Monday, May 07, 2007

Talk about a contrarian ...

... consider Tom Wolfe: Dandy with a taste for literary spats.

“Bush is portrayed as a moron. I’ve only conversed with him a couple of times – not for very long – but I found he was more literate on literature than the editor of the New York Review of Books, Bob Silvers. I’ve talked to both of them, and he makes Bob Silvers look like a slug.”

3 comments:

  1. Anonymous4:53 AM

    Wolfe- a silly looking strangely trumped up mediocrity. If this is fiction I want my television back.

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  2. Nothing like incisive, dispassionate analysis. What else is education - or is it training - for?

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  3. Anonymous8:29 AM

    If we are to measure literary worth meaningfully, then Wolfe is certainly at best a mediocrity. Coupled with this mediocrity is a comically pompous self-regard. The magisterial sweep of his supposedly brillian(substitute banal and false)overview of politics, culture, etc...for some reason brings to mind Dostoevsky's distaste and ultimate disgust for the effete creature Turgenev turned himself into. Though of course Turgenev at least had at least past genius behind him. Noone could make anything like such claims for Wolfe. 'A silly-looking trumped up mediocrity' stands.

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