No but yeah but! American Psycho!Still!

So much that is powerful in this. What hits you - with a real smack in the face - is the way the narrative moves seamlessly from dispassionate, detailed, obsessive account of meaningless nothings - the price of a shirt, a designer label, the design of a new business card, for heavens sake - to dispassionate, detailed account of horrific torture and murder beyond what you and I can probably imagine. At one point I actually had to look away from the text. Like I said; it is total disconnect. EmotionLESS.

This is a novel that stays with you. Believe me.

Have been working with kiddies today - also writing Gothic!  A small sample from a Year 6 student:

'The crow, which flew at my son's head, clawed his face; ripped his hair out. I hurled the rock. The crow hovered away then it hit my son on the forehead. I rushed over. No pulse. He was dead.'

We have been focusing on sentence variety and dynamic verbs - I reckon this young man has it cracked.
And as for the crow - evil! 'Black Cat' inspired? Probably!

And now. American Psycho - whoa!

Have been utterly gripped by Brett Easton-Ellis' American Psycho - by the way the protagonist, Patrick Bateman's narrative is utterly disconnected. I hadn't realised how many years ago this was published - 1991 - and apparently was slated by critics at that time as writing 'disgustingly about the disgusting'. Yeah, well, it is - but it is also beautifully crafted and controlled and, at times, rather funny! (Its the story of a serial killer on Wall Street). It was also slammed as 'so pointless, so themeless'... er NO. What it is, actually, is a clever and ironic portrayal of the prostration of one's Self at the altar of All Things Material in a consumer driven society. Topical theme, methinks.

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Spent my spare minutes over the Easter weekend grappling with the Guardian's Easter Cryptic crossword - an evil affair involving a literary theme and  quote, possibly obscure...  After much wrestling with the brain cells, worked out the theme was Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood. Nine characters from his work were answers to clues - wonderful folk such as Nogood Boyo, Willy Nilly and Lily Smalls were hiding in there. No sign of such gems as Organ Morgan, Ocky Milkman or Evans the Death though.

Or Captain Cat, come to that.

And the quote? (Very softly): 'To begin at the beginning: It is spring, moonless night in the small town, starless and bible-black'...

Bible-black. Love it.

The Black Cat revisited...

Hi - this is my discussion  page for all things literary... lets wade in with my current obsession: all things gothic. I was recently re-working Edgar Allen Poe's The Black Cat so that I could use it for younger writers (I work at a local primary school, supporting children with developing writing skills). So I came to the moment where Poe writes: 'I took from my waist-coat pocket a penknife, opened it, grasped the poor beast [the cat] by the throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes from the socket.' I pulled a face, and thought... there is no way I can use this with children. I will have a dozen or so parents banging on my door to complain at animal cruelty!

It struck me then, the inherent cruelty, savagery even, of Poe's writing. Not the thrill of anticipation found in gothic writing perhaps, but rather a sickening sense of horror. The wince, you could say, rather than the thrill!

This aside, what he achieves is a reworking of domestic pet into twisted, gothic grotesque character. Listen to this - Poe describing cat again: 'Wherever I sat, it would crouch beneath my chair, or spring upon my knees, covering me with its loathsome caresses. If I arose to walk it would get between my feet and thus nearly throw me down, or, fastening its long and sharp claws in my dress, clamber, in this manner, to my breast... I started hourly from dreams of unutterable fear to find the hot breath of the thing upon my face.'

Lovely. Affectionate pussycat reduced to grotesque thing. For mine, I eventually decided upon the following, for my younger writers: 'I grasped the poor thing and, holding it in front of me, squeezed my hands around its neck until it became limp.' My watered down version has inevitably lost some of that Poe-esque power - but hopefully parents have coped with this - no complaints so far, anyway!

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