a lesson in creative blurbing
Blurb from back cover of American Psycho:
"The first novel to come along in years that takes on deep and Dostoyevskian themes...[Ellis] is showing older authors where the hands have come to on the clock." - Norman Mailer, Vanity Fair
Quote from the actual essay, Children of the Pied Piper:
"So, the first novel to come along in years that takes on deep and Dostoyevskian themes is written by only a half-competent and narcissistic young pen. Nonetheless, he is showing older authors where the hands have come to on the clock."
He goes on to say:
"I cannot forgive Bret Easton Ellis. If I, in effect, defend the author by treating him at this length, it is because he has forced us to look at intolerable material... What a deranging work! It is too much of a void, humanly speaking, to be termed evil, but it does raise the ante so high that one can no longer measure the size of the bet. Blind gambling is a hollow activity and this novel spins into the center of that empty space."
Moral of the story: you can hate a book all you want, and even publish an essay in Vanity Fair detailing how much and why you hate it, but with a simple ellipsis your hateful words can still be used to sell the very thing they're directed at. neat!
"The first novel to come along in years that takes on deep and Dostoyevskian themes...[Ellis] is showing older authors where the hands have come to on the clock." - Norman Mailer, Vanity Fair
Quote from the actual essay, Children of the Pied Piper:
"So, the first novel to come along in years that takes on deep and Dostoyevskian themes is written by only a half-competent and narcissistic young pen. Nonetheless, he is showing older authors where the hands have come to on the clock."
He goes on to say:
"I cannot forgive Bret Easton Ellis. If I, in effect, defend the author by treating him at this length, it is because he has forced us to look at intolerable material... What a deranging work! It is too much of a void, humanly speaking, to be termed evil, but it does raise the ante so high that one can no longer measure the size of the bet. Blind gambling is a hollow activity and this novel spins into the center of that empty space."
Moral of the story: you can hate a book all you want, and even publish an essay in Vanity Fair detailing how much and why you hate it, but with a simple ellipsis your hateful words can still be used to sell the very thing they're directed at. neat!