastically encouraging.

A thousand thanks to everyone on Facebook who jumped in and wrestled with my crazy list of lists and criteria and general self-contradiction. Y'all are the best!