a note to myself about reality, butts, and the state of fiction: or here are some things that are dumb

1. the idea that literature is exhausted or that it is no longer able to change reality (an excerpt over at htmlgiant).  like some commenter says, take the butthurt and soak it in a butt-tub.  a novel can't change reality anymore?  when did a novel change reality?  when did, like collectively, we all have deja-vu and it was really a novel changing reality?

2.  complaining about mfa writing.  there are more books than ever before at any point in human history, please, you don't have to read mfa books.  also, you don't have to read.

3.  telling people to be less serious.  why is everyone so serious everyone sometimes wants to know?  why can't we all take ourselves less seriously?   good advice, thank you. everyone who tells everyone else to be less serious, seriously, thank you.  listen, you serious person, why can't you be less serious?  you serious person, why can't you joke more, like how it was before, when everyone was joking, i mean, seriously.

4.  any statement that talks about living in the "real world" or that we need more stories about the "real world" where "real world" is a substitute for a story that has whiskey, adultery, low-income-living, wife-beaters, period blood, period sex, punching, guns, fast-somewhat-dirty-cars, knives, trailer parks, unshorn balls/abundant male butt-hair.

5.  using the word "blood" as a metaphorical descriptor for the process of writing or experience of reading certain writing or certain writing being read.  as in: "seemed like he shit blood to write that story, love it" or "she bled all over the audience, that reading was so good."

6. hyperbole about a book/story/poem in general.  as in: "this book will rock you face off and you deserve for your face to be rocked off." or stuff like "omg, i just swoon over her books."

7. coolness.

love,
alan