Apparently, what’s really going on is that Hamlet’s father was a total homo. As I understand it from the review, Claudius comes out blameless in this version; the real bad guys were Gay Absentee Dad Hamlet and all the prince’s friends that he molested.

Whenever I read another example of Card’s pathological homophobia, I’m reminded of my first (and as far as I’m aware, only) exposure to Card’s writing: it’s a short story called “Fat Farm” that appeared in OMNI magazine in 1980. I must’ve been around 11 or 12 when I read it, and I’ll never forget it, partly because I’d never before seen such a dark and nasty piece of work.

The story is this: a morbidly obese man returns to the clinic he visits every few years, checking in as a fat man and leaving in perfect physical shape to begin the cycle once again. But this isn’t any normal clinic; this is a clinic in the future in a sci-fi anthology magazine! Instead of giving you a workout, the clinic actually transfers your consciousness into a younger, fresher, slimmer body.

What our protagonist doesn’t realized, however, is that his consciousness isn’t just transferred, but copied. His “old” body still lives, but without any of the legal rights to his identity that he had when checking in. He’s sent to a work farm, where he’s subjected to manual labor and abuse from a brutal overseer who absolutely despises him for some unknown reason. After years of working at a potato farm, he finally earns the lean, muscular (and tanned!) body he’d always wanted, buried under layers of flab. When another, disgustingly fat version of himself is brought in to work, he can feel nothing but hatred and disgust for what that version had done to himself in so short a time. And he finally learns why the overseer always hated him so much: the overseer was the original version!

The moral of the story is obvious: even with future technology, fat people will still be lazy and awful. As an impressionable pre-teen who was still wearing pants sized “Husky,” that stuck with me for a long time.

The other reason it stuck with me so much is that it was the first time I’d read anything that gay. Card spends paragraphs describing the main character seeing his younger self — he’s brought in naked, they caress, they embrace — in great detail. The protagonist works the farm naked, and Card describes lots of tight hard muscles and sun-browned flesh. And it’s not just gay, it’s 80s gay, equal parts self-loathing and cartoonish debauchery:

Somewhere, the man who would be J was dancing, was playing polo, was seducing and perverting and being delighted by every woman and boy and, God knows, sheep that he could find; somewhere the man who would be J dined.

[…]

The helicopter turned then, so that Barth could see nothing but sky from his window. He never saw the whip fall. But he imagined the whip falling, imagined and relished it, longed to feel the heaviness of the blow flowing from his own arm. Hit him again! he cried out inside himself. Hit him for me! And inside himself he made the whip fall a dozen times more.

Not just boys, but sheep! Whip harder!

For those who aren’t familiar with OMNI magazine: it was a science fiction anthology published by Bob Guccione of Penthouse fame. It had some amazing paintings for the stories, which were a combination of “hard” science fiction and sex. Keep in mind this was before the internet, when we pre-teens were still resorting to fiddling the dial on the cable box to try and get a fleeting, blurry glimpse of a tit. The stories in OMNI were usually dark, nihilistic, and with an unhealthy descriptions of sex-to-psychological horror ratio, but in those days we took what we could get.

So Card’s story was my first exposure to dudes making out with each other. (Which I suppose would now make him King Hamlet to my Horatio). And, unfortunately, it fit in with how I wanted to think of homosexuality: synonymous with irresponsibility, hedonism, excess. I wanted to reinforce that I wasn’t like those people; I was better than that. And once that was straightened up, I went back to reading about the dudes making out with each other.

It’s become a trend to suggest that the most vocal anti-gay types are all latent homosexuals themselves. Of course there’s plenty of evidence for that, provided by pastors and Republican representatives, with their work-out regimens and luggage handlers and unconventional notions of restroom etiquette. But I think that’s way too simple, if only because there can’t possibly be enough gay people to account for all of the anti-gay sentiment. The species would go extinct if there were. Fear and mistrust of people who are different, that’s much more universal.

That said, though, Card has spent a lot of time thinking and writing about gay men.

When I was searching for a copy of the story online, I turned up this article by Card saying that all the so-called “research” about the health risks of obesity are invalid. It’s a complete reversal from the guy who wrote “Fat Farm” 25 years earlier, a diatribe about how fat people are repulsive and also they have heart disease and are impotent. What’s galling is his hypocrisy in decrying prejudice against people who are overweight and the tendency to treat obesity as a moral failing. That conclusion is valid, of course, but he deserves no praise for it: Card didn’t grow a conscience over 25 years; he grew fat.

Card continues to speak and write of homosexuality as a moral failing. Maybe it really is a sign of latent homosexuality; all I can see is arrogance. He’s not so much a caricature of the self-loathing homophobe as a caricature of the modern self-described conservative. He understands science better than any politically correct “studies,” and he uses his own perverted version of “science” to support what his common sense and upbringing tell him are true. Things are so much simpler when you can reduce complex biological and sociological systems to trite conclusions and claim they’re based on evolutionary adaptation.

Ultimately, I feel the same way about the cause of Card’s homophobia as I do about the cause of homosexuality itself: it doesn’t matter. What matters is whether you’re a force for good or evil in the world. Technically, I’m supposed to feel some measure of sympathy for self-loathing homosexuals, since I used to be one, but then I remember how I never actively campaigned to treat gay people as morally and legally inferior. And I’ve got even less sympathy for anybody who claims to know what life is like for me without even knowing me. But then, I wouldn’t be arrogant enough to rewrite Shakespeare, either.

What I don’t understand is why this clown keeps getting work.

Synopsis
The author of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies discovers Abraham Lincoln’s private journal, detailing his history as the greatest vampire hunter of the 1800s.

Futility Disclaimer
The book was by most accounts a big success, a movie’s already in the works, and nobody expects great literature from a book called Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.

Pros
No-brainer of a can’t-fail concept. Well researched (or at least Wikipediaed) enough to avoid being completely frivolous. Lincoln’s ally Henry Sturges is a fairly compelling character. Character voice and journal entries feel authentic enough. There are a few pretty good action sequences, and some pretty horrifying slavery-as-vampirism sequences. Has the same fortifying-by-proxy effect as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: if reading easily-accessible history is as abhorrent to you as reading Jane Austen is to me, you might get something useful out of the book. Abraham Lincoln killing vampires with an axe is what’s promised on the cover, and there’s plenty of that in the book.

Cons
Absolutely no surprises — spoiler warning, John Wilkes Booth is a vampire! — and it takes no risks with the material. Almost all of the vampire-killing stops once Lincoln gets into office, and the book loses most of its punch. The clumsily-Photoshopped period photos don’t add anything, and actually stand out against the attempts at authenticity in the text. So much of the book feels like a novelization of a made-for-TV biopic, as if the author took a list of names and places from a cursory biography of Lincoln and used it as his outline, without making it feel like everything flowed together naturally. (There are occasional exceptions, for instance with Lincoln’s friendship with Joshua Speed, where the author puts a little bit of effort into making Speed feel like a real character).

Synopsis
On the surface, it seems like Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter is less of the search-and-replace job that Pride and Prejudice and Zombies was, but ultimately it’s the exact same concept: take “supposed to be good for you” source material, add internet-meme-inspired action sequences, and cash in from folks like me who’ll buy a book based on the title alone. This isn’t a bad book by any stretch, and it’s got more heft than the goofy title would suggest. But the gimmick is starting to feel more than a little crass, when the book takes a concept and does so little to expand on it. I’m feeling less like I’m in on the joke, riffing with the author on a wacky idea, and more like I’m being sold a T-shirt with an ironic slogan.

Ultimately, the book is too goofy to qualify as “real” literature, but too dry to qualify as action-horror-comedy. There are enough passages in the book — the embellished story of the Roanoake colony, for instance — that are just on the cusp of being interesting on their own merits, that I wish the author would try to write a book from scratch.

Plus it hits all the right notes. It’s nearly impossible to find writing this sharp — especially comedy writing, which hardly anyone in comics can get right — or artwork this polished in the “big three” publishers, much less from a semi-obscure smaller house. The guys behind the comic published their manifesto a couple of years ago, and it proves that they didn’t just stumble onto a good comic, they know what they’re doing. It’s clear that they’ve put a lot of thought and effort into making something that’s smart, goofy fun.

But as much as I like it, I can all but guarantee it never would’ve caught my attention if not for the Comics app from Comixology. As a matter of fact, I’m pretty sure I have one of the Atomic Robo Free Comic Book Day issues in print lying around somewhere, but I didn’t pay much attention to it (assuming I read it at all). It’s a perfect example of the long-promised potential of digital distribution, but it actually worked for once.

At a retailer, a new comic is a pretty significant investment — not just in money, but time and attention. Smaller publishing houses get overwhelmed by the “big two” (I’d include Dark Horse and call it the “big three”), which dominate the space with long-running established characters and the sheer volume of stuff they release. If I’m only going into a shop once a month at the most, then I’m going to be most interested in catching up on the few series I already follow, and I won’t stray too far out of my comfort zone. And even when the issues are cheaper or even free, I’m reluctant to pick them up, because I’ve already got so much competing for my attention: I know that when I get home, I’m not going to be able to devote more than an hour or two to reading a bunch of comic books.

That’s how DC & Marvel continue to dominate, even when their ratio of great to mediocre is depressingly low: I’m more likely to buy a poorly-written X-Men or Justice League spin-off than a well-written comic featuring a character I’ve never heard of. Even if it’s by a known talent whose work I’ve liked elsewhere. I’ve railed against this in videogames, where there’s this increasing insistence on sequels, licenses, and spin-offs instead of original IP, but I’m just as guilty of it. In comics, I am the dreaded but desirable Casual Audience.

But the iPad levels the playing field. (At least, somewhat, and we’ll see how long it lasts). The “flagship” Comics.app puts stuff from the indies right alongside the bigger publishers in the new releases, giving everything equal cover space and making everything searchable. You can easily see why Marvel and DC demanded their own reskinned and branded versions of the Comics app (and DC demanded its own button in the flagship app), because it’s the only way to keep exploiting the brand dominance they spent decades building. They’ve spent so long milking everything they can out of their long-running characters, their main advantage at this point is familiarity, not (necessarily) quality.

It’s still very unsettling to me that I can turn on my Magic Tablet of Privilege, launch an app, and buy an issue of Hellboy, Batman, or maybe one of the original Lee/Kirby issues Fantastic Four, whenever I feel like it. That was one of the main reasons I bought the thing in the first place, but I never actually expected it to happen. It took a year from the release of the first iPhone before Apple put out the SDK, so I expected a similar delay before the potential of the iPad was realized. But here we are just a few months after release, and all of the major comics publishers have something — not nearly enough yet, but something — available. When I was in my hotel room in Florida a couple of weeks ago, I read the last couple of issues of Chew and a couple issues of Grant Morrison’s run on Batman in 2006, none of which I would’ve bothered with if I’d had to get individual issues or even trade paperbacks. It was more like being in the future than anything in Tomorrowland or Future World.

Not everything’s perfect, of course:

• Recent issues: The smaller publishers are pretty good about staying current, and DC and Marvel have a smattering of recent issues available, but for the most part, everything you can get (legally) for the iPad is at least a year old. That’s fine for casual types like me, who are still in the process of getting caught up. But I’m going to catch up pretty soon, and I’ve pretty much sworn off individual issues at this point. They just seem like a waste of money, time, and space. It’s digital distribution or no sale for me.
• Availability: Even among the older material, there are still big holes in the libraries. It’s great that Dark Horse is finally in, but as of right now they’ve only got the first volume of Hellboy and a couple of smaller series that don’t interest me. Where’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the B.P.R.D.? DC and Marvel have a lot more, but they’re still being fairly tentative and keeping the releases to their major series, cross-overs, and movie tie-ins. It’s fantastic that DC has Batman: Year One online, but I’ve already bought that mini-series. Three times, even. Instead of just re-releasing the stuff that’s already made money several times over, it seems like the biggest potential of digital distribution is in releasing semi-obscure stuff that doesn’t warrant a full reprint. Release the J.M. DeMatteis and Shawn McManus issues of Dr. Fate from the late 80s, for instance, and I’ll buy every one (again).
• Organization: It seems odd to follow a complaint that there’s not enough stuff available with a complaint that stuff is too hard to find, but there you go. Comixology’s UI design, which seemed great while everyone was still getting used to the idea of digital comics and were still waiting for the big publishers to join in, has already gotten overwhelmed by the amount of content available. They’ve effectively managed to duplicate the problems of a physical comic book store (and comic book collection) on a device with infinite capacity. In the store, the cover flow view is fixed and takes up a big chunk of screen real estate. Browsing is limited to lists of text, there’s no easy way to browse through everything from a certain publisher or in an individual series, for instance. And in the “My Comics” section, I have to scroll through a half-screen-sized list of every issue I’ve bought, when I’d much rather just ditch the cover flow view and instead get drill-downs or “folders” based on series. Plus, they don’t put dates on anything, possibly at the publisher’s request. For a medium that’s so heavy on monthly releases and continuity, you need to know when stuff originally came out.
• Pricing: You can’t have anything delivering content to the over-privileged without hearing complaints about the price, and comics are no exception. I’m actually completely fine with their charging $1.99 for individual issues — print issues run around $2.99 these days, with ads. Plus the argument that “there’s no printing cost!” is pretty disingenuous; I don’t know the actual numbers, of course, but I would almost guarantee that the cost of talent, editorial, marketing, licensing, and advertising dwarfs printing costs by a wide margin. Not to mention Apple’s 30% cut of everything. No, my problem with the pricing is that everything’s treated as single issues, kind of like if the iTunes Store only sold singles and didn’t allow you to buy the whole album. Since they’re putting out mostly old material anyway, why not offer more collected volumes? I bought Hellboy: Seed of Destruction for the iPad, even though I already own it in both hardback and paperback. I wouldn’t have done that if I’d had to buy the individual issues.

And again, this is all something that Atomic Robo (and, I’m assuming, publisher Red 5 Comics) gets right, while the big names are still floundering. The first issue of Atomic Robo is free, as are the two Free Comic Book Day issues. The series are arranged in volumes of five or six issues each (there are three out right now), and you can choose to buy the individual issues or the collected volume. Individual issues are only 99 cents, and the volumes are four bucks, a dollar less than you’d pay for getting them individually. It’s all exactly the way it should be handled, and I rewarded them by buying in bulk. I’m coming to the series late, and it looks like individual issues of Volume 4 are already out, while they’re not yet available digitally; I’ll be interested to see if they come out once the TPB of Volume 4 is released later this year.

Until then, if you want to try Atomic Robo and you’ve got an iPad or iPhone: get the Comics app, and then download the free “Atomic Robo: FCBD Edition”. The second story, “Why Atomic Robo Hates Dr. Dinosaur,” is my favorite of anything in the series, and actually one of my favorite comics I’ve read since The Amazing Screw-On Head.

I’ve read explanations for all the publisher-imposed limitations with digital comics, and they’re the same as for music, traditional books, and videogames. But instead of learning from what’s come before, it seems like every medium is going to have to learn the same lessons as it makes the crossover into digital.

The first worry is that digital sales will cannibalize print sales. But with comics, it’s the same as with traditional books: the disposable stuff will go digital, the good stuff will always have a home in print. Single issues and “lesser” series, like paperback books and pop singles, are disposable. Collections and trades are permanent. I mentioned that I bought Hellboy: Seed of Destruction for the iPad, but there’s no way that I’m ever giving up my paperback or hardback copies. And I’d never give the digital version as a gift.

The second worry is that digital sales will hurt comics retailers, and that’s the one that I have a little bit more sympathy for, but not much. Comixology has stressed that they see themselves as a supplement to comic shops, not a replacement. They’ve made good on this by including “buy in print” links all over the store with everything you can get digitally. Plus, they’ve still got their other app, which coordinates comic book pull lists with retailers. And again, what’s going to happen is that the businesses that deserve to stay alive will stay alive; the ones that don’t add anything to the experience will become defunct. The store that just has a bunch of long boxes and a surly dude at the counter to sneer at you while you pay three bucks for a 20-page comic? They can go, and good riddance. But the stores that get it right don’t have much to worry about.

Isotope Comics in San Francisco gets it right, and they should have nothing to fear from digital distribution. They’re not just a middleman to keep your pull list for you as you make your obligatory visit whenever new comics come in. Frankly, if you’re looking for the stuff you expect to find from a comic book store — everything new and tons of long boxes filled with back issues — you’re going to be disappointed. Because that’s not the point of the store; James and the people working there didn’t make a comic book store but a comic book lounge. It’s social. They promote the stuff they like. You get recommendations on comics, both the big releases and stuff you’d never have heard of otherwise. There are regular events with artists and writers, and the feel is more like a nightclub than any comic book store you’ve ever been to. Even when nothing’s going on, and you are just stopping in to pick up whatever’s on your pull list, you can get a good conversation about whatever geek topic is making waves at the moment. That kind of social atmosphere is something you’ll never be able to get from an iPad app, and it’s the model that more places should be following instead of just complaining that their business is being taken away.

I already get trade paperbacks from Isotope instead of going through Amazon, just because I want to keep supporting the store. I don’t see that changing anytime soon; I just get to avoid having to buy single issues. Maybe someday I’ll be able to head down to Isotope, pick up the latest volume of Fables in print, and get a couple of recommendations on cool new stuff coming out. I can then fire up the Comics app on my iPad, go to the Isotope section, and download the recommendations, giving the store a cut much like with Amazon’s sponsored links. When we get to that point, I’ll know we’re really in the future.

Synopsis
John Hodgman got famous from “The Daily Show” and those Apple ads and also he’s friends with Jonathan Coulton. (Actually: a continuation of his almanac of made-up facts, begun in The Areas of My Expertise).

Dismaying Fact Discovered
Hodgman is only 24 days older than I am.

Pros
Plenty of inspired bits of surreal comedy that reminded me of Woody Allen and Steve Martin’s comedy-sketch books. Reading random passages made me laugh out loud, several times (and that’s rare). Has a made-up children’s rhyme about the Jonestown Massacre that is pure genius. Has a well-written and genuinely sweet love letter to his wife that is disguised as an essay about alien abduction. Contains the phrase “also, a poop tube.”

Cons
When reading it in order, the set-up/surreal punchline IN ALL CAPS schtick can start to seem a little tedious and forced. Feels more disposable and contains more celebrity name-dropping than I’d expected. The 700 mole-men aren’t as funny as the 700 hoboes, somehow.

Verdict
Hodgman is all about the delivery, both in person and in print, but he’s also managed to distinguish himself as an earnest and surprisingly sincere writer as surprised by his own fame as anyone else. If you’re a fan of the previous book, you’ve already gotten this one. If you’re wondering what the fuss is about, start with The Areas of My Expertise, even though this one is funnier.

A Personal Note
Obviously, I didn’t make it even halfway to my goal of reading 26 books in 2008. For those who are math-deficient, I didn’t even read a book a month, and some, like this one, were short comedy books that technically shouldn’t count. As with so many other things, I blame Strong Bad.

BUT, I have learned a valuable lesson: don’t make New Year’s Resolutions. Or at least, don’t write about them on the internet.

Synopsis
The Jungle Book for goth kids.

No, the Real Synopsis
After his family is killed, a toddler wanders into the neighboring graveyard. He’s taken in by the residents, raised as one of their own, and taught the ways of the dead.

Pros
Genius concept, interesting and endearing characters, great pacing. Crammed full of clever touches and imagination. Occasional passages that are just perfect, such as a stranger describing the boy: “He smelled like a shed. His hair was long and shaggy, and he seemed extremely grave.”

Cons
Occasionally reminds the reader that this is a young adult book — the villain revealing the entire back story at the climax, deus ex machinas coming right after the young hero has proven himself and learned a valuable lesson, etc. A climactic point in one of the stories is the hero re-enacting the oldest adventure game puzzle there is, which kind of ruined the story. The ending is tough to take if you’re feeling childless or if you’re separated from your family, and especially tough if you’re both.

Verdict
My favorite non-Sandman Neil Gaiman story; I think he might be at his best when he’s reinventing.

Wallace’s death shocked me into reading some of his stuff, especially after seeing one reviewer after another mention exactly that play between media influence, irony, self-awareness, sincerity, and cynicism as a recurring theme in his work. I’ve started with A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, and I had to stop after 80 pages to process it. One of the essays in that book, “E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction,” is one of the most insightful things I’ve ever read.

In that one essay, Wallace manages to touch on everything I’ve been trying to figure out for decades about the media, pop culture, and How We Got To This Point. I don’t even like to suggest that they’re ideas that I’ve had; they’re ideas that I’ve been trying to have, but my brain just couldn’t form them. My own attempts at it seem banging-the-rocks-together facile: “Why no people say what them mean? How come reading The Onion A.V. Club make Chuck so sad inside?” And it’s jarring to be reading a series of observations so relevant, and come across a mention of “St. Elsewhere” or “Moonlighting” or “Growing Pains,” reminders that this was written 18 years ago.

To me, the most interesting points of the essay are:

• Watching television isn’t voyeurism. “Voyeurism” connotes some degree of intrusion, or at least the idea that the subject is unaware he’s being viewed. Television exists to be viewed, and the performers have become super-skilled at being watched without seeming like they’re being watched. If there ever were any sense that the television is a window onto reality, it’s been lost by now.
• Television isn’t as malevolent as some analysts like to claim. Claims that television “does” this or that are specious, because they assume a motivation that doesn’t exist. Again, television exists simply to be watched; even the goal of making money is secondary to that, because the only way to make money from television is to have people watching it. Wallace claims that at one point, TV was able to focus people’s attention on things in the real world, but the audience has been too well-trained for that to happen anymore. He makes the brilliant analogy: “A dog, if you point at something, will only look at your finger.”
• Television isn’t as harmless as analysts claim, either. You’ll often hear people claim that TV (or the internet, or videogames) doesn’t shape society, it’s simply a mirror of society. Wallace reminds us that looking at a mirror for six hours a day on average isn’t healthy behavior. And television isn’t an accurate mirror; it unnaturally selects for certain qualities in the audience that aren’t based on survival, but “watchability.”
• Television isn’t just impervious to criticism; it absorbs criticism. This is the key point, I believe, and the most relevant one to any of us who “came of pop-cultural age” in the late 80s through the 90s. Attempts to peek behind the curtain are turned into “entertainment news.” Attempts to criticize television for being vapid or commercial are absorbed and turned into parody and self-mockery. And it’s simply self-reference, and not genuine satire: it’s not deconstruction or rebellion or condemnation, but reassurance. It’s designed to remind the audience that they’re all in on the joke; they can see just how artificial all of this is, even if those other guys can’t.
• Irony is destructive.

As a side note: the overwhelming popularity of reality television is something that’s completely mystified me. It was initially described (by the self-referential media) as a reaction to the writer’s strike, but that never explained why or how it survived and thrived for so long afterwards. Wallace’s article never mentions reality TV, but indirectly explains not just why it became so popular, but also makes it seem inevitable in retrospect. It’s a natural progression from the state of television in the late 80s and early 90s. It re-introduces a sense of voyeurism, one that’d been lost by decades of actors who’d become so skilled at “seeming unwatched.” It’s frequently about celebrities or rich people, so we can enjoy the vicarious wealth of “Dynasty” or “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous,” while reassuring us that we’re better than those people. It provides the most basic requisites of drama — we don’t want “grey areas,” we want clear villains and clear heroes — while simultaneously reassuring us that we know better than to believe everything we see on TV. We know that there’s always a camera there, so we want to be reminded that we know; handheld cameras and “spy cams” give us that.

You’ll frequently see the observation: “They call it ‘reality TV,’ but I know it’s not real.” That’s the whole appeal of it: it’s designed to reward the audience for making that observation. It lets us see behind the process of making television, enjoy the results of that process, and be satisfied that we’ve seen behind the process. Audiences spent decades saying “look how fake television is,” and television responded by becoming increasingly self-referential and breaking through the fourth wall. And once you’ve broken through the fourth wall, there’s nowhere else to go but back inside. The message isn’t “look how fake this is!” but “look how fake this is; isn’t it great?” It’s not a mirror to society; it’s two mirrors set up facing each other. Images bounce back and forth indefinitely, adding another layer of artifice with each reflection, until there’s no meaning left.

Enter irony. It’s the perfect tool for my generation, because it’s the perfect expression of lazy rebellion. Our greatest currency is being “aware,” and the worst sin we can commit is being out of the loop, out-dated, and overly earnest or sincere. Recently, when George Carlin died, most of the obituaries mentioned “counter-culture” and debated whether or not Carlin was a part of that. What struck me was how the whole idea of a “counter-culture” just seems quaint now. It doesn’t seem anarchistic as much as optimistic. There was a sense that things could be better than they were, and the reaction was to try and tear it all down.

But then, there was nothing offered to take its place. And that’s the overriding attitude that we inherited. Wallace makes an analogy to revolutionary forces tearing down a corrupt regime and creating a power vacuum. And I believe we’ve taken that to such an extreme that we value the process of analyzing and tearing down more than we value the process of creation.

As far as social studies go, this post is still in ten-years-old, Generation X territory. And even mentioning that, I’m reminded of the job interview where I said, completely in earnest, that Microserfs was one of my favorite books. And the very thought of that horrifies me now; now I can only see that book as alternating passages of overwhelmingly maudlin melodrama and desperate attempts to seem hip. We’ve even got an icon representing desperate attempts to seem hip, which I’m increasingly distressed to learn is no longer as universally-recognized as it once was.

But what about now? Wallace’s essay doesn’t mention the internet, or even the DVR. Television definitely hasn’t become irrelevant, but it has stopped demanding so much of our attention. (I’d be extremely surprised if the statistic that Wallace keeps mentioning were still accurate, that the average American spends six hours a day watching TV). For a lot of people, the internet’s taken its place, and I know that in my case, it demands even more of my time. (Which I’m all too happy to give).

And I believe that you can see the legacy of 90s television mentality all throughout the internet: the culture of the internet places so much value simply on having seen something. I was the first person to read this post and comment on it! I saw that video weeks ago. I’d heard of this already and wrote about it here. For the most part, we’ve even abandoned real analysis of what we’re seeing, at least any analysis deeper than “AWESOME!!!” or “gay,” plus a rating from 1 to 5 stars. And we’ve labeled this “interactivity” and elevated it to the same importance as actual creation.

I don’t mean for this to sound as dismissive as it does; I do believe that there’s an important social aspect to all of this, and that’s important to overcome the kind of culture-wide loneliness that builds up after millions of man-hours of obsessive, solitary TV-watching. And there is a lot of genuinely great stuff being generated from the most unlikely of places. For all the opportunistic grabs at attention, or lazy lowest-common-denominator humor, you’re frequently reminded that people can be really neat when they try.

But we’ve seen what a blight the unchecked abuse of irony can have on the cultural ecosystem, and we’re just starting to break free of that and allow ourselves to be sincere again. (On occasion). Irony is basically just a defense mechanism against having your most sincere thoughts dismissed as trite or ignorant or outdated. So what happens in an environment where the audience is not only allowed but encouraged to tell you immediately and in great numbers that your most sincere thoughts are trite or ignorant or outdated? Are people gradually getting better able to handle criticism, or are they just suppressing anything that runs the risk of not being accepted?

And I have to wonder what it is exactly that we’re building, and not just reacting to or rebelling against. It seems like we’re still experiencing a glut of spoof and parody and “irreverent deconstruction” and, at best, “reinvention,” long after we should’ve outgrown the need to say that stuff sucks and started making stuff that doesn’t suck. I can begrudgingly accept that my generation is doomed to that fate — we’ll go down in history as the inventors of the mash-up, the re-imagining, and “I Love the 80s” — but how deep a hole have we dug ourselves into, exactly?

The future of pop culture, and probably real culture too, is going to be driven by the internet. The internet is extremely proud of itself for facilitating an environment that lets the audience answer the question “What do you think about this?” When do we stop mistaking “reaction” for “interaction,” and start asking the simpler question: “What do you think?“

Book
Yokai Attack!: The Japanese Monster Survival Guide by Hiroko Yoda, Matt Alt, and Tatsuya Morino

Synopsis
Like the excellent book The Field Guide to North American Monsters, but with yokai. Contains entries for several monsters of Japanese folklore, with information on their origins, habitat, and what to do in the event of an encounter.

Pros
Great introduction to yokai, making absolutely no assumptions about the reader’s familiarity with Japanese folklore, language, or pop culture. Includes the kanji name for each monster, a translation of the name into English, and notes on the etymology of the names and their use in idioms, which are great for people trying to learn the Japanese language. Each entry includes a full-page illustration of the creature done in the style of Shigeru Mizuki and the original source. Images from the original source material are also included wherever possible. Has an excellent bibliography and reference section, recommending plenty of related books and films. Mentions each creature’s “relevance,” indicating which creatures are the best-known and which are more obscure, or are only part of the folklore of certain regions.

Cons
Because the book is intended as an introduction, it’s pretty shallow. Each entry is limited to 2 and a half pages at the longest, the bulk of it dedicated to the height/weight/habitat information which keeps the “field guide” gag running. The descriptions keep a light “isn’t all this stuff wacky?” attitude, which can deflate the coolness of it all somewhat.

Synopsis
Although I personally prefer SHMorgan’s Obakemono Project website, both for the art style and for the number and depth of the entries, Yokai Attack! is a better general introduction. The book’s format and its use of popular expressions, idioms, and the monsters’ appearance in popular culture give a better sense of how this aspect of Japanese folklore fits into the country as a whole, and how many of them came about. It’s a fun book, highly recommended for anyone interested in this stuff. You should also check out the book’s official website.

Synopsis
The history of “the only rock we eat,” and how finding, producing, and transporting it has shaped economies and governments from pre-history to the modern day.

Pros
Extremely well-organized, with short chapters presented in chronological order describing how a particular region and a particular group of people were affected by salt during that time. Keeps the subject interesting by using personal stories wherever possible. Exhaustively researched, throwing together travelogues, personal accounts, recipes, and descriptions of scientific breakthroughs and production techniques, along with the geography and descriptions of economics, governments and trade routes you’d expect from a history book.

Satisfied my trivia requirement in the first few chapters — e.g. the words “soldier,” “salary,” and calling the Celts “Gauls” all derived from words for salt. Answered a question I’ve been wondering for years, but was always too lazy to look up: what are those weird geometric pink and brown pools in the south San Francisco Bay? (They’re salt ponds). Manages to follow tangents like the development of tabasco and the creation of Israeli resorts on the Dead Sea, without straying too far from the main story.

Cons
It’s still a book about salt. The book spends so much time talking about salted cod and Basque salt producers, that you can’t help but feel like the author cribbed a lot of the material from his earlier books. Reading the book kept making me crave weird food and games of Civilization. The subject inspires a ton of terrible cliches and puns in book reviews.

Verdict
The highest compliment I can give to any documentary or history work is that it reminds me of James Burke’s Connections series. Despite the quote from Anthony Bourdain on its cover, Salt is more than just a food history book; it really does feel like an extended episode of Connections with a fixation on one particular topic. You get a real sense of the epic history of salt, and you can understand how something that is now so common could have once been scarce enough to influence the outcome of wars and the success of entire civilizations.

Synopsis
A collection of letters sent from the demon Screwtape to his nephew Wormwood, advising the younger demon on the best ways to tempt a human soul away from Christianity to become food for Hell.

Pros
Brilliant concept, with a ton of potential for satire. Has one moment where Lewis really takes advantage of the concept, and the effect is both darkly comic and shocking. Several passages have real insight into the human condition, in particular our capacity for self delusion, and our pointless fixation on novelty. Gives a good description of how The Seven Virtues interrelate, and how easily and subtly they can be corrupted into one of the Seven Deadly Sins.

And despite its fantastic concept, it ultimately conveys a very mature and modern conception of corruption and Hell: not just as a cataclysmic turn to evil, but as the gradual and almost imperceptible decay of the soul. Where the final punishment isn’t just torment, but being cut off from light, robbed of potential, and ultimately consumed.

Cons
Doesn’t really work as satire, since it’s clearly Lewis’ voice throughout — the end result doesn’t feel like an author inhabiting an evil character, but just as if he’d taken Mere Christianity and done a simple search-and-replace and negated most of the verbs. As a result, you don’t get a real sense of what Lewis is saying for much of it; you’re too preoccupied trying to do multiple reverse-translations in your head to get at the real message.

Has the same worldview as Mere Christianity: that of the conservative, white man living in the UK during World War II. Constantly takes a dismissive view of women, overvalues patriotism and automatically equates it with “courage,” and is repeatedly scornful of non-traditional values or really anything “modern.” (With frequent warnings that his views will be dismissed as “puritanical” or prudish, which come across more as being defensive than genuinely self-aware).

An additional piece, “Screwtape Proposes a Toast,” is included with this edition of the book. It was written long after the letters, it has its own introduction by Lewis, and it’s just awful. While the Letters read like the work of a clever and imaginative man who’s got genuine, universal insight combined with some quaintly outdated values, the last section just reads like an embittered crank writing a letter to the editor of the local paper. It’s a conservative, almost libertarian, political rant disguised as having spiritual relevance.

Verdict
I’d thought that this would be a companion for Mere Christianity, but it turned out to be more a rewording of that book, with more specific examples. It’s more imaginative and clever than Mere Christianity, but also more difficult to read because of its attempt to be “satire.” And it’s a shame that “Screwtape Proposes a Toast” is included, because it leaves you with a negative impression of the whole book.

Synopsis
Originally presented as a series of lectures on BBC Radio during World War II, this book is Lewis’s attempt to describe and defend the fundamental beliefs of Christianity, regardless of any particular church or denomination. It’s presented from the perspective of a former atheist who converted to Christianity, speaking as a layman instead of a theologist, and using informal and conversational language throughout.

Pros
Sees science and intellect as supplements to religious belief, not opponents of it. Describes the path from atheism to Christianity as a philosophical and ethical question, not as one of dogma or simply faith. Provides contemporary (for the 1940s) examples of the Seven Virtues and other ideals, instead of just quoting parables or passages from scripture. Encourages the reader to reject parts of the book if they don’t provide any illumination for him. Gives the clearest explanation of the Trinity that I’ve ever heard; for the first time, I feel like I understand the concept.

Cons
Although the book is marketed as “timeless,” it is very much the product of a man born in the United Kingdom at the turn of the 20th century and coming of age during WWI. His views on patriotism and war, feminism, sexuality, homosexuality, race relations, and non-Christian belief systems are almost comically dated and so conservative as to be offensive. (For example: men should be in charge of the household, because somebody’s got to be in charge, and women don’t have the temperament for it).

Although he doesn’t use the word “faith” when describing the transition from atheism to theism, his arguments still frequently reduce to faith. His position is logical but not airtight, and at some points he still ends up in a circular or empty argument: God must exist because otherwise we wouldn’t want Him to exist; and Jesus must be the son of God because He said He was, and only a lunatic would claim that if he weren’t.

And although Lewis describes himself as a former atheist, he really comes across as a formerly lapsed Christian. When he refers to his old beliefs, they sound like a man raised Christian who’s had a crisis of faith, but is struggling to believe again. As a result, the book doesn’t seem to offer much to “modern” atheists (those not brought up in a religious household), or people of non-Christian beliefs. He’s very dismissive of atheism and other religions, calling them “childish” or “simple” when he deigns to mention them at all.

And he has an irritating tendency to trivialize the Nazis, lumping them in with nuisances like the guy who steals your seat on the bus.

Verdict
The book is conversational and for the most part pleasant to read; even the “offensive” bits aren’t anywhere near as spiteful and judgmental as modern-day evangelists tend to be, but more a jarring reminder of when and where the book was written. But I can’t really see who would benefit from it apart from people who are already Christians and have never truly tested their faith, or Christians who are having a crisis of faith and want to get back into the fold. Non-Christians will likely be turned off in the early chapters. As it was, I started out the book mostly on Lewis’s side, and I still objected to it more often than I agreed with it.