Word: barthes
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This is John Barth's new book, Lost in the Funhouse, which is a collection of stories for "print, tape, live voice." The Funhouse of the title is the metaphysical maze of reality, perception, and creation. The book is an extraordinary inside-outside-inside exploration of the process of composition, like a photograph of a man taking a photograph. Whitehead said that literature is that which embodies what it indicates. When that which is embodied is the act of embodiment, there is bound to be a bang, probably the reader slamming shut the book...
Lost in the Funhouse consists of facile, stylistic games. There is no doubt that Barth has an excellent command of the language, but his skill is misdirected, or, more accurately, not directed at all. The stories "Title," "Life-Story," and, in different ways, "Anonymiad," "Lost in the Funhouse," and "Autobiography" are stories about men writing stories. Indeed, in "Life-Story" the man in the story is writing a story about a man writing a story and so on. The novelty of the idea is quickly exhausted; Borges could have summarized it in a single line...
...stories, is about love, however abstractly that compact may be presented. There is, though, a basic flaw in the piece: In fantastic literature, the author is allowed to make any conditions he likes, but once these are established, the action must be within their limits. The reader will allow Barth to allow a spermatazoa to meditate, but he cannot allow that spermatazoa to record theories about his purpose (correct in every detail)--which theories no spermatazoa could ever have conceived...
...seaside amusement park with his family, and there he gets lost in the funhouse. We are not sure if he really gets lost in the funhouse because we are made constantly aware of the author's hand pushing his characters around. Does Ambrose get lost, or does Barth make him get lost, or does Barth speculate about making him get lost? It is impossible to tell, which may be what the author is driving...
LOST IN THE FUNHOUSE, by John Barth. When read straight through, these 14 experimental pieces of fiction by the author of Giles Goat-Boy interact to produce a series of enticing illusions...