Steal some other book

[sandwichcontrol]

At a noted East Village bookshop with a deliriously good collection of literary magazines, I decided to wean myself from their pulpy lure [pulpy pap?--ed.] and go browse through the real literature. Perusing Fiction among the A's, I came across this sign: Auster is at the information desk. I moved slightly to my right, and found: Bukowski is at

Comments

When you write about me, I sound ten pounds thinner.

[anonymous]

Isaac fixed my computer! Isaac fixed my computer! Yay! Love, Cara

Re: When you write about me, I sound ten pounds thinner.

[sandwichcontrol]

Your subject line is so true, but I can't figure out why. Certainly I'm not picturing you ten pounds lighter when I write you -- if anything, I'm envisioning you 30 or 40 pounds heavier, and on a chaise longue, with corgis, and a box of peppermints.

Like a Wharton character. So it's odd that I write you like Philip Roth doing Evelyn Waugh (no, not like that).

P.S. LiveJournal's spell checker suggests "longueur" for "longue."

Being fat will make my hands look feminine for once.

[anonymous]

Ah! I have told you about my deep desire to grow up to be the aunt in _The House of Mirth_, yes? So fat my little hands look wholly unrelated to my body, and so fat I scandalously move my bedroom downstairs. Oh, I'll be lovely when I'm fat.

"Longue"? The OED says "Obs. form of LUNG." I must say I find your reference confusing. My little French dictionary suggests you are making obscure grammatical associations entirely too complex for my girlish mind. Surely you don't mean "chaise lounge"? Please, I beg of you your explanation.

Ever your faithful reader,
C.P.Rachele

P.S. Avi told his mother the other day (in a fit of scruffy-boy pique) that he was tired of living in a Philip Roth novel. Now she ends all her emails with, "I am not a stereotype. Love, your mother."

I moved to NY to usurp your friends. Avi's next.

[sandwichcontrol]

There is no such thing as a "chaise lounge." The correct term is "chaise longue," which means "long chair." "Chaise lounge" is one of those singularly American mistakes with French -- we always seem to butcher the language somewhat deliberately -- like our "nom de plume" for the proper "pseudonym," or the all too ubiquitous "with au jus" of cafeteria menus.

And I think the character you're thinking of is in A of I, not H of M.

[dehumidifier]

I like Burroughs. Well, most of it anyways.
Bukowski, however...do people actually believe they are reading amazing poetry when they read Bukowski? I've always found it average at best, save the occasional line here and there. Just because something is formatted like poetry does not make it poetry.

I have yet to warm up to James.

[maidofspades]

I stalked Jonathan Safran Foer once. Or twice.

I almost had him, too. But Paul Auster came between us.