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ni'k · 10.23.2010, 06:59 PM

i think it's for the best that most people are past that gonzo beat stuff. there is a really nasty superficiality to it. In the 60's you could maybe get away with it now, but trying to write that kind of high intensity ultra personal drug rampage prose nowadays will just burn you out and give you liver damage ha. in the era of the internet and the kind of media blitz and amped up hedonism writing like that just seems idioitic. i couldn't bear to read kerouac at this point, the last time i did it was just far too boring. i hear kirsten stewart is making an on the road film, which tells you all you need to know. and there was a ginsburg film released this year about the obscenity court battle over howl which according to the review i read is excruciatingly boring in that all american freedom of speech kind of way. i guess ginsberg and kerouac could be thought of as "establishment" writers at this point. certainly harmless and past their sell by date. thompson as well who can be best summed up in the words of some posh student i met as a "buffoon who wrote one clownish yet exciting book and then just partied any sliver of talent out of himself."

i think if you haven't faced the fact that the beats and what they did is just archaic in 2010 then you've got no hope anyway. i mean, scouring the wierder realms of literature in the 60's in your crappy new york apartment like burroughs did was pretty cool but now with the internet there's little that seems so tantalisingly remote.

ligotti is a horror writer btw but don't let that put you off. his stuff has the same unsettling slimy tone of burroughs but he pulls it off with prose that is at times almost old fashioned and classical

the place to start is probably the short story collection teatro grottesco.

you were mentioning welsh - i know he gets some flack but a lot of his stuff really is quite quality. the acid house for example, and filth which is the one of his that noone seems to ever talk about. apparently he is working on another trainspotting sequel, but he seems to be taking his time. probably because he's gone all aristocratic and gentleman like now and doesn't like the idea of writing about the depressing later years of the characters that we can all imagine them having.

10.23.2010, 06:59 PM	#74
ni'k invito al cielo Join Date: Aug 2006 Posts: 3,360	i think it's for the best that most people are past that gonzo beat stuff. there is a really nasty superficiality to it. In the 60's you could maybe get away with it now, but trying to write that kind of high intensity ultra personal drug rampage prose nowadays will just burn you out and give you liver damage ha. in the era of the internet and the kind of media blitz and amped up hedonism writing like that just seems idioitic. i couldn't bear to read kerouac at this point, the last time i did it was just far too boring. i hear kirsten stewart is making an on the road film, which tells you all you need to know. and there was a ginsburg film released this year about the obscenity court battle over howl which according to the review i read is excruciatingly boring in that all american freedom of speech kind of way. i guess ginsberg and kerouac could be thought of as "establishment" writers at this point. certainly harmless and past their sell by date. thompson as well who can be best summed up in the words of some posh student i met as a "buffoon who wrote one clownish yet exciting book and then just partied any sliver of talent out of himself." i think if you haven't faced the fact that the beats and what they did is just archaic in 2010 then you've got no hope anyway. i mean, scouring the wierder realms of literature in the 60's in your crappy new york apartment like burroughs did was pretty cool but now with the internet there's little that seems so tantalisingly remote. ligotti is a horror writer btw but don't let that put you off. his stuff has the same unsettling slimy tone of burroughs but he pulls it off with prose that is at times almost old fashioned and classical the place to start is probably the short story collection teatro grottesco. you were mentioning welsh - i know he gets some flack but a lot of his stuff really is quite quality. the acid house for example, and filth which is the one of his that noone seems to ever talk about. apparently he is working on another trainspotting sequel, but he seems to be taking his time. probably because he's gone all aristocratic and gentleman like now and doesn't like the idea of writing about the depressing later years of the characters that we can all imagine them having.
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