The Broom of the System
I finished reading David Foster Wallace's The Broom of the System today (for the first time), part of my preparation to write the Person Chapter of the diss. The writing of the Hipster Chapter also continues, less apace than I'd prefer, but still. I'm reading a fantastic history of the hugely-important literary journal Kenyon Review (by Marian Janssen) and have just started Arnold Rampersad's newly-released biography of Ralph Ellison--which also looks very promising. Work on my own novel has begun to compete for brain bandwidth with all of the aforementioned stuff, but I'm in a period of relative calm vis-a-vis Pop Apocalypse. Just turned in a revised draft to my editor.
All of which is to say, when combined with fellowship applications and other projects, that this is one of the busiest times in my writing/thinking life, like ever, but I can't complain; it's a very wonderful gift to have this time and these opportunities. Many equally if not more worthy people don't have chances like these.
But back to DFW:
Reading Broom was a trip--it'll definitely find its way into the Infinite Jest-centered Person Chapter of the diss. What has begun to obsess me in my critical writing is how very much the educational contexts of a writer's background shape his or her production. What makes Broom so much of a trip then is the extensiveness and sophistication with which its author comments on the format and content of fiction produced in the MFA and creative-writing classroom circa the mid-to-late '80s. And also takes on the still-strong theoretical orthodoxies of that paradoxically Reaganesque-cum-poststructuralist moment.
That is, it seems as if DFW was keenly aware of what the dominant and competing strands of literary orthodoxy were at the time that he was writing. How his analysis of and reaction to these orthodoxies launched his career-trajectory and how his fictional and essayistic responses have set an agenda for his contemporaries is the subject of my person chapter--and the Believer Chapter that follows from it.
When discussing Broom, I think I will want to focus these questions through an analysis of how DFW fictionally reimagines the concept of a "person." Can a talking parrot be a person? How are fictional characters like people--and/or not? Does a notion of communication serve as the logical foundation for personhood or does the logical priority go the other way around (person then communication)?
Based on Wallace's reading of Wittgenstein, I suspect that he takes communication as the minimal lynch-pin of what it means to be a person. From this, various consequences follow, including of course the notion that irony is destructive to our humanity and personhood.
These are my preliminary thoughts as I try to wrap my mind around Broom, which anticipates Infinite Jest in lots of important ways, though it's a less-good novel by comparison. Then again, DFW wrote the book when he was in his early twenties, so he can maybe be forgiven for its flaws, I think.
Agented
In another deviation from academic matters--but not entirely--I'm now agented, and well-agented.
The interesting academic angle on this development comes from a conversation I had yesterday with Matt Jockers, a professor in the English department who does technology-related stuff. We talked about the possibility of building or developing some sort of social-networking application that I could use to map connections among authors and publications for my dissertation.
My hunch is that social-networking theory and analysis might be a useful way of learning how and why certain authors are connected to other authors. Why do David Foster Wallace and Jonathan Franzen mutually blurb each other? Probably because they were friends. Why did Franzen blurb Alex Shakar's The Savage Girl? What is the relationship between the blurb and the fact that they share an agent? Whatever the answer for these particular questions, I think literary studies has too often ignored the ways in which social networks shape or can help explain aspects of literary history. At best we have a vague sense that lots of modernists were running around Paris together, etc.
For my project, my interest is in building a model of the networks surrounding Dave Eggers and the whole McSweeney's publishing operation. My operating theory, for now at least, is that aesthetic postirony--quirkiness, Brooklynite precocity, Wes-Andersonian bric-à-bracity--has as much to do with social networks as anything else. We tend to speak and write like our friends and neighbors. In an increasingly globalized age, where family relations dominate our fates less than they have, our affiliations and voluntary associations can be very powerful indeed. It's what used to be called "peer pressure," but is probably better referred to as something like "aesthetic entropy."
Agented
In another deviation from academic matters--but not entirely--I'm now agented, and well-agented.
The interesting academic angle on this development comes from a conversation I had yesterday with Matt Jockers, a professor in the English department who does technology-related stuff. We talked about the possibility of building or developing some sort of social-networking application that I could use to map connections among authors and publications for my dissertation.
My hunch is that social-networking theory and analysis might be a useful way of learning how and why certain authors are connected to other authors. Why do David Foster Wallace and Jonathan Franzen mutually blurb each other? Probably because they were friends. Why did Franzen blurb Alex Shakar's The Savage Girl? What is the relationship between the blurb and the fact that they share an agent? Whatever the answer for these particular questions, I think literary studies has too often ignored the ways in which social networks shape or can help explain aspects of literary history. At best we have a vague sense that lots of modernists were running around Paris together, etc.
For my project, my interest is in building a model of the networks surrounding Dave Eggers and the whole McSweeney's publishing operation. My operating theory, for now at least, is that aesthetic postirony--quirkiness, Brooklynite precocity, Wes-Andersonian bric-à-bracity--has as much to do with social networks as anything else. We tend to speak and write like our friends and neighbors. In an increasingly globalized age, where family relations dominate our fates less than they have, our affiliations and voluntary associations can be very powerful indeed. It's what used to be called "peer pressure," but is probably better referred to as something like "aesthetic entropy."
Pop Apocalypse
In the wake of the acceptance of my first novel Pop Apocalypse by a publisher, I've spent the last few weeks scrambling to find a literary agent. I'm learning a lot about the book publishing business in short order--ironically, more than I have ever learned in any of my academic literature classes--but am reticent to post anything substantial here about these experiences until everything is settled. I haven't found an agent yet. I haven't signed a contract.
Once I do, the more serious business of reorganizing this blog, and (more generally) my online presence, will begin. Looking at the academic job list, one thing has become certain: when I go on the job market next (academic) year, I will definitely consider applying for positions as an assistant professor of creative writing. That would be such a trip.
For the curious, a little bit about the novel: Pop Apocalypse is a dystopian political satire set in a near future US. Its protagonist is Eliot R. Vanderthorpe, Jr., celebrity heir to a billion dollar fortune. Eliot, a grad school dropout, is the son of the founder and CEO of the Omni Science Corporation, a company that makes video search software, a kind of "evil" Google. The novel begins when, after a summer of debauched partying, Eliot tries to straighten himself up by listing his name on the New York Reputations Exchange (NYRE). After "going public," Eliot discovers that the Market has some unsettling plans for his future, of which I can only say the novel's title is the major clue.
I want to make Pop Apocalypse the first of three novels set in this same near future, each of which tells a distinctly different story, with different characters. More to come.
Pop Apocalypse
In the wake of the acceptance of my first novel Pop Apocalypse by a publisher, I've spent the last few weeks scrambling to find a literary agent. I'm learning a lot about the book publishing business in short order--ironically, more than I have ever learned in any of my academic literature classes--but am reticent to post anything substantial here about these experiences until everything is settled. I haven't found an agent yet. I haven't signed a contract.
Once I do, the more serious business of reorganizing this blog, and (more generally) my online presence, will begin. Looking at the academic job list, one thing has become certain: when I go on the job market next (academic) year, I will definitely consider applying for positions as an assistant professor of creative writing. That would be such a trip.
For the curious, a little bit about the novel: Pop Apocalypse is a dystopian political satire set in a near future US. Its protagonist is Eliot R. Vanderthorpe, Jr., celebrity heir to a billion dollar fortune. Eliot, a grad school dropout, is the son of the founder and CEO of the Omni Science Corporation, a company that makes video search software, a kind of "evil" Google. The novel begins when, after a summer of debauched partying, Eliot tries to straighten himself up by listing his name on the New York Reputations Exchange (NYRE). After "going public," Eliot discovers that the Market has some unsettling plans for his future, of which I can only say the novel's title is the major clue.
I want to make Pop Apocalypse the first of three novels set in this same near future, each of which tells a distinctly different story, with different characters. More to come.
Much Nigher Than You Think
You know that hypothetical situation I mentioned in my previous post, the one about my having at some point in the near future to think about what to do with this blog if I got Pop Apocalypse picked up by a publisher? Well, holy shit, it's not a hypothetical situation anymore. I repeat, somewhat numb with excitement, holy shit!
Much Nigher Than You Think
You know that hypothetical situation I mentioned in my previous post, the one about my having at some point in the near future to think about what to do with this blog if I got Pop Apocalypse picked up by a publisher? Well, holy shit, it's not a hypothetical situation anymore. I repeat, somewhat numb with excitement, holy shit!
The End (of the Summer) is Nigh
I'm back in San Francisco--blogging from the Que Tal cafe on Guerrero and 22nd. My long summer of traveling is finally at an end.
This has been perhaps my craziest and busiest summer on record. I spent two weeks in Singapore, two weeks in Jakarta, more than three weeks at the Ransom Center at UT Austin, two weeks back in San Francisco, and finally two weeks in New York visiting family and friends. During this time, I've managed to be amazingly productive on numerous fronts. That part of my brain that focuses on tasks-at-hand has spontaneously mutated a new ability, apparently, to generate some Ritalin-like chemical that keeps me going. Maybe the life of a self-starting (graduate student) freelancer suits my work habits better than anything I've tried before. It beats taking classes and writing seminar papers that do not link up to larger projects.
I found lots of useful material at the Ransom Center. My photocopies of Pynchon, Wallace, Franzen, and Safran Foer letters have come in the mail. I officially began drafting my hipster chapter yesterday (with an aim of having a 60-70 pp. draft by the end of the year).
On top of this official work, I've completed a full revision of my novel-in-progress, Pop Apocalypse. I should not discuss the novel here in a space dedicated to my academic pursuits, but it suffices to say that it's much improved, sentence by sentence. My writing has grown in lots of ways over the last three months, a new plateau among hopefully many more to come. I also have a few possible leads on the next few steps: finding an agent and publisher. If anything happens on the novel-publishing front I may consider starting a dedicated novel-blog or, alternately, converting this blog into something more general, using tags to differentiate among types of content.
Most interestingly, I wonder if in the long term my "official" pursuits (as a literary critic) and my "hobby" (as a fiction writer) may synthesize into some ideal commixture of critic and writer. After all, I was teaching creative writing in Singapore and Indonesia and, frankly, helping kids write their own fiction was the most enjoyable and successful teaching experience I've ever had, bar none. And also after all, there've been denizens of Academe's Groves who've successfully combined these two job functions into one person. Why not me? Whether or not this path will be part of my future remains an open question. To achieve this synthesis successfully would fulfill one of my most deeply-held dreams.
The End (of the Summer) is Nigh
I'm back in San Francisco--blogging from the Que Tal cafe on Guerrero and 22nd. My long summer of traveling is finally at an end.
This has been perhaps my craziest and busiest summer on record. I spent two weeks in Singapore, two weeks in Jakarta, more than three weeks at the Ransom Center at UT Austin, two weeks back in San Francisco, and finally two weeks in New York visiting family and friends. During this time, I've managed to be amazingly productive on numerous fronts. That part of my brain that focuses on tasks-at-hand has spontaneously mutated a new ability, apparently, to generate some Ritalin-like chemical that keeps me going. Maybe the life of a self-starting (graduate student) freelancer suits my work habits better than anything I've tried before. It beats taking classes and writing seminar papers that do not link up to larger projects.
I found lots of useful material at the Ransom Center. My photocopies of Pynchon, Wallace, Franzen, and Safran Foer letters have come in the mail. I officially began drafting my hipster chapter yesterday (with an aim of having a 60-70 pp. draft by the end of the year).
On top of this official work, I've completed a full revision of my novel-in-progress, Pop Apocalypse. I should not discuss the novel here in a space dedicated to my academic pursuits, but it suffices to say that it's much improved, sentence by sentence. My writing has grown in lots of ways over the last three months, a new plateau among hopefully many more to come. I also have a few possible leads on the next few steps: finding an agent and publisher. If anything happens on the novel-publishing front I may consider starting a dedicated novel-blog or, alternately, converting this blog into something more general, using tags to differentiate among types of content.
Most interestingly, I wonder if in the long term my "official" pursuits (as a literary critic) and my "hobby" (as a fiction writer) may synthesize into some ideal commixture of critic and writer. After all, I was teaching creative writing in Singapore and Indonesia and, frankly, helping kids write their own fiction was the most enjoyable and successful teaching experience I've ever had, bar none. And also after all, there've been denizens of Academe's Groves who've successfully combined these two job functions into one person. Why not me? Whether or not this path will be part of my future remains an open question. To achieve this synthesis successfully would fulfill one of my most deeply-held dreams.
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About Me
I'm a novelist, scholar of post-WWII U.S. fiction, and ACLS New Faculty Fellow at Princeton University. My first novel, Pop Apocalypse, was published by Ecco/HarperCollins in 2009. 
I co-edited (with Samuel Cohen) a collection of creative and critical essays, The Legacy of David Foster Wallace, which was released by the University of Iowa Press in 2012.
My second novel, Hamsterstan, was recently completed. 
I'm working on a literary history of countercultural irony from Ralph Ellison to David Foster Wallace, which is under contract with Harvard University Press. My writing has appeared in The Believer, boundary 2, io9, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and elsewhere. I blog pretty regularly over at Arcade. In the fall, I will become an assistant professor in the English Department at the University of Maryland, College Park. If this litany of interesting biographical tidbits doesn't slake your fact-thirst, please feel free to contact me at lee [dot] konstantinou [at sign] gmail [dot] com or via Facebook. |
@lkonstan
- @LeifSorensen1 Will do. http://twitter.com/#!/lkonstan
- Off to Chicago tomorrow for "Comics: Philosophy & Practice." Superexciting lineup: http://t.co/jw7sQfeJ What should I do at night? http://twitter.com/#!/lkonstan
- @Ed_Raso Oppositional in the sense that they oppose the degrading effects of a dominant cultural irony, and want a positive alternative. http://twitter.com/#!/lkonstan
- Got my copy of J R from @Dalkey_Archive today. #OccupyGaddis commences in a little more than 2 weeks at @LAReviewofBooks http://twitter.com/#!/lkonstan
- @Ed_Raso His stories and essays often geographically counterpose a credulous midwest against a cynical coastal elite. He wanted a third way. http://twitter.com/#!/lkonstan
- @Ed_Raso Totally agree. Wallace took that common Gen X feeling and turned it into interesting art. I think his Midwestern-ness mattered... http://twitter.com/#!/lkonstan
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