Mark Twain, Fuck You Sideways

Roughing It is a book no human being should ever have to read straight through in two weeks. Or in any amount of time, for that matter. It's 500+ pages of Twain's ambling mind. An ambling mind that would put my ambling mind to shame. More riddled with digressions than a mob informant is with bullets, Twain's meandering, semi-autobiographical account is like watching paint dry. Gray paint. On a cloudy day. I feel like, after such statements, I owe you some sort of explanation for my harsh criticisms. Endebtedness is a common feeling of mine, probably a relic of Catholic guilt, so pardon me if this seems unecessary, but I won't sleep tonight if I don't offer some sort of vague justification for my hatred of everything that is Twain.

Twain and I have a sordid past. Every time I come across a work of his in class, its like that awkward run in with an ex, but with even more seething resentment. You see, Twain and I first met in High School, junior year, when he showed me his Huck Finn and I refused to show him mine. From then on, there was a mutal hatred there. I wanted to burn Twain's collected works in a fire, and he wanted to bore the pants off me, the dirty old man. I read Huck Finn, begrudgingly, and hated him for it. Hated his folksy charms, his biting wit, his boring preaching, and most of all, just how damn boring it all was.

I can forgive cliche. I can forgive an absurd plot. I cannot, however, forgive the absence of plot. There's nothing in Twain's writing to even call a plot. It's just a lot of Twain patting himself on the back for his "enlightened" views and pithy sayings. Well, Samuel Clemens, I have a pithy saying for you: fuck you sideways. That's right, I know your real name, and I also have no trouble with telling a man who's been dead over a century to go get fucked sideways. Why is it so easy for me? Easy. I have now read two works by the man. Two works that epitomize everything I hate about his writing. Roughing It was the finisher. If I didn't hate him before reading all of that musty old tome, I certainly do now. It was an inescapable reality. An inevitable scenario that even J.J. Abrams couldn't twist into something else with his fetishes for alternate realities. I was born destined to hate Mark Twain.

It's a harsh claim, I admit. But I feel it is the truth. Twain's penchant for the mundane, interspersed with terrifyingly dense local diction, doomed us to be nemeses from the begining of time. And with my most recent foray into his catalogue of horrors, it only proved to me that Mark Twain needs to be set in the proper context. That context being? I will let this handy graphic illustrate my point:
I really wish someone had just told him to stop before he got started. Honestly, it would've saved us a lot of hardship. American Lit before Modernism could've been taken seriously, for one. For another, I wouldn't have to read 500+ of his pages in two weeks. I'd rather read one of those esoteric Russian novels from the 19th century than plod through Twain's long-winded mire of utter mundanity (which I am now, in the style of Twain, making a word). I would actually prefer an immensely complicated and tragic plot, filled with characters that have un-pronounceable names and are virtually impossible for those outside Russian aristocracy in the 1800's to relate to. That's right, I'd rather try my hand at interpretive reading through the eyes of a Czar than that of a country bumpkin with indecipherable diction and a penchant for drunkenness.

Don't get me wrong, I tried to like Twain. I did. And at first it wasn't so bad. He had his moments of wit. Sometimes he'd tickle you with a home-spun story, or a bit of droll irony. But the reality is, he just can't keep you interested with that forever. Pretty soon you just get annoyed by his old stories, and it ends up with you as Twain's long-suffering spouse, having to pretend to give a shit about his stories of silver mining in Nevada, or lazing about like a jackass for five straight chapters. It's just not fun. You're left empty inside, wondering how anyone could make the Wild West boring.

So...Roughing It. What's the deal with you not summarizing it, you ask? Well, I feel like my bitching has already made that clear: there is no plot. Nothing. Zilch. Not an iota of plot to be found. I feel like that is review enough for most people. Just steer clear. Very far clear. Twain will just break your soul, under the guise of wit and Americana. It's a shame, because honestly, the man has some interesting things to say. Problem is, he has one hell of a time getting around to it. And I'm sorry, I do not care how damn interesting what you have to say to me is. If it takes you 5,000 words to lead up to your point of 50 words, I will probably shun you. Or at least ignore you with my ivory tower intellectualism, which cannot tolerate foolish people, idlers, and those who find Dan Brown "a damn good read." To those of you who fit in that category, I sincerely apologize to you. It must be hard being so terribly uninteresting, and my comments must be only salt in the wound. Of course, that is only if you realize you are being attacked.

In the end, I suppose my advice for those of you saying: "I've never read Twain, but isn't he, like totally, famous? I should probably read him, right?" Wrong. Just wrong. Please. Please don't do that to yourself. You might end up hating books, which would be sad.

Go read a real book,

The Crier

Not Exactly a Sermon on the Mount

Blogging. Hate the term enough that if it were a people I would advocate its genocide. I've tried it before. Tried it a number of times and met with varying levels of success and self-satisfaction. The only problem with all my attempts was that I strove for the big money, the big catch, the big fucking profound thought that would some how validate all the time I spent clacking away at my keyboard. Of course, I never found the thing. I'm a college student, I have nothing profound to say. Pretentious things to say? Sure. Ivory Tower elitism? Absolutely. But profound thoughts that throw something into question? That bring something new to the table? That change how we see life? Fuck no. I don't have the time for that, nor is my life even that exciting. I may be intelligent enough to string a couple sentances together and call them "a blog," but screw me sideways if I think for one minute that makes me the next great thinker. I'm just a young adult, bored on certain evenings, with an opinion on nearly everything. Couple that with a free outlet for it? Holy shit, you caught this cheap bastard of a college student hook, line, and sinker.

So, you ask, now that you've laid all that out in a semi-tagental paragraph, what are you actually going to do with your corner of the internet?

Well, first off, I'll continue to force you to pose questions to me, without your consent. I'd apologize, but seeing as no one is going to actually get around to reading this, I'll save it. Secondly, I plan to follow my usual procedure regarding my blogs -- that being immediately forget about them. Don't be disappointed. You won't be missing much, unless you enjoy the snarky, sarcastic, and generally mean-spirited rants of a college student secluded on a hill. Or, perhaps you love it when people who have no right to complain about anything feel entitled to do so. If you're such an individual, let me direct you so you can get your regular fix. That link also works for people who pop a boner at the sights and sounds of demegogery. Or maybe you're just a huge, self-important douche. If so, I empathize with you.

Seriously though, why are you still reading this? Are you expecting me to have something witty to say? Something scathing, or biting that will just make the inner sociologist inside you squirm at my slightest bitching about classism? Because, I will also empathize with that. Or, at least, my inner sociologist will. I normally try to ignore him though. He's too bound by theory, marxism, and an overbearing hatred of anything contianing the words "corporate," "capitalist," "global economic system," and "social class." That coporate part also applies to "Something Corporate," but for totally different reasons. I digress. I have no idea how we got here. I suppose that's a fucking H-Bomb of a question right there though. I'll let your mind fizzle like pop rocks for a bit.

Better?

Good.

This "blog" (fuck, I hate that word) is aimless. It is like my brain. Except if you distilled my brain to only its most rage-filled and vitriol-spewing portions and made it into a smoothie. Incidentally, that smoothie would taste like brain, which should dissuade you from trying it at home. Also, you'd die. Brain smoothies aside I cannot promise anything my lovelies. Actually, no I can. I promise to never refer to you as "my lovelies" again, no matter how much it makes me chuckle. Deep down I cringe. Normally I'm not affected by shame, but fuck was that shameful. So, yeah, you got one promise out of me. That's the only one I'm making. Well...let me make one more. I promise that if you stick around you will be at least mildly entertained. Or appalled. Or become comatose. Either way, something will happen to you. I can't say it'll be good though. Still, life's full of risks. And people you despise deep down with seething resentment. It's also full of awesome things, like music, puppies, baked goods, and blankets. I love blankets.

A story for another day! One where the cold meds aren't making me sound bi-polar, or like I slipped out of bedlam in the night. I realize the internet is the place for many people to let their crazy out (or TV, it seems) but I really don't want to become one of those. I'll leave that to the professionals. The genuine articles. I'll stick to my own particular brand of crazy -- the cold meds enduced kind, aside -- which is mainly just a lot of ranting and ego-stroking humor. All the same, I'll try to maintain some decorum in between f-bombs and references to "Getting screwed sideways."

So yeah, not going to have any of that. Decorum, I mean. Stay classy ladies and gents. I'll keep shouting down from the hill every once and awhile. Just tune me out if I get on your nerves. And if I disrupt the migratory patterns of the buzzards that live around here, well, I apologize to the National Park Service...or the Department of Fucking Scary Carrion Birds. Basically whatever agency deals with that kind of shit. Alright, seriously, I'll get down off the hill before I roll off under the weight of my ramblings.

Best,

Granville Crier