Word: readerly
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...triumph over the plate: “There comes a point...when the pleasure of tasting food gives way to a more visceral, almost delirious delight in the physical act of eating.” Just as Barlow feels compelled to finish the steaming bag of bones, the reader feels compelled to finish the book for the sheer pleasure of conquering it. Still, “Squeal” is not an entirely unappetizing adventure. Like Barlow’s twice-consumed intestinal entrée, the book is also full of meaty gems. His evident mastery of language?...
...domestic realm, as their wives make them feel ashamed, used, and inadequate. Developing complexes that make them shudder at the thought of having sex with their wives, they retreat into passivity or run far, far away into delusion.Tsutsui’s own detached narrative voice allows the reader to laugh at events that would otherwise be overly pathetic or horrifying. The clever blend of science fiction and realism allows Tsutsui to defamiliarize the familiar and highlight certain similarities that wouldn’t otherwise be obvious. The routine parts of life—worries about what the boss will...
While literary references ooze from Komunyakaa’s poems, they are surprisingly readable and unpretentious. Yet there is still a clear wall between the poet and the reader. As Komunyakaa once said, “Poetry is a kind of distilled insinuation. It’s a way of expanding and talking around an idea or a question...
...being able to fully express his emotions regarding it. “Iraq? Well, as I said before: / If you start me talking, / I’ll tell everything I know,” he says, implying that there is a whole world of information to which neither the reader nor the narrator is privy...
...hubble-bubbles and the sahibs lighting their Sumatra buncuses. Cunchunees whirling and ticky-taw boys beating their tobblers...” And so it goes for an entire page. The jerks from one end of the linguistic spectrum to the other serve no one well, least of all the reader. There are rich possibilities within “Sea of Poppies” that never come to bloom. With such an ambitious reach, Ghosh’s novel ought to make the reader a part of its historical present. Excellence is within reach, but the fact that it is only...