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Spurious #1
Spurious
In a raucous debut that summons up Britain's fabled Goon Squad comedies, writer and philosopher Lars Iyer tells the story of someone very like himself with a "slightly more successful" friend and their journeys in search of more palatable literary conferences and better gin. One reason for their the narrator's home is slowly being taken over by a fungus that no one seems to know what to do about.
Before it completely swallows his house, the narrator feels compelled to solve some major philosophical questions (such as "Why?") and the meaning of his urge to write, as well as the source of the fungus ... before it is too late. Or, he has to move.
Before it completely swallows his house, the narrator feels compelled to solve some major philosophical questions (such as "Why?") and the meaning of his urge to write, as well as the source of the fungus ... before it is too late. Or, he has to move.
188 pages, Paperback
First published January 25, 2011
35 people are currently reading
1104 people want to read
About the author
Lars Iyer
11 books99 followersLars Iyer is the author of the novel Wittgenstein Jr (2014). He has also written a trilogy of novels – Spurious, Dogma and Exodus. Iyer has also written two scholarly books on the work of Maurice Blanchot. He teaches philosophy at Newcastle University in the UK.
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February 9, 2017
I’m a big fan of bringing the new year in with a kiss. It’s a tradition I’ve enjoyed with my dear wife, family and friends (with my old neighbor, Mrs. Sundquist, as the exception after she’d been hitting the pickled eel jar). I can also make KISS a mnemonic to apply here – a reminder to Keep It Short, Steve. (My original version was KISSSSSSSS for “Keep It Short, Spiel-Spewing Soapbox-Spouting Stupor-Stretching Stupidass,” but that would be silly and self-controverting.) Anyway, I hope to start clearing the backlog from my to-be-reviewed list with a few abbreviated remarks.
Spurious is easy to summarize. You know the expression about the excitement of watching paint dry? Well, this one was a variation where the narrator, Lars, watched mold grow on the walls of his flat. That, and he’d philosophize (though not deeply or well) with his academic friend and rival known as W. They’d go on at length about the nature of their own idiocy, and how meaningful insights would be theirs if only a proper (absurd) set of conditions would prevail. It was a kind of running joke about academia and the over- examined life.
I smiled more often than you might think. The put-downs were often clever since Lars and W. knew their shared vulnerabilities well. Here is but one of the countless examples:
Other reviewers have likened this to Waiting for Godot, and I can see that. There’s meant to be something beyond the inactivity. I can’t be sure, but I think the “something” is a sort of meta-existentialism. (I also can’t be sure if I’m joking here or not.) It’s a slim, seemingly insubstantial book, but anything fueled by heavy drinking and references to Kafka has got to have abstract, fuzzy, and metaphorical foundations, right?
I opted for three stars, though at times thought it warranted four. In the end it seemed like whatever the point was, it was belabored. I remember thinking of those more experimental Saturday Night Live skits late in the show that would go to senseless extremes flogging the same basic joke. At least Iyer’s target was a fun one: his own chosen profession. He’s a philosophy prof at the university in Newcastle.
Spurious is easy to summarize. You know the expression about the excitement of watching paint dry? Well, this one was a variation where the narrator, Lars, watched mold grow on the walls of his flat. That, and he’d philosophize (though not deeply or well) with his academic friend and rival known as W. They’d go on at length about the nature of their own idiocy, and how meaningful insights would be theirs if only a proper (absurd) set of conditions would prevail. It was a kind of running joke about academia and the over- examined life.
I smiled more often than you might think. The put-downs were often clever since Lars and W. knew their shared vulnerabilities well. Here is but one of the countless examples:
W., as usual, is reading about God. God and mathematics, that's all he's interested in. Somehow everything has to do with God, in whom W.'s not capable of believing, and mathematics, which W. is not capable of doing. And he's reading about God and mathematics in German, W. says, which means he doesn't really understand what he doesn't understand.
Other reviewers have likened this to Waiting for Godot, and I can see that. There’s meant to be something beyond the inactivity. I can’t be sure, but I think the “something” is a sort of meta-existentialism. (I also can’t be sure if I’m joking here or not.) It’s a slim, seemingly insubstantial book, but anything fueled by heavy drinking and references to Kafka has got to have abstract, fuzzy, and metaphorical foundations, right?
I opted for three stars, though at times thought it warranted four. In the end it seemed like whatever the point was, it was belabored. I remember thinking of those more experimental Saturday Night Live skits late in the show that would go to senseless extremes flogging the same basic joke. At least Iyer’s target was a fun one: his own chosen profession. He’s a philosophy prof at the university in Newcastle.
February 23, 2014
What place do we have in the world? None. Where's it all going? To perdition. To desolation, and to the abomination of desolation. And are we going with it? All the way! That's where we're heading now with our gin and our apocalypticism, full speed into the night.
I was first made aware of the novel Spurious by Goodreader [p]. He is now gone, into the ether. Or night. I miss him and his reviews. I likely spend too much time pondering that "miss." Spurious details a friendship. The parties are Lars and W. I haven't pondered whether the "Lars" is the novel's author. The friendship meditates on failure and on the historical friendship between Kafka and Brod. I bought two copies of this novel. I gave one to my best friend when he visited last week. I don't worry about failure. I do worry about my friend. I try not to be troubled when ranks of goodreaders move on. I sort of stick things out. I have been at my job for almost 21 years. I have been friends with j for almost 30. I read this novel in two sessions, the latter riddled with doubt about it all. By "all" I mean existence, not the snarky frame of this narrative. My friend is now back in New York and life proceeds. Most likely I won't read further novels from the author.
I was first made aware of the novel Spurious by Goodreader [p]. He is now gone, into the ether. Or night. I miss him and his reviews. I likely spend too much time pondering that "miss." Spurious details a friendship. The parties are Lars and W. I haven't pondered whether the "Lars" is the novel's author. The friendship meditates on failure and on the historical friendship between Kafka and Brod. I bought two copies of this novel. I gave one to my best friend when he visited last week. I don't worry about failure. I do worry about my friend. I try not to be troubled when ranks of goodreaders move on. I sort of stick things out. I have been at my job for almost 21 years. I have been friends with j for almost 30. I read this novel in two sessions, the latter riddled with doubt about it all. By "all" I mean existence, not the snarky frame of this narrative. My friend is now back in New York and life proceeds. Most likely I won't read further novels from the author.
January 15, 2013
This is the rather spare depiction of two absurd characters that immediately calls to mind a sort of revamped Waiting For Godot for the 21st century. Lars narrates the nothing-much-actually-happening happenings between himself and his friend W. They appear to be philosophy professors. They drink heavily. They worship Kafka. They both denigrate themselves and each other constantly as failures, as idiots, as apes. They muse bluntly and repetitively about the great meaninglessness and shittiness of everything, but also about the vague possibility of meaning and redemption (but mostly the former one). It's often viewed as a humorous take on the absurdity of existential angst, but it also becomes a bit boring in its (no doubt, intentional) over-repetition, though I still ultimately found it engaging, despite certain moments where I wished it would just shift gears or something.
The only real plot consists in this mysterious dampening of Lars' flat which causes a bizarre mold to colonize his home and the spores, his lungs. It's weird and takes on a metaphorical role in the book that's almost a little too obvious.
There are clever and even moving bits, but mostly it reads as a very cynical and straightforward mockery of academia and intellectual life that only an academic and intellectual could write and/or appreciate reading.
This book is the first of a trilogy the author (who is unsurprisingly a philosopher first, and novelist second) has concocted and though I ultimately gave this three stars (though there were moments I considered four and maybe certain paragraphs where I may've considered five) I'm still interested to see where he takes these ridiculously dour characters next and will pick up Dogma, the second installment.
The only real plot consists in this mysterious dampening of Lars' flat which causes a bizarre mold to colonize his home and the spores, his lungs. It's weird and takes on a metaphorical role in the book that's almost a little too obvious.
There are clever and even moving bits, but mostly it reads as a very cynical and straightforward mockery of academia and intellectual life that only an academic and intellectual could write and/or appreciate reading.
This book is the first of a trilogy the author (who is unsurprisingly a philosopher first, and novelist second) has concocted and though I ultimately gave this three stars (though there were moments I considered four and maybe certain paragraphs where I may've considered five) I'm still interested to see where he takes these ridiculously dour characters next and will pick up Dogma, the second installment.
March 24, 2011
I really enjoyed this book, though I don't think everyone will. I loved it for its hilarious exploration of writing and academia and what it means to be a truly great thinker. W. is a fantastically contrary character who manages to be both self-deprecating and narcissistic. The narrator is verbally abused by W. throughout the whole story and I was thoroughly amused by the two friends' pursuit of "ideas" and great thoughts. Throw in a contention that the End Times are near, an apartment slowly being devoured by persistent and aggressive damp, and a dip into what Apocalypse really means. This book is funny, strange, and philosophically charged. It would have helped me to know more about the works of Kafka and his basic autobiography before embarking on a reading of this book, but some quick research half way through and familiarity with The Metamorphosis helped. This book is unlike anything I've ever read stylistically and I think anyone who has been through the wringer of the academic world, and thought that perhaps the creating the appearance of great thinking was more prevalent than actual discussions and learning should probably pick this one up.
December 14, 2016
We are Brod and Brod, we agree, and neither of us is Kafka.
If this quote means nothing to you, this might not be the book for you. I am by no means an expert on Kafka, but I have a feeling Max Brod is hard done by in this quote and other references to him in the book. But I’ll leave that for someone who knows what they are talking about.
The two “heroes” of this book are W. and the narrator who happens to be called Lars, like the author. Much of the book is W. finding increasingly inventive ways to insult Lars which Lars records with equanimity. Much of the rest of the book is Lars describing the damp (understatement!) in his house and his increasingly desperate attempts to do something about it before his home collapses. In between these bits, W. and Lars talk about apocalypticism and messianism, about the end of the world (symbolised, possibly, by the damp in Lars’ house) and about the possibility that one of them might have a thought or an idea one day. And about a few other things, too. Both are employed in the academic world and they sometimes travel to conferences in Europe (they both live in England). Alcohol is often involved in their discussions.
There isn’t really a plot. The two protagonists talk to each other and sometimes mention what they are doing which turns out to be something different from what they were doing last time they mentioned it. But that’s about as much as you get in terms of plot. It is repetitive, with ideas and sometimes paragraphs making more than one appearance. It is sometimes confusing who is talking and who they are talking about (which is a bit hard to imagine as only W. or Lars can be talking and only W. or Lars can be the subject!). But, in a deadpan way, it is actually funny. Not laugh out loud funny, more witty in a clever way.
I’m not quite sure what to make of it, to be honest. I read it in two sessions. In the first, I wondered if I would come back and finish it. In the second, I started to warm to the characters and settle into the unusual style. It is the first in a trilogy and I liked it enough to think I will read the next one, but not enough to mean I will do that immediately.
Yes, that’s what happened, W. says: disappointment, and then drinking (and smoking). Then there was the apocalypse, which made things even worse. That's not an opinion of the book, just the kind of thing that needs to amuse you if you are going to find the book funny.
If this quote means nothing to you, this might not be the book for you. I am by no means an expert on Kafka, but I have a feeling Max Brod is hard done by in this quote and other references to him in the book. But I’ll leave that for someone who knows what they are talking about.
The two “heroes” of this book are W. and the narrator who happens to be called Lars, like the author. Much of the book is W. finding increasingly inventive ways to insult Lars which Lars records with equanimity. Much of the rest of the book is Lars describing the damp (understatement!) in his house and his increasingly desperate attempts to do something about it before his home collapses. In between these bits, W. and Lars talk about apocalypticism and messianism, about the end of the world (symbolised, possibly, by the damp in Lars’ house) and about the possibility that one of them might have a thought or an idea one day. And about a few other things, too. Both are employed in the academic world and they sometimes travel to conferences in Europe (they both live in England). Alcohol is often involved in their discussions.
There isn’t really a plot. The two protagonists talk to each other and sometimes mention what they are doing which turns out to be something different from what they were doing last time they mentioned it. But that’s about as much as you get in terms of plot. It is repetitive, with ideas and sometimes paragraphs making more than one appearance. It is sometimes confusing who is talking and who they are talking about (which is a bit hard to imagine as only W. or Lars can be talking and only W. or Lars can be the subject!). But, in a deadpan way, it is actually funny. Not laugh out loud funny, more witty in a clever way.
I’m not quite sure what to make of it, to be honest. I read it in two sessions. In the first, I wondered if I would come back and finish it. In the second, I started to warm to the characters and settle into the unusual style. It is the first in a trilogy and I liked it enough to think I will read the next one, but not enough to mean I will do that immediately.
Yes, that’s what happened, W. says: disappointment, and then drinking (and smoking). Then there was the apocalypse, which made things even worse. That's not an opinion of the book, just the kind of thing that needs to amuse you if you are going to find the book funny.
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May 15, 2021Lars hep böyleydi; bense onu tanıdığım andan itibaren onun rutubet kokusu sızdıran büyüsüne kapılmıştım. Doğası gereği acizdi, benim kişisel lanetim olmakla görevlendirilmişti ve hayatta gerçekten başarıyla yaptığı tek şeyin bu olduğu su götürmez bir gerçekti. Hayatıma girmesiyle, her şeyin, oldukça gürültüsüz bir şekilde baş aşağı yuvarlanmaya başlamış olduğunu fark etmeyen bir tek sensin dedim. Herkes söylüyor bunu.
Kendimizi alkol tanrılarına kurban ettiğimiz bir gün, içmekten başka yapılabilecek tek şeyin öylece durmak olduğunu, ama bizim, özellikle de Lars'ın hiçbir zaman bunu yapacak cesareti olmadığını söyledim ona. Üstelik, boş duracak cesareti olmadığı gibi, gerçekten meşgul olacak azim de yoktu onda. Bu ikisi arasında bir salınım, bir oyalanmasın dedim; kayıpsın, birinin seni bulmasını bekliyorsun ama olmayacak böyle bir şey; bitiksin sen; yetersizsin.
''Budalalığınla yüzleşmek, çarpışmak, budalalığında parçalanmak zorundasın. Sen kendi budalalığını deneyimleyene kadar hiçbir şey başlamayacak.''
Yine de, akıl almaz bir şekilde ona sempati duyduğumu, hatta onu sevdiğimi söyledim. Zayıf noktam sensin benim. Kendi sonumu görüyorum sende. İçten içe, gizli ve suçlu bir umutla beklediğim mesihsin sen; alelade gülümseyen çarpık Buda'msın. İyi bir mesihçi olamadığım için sevmek zorundayım seni. Sen, bendeki düşünce hastalığının; kıyametçiliğin bir semptomusun dedim Lars'a. Seviyorum seni, şişman, aptal ve tembel, rutubet kokan tanrıçamsın sen benim. Sen, benim serbest düşüşümsün.
Kendimizi alkol tanrılarına kurban ettiğimiz bir gün, içmekten başka yapılabilecek tek şeyin öylece durmak olduğunu, ama bizim, özellikle de Lars'ın hiçbir zaman bunu yapacak cesareti olmadığını söyledim ona. Üstelik, boş duracak cesareti olmadığı gibi, gerçekten meşgul olacak azim de yoktu onda. Bu ikisi arasında bir salınım, bir oyalanmasın dedim; kayıpsın, birinin seni bulmasını bekliyorsun ama olmayacak böyle bir şey; bitiksin sen; yetersizsin.
''Budalalığınla yüzleşmek, çarpışmak, budalalığında parçalanmak zorundasın. Sen kendi budalalığını deneyimleyene kadar hiçbir şey başlamayacak.''
Yine de, akıl almaz bir şekilde ona sempati duyduğumu, hatta onu sevdiğimi söyledim. Zayıf noktam sensin benim. Kendi sonumu görüyorum sende. İçten içe, gizli ve suçlu bir umutla beklediğim mesihsin sen; alelade gülümseyen çarpık Buda'msın. İyi bir mesihçi olamadığım için sevmek zorundayım seni. Sen, bendeki düşünce hastalığının; kıyametçiliğin bir semptomusun dedim Lars'a. Seviyorum seni, şişman, aptal ve tembel, rutubet kokan tanrıçamsın sen benim. Sen, benim serbest düşüşümsün.
February 29, 2012
(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)
By all laws of the current literary market, the comedic novels Spurious and Dogma by philosopher Lars Iyer (comprising two-thirds of an as-yet unfinished trilogy) shouldn't really exist at all, and it's a testament to the suddenly hot Melville House that they've not only published them, but have been promoting the newest with all the pomp and resources usually afforded only to Stephen King potboilers; for these are not traditional novels nearly as much as they are the spiritual grandchildren of Samuel Beckett, absurdist and cyclical tales where the point is not really to see "what happens" but rather to wallow in the abstract pleasures of language itself. Comprised as a series of conversations between a philosopher who just happens to be named Lars and his doppelganger and frenemy known only as W., and with the story details grounded in just exactly enough reality to seem plausible (they live on opposite sides of Britain; W. has recently become a Malcolm-Gladwell-type popular public prognosticator; Lars is experiencing a mysterious mold problem in his house that threatens to take over the entire building), readers will nonetheless get quickly frustrated if expecting such silly things from these books as a plot or character development; instead, this is more like getting a glimpse of what it must be like inside the head of a college professor while they're in the middle of having a nervous breakdown, a series of funny yet sometimes impossible-to-follow rants and arguments between the two that reference as many obscure thinkers and experimental artists as Family Guy does '80s television shows (and many times just as randomly). I agree with a lot of other critics I've come across, that I immensely enjoyed these silly yet high-falutin' comedies, but can't imagine another human being who will as well; and for that many unrelated strangers to say the same thing is a powerful statement indeed, and makes one understand why the publisher has put such a big promotional push behind what's essentially the very definition of idiosyncratic writing. As you can tell, it takes a special type of personality to enjoy these books; but if you're already a fan of such things as Waiting for Godot and A Confederacy of Dunces, you owe it to yourself to at least take a stab at these frustrating but ultimately satisfying head-scratchers.
Out of 10: 8.8
By all laws of the current literary market, the comedic novels Spurious and Dogma by philosopher Lars Iyer (comprising two-thirds of an as-yet unfinished trilogy) shouldn't really exist at all, and it's a testament to the suddenly hot Melville House that they've not only published them, but have been promoting the newest with all the pomp and resources usually afforded only to Stephen King potboilers; for these are not traditional novels nearly as much as they are the spiritual grandchildren of Samuel Beckett, absurdist and cyclical tales where the point is not really to see "what happens" but rather to wallow in the abstract pleasures of language itself. Comprised as a series of conversations between a philosopher who just happens to be named Lars and his doppelganger and frenemy known only as W., and with the story details grounded in just exactly enough reality to seem plausible (they live on opposite sides of Britain; W. has recently become a Malcolm-Gladwell-type popular public prognosticator; Lars is experiencing a mysterious mold problem in his house that threatens to take over the entire building), readers will nonetheless get quickly frustrated if expecting such silly things from these books as a plot or character development; instead, this is more like getting a glimpse of what it must be like inside the head of a college professor while they're in the middle of having a nervous breakdown, a series of funny yet sometimes impossible-to-follow rants and arguments between the two that reference as many obscure thinkers and experimental artists as Family Guy does '80s television shows (and many times just as randomly). I agree with a lot of other critics I've come across, that I immensely enjoyed these silly yet high-falutin' comedies, but can't imagine another human being who will as well; and for that many unrelated strangers to say the same thing is a powerful statement indeed, and makes one understand why the publisher has put such a big promotional push behind what's essentially the very definition of idiosyncratic writing. As you can tell, it takes a special type of personality to enjoy these books; but if you're already a fan of such things as Waiting for Godot and A Confederacy of Dunces, you owe it to yourself to at least take a stab at these frustrating but ultimately satisfying head-scratchers.
Out of 10: 8.8
January 12, 2023
«Quizá desarrolle tuberculosis, le digo a W., y eso me convertiría en un auténtico intelectual europeo»
March 21, 2017
'Compare our friendship', says W., 'to that of Levinas and Blanchot.' Of their correspondence, only a handful of letter survive. Of ours, which take the form of obscenities and drawings of cocks exchanged on Microsoft Messenger, everything survives, although it shouldn't.
Lars Iyer’s Spurious was his debut novel and the first in a trilogy with Dogma and Exodus that, in practice, form one novel. The final volume Exodus was shortlisted in 2013 for the inaugural version of the excellent Goldsmiths Prize, and I read the trilogy as part of my plan to read all of the novels shortlisted from 2013 to date.
The Goldsmiths Prize was created to “ celebrate the qualities of creative daring associated with the University [of London] and to reward fiction that breaks the mould or extends the possibilities for the novel form” and Spurious is certainly an unusual novel.
Lars and W. are philosophers, working in academia in Newcastle and Plymouth respectively, but notably unsuccessful and seemingly more concerned with consuming gin than advancing the course of research. The novel is narrated by Lars but largely consists, amid descriptions of their travels and a running description of his battles with chronic damp in his flat, of a stream of insults delivered by W to Lars.
Which one of us is Kafka and which Brod? W muses. We're both Brod, he says, and that's the pity of it.
But in practice the relationship is a little akin to that between Beavis (W.) and Butthead (Lars) – however little self-regard W. has he can still look down on Lars:
You should do a book, says W., if only so I can hear you whine. I like it when you whine in your presentations. Like a stuck pig, crying out! No, it's more plaintive than that. Like a sad ape. A sad ape locked up with his faeces.
Between the comically repetitive insults, Iyer does actually manage to include references to real philiosophy, mostly relating to religion – Lars is a Hindu and W. , a Catholic from a family of Jewish converts - with the effect that he feels guilty about feeling guilty! - with a particular interest in Messianism: Franz Rosenzweig’s The Star of Redemption and Hermann Cohen's The Principles of the Method of Infinitesimals and its History, which defeats W. mathematically.
Literature softened our brains, says W. - 'we should have been doing maths. If we knew maths, we might amount to something. As it is, we'll amount to nothing.'
Other touchpoints are the movies of Bela Tarr ("He said he discovered mid, rain and the infinite, on that order.") and his collaboration with Laszlo Krasznahorkai and even Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s Dead Flag Blues (The sun has fallen down, And the billboards are all leering, And the flags are all dead at the top of their poles).
Certainly unusual and a very enjoyable read. My concern is that at one level this is a rather light comic novel, but one suspects there are layers underneath which pass this (and I suspect most) readers by altogether. Both the underlying philosophy itself but also in-jokes given that Lars and W. appear to be based on real life people (Iyer himself has said “Almost everything in my novels is based on something real, but I exaggerate wildly, like any good anecdotalist”) – Lars obviously the author himself (and indeed the novel started life as a blog http://spurious.typepad.com/) and W. the philosopher W
For a more insightful review on these points see:
http://quarterlyconversation.com/pile...
And for the author’s own take on the trilogy this interview:
http://www.thewhitereview.org/intervi...
Lars Iyer’s Spurious was his debut novel and the first in a trilogy with Dogma and Exodus that, in practice, form one novel. The final volume Exodus was shortlisted in 2013 for the inaugural version of the excellent Goldsmiths Prize, and I read the trilogy as part of my plan to read all of the novels shortlisted from 2013 to date.
The Goldsmiths Prize was created to “ celebrate the qualities of creative daring associated with the University [of London] and to reward fiction that breaks the mould or extends the possibilities for the novel form” and Spurious is certainly an unusual novel.
Lars and W. are philosophers, working in academia in Newcastle and Plymouth respectively, but notably unsuccessful and seemingly more concerned with consuming gin than advancing the course of research. The novel is narrated by Lars but largely consists, amid descriptions of their travels and a running description of his battles with chronic damp in his flat, of a stream of insults delivered by W to Lars.
Which one of us is Kafka and which Brod? W muses. We're both Brod, he says, and that's the pity of it.
But in practice the relationship is a little akin to that between Beavis (W.) and Butthead (Lars) – however little self-regard W. has he can still look down on Lars:
You should do a book, says W., if only so I can hear you whine. I like it when you whine in your presentations. Like a stuck pig, crying out! No, it's more plaintive than that. Like a sad ape. A sad ape locked up with his faeces.
Between the comically repetitive insults, Iyer does actually manage to include references to real philiosophy, mostly relating to religion – Lars is a Hindu and W. , a Catholic from a family of Jewish converts - with the effect that he feels guilty about feeling guilty! - with a particular interest in Messianism: Franz Rosenzweig’s The Star of Redemption and Hermann Cohen's The Principles of the Method of Infinitesimals and its History, which defeats W. mathematically.
Literature softened our brains, says W. - 'we should have been doing maths. If we knew maths, we might amount to something. As it is, we'll amount to nothing.'
Other touchpoints are the movies of Bela Tarr ("He said he discovered mid, rain and the infinite, on that order.") and his collaboration with Laszlo Krasznahorkai and even Godspeed You! Black Emperor’s Dead Flag Blues (The sun has fallen down, And the billboards are all leering, And the flags are all dead at the top of their poles).
Certainly unusual and a very enjoyable read. My concern is that at one level this is a rather light comic novel, but one suspects there are layers underneath which pass this (and I suspect most) readers by altogether. Both the underlying philosophy itself but also in-jokes given that Lars and W. appear to be based on real life people (Iyer himself has said “Almost everything in my novels is based on something real, but I exaggerate wildly, like any good anecdotalist”) – Lars obviously the author himself (and indeed the novel started life as a blog http://spurious.typepad.com/) and W. the philosopher W
For a more insightful review on these points see:
http://quarterlyconversation.com/pile...
And for the author’s own take on the trilogy this interview:
http://www.thewhitereview.org/intervi...
May 4, 2013
“¿En qué momento te diste cuenta de que no llegarías a nada? Cuando vuelves al mirada hacia tu vida, ¿qué ves? ¿Cómo te sientes al saber lo que es la grandeza, y que jamás la alcanzarás? ¿Qué significa para ti que tu vida no haya servido para nada?“. “Magma” (publicado en España por Pálido Fuego) es un libro repleto de preguntas. Son preguntas que un tal W. dirige a su amigo y protagonista del libro, a quien a veces se dirige como Lars (¿alimentando la sospecha de la autobiografía?). Pero bien podrían ser también preguntas propulsadas contra el lector de forma agresiva y caótica, sin aparente orden ni concierto, como una ráfaga de metralla en medio de un campo de batalla silencioso que se niega a reconocerse como campo de batalla y que es la vida de quien lee. Todo es posible, y la probabilidad de que “Magma” no sea más que un espejo palpita en sus propias páginas… Pero no hace falta, sin embargo, buscarle los posibles pliegues alegóricos al libro de Lars Iyer para que su lectura sea una experiencia fascinante que te mantiene en vilo, flotando a lomo de tu propia perplejidad ante la dinámica con eje podrido sobre el que gira la amista de los dos protagonistas.
Es esta una amistad que remite directamente aquella literatura que, hasta bien avanzado el siglo XX, dejó constancia de las relaciones sumamente ilustradas que alumbraron los ambientes universitarios y literarios de Gran Bretaña (y, en menor medida, Estados Unidos). La fascinación reciente por el Círculo de Bloomsbury o por los Apóstoles de Cambridge es algo que parece calurosamente vigente si atendemos la publicación de libros como “El Contable Hindú” de David Leavitt o el reciente “Mi Hermana y Yo” de J.R. Ackerley. Lo que es menos habitual (y ampliamente estimulante) es la revisión de ese acerbo de intelectualismo esnob que Iyer sublima en su “Magma“: las referencias temporales dejan bien claro que los protagonistas de este libro, el primero de una trilogía, viven en un presente con acceso a Internet y a la prensa rosa. Sin embargo, y sin aparente esfuerzo (por parte de los personajes ni de un escritor que nunca fuerza la maquinaria), W. y Lars viven de forma natural un decadentismo intelectual en el que no son difíciles rastrear las constantes de la literatura de principio del siglo pasado: el desdén hacia la inteligencia ajena como moneda de cambio en las relaciones con los más allegados, el ver la vida pasar mientras las preguntas se repiten reiteradamente actuando de grilletes de acero…
Los protagonistas de “Magma“, sin embargo, tienen claro cuál es el culpable de su estancamiento vital: ”¿Cuándo empezó todo a ir mal?, cavila W. Ambos sabemos la respuesta: ¡la literatura! ¡Si tan sólo comprendiéramos las matemáticas! ¡Si tan sólo nos inclináramos hacia las matemáticas!” Algunas páginas antes, esta sospecha ya se había preconizado: “¿Pero no admira W. el hecho de que sintamos algo por la literatura? ¿No cree que es eso lo que nos salva? W. no está convencido. <>“. Así funciona el libro de Iyer: rodeando siempre las mismas cuestiones, las mismas preguntas en la boca de W. como una bola de hierro atada al tobillo que hunde a Lars hacia un fondo oscuro en el que lo normal sería pensar que cada vez es más difícil ver la luz de la superficie. Pero ahí reside otra de las grandezas de “Magma“: la autoestima de Lars nunca se resiente por mucho que el único propósito de W. parezca dañar su ego. De hecho, es inevitable tomarse las conversaciones entre los dos amigos con un humor nada exhibicionista, como una ironía supurante sobre el ratio de dolor y cinismo que implica cualquier relación humana.
Y es que, por mucho que los protagonistas se pasen el libro buscando un mesías (artistas consagrados como Kafka y Béla Tarr) y líderes (personas con las que conviven y a los que siempre acaban ahuyentando por un motivo u otro), por mucho que el Apocalipsis planee en el horizonte de “Magma” como un proceso en descomposición paralelo a las humedades del piso de Lars (un proceso que, por otra parte, sería la única redención posible según W. para la ignorancia y la falta de talento de su amigo)… Por mucho que estos y otros temas sobrevuelen la novela de Lars Iyer, lo que aquí prima (y duele) es precisamente la disección de una relación de amistad. ”Esta es la gran fantasía de W., admite: un grupo de amigos que favorecieran el pensamiento entre ellos.“, explica el narrador en cierto momento. ¿Es esa también la gran fantasía de Iyer y su obra? La respuesta está en la frase que sigue a la cita anterior:”¿Favorezco yo su pensamiento?, le pregunto. <<¡No! ¡Al contrario! ¡Tú eres un idiota!>>“. Y es que, si la respuesta hubiera sido simple y directa, “Magma” no sería tan rematadamente subyugante.
Es esta una amistad que remite directamente aquella literatura que, hasta bien avanzado el siglo XX, dejó constancia de las relaciones sumamente ilustradas que alumbraron los ambientes universitarios y literarios de Gran Bretaña (y, en menor medida, Estados Unidos). La fascinación reciente por el Círculo de Bloomsbury o por los Apóstoles de Cambridge es algo que parece calurosamente vigente si atendemos la publicación de libros como “El Contable Hindú” de David Leavitt o el reciente “Mi Hermana y Yo” de J.R. Ackerley. Lo que es menos habitual (y ampliamente estimulante) es la revisión de ese acerbo de intelectualismo esnob que Iyer sublima en su “Magma“: las referencias temporales dejan bien claro que los protagonistas de este libro, el primero de una trilogía, viven en un presente con acceso a Internet y a la prensa rosa. Sin embargo, y sin aparente esfuerzo (por parte de los personajes ni de un escritor que nunca fuerza la maquinaria), W. y Lars viven de forma natural un decadentismo intelectual en el que no son difíciles rastrear las constantes de la literatura de principio del siglo pasado: el desdén hacia la inteligencia ajena como moneda de cambio en las relaciones con los más allegados, el ver la vida pasar mientras las preguntas se repiten reiteradamente actuando de grilletes de acero…
Los protagonistas de “Magma“, sin embargo, tienen claro cuál es el culpable de su estancamiento vital: ”¿Cuándo empezó todo a ir mal?, cavila W. Ambos sabemos la respuesta: ¡la literatura! ¡Si tan sólo comprendiéramos las matemáticas! ¡Si tan sólo nos inclináramos hacia las matemáticas!” Algunas páginas antes, esta sospecha ya se había preconizado: “¿Pero no admira W. el hecho de que sintamos algo por la literatura? ¿No cree que es eso lo que nos salva? W. no está convencido. <>“. Así funciona el libro de Iyer: rodeando siempre las mismas cuestiones, las mismas preguntas en la boca de W. como una bola de hierro atada al tobillo que hunde a Lars hacia un fondo oscuro en el que lo normal sería pensar que cada vez es más difícil ver la luz de la superficie. Pero ahí reside otra de las grandezas de “Magma“: la autoestima de Lars nunca se resiente por mucho que el único propósito de W. parezca dañar su ego. De hecho, es inevitable tomarse las conversaciones entre los dos amigos con un humor nada exhibicionista, como una ironía supurante sobre el ratio de dolor y cinismo que implica cualquier relación humana.
Y es que, por mucho que los protagonistas se pasen el libro buscando un mesías (artistas consagrados como Kafka y Béla Tarr) y líderes (personas con las que conviven y a los que siempre acaban ahuyentando por un motivo u otro), por mucho que el Apocalipsis planee en el horizonte de “Magma” como un proceso en descomposición paralelo a las humedades del piso de Lars (un proceso que, por otra parte, sería la única redención posible según W. para la ignorancia y la falta de talento de su amigo)… Por mucho que estos y otros temas sobrevuelen la novela de Lars Iyer, lo que aquí prima (y duele) es precisamente la disección de una relación de amistad. ”Esta es la gran fantasía de W., admite: un grupo de amigos que favorecieran el pensamiento entre ellos.“, explica el narrador en cierto momento. ¿Es esa también la gran fantasía de Iyer y su obra? La respuesta está en la frase que sigue a la cita anterior:”¿Favorezco yo su pensamiento?, le pregunto. <<¡No! ¡Al contrario! ¡Tú eres un idiota!>>“. Y es que, si la respuesta hubiera sido simple y directa, “Magma” no sería tan rematadamente subyugante.
February 28, 2012
I read this for fun while I was teaching Notes from Underground, and, unfortunately for Mr Iyer, the comparison doesn't do him much good. The best case scenario for Spurious (and the title hints that this might be right) is: this book tries to do for late twentieth century ideas what Dostoevsky's Notes did for mid nineteenth century ideas, i.e., show the hollow stupidity. It certainly does that. If you're my age or a little older or a little younger, you probably had to/desperately wanted to read many of the names dropped here, explicitly or implicitly: W. Benjamin; Deleuze; Blanchot; Levinas; Heidegger; Rosenzweig; Scholem. You probably got a little bit out of some of them. You probably got more out of Kafka, who figures even more heavily here. So in Spurious, you get 'Lars's' memory of his conversations with another guy. They're both academics, presumably in a cultural studies or critical theory department. The more forceful one, W., seems to be convinced that they're idiots and will never know what it means to 'think.' So, like the Underground man before them, they vacillate and end up doing very little, before living through a very resonant, very brief plot (for the Underground man, the attempt to save a prostitute; for W. and Lars, a Kafka-esque struggle against rising damp). Another obvious touchstone here: Beckett's stripping away of 'literature' from his plays.
So far so curious. But for the book to really get anywhere, either the implied author, or the narrator, or the character W. needs to realize that the ideas they're swimming around in are garbage in very obvious and fundamental ways: there is no 'thought' of a detached, genius kind, not anywhere. There is no 'experience of thought,' unless you're on drugs, and there's a reason your thoughts on drugs are garbage. There's a reason, too, that the 'thinkers' in the above tradition drift towards history of religion, particularly non-conformist themes like mysticism and messianism; you get the frisson of believing in something without really actually believing in anything.
I'm not convinced, though, that the book is really a critique of those ideas (and the lifestyle which goes along with them) on any level. In too many ways, it looks like an attempt to fulfill them. But when you fulfill garbage ideas, you get garbage.
So, Iyer writes very, very well, but ultimately this reminds me of Philip Roth. Amazing facility with language + paucity of intelligent reflection = readable, funny, touching, intellectually bankrupt books. I hope the sequel, 'Dogma,' gives me reason to think that Iyer's doing much more than that.
So far so curious. But for the book to really get anywhere, either the implied author, or the narrator, or the character W. needs to realize that the ideas they're swimming around in are garbage in very obvious and fundamental ways: there is no 'thought' of a detached, genius kind, not anywhere. There is no 'experience of thought,' unless you're on drugs, and there's a reason your thoughts on drugs are garbage. There's a reason, too, that the 'thinkers' in the above tradition drift towards history of religion, particularly non-conformist themes like mysticism and messianism; you get the frisson of believing in something without really actually believing in anything.
I'm not convinced, though, that the book is really a critique of those ideas (and the lifestyle which goes along with them) on any level. In too many ways, it looks like an attempt to fulfill them. But when you fulfill garbage ideas, you get garbage.
So, Iyer writes very, very well, but ultimately this reminds me of Philip Roth. Amazing facility with language + paucity of intelligent reflection = readable, funny, touching, intellectually bankrupt books. I hope the sequel, 'Dogma,' gives me reason to think that Iyer's doing much more than that.
June 8, 2011
i almost loved this book. it's really very funny, and the writing is so clear, it's like a window. it's a portrait of a friendship between two (idiot?) philosophers; kind of a mix between beckett and wodehouse. the only thing it lacks is some kind of happening which might lead to an actual story. (there is the "creeping dampness in the walls" thing, but that never really goes anywhere.) in any case, it's very charming; i smiled the whole way through. it's just that after a while, you get that's all there is, and whatever urgency there was is lost.
We've never liked crossing roads. Now the bridge by the station has come down, we have to run across the road in a blind fury, me with my rucksack, W. with his man bag, pausing only on the bush-covered verge between the two lanes.
We push our way through the bushes. We're halfway! But we still have half a dual carriageway to cross. It's fearsome! We pause for a moment and then run like idiots, heads down and in fear for our lives to the other side of the road.
Only the pedestrian has the measure of the world, we agree. The pedestrian is the true proletarian. Drivers have always been mysterious to W. and I. What do we know of them? How can we understand what goes through their heads?
Sometimes drivers or their passengers shout abuse at him when they pass, W. says. It's his hair, W. says, his ringlets. Drivers hate ringlets.
We've never liked crossing roads. Now the bridge by the station has come down, we have to run across the road in a blind fury, me with my rucksack, W. with his man bag, pausing only on the bush-covered verge between the two lanes.
We push our way through the bushes. We're halfway! But we still have half a dual carriageway to cross. It's fearsome! We pause for a moment and then run like idiots, heads down and in fear for our lives to the other side of the road.
Only the pedestrian has the measure of the world, we agree. The pedestrian is the true proletarian. Drivers have always been mysterious to W. and I. What do we know of them? How can we understand what goes through their heads?
Sometimes drivers or their passengers shout abuse at him when they pass, W. says. It's his hair, W. says, his ringlets. Drivers hate ringlets.
July 9, 2016
Yaz sıcağında okumanızı tavsiye etmem ilk olarak. O kadar sade ama derinki zaman zaman ne anlattığına odaklanmam gerekti. Evet anlattığı çok açık ifade edilmiş ama demek istediği bir o kadar örtük. Yazarın bir filozof olması ve yıllarını felsefeye vermiş olmasının da bunda etkisi çoktur. Bir arkadaş izleniminin monolog haline dönüştürüldüğü kitapta net bir şey anlatılıyor diyemem fakat net birçok şeyi sorgulattığını söyleyebilirim. Oldukça optimizm düşmanı bir kitap da diyebilirim. Kafamda deli sorular...
10/6.5
10/6.5
March 28, 2021
Reasons I liked this book:
It’s hilarious and clever simultaneously
The Plymouth locations remind me of where I lived many years ago and maybe triggered feelings of nostalgia for a childhood that probably never existed
It doesn’t take itself too seriously despite being often quite serious
It’s often thought provoking but also thoughtless
There are only two characters. It’s minimalism appeals to my own minimalist tendency
It didn’t overstay its welcome.
It didn’t seem pretentious but maybe it is?
I believe it’s part one of a trilogy. I’ve always liked a good threesome.
It’s hilarious and clever simultaneously
The Plymouth locations remind me of where I lived many years ago and maybe triggered feelings of nostalgia for a childhood that probably never existed
It doesn’t take itself too seriously despite being often quite serious
It’s often thought provoking but also thoughtless
There are only two characters. It’s minimalism appeals to my own minimalist tendency
It didn’t overstay its welcome.
It didn’t seem pretentious but maybe it is?
I believe it’s part one of a trilogy. I’ve always liked a good threesome.
April 16, 2011
Spurious is narrated by a writer named Lars, and the story's about his friendship with another writer, W. The narrative voice, with its mix of aimlessness and repetitiveness and deadpan humor, kind of reminded me of Martin Millar's writing, except more explicitly smart/philosophical (though as far as W.'s concerned, the narrator's really quite stupid). Much of the book consists of the narrator recounting his conversations with W., and the slight remove that this creates is really appealing to me: you get lines of speech from W. but it's not a whole conversation rendered in dialogue, it's the narrator's remembering of or transcription (or imagining) of the dialogue, dialogue and paraphrase (or invention): it makes it funnier, I think, and keeps it from being tedious in the way that dialogue in fiction can sometimes be so tedious.
As Lars and W. travel and drink and philosophize, W. obsesses about their mutual status as failures and makes casually mean remarks to Lars all the time, like:
and the two of them together are funnily creepy, with their obsession with the apocalypse and messianism. Because the book spends so much time talking about thought, about what the characters are reading and writing (or not reading, and not writing), about the ideas they're trying to grasp (and because the characters often repeat themselves, as they circle around the same ideas and concepts), I found the concrete bits of the narrative (train rides, gin, a horribly damp flat) to be satisfying, a bit of a breather between Kafka and "infinitesimal calculus" and all the rest.
As Lars and W. travel and drink and philosophize, W. obsesses about their mutual status as failures and makes casually mean remarks to Lars all the time, like:
'When did you know?', W. says with great insistence. 'When did you know you weren't going to amount to anything? Did you know?', he asks, because sometimes he suspects I never did. Well he knows, at any rate, for both of us. (10)
and the two of them together are funnily creepy, with their obsession with the apocalypse and messianism. Because the book spends so much time talking about thought, about what the characters are reading and writing (or not reading, and not writing), about the ideas they're trying to grasp (and because the characters often repeat themselves, as they circle around the same ideas and concepts), I found the concrete bits of the narrative (train rides, gin, a horribly damp flat) to be satisfying, a bit of a breather between Kafka and "infinitesimal calculus" and all the rest.
August 30, 2015
Mi è piaciuto un sacco questo libro. Due "filosofi", amici e ubriachi che ci raccontano la sua storia.
Ho stratto tanti pensieri:
"E lui, quando alza lo sguardo dalle sue fatiche? Cosa vede? Cosa sogna? Sogna il pensiero, sostiene. Un singolo pensiero, da cui possa scaturire qualcosa. Un singolo pensiero che possa giustificare la sua esistenza."
"Siamo i bip di un radar che nessuno controlla. A nessuno importa dei nostri destini, forse nemmeno a noi stessi. Questo ci contraddistingue fortemente, concordiamo: l'indifferenza verso il nostro destino."
"Tutto deve rimanere uguale a se stesso. Qui sta la nostra forza."
"Ero sempre stato perso, non è così? Non lo sapevo nemmeno di essere perso, ma lo ero. O forse non mi ero mai perso."
"Trova che l'espressione "vortice di impotenza" sia particolarmente stimolante. Descrive la mia intera vita: azione e impotenza; movimento e paralisi; una strana combinazion tra disperazione e frenesia. "
Ho stratto tanti pensieri:
"E lui, quando alza lo sguardo dalle sue fatiche? Cosa vede? Cosa sogna? Sogna il pensiero, sostiene. Un singolo pensiero, da cui possa scaturire qualcosa. Un singolo pensiero che possa giustificare la sua esistenza."
"Siamo i bip di un radar che nessuno controlla. A nessuno importa dei nostri destini, forse nemmeno a noi stessi. Questo ci contraddistingue fortemente, concordiamo: l'indifferenza verso il nostro destino."
"Tutto deve rimanere uguale a se stesso. Qui sta la nostra forza."
"Ero sempre stato perso, non è così? Non lo sapevo nemmeno di essere perso, ma lo ero. O forse non mi ero mai perso."
"Trova che l'espressione "vortice di impotenza" sia particolarmente stimolante. Descrive la mia intera vita: azione e impotenza; movimento e paralisi; una strana combinazion tra disperazione e frenesia. "
August 21, 2025
What a sad existence
February 17, 2013
Philosophy made fun. A darkly funny take on the simultaneous meaninglessness and joyfulness of human existence. Two academic philosophers, W. and Lars, live in England, go to some academic conferences, reminisce about a trip to Poland, drink a lot, W. makes fun of Lars, and they talk about philosophy. And it's really fun and entertaining, even if you don't know anything about philosophy (like me!). The narrator is Lars. Lars Iyer is the author of the book. Lars Iyer, the author, is an academic philosopher who lives in England. Is it based on the author's own life? Is W. a real person? Is Lars really Lars Iyer? Not clear (not that it matters), but that spices things up a bit as you read too!
This book has no real narrative, which I like a lot. Sentences and ideas repeat themselves throughout the text, which is broken up into hyper-short chapters and funky page spacing (both things which I've noticed a lot in more contemporary world lit). I don't understand the whys and hows of text layouts (yet) but I like the idea of flying through books, and each "chapter" is a vignette centered on a theme, or an experience, or a thought (even though believing one can think is the "greatest illusion" [p. 92]).
I love books that get at the root of our existence. The human condition. Our ability to be great and complete shit at the same time. Infinitesimally meaningless and unbelievably profound at the same time. The apocalypse. The ongoing search for the Messiah, a leader. Which W. and Lars are seeking. A leader. Someone to give dispense unto them the wisdom they crave. And with their ruminations on idiocy and their own lack of value in the world, they seem a lot like Vladimir and Estragon seeking their Godot, reveling in and bemoaning the black humor of existence all the while (one quote on the back cover compared Lars & W. to Laurel and Hardy, but this book isn't that kind of funny, it's darker, bleaker, way more Waiting for Godot):
And I love that these guys love Bela Tarr. "Bela Tarr spent six months visiting every house and every pub on the plain, W. notes. He said he discovered mud, rain and the infinite, in that order. Mud, rain, and the infinite: nothing to W. is more moving than those words." (188)
W. always asks Lars questions, they are part of the narrative backbone, one of the repetitive elements that recur and make me pause to think, and rethink:
In the end, this quote is what the book is all about. So read it, it's so worth it (I already can't wait to re-read it, I enjoyed going back and typing out my favorite quotes afterwards, I ended up revisiting almost the entire novel that way):
This book has no real narrative, which I like a lot. Sentences and ideas repeat themselves throughout the text, which is broken up into hyper-short chapters and funky page spacing (both things which I've noticed a lot in more contemporary world lit). I don't understand the whys and hows of text layouts (yet) but I like the idea of flying through books, and each "chapter" is a vignette centered on a theme, or an experience, or a thought (even though believing one can think is the "greatest illusion" [p. 92]).
I love books that get at the root of our existence. The human condition. Our ability to be great and complete shit at the same time. Infinitesimally meaningless and unbelievably profound at the same time. The apocalypse. The ongoing search for the Messiah, a leader. Which W. and Lars are seeking. A leader. Someone to give dispense unto them the wisdom they crave. And with their ruminations on idiocy and their own lack of value in the world, they seem a lot like Vladimir and Estragon seeking their Godot, reveling in and bemoaning the black humor of existence all the while (one quote on the back cover compared Lars & W. to Laurel and Hardy, but this book isn't that kind of funny, it's darker, bleaker, way more Waiting for Godot):
"We're fated in some way. We're circling round and round what we cannot possibly understand. And isn't that why we're drawn to it? Isn't that the lure? You cannot understand this idea. You'll never understand it, not today, not tomorrow. But the day after that?, we ask. The day after tomorrow?
That's our faith. It's not faith in the Messiah, but that we might be brought into the vicinity of the idea of the Messiah; that a little of its light might reach us. The Messiah: isn't he forever beyond us, just beyond? We've always just missed him. We missed the appointment . . ." (180)
And I love that these guys love Bela Tarr. "Bela Tarr spent six months visiting every house and every pub on the plain, W. notes. He said he discovered mud, rain and the infinite, in that order. Mud, rain, and the infinite: nothing to W. is more moving than those words." (188)
W. always asks Lars questions, they are part of the narrative backbone, one of the repetitive elements that recur and make me pause to think, and rethink:
"I keep a mental list of W.'s favourite questions, which he constantly asks me so as to ask himself. –'At what point did you realize that you would amount to nothing?' ; 'When was it that you first became aware you would be nothing but a failure?'; 'When you look back at your life, what do you see?'; 'How is it that you know what greatness is, and that you will never, ever reach it?'"
'What does it mean to you that your life has amounted to nothing?, W. asks me with great seriousness. And then, 'Why have your friends never made you greater?' This is W.'s great fantasy, he admits: a group of friends who could make one another think. Do I make him think?, I ask him. –'No! The opposite! You're an idiot!'
Then: 'What do you consider to be your greatest weakness?' W. answers for me: 'Never having come to terms with your lack of ability. Because you haven't, have you? Have you?' (100-01)
In the end, this quote is what the book is all about. So read it, it's so worth it (I already can't wait to re-read it, I enjoyed going back and typing out my favorite quotes afterwards, I ended up revisiting almost the entire novel that way):
"W. wonders whether we too have discovered the infinite in our own way. Our incessant chatter. Our incessant feeling of utter failure. Perhaps we live on our own version of the plain, W. muses. Am I the plain on which he is lost, or vice versa? But perhaps the plain is the friendship between us on which we are both lost, he says."
December 3, 2014
Contemplating the id, the ego, and humanity at large through criticism of the self. An interesting approach, and so I loved this book. Laughed almost the entire way through it. The sarcasm. The idiotic generalizations. The hate/loathe/detest relationship the two characters have with one another vis-à-vis the idea of living in general, and the damp reminded me of the scene in the movie "Eraserhead" where the dirt and vegetation take over the apartment. Much the same as our characters here fear the idiocy that is taking over their existence. I do love a plotless story, and yes, it did remind me of Beckett. Existence here for Lars and W. is stripped down to the most random, mundane, and hopelessly belittling conversations imaginable, and that banality invites all sorts of philosophical interpretation. They are stupid. They have achieved nothing of value. They drink too much. Whine too much. Hate and love on each other too much, and more importantly, they are not Kafka. Though, and I quote:
"W. is a mystic. One day he might become properly religious. He says that he might. Sometimes he feels on the verge of religion."
And Lars, a prophet of sorts:
"Somewhere on the other side of the wall, life has reached a new level. Somewhere, damp mutters to itself; damp dreams, there behind the wall. And what will it say when it comes to itself? What will it say when it wakes up?
"W. is a mystic. One day he might become properly religious. He says that he might. Sometimes he feels on the verge of religion."
And Lars, a prophet of sorts:
"Somewhere on the other side of the wall, life has reached a new level. Somewhere, damp mutters to itself; damp dreams, there behind the wall. And what will it say when it comes to itself? What will it say when it wakes up?
August 13, 2017
I might've given this 5 stars but the characters are so annoying that I couldn't bring myself to encourage them. It's a testament to Lars Iyer that his creations are so rotund in their repulsiveness. You can have no sympathy for them. It's as if two Withnails have lost their "I"s, found each other and somehow become academics.
April 12, 2011
Very funny! and very moving, and very much to think about here -- I can't quite imagine two more volumes of the same, but -- bring them on!
April 30, 2012
Whenever writers offer their ideas of what fiction should be, they usually end up describing precisely the type of writing they do.
Like Sebald saying that “fiction” (which is what his writing is considered) was a “form of imposture I find difficult to take” and that he prefers autobiographical stuff (no surprise here). He says he’s resistant to the “rules and laws” of fiction, as if analogous rules and laws--assuming they do exist for fiction--mustn’t then also be present in autobiography, which has to be one of the most conformist genres (though it’s true that Sebald is really beyond genre, since no one quite does what he does). You get the point: since his writing is autobiographical—-as it covers random long walks and thoughts—-he posits that this form is somehow freer from constraints or is somehow nobler than lowly fiction.
Stuff like this is annoying because the writer, as in this case, will act as if this is not a matter of personal aesthetics (or a matter of the type of writing they happen to do well), but rather a flaw that’s out there in the world and that has to be addressed.
Likely, there’s a part of any given writer that dislikes almost all other writing. And that on some level writing yourself, engaging in the fray, is the attempt to make up for this dissatisfaction. To the familiar question: Who’s your favorite author? I feel like I have nothing clear to say, because part of me dislikes every last one.
In Iyer’s manifesto on the current state of literature (it’s at the White Review; just Google “Lars Iyer Manifesto”), in which he pronounces that “literature is a corpse and cold at that,” he basically says that now all a writer can do is walk around and observe the literary ruins (which is a perfect description of Spurious). There's something hegemonic about Iyer's manifesto and his novels. The grand assumption is that "all of us" (presumably meaning educated people in the West who care about reading/writing fiction and/or philosophy) are now incapable of authentic thought, that real creation is sealed off in the past, that everything is now a travesty of what it once was, and so on. Beyond being a kind Modernist lament, this type of thing perhaps can also be seen as the lament of every era (not to mention there have of course been hundreds of pronouncements that the novel is dead already). People cannot resist harking back to supposed better times, when things were more authentic, when existence was in line with the natural order and philosophers’ thoughts reached stratospheric levels, and so on.
Iyer also seeks to be “nonliterary.” It's interesting how literary writers often want to be nonliterary. But this usually translates to, more literary. The idea of being nonliterary is supposed to announce your forthrightness and adherence to the “truth” of the “current situation.” It goes back to Plato’s idea of throwing poets out of the towns. There’s no time for such frivolities when you’re seeking the truth and trying to impose a "better" way to live on society. There’s definitely something puritanical about it, an appeal to plain speaking and simple expressions, a suspicion of novelty and excess.
Being “nonliterary” can also mean: to reach out to include more of existence, stuff typically considered out of bounds, perhaps. Or, to apply new ideologies to writing that are not perceived to fit prevailing literary modes. Or, to undermine literary tradition and present your book as being beyond literature, the next step. Either way, when a book is commended as being nonliterary (and it’s only purely literary outfits that make these pronouncements, and it’s always considered a deep compliment) expect something that’s actually very “literary.” War and Peace was at one time seen as nonliterary.
[EDIT: Here's a perfect example of what I was talking about above. This quote is taken from a LARoB piece on Martin Amis, in which the author says that one of Amis's primary tension is the "literary vs. unliterary": "Irving Howe wrote of Saul Bellow's prose that it was sometimes 'strongly anti-literary,' that it tried to 'break away from the stateliness of the literary sentence.'" This is a literary critic talking about Saul Bellow. It really is a beautiful specimen of a literary critic's praising the nonliterariness of a literary writer in a literary journal.]
The book itself: This is the third much-hyped contemporary novel I’ve read recently. The other two were Lerner’s Leaving the Atocha Station and Barnes’s The Sense of an Ending, both of which made me feel like I was a victim of some kind of conspiracy. Surely, this could not be the novel everyone is raving about. Did someone at the press warehouse swap out the real text? Did James Wood really love Lerner’s novel that much, or was Wood’s identity stolen? Did Barnes actually win the Booker Prize, or was it all a vast joke?
Spurious did not quite make me feel this way, but I still found the book pretty underwhelming considering its hype. (I realize this hype is not the writer’s fault at all.) And I don’t think that Spurious is all that deceptive in its simplicity, as many seem to. I think that because of Iyer’s manifesto and other such pronouncements on his blog, this collection of witty conversations is receiving more earnest theorizing and critical attention than it might deserve. Read the lit blog reviews. They’re always saying things like,
“Here we’re dealing with something laughably less than literature – but maybe, therefore, something more.”
“Though it seems nothing much is happening here... perhaps something is...?”
It is a series of funny conversations between two academics. With its repetitions and snarky comments it at times begs to be compared to Bernhard, but it lacks the rhythm and intensity of Bernhard.
Iyer said in an interview that he hopes for a “backlash against Dogma [the sequel to Spurious]... something cruel.... A desire for the order of the world to be restored, even though I know it cannot be restored. This, of course, is really the desire for an older literary world, a world of tradition and security* from which I feel utterly estranged.”
Beyond the playful melodrama** (the idea that some book review of Iyer’s collections of aphorisms could “restore the world” for anyone is obviously absurd), this quote also seems kind of self-serving. It could be paraphrased like this: “It’s okay if people don’t think my novel is worthwhile, in fact I hope they don’t; this just means that they’re stuck in old-fashioned expectations of what literature should be and that such expectations might still have some life to them after all; but you and I know they’re wrong, right?”
*This “old literary world of security and tradition” seems to be a place Iyer believes once existed, or that we walk around today believing that it once existed, whereas I think most people acknowledge it as an illusion. From here, after hundreds of years of codifying literature, it only appears this way. For, seen a certain way, all writing is new and unprecedented, and thus is an “attack” on the already existing Text (thus Derrida). Writers in the supposed heyday had little or no concept that they were in the midst a secure, tradition-rich ground from which to launch their narratives (because they were not).
The project of pinning down the Western canon didn’t seem to arise in earnest until the late-19th century, at a time when Dostoevsky was writing revolutionary fiction and even Trollope(!) was being criticized by Henry James for employing what would come to be called metafiction (“Reader, don’t worry; my heroine will not marry the villain”). And of course this was a generation before writers like Joyce/Beckett/Woolf/Proust who would write deeply aggressive, untraditional novels. And nearly two hundred years before that, 18th century literature contains some of the wildest nonsecure, nontraditional novels written. Sterne was writing stuff that was presumed too weird to last, for example, and Tristram Shandy is still considered one of the most “experimental” novels ever written. And before that Cervantes was writing a bizarre metafiction that viciously satired the “traditional” writing of the previous couple hundred of years, the lays and tales of medieval romance. And these romances in turn were a vernacular path away from traditional Greco-Roman epic storytelling. So where, precisely, is this secure comfy tradition located?
**Playful melodrama is legion in Spurious.
Like Sebald saying that “fiction” (which is what his writing is considered) was a “form of imposture I find difficult to take” and that he prefers autobiographical stuff (no surprise here). He says he’s resistant to the “rules and laws” of fiction, as if analogous rules and laws--assuming they do exist for fiction--mustn’t then also be present in autobiography, which has to be one of the most conformist genres (though it’s true that Sebald is really beyond genre, since no one quite does what he does). You get the point: since his writing is autobiographical—-as it covers random long walks and thoughts—-he posits that this form is somehow freer from constraints or is somehow nobler than lowly fiction.
Stuff like this is annoying because the writer, as in this case, will act as if this is not a matter of personal aesthetics (or a matter of the type of writing they happen to do well), but rather a flaw that’s out there in the world and that has to be addressed.
Likely, there’s a part of any given writer that dislikes almost all other writing. And that on some level writing yourself, engaging in the fray, is the attempt to make up for this dissatisfaction. To the familiar question: Who’s your favorite author? I feel like I have nothing clear to say, because part of me dislikes every last one.
In Iyer’s manifesto on the current state of literature (it’s at the White Review; just Google “Lars Iyer Manifesto”), in which he pronounces that “literature is a corpse and cold at that,” he basically says that now all a writer can do is walk around and observe the literary ruins (which is a perfect description of Spurious). There's something hegemonic about Iyer's manifesto and his novels. The grand assumption is that "all of us" (presumably meaning educated people in the West who care about reading/writing fiction and/or philosophy) are now incapable of authentic thought, that real creation is sealed off in the past, that everything is now a travesty of what it once was, and so on. Beyond being a kind Modernist lament, this type of thing perhaps can also be seen as the lament of every era (not to mention there have of course been hundreds of pronouncements that the novel is dead already). People cannot resist harking back to supposed better times, when things were more authentic, when existence was in line with the natural order and philosophers’ thoughts reached stratospheric levels, and so on.
Iyer also seeks to be “nonliterary.” It's interesting how literary writers often want to be nonliterary. But this usually translates to, more literary. The idea of being nonliterary is supposed to announce your forthrightness and adherence to the “truth” of the “current situation.” It goes back to Plato’s idea of throwing poets out of the towns. There’s no time for such frivolities when you’re seeking the truth and trying to impose a "better" way to live on society. There’s definitely something puritanical about it, an appeal to plain speaking and simple expressions, a suspicion of novelty and excess.
Being “nonliterary” can also mean: to reach out to include more of existence, stuff typically considered out of bounds, perhaps. Or, to apply new ideologies to writing that are not perceived to fit prevailing literary modes. Or, to undermine literary tradition and present your book as being beyond literature, the next step. Either way, when a book is commended as being nonliterary (and it’s only purely literary outfits that make these pronouncements, and it’s always considered a deep compliment) expect something that’s actually very “literary.” War and Peace was at one time seen as nonliterary.
[EDIT: Here's a perfect example of what I was talking about above. This quote is taken from a LARoB piece on Martin Amis, in which the author says that one of Amis's primary tension is the "literary vs. unliterary": "Irving Howe wrote of Saul Bellow's prose that it was sometimes 'strongly anti-literary,' that it tried to 'break away from the stateliness of the literary sentence.'" This is a literary critic talking about Saul Bellow. It really is a beautiful specimen of a literary critic's praising the nonliterariness of a literary writer in a literary journal.]
The book itself: This is the third much-hyped contemporary novel I’ve read recently. The other two were Lerner’s Leaving the Atocha Station and Barnes’s The Sense of an Ending, both of which made me feel like I was a victim of some kind of conspiracy. Surely, this could not be the novel everyone is raving about. Did someone at the press warehouse swap out the real text? Did James Wood really love Lerner’s novel that much, or was Wood’s identity stolen? Did Barnes actually win the Booker Prize, or was it all a vast joke?
Spurious did not quite make me feel this way, but I still found the book pretty underwhelming considering its hype. (I realize this hype is not the writer’s fault at all.) And I don’t think that Spurious is all that deceptive in its simplicity, as many seem to. I think that because of Iyer’s manifesto and other such pronouncements on his blog, this collection of witty conversations is receiving more earnest theorizing and critical attention than it might deserve. Read the lit blog reviews. They’re always saying things like,
“Here we’re dealing with something laughably less than literature – but maybe, therefore, something more.”
“Though it seems nothing much is happening here... perhaps something is...?”
It is a series of funny conversations between two academics. With its repetitions and snarky comments it at times begs to be compared to Bernhard, but it lacks the rhythm and intensity of Bernhard.
Iyer said in an interview that he hopes for a “backlash against Dogma [the sequel to Spurious]... something cruel.... A desire for the order of the world to be restored, even though I know it cannot be restored. This, of course, is really the desire for an older literary world, a world of tradition and security* from which I feel utterly estranged.”
Beyond the playful melodrama** (the idea that some book review of Iyer’s collections of aphorisms could “restore the world” for anyone is obviously absurd), this quote also seems kind of self-serving. It could be paraphrased like this: “It’s okay if people don’t think my novel is worthwhile, in fact I hope they don’t; this just means that they’re stuck in old-fashioned expectations of what literature should be and that such expectations might still have some life to them after all; but you and I know they’re wrong, right?”
*This “old literary world of security and tradition” seems to be a place Iyer believes once existed, or that we walk around today believing that it once existed, whereas I think most people acknowledge it as an illusion. From here, after hundreds of years of codifying literature, it only appears this way. For, seen a certain way, all writing is new and unprecedented, and thus is an “attack” on the already existing Text (thus Derrida). Writers in the supposed heyday had little or no concept that they were in the midst a secure, tradition-rich ground from which to launch their narratives (because they were not).
The project of pinning down the Western canon didn’t seem to arise in earnest until the late-19th century, at a time when Dostoevsky was writing revolutionary fiction and even Trollope(!) was being criticized by Henry James for employing what would come to be called metafiction (“Reader, don’t worry; my heroine will not marry the villain”). And of course this was a generation before writers like Joyce/Beckett/Woolf/Proust who would write deeply aggressive, untraditional novels. And nearly two hundred years before that, 18th century literature contains some of the wildest nonsecure, nontraditional novels written. Sterne was writing stuff that was presumed too weird to last, for example, and Tristram Shandy is still considered one of the most “experimental” novels ever written. And before that Cervantes was writing a bizarre metafiction that viciously satired the “traditional” writing of the previous couple hundred of years, the lays and tales of medieval romance. And these romances in turn were a vernacular path away from traditional Greco-Roman epic storytelling. So where, precisely, is this secure comfy tradition located?
**Playful melodrama is legion in Spurious.
May 21, 2018
Perhaps 3.5. It’s an odd, funny little book and I’m not sure how or if I should review it.
February 13, 2015
I expected more from this novel, I expected less. I expected this, but more and less.
If you ever attempted to write anything scholarly, if you spent at least a couple of years in grad school with your impostor syndrome as your best friend and confessor, then you will feel right at home in this novel and it's going to be super uncomfortable and you will like it that way.
In lieu of any grand paeans these things are bound to contain here I offer a selection of my favorite bits:
“When did you know?’, W. says with great insistence. ‘When did you know you weren’t going to amount to anything? Did you know?’, he asks, because sometimes he suspects I never did.”
“Do you think it’s possible to die of stupidity?’ W. sighs. ‘Not as a consequence of that stupidity’, he notes, ‘but from stupidity.”
“But perhaps it doesn’t matter whether we’re shameless or not: we’ll do exactly the same thing anyway and will be eternally surprised at the rediscovery of our own idiocy.”
“We have to remember not to tell them, each of them, that they are our new leader. It would only frighten them off, W. says. No one should ever know he or she is our leader, we agree. Only we should know. And we should follow them in secret.”
“As we look out to sea, a great shadow seems to move under the water. He can see it, says W.—‘Look: the kraken of your idiocy’. Yes, there it is, moving darkly beneath the water.”
“Perhaps it will suit me, my obesity. Perhaps it will give me gravitas.”
“We know what genius is, says W. aphoristically, but we know we’re not geniuses. It’s a gift, he says, but it’s also a curse. We can recognise genius in others, but we don’t have it ourselves.”
“When I die, W. says, he’s going to be my literary executor. Delete, delete, delete, that’s what he’s going to do.”
“Which one of us is Kafka and which Brod?, W. muses. We’re both Brod, he says, and that’s the pity of it. Brods without Kafka, and what’s a Brod without a Kafka?”
“Somehow everything has to do with God, in whom W.’s not capable of believing, and mathematics, which W. is not capable of doing. And he’s reading about God and mathematics in German, W. says, which means he doesn’t really understand what he doesn’t really understand.”
“It’s all shit, it’s all going to shit. It will always have already been shit’,”
“Thought is not the absence of idiocy, although idiocy is the absence of thought.”
“He knows me: without some project, I’ll become far too content. My idiocy will become an alibi, an excuse, which is just a way to avoid it altogether.—‘You have to run up against your idiocy, to shatter yourself against it’, W. says. ‘Nothing can begin unless you experience your idiocy’.”
“All jobs are becoming the same, W. observes. We’re all administrators now, all of us. What do any of us do but administer? We administer and prevaricate about administration. Work time is either administration time or prevaricating about administration time,”
“If you’re not going to be a thinker, you should at least look like a thinker,”
“Everything begins when you understand that you, and you above all, are Max Brod: this, for W., is the founding principle. That you (whoever you are) are Max Brod, and everyone else (whoever that might be) is Franz Kafka. Which is to say, you will never understand anyone else and are endlessly guilty before them, and that even with the greatest effort of loyalty, you will betray them at every turn.”
If you ever attempted to write anything scholarly, if you spent at least a couple of years in grad school with your impostor syndrome as your best friend and confessor, then you will feel right at home in this novel and it's going to be super uncomfortable and you will like it that way.
In lieu of any grand paeans these things are bound to contain here I offer a selection of my favorite bits:
“When did you know?’, W. says with great insistence. ‘When did you know you weren’t going to amount to anything? Did you know?’, he asks, because sometimes he suspects I never did.”
“Do you think it’s possible to die of stupidity?’ W. sighs. ‘Not as a consequence of that stupidity’, he notes, ‘but from stupidity.”
“But perhaps it doesn’t matter whether we’re shameless or not: we’ll do exactly the same thing anyway and will be eternally surprised at the rediscovery of our own idiocy.”
“We have to remember not to tell them, each of them, that they are our new leader. It would only frighten them off, W. says. No one should ever know he or she is our leader, we agree. Only we should know. And we should follow them in secret.”
“As we look out to sea, a great shadow seems to move under the water. He can see it, says W.—‘Look: the kraken of your idiocy’. Yes, there it is, moving darkly beneath the water.”
“Perhaps it will suit me, my obesity. Perhaps it will give me gravitas.”
“We know what genius is, says W. aphoristically, but we know we’re not geniuses. It’s a gift, he says, but it’s also a curse. We can recognise genius in others, but we don’t have it ourselves.”
“When I die, W. says, he’s going to be my literary executor. Delete, delete, delete, that’s what he’s going to do.”
“Which one of us is Kafka and which Brod?, W. muses. We’re both Brod, he says, and that’s the pity of it. Brods without Kafka, and what’s a Brod without a Kafka?”
“Somehow everything has to do with God, in whom W.’s not capable of believing, and mathematics, which W. is not capable of doing. And he’s reading about God and mathematics in German, W. says, which means he doesn’t really understand what he doesn’t really understand.”
“It’s all shit, it’s all going to shit. It will always have already been shit’,”
“Thought is not the absence of idiocy, although idiocy is the absence of thought.”
“He knows me: without some project, I’ll become far too content. My idiocy will become an alibi, an excuse, which is just a way to avoid it altogether.—‘You have to run up against your idiocy, to shatter yourself against it’, W. says. ‘Nothing can begin unless you experience your idiocy’.”
“All jobs are becoming the same, W. observes. We’re all administrators now, all of us. What do any of us do but administer? We administer and prevaricate about administration. Work time is either administration time or prevaricating about administration time,”
“If you’re not going to be a thinker, you should at least look like a thinker,”
“Everything begins when you understand that you, and you above all, are Max Brod: this, for W., is the founding principle. That you (whoever you are) are Max Brod, and everyone else (whoever that might be) is Franz Kafka. Which is to say, you will never understand anyone else and are endlessly guilty before them, and that even with the greatest effort of loyalty, you will betray them at every turn.”
February 20, 2013
I suppose the first thing to say about this book is that it would make a very good blog. That is partly because it is the book of a blog, or rather the book of an author who blogged things that presumably achieved something that led to this being published. Or possibly the book is an actual collection of posts from the blog. I’m not entirely sure. But I have read some of Spurious (the blog) and I enjoyed it and so I thought this book would be a good blog-book to read.
You could call it a novel, though there isn’t a story as such. We follow the author/narrator and his curious relationship with a man named W. as they wander across Europe from one academic conference to another. They idle about, walk around, drink heavily, and converse in a manner artfully contrived. It’s a sketch show of sorts, a kind of high-lowbrow buddy movie; always very clever, very knowing, but oddly clear and refreshing despite that.
I mean the writing is basically really good. It’s often very funny, philosophical and intelligent, despite W.’s frequent insistence on Lars’ stupidity. For the first half of the book I marked many passages:
‘‘What have I told you!,’ says W. as we board the train in Frankfurt. ‘This is public space. Pub-lic. That means outside your head.’ He points to my head. ‘Private’. And then out to the world. ‘Public’.’’
...
‘In truth, we have found several leaders. Our first leader was always an example to W. and me. – ‘I’m not very interesting’, he always insisted, ‘but, my...thoughts are interesting’. My...thoughts! We were particularly impressed by the way he said it. My...thoughts…It was as though there were an infinite distance between those words. As though he had nothing to do with his thoughts! As though they had him and not the other way round! He felt a kind of moral duty to his thoughts, we remember. It was as though his life was only a receptacle for something infinitely more important.’
(Given that I once protested to my girlfriend that I have a 'rich inner life' despite being otherwise quite dull, I found the above quote particularly painful to read.)
‘I keep a mental list of W.’s favourite questions, which he constantly asks me so as to ask himself. –’At what point did you realise that you would amount to nothing?’; ‘When was it that you first became aware you would be nothing but a failure?’; ‘When you look back at your life, what do you see?’; ‘How is it that you know what greatness is, and that you will never, ever reach it?’
This is very good, I think; hard to do well, but here made to look easy. The author has the timing and the self-lacerating wit of a great stand-up comic. And of course it is immensely self-involved, but it would be far less interesting to me if it weren’t.
But despite the bleak tone and setting (Lars’ home is slowly being swamped by a terrifying form of rising damp) the book never quite moves beyond the level of the quip and the aphorism. It feels like a slight thing. Not insubstantial, since the questions posed are weighty enough to mull over – and yet not so troublesome either. It has little of the relentless quality of a Thomas Bernhard, nor is it as heartfelt as W.G. Sebald. But it is worth reading. And it is short. You could probably breeze through it in an afternoon. I liked that it was short and not a novel.
You could call it a novel, though there isn’t a story as such. We follow the author/narrator and his curious relationship with a man named W. as they wander across Europe from one academic conference to another. They idle about, walk around, drink heavily, and converse in a manner artfully contrived. It’s a sketch show of sorts, a kind of high-lowbrow buddy movie; always very clever, very knowing, but oddly clear and refreshing despite that.
I mean the writing is basically really good. It’s often very funny, philosophical and intelligent, despite W.’s frequent insistence on Lars’ stupidity. For the first half of the book I marked many passages:
‘‘What have I told you!,’ says W. as we board the train in Frankfurt. ‘This is public space. Pub-lic. That means outside your head.’ He points to my head. ‘Private’. And then out to the world. ‘Public’.’’
...
‘In truth, we have found several leaders. Our first leader was always an example to W. and me. – ‘I’m not very interesting’, he always insisted, ‘but, my...thoughts are interesting’. My...thoughts! We were particularly impressed by the way he said it. My...thoughts…It was as though there were an infinite distance between those words. As though he had nothing to do with his thoughts! As though they had him and not the other way round! He felt a kind of moral duty to his thoughts, we remember. It was as though his life was only a receptacle for something infinitely more important.’
(Given that I once protested to my girlfriend that I have a 'rich inner life' despite being otherwise quite dull, I found the above quote particularly painful to read.)
‘I keep a mental list of W.’s favourite questions, which he constantly asks me so as to ask himself. –’At what point did you realise that you would amount to nothing?’; ‘When was it that you first became aware you would be nothing but a failure?’; ‘When you look back at your life, what do you see?’; ‘How is it that you know what greatness is, and that you will never, ever reach it?’
This is very good, I think; hard to do well, but here made to look easy. The author has the timing and the self-lacerating wit of a great stand-up comic. And of course it is immensely self-involved, but it would be far less interesting to me if it weren’t.
But despite the bleak tone and setting (Lars’ home is slowly being swamped by a terrifying form of rising damp) the book never quite moves beyond the level of the quip and the aphorism. It feels like a slight thing. Not insubstantial, since the questions posed are weighty enough to mull over – and yet not so troublesome either. It has little of the relentless quality of a Thomas Bernhard, nor is it as heartfelt as W.G. Sebald. But it is worth reading. And it is short. You could probably breeze through it in an afternoon. I liked that it was short and not a novel.
January 17, 2016
Thus by the hand of Lars a narrative mirror- of dateless fragments titled with the warmth of an editorial rejection- of their (i.e. the simian duo of W. and Lars) learned angst, of their riven quests, of their parodic aping of humanness at once reflected. The title, "Spurious," in this regard captures too in its anxious adjectivity the want of Lars and W. for that transformative connection to noun-ness, to completion, to Being. Yes, this is their "way out": to be morphed via apocalyptic howl and messianic wand into ever receptive (human) cisterns of "thoughts". Here, but here on this new and higher ring on the Great Chain of Being Lars and W. would exchange for their flowered shirts the black garments of thought. Additionally they would lose their fear of crossing streets, their "administrative work", their encounters with fastidious waiters, and their weekly baths. Yet here in this report ever caught by its narrative style in the specious present, Lars in "Spurious" shows their lived absurdity in an oppressive world. And from that world Lars and W. seek if not a "way out" then at least a "way onward." To that end Lars asks, "What would Kafka do?"
"What would Kafka do?!" Amazed that Lars even said this, yet not so numbed or charmed by the sirens of linguistic skepticism that lights this "play of words" one seeks its meaning, its reference and so asks, "How is it that this brace of once brachiating beings now focus so closely on Kafka?" An oracular voice (after all, none can see the speaker, so doubt it if you wish) answers, "Well, consider that Kafka is a kind of almost nearly maybe the sire of W. and Lars. That is, they are the great nephews of Peter, the humanized ape that gives the repot in Kafka's "Report to an Academy".
Bereft of the clear, diurnal change enjoyed or rather endured by Swan Lake's Odette (from swan by day to human by night, for example), twilight instead holds Lars and W. in a shimmering state that teeters or twitters between self-respecting ape and self- lacerating human. In this fury fuzzy form of both/and, Lars and W. ape, that is mock, the (all too) human discontent with their finitude. Here this discontent focuses on the failures of language to meet, to provide any justification for...well, you know the Absolute Truth, Certainty, (and perhaps a Marxist Utopia too). (In this light, Lars and W. could be L. and Mo, that is Levinas and Maurice Blanchot.) Nevertheless, the funniest thing in this comic book is Lars and K.'s Disnefication of language. That is, they animate and personify language into a perverse beast, arbitrary, illusive, and just plain mean, then impatiently punish themselves as they wait for it to grant them thoughts. Yet, at the end of "Spurious", Lars senses that "meaning something" via the medium of language, for example, entails "going up to someone."(Wittgenstein) After all, all they have is each other.
"What would Kafka do?!" Amazed that Lars even said this, yet not so numbed or charmed by the sirens of linguistic skepticism that lights this "play of words" one seeks its meaning, its reference and so asks, "How is it that this brace of once brachiating beings now focus so closely on Kafka?" An oracular voice (after all, none can see the speaker, so doubt it if you wish) answers, "Well, consider that Kafka is a kind of almost nearly maybe the sire of W. and Lars. That is, they are the great nephews of Peter, the humanized ape that gives the repot in Kafka's "Report to an Academy".
Bereft of the clear, diurnal change enjoyed or rather endured by Swan Lake's Odette (from swan by day to human by night, for example), twilight instead holds Lars and W. in a shimmering state that teeters or twitters between self-respecting ape and self- lacerating human. In this fury fuzzy form of both/and, Lars and W. ape, that is mock, the (all too) human discontent with their finitude. Here this discontent focuses on the failures of language to meet, to provide any justification for...well, you know the Absolute Truth, Certainty, (and perhaps a Marxist Utopia too). (In this light, Lars and W. could be L. and Mo, that is Levinas and Maurice Blanchot.) Nevertheless, the funniest thing in this comic book is Lars and K.'s Disnefication of language. That is, they animate and personify language into a perverse beast, arbitrary, illusive, and just plain mean, then impatiently punish themselves as they wait for it to grant them thoughts. Yet, at the end of "Spurious", Lars senses that "meaning something" via the medium of language, for example, entails "going up to someone."(Wittgenstein) After all, all they have is each other.
February 27, 2013
As I began to read this book I could see it was going to be one of those love-it-or-loathe-it books and I can see from the reviews already posted that I was right. I fall into the love-it camp although I could’ve loved it more. I chose it because it was recommended to people who appreciated Beckett; I can tick that box and I agree, if you appreciate the kind of (seemingly) inane banter that takes place between the likes of Didi and Gogo (although this pair veers more towards the Hamm/Clov end of the spectrum) then you might be pleasantly surprised by this one. It began life as a blog; it’s easy to see each chapter as a post and I actually suspect that it might be more enjoyable read one a day (or however often he posted these) rather than as a unified work because it really isn’t especially unified. Two philosophers, the obese Lars and the older W. (his one-time professor from all accounts) engage in conversation in each other’s houses, on the road to give lectures, on the phone and by mail; the locations are irrelevant frankly. I say ‘conversations’ but that’s not really the right word because Lars, our narrator, says very little. Mostly he reports the affectionately-abusive things W. says to him. The main thing we learn about Lars is that his flat has major, major issues with damp and the only thing vaguely resembling a narrative in the book concerns his efforts to get this fixed, that is assuming that any of the experts can agree on the root cause of the problem. Drink also features heavily in the lives of these two and as I moved through the book I felt less of the influence of Beckett and more that of Bruce Robinson (Withnail and I).
The book is written by a philosopher but you don’t need to be a philosopher to read it. I was going to write ‘understand’ but understanding is not the point. Lars and W. don’t understand much—an excellent starting point I would’ve thought if you wanted to study philosophy—and readily acknowledge the fact; the sad fact is that neither of them seems to be doing anything that might change that position and it’s a complete wonder how they manage to stay employed as they don’t appear to understand anything they read or write. If you regard philosophy as being about the search for answers without actually expecting to find any then this book exemplifies that. And yet it’s fun to watch the two of them prattle on, although, as I’ve said already, the bulk of the prattling is done by W. and boy can he prattle.
At 192 pages it’s not a long read and not even an especially hard read if you don’t stop every five minutes to look up the names of thinkers or filmmakers you’ve likely never heard of. There are two sequels and I’m quite tempted to give another one a go.
The book is written by a philosopher but you don’t need to be a philosopher to read it. I was going to write ‘understand’ but understanding is not the point. Lars and W. don’t understand much—an excellent starting point I would’ve thought if you wanted to study philosophy—and readily acknowledge the fact; the sad fact is that neither of them seems to be doing anything that might change that position and it’s a complete wonder how they manage to stay employed as they don’t appear to understand anything they read or write. If you regard philosophy as being about the search for answers without actually expecting to find any then this book exemplifies that. And yet it’s fun to watch the two of them prattle on, although, as I’ve said already, the bulk of the prattling is done by W. and boy can he prattle.
At 192 pages it’s not a long read and not even an especially hard read if you don’t stop every five minutes to look up the names of thinkers or filmmakers you’ve likely never heard of. There are two sequels and I’m quite tempted to give another one a go.
March 1, 2013
To paraphrase Seinfeld, "It's a book about Nothing!" Okay, not exactly, it's a book about two academics, philosophers, who want to have Thoughts, and live in the world of Ideas, only they're too stupid, they realize, they know this, they can't accomplish anything, so the one verbally abuses the other to delightful effect, and they seek a Leader who can provide them Thoughts, only whenever they find one they scare him away by telling him they're his followers, so mostly they try to read books which they don't understand, and discuss the apocalypse and the Messiah, and try to look religious since they unfortunately lack all religious belief ("Nothing is more boring than an atheist", laments W.), and drink a lot of gin.
It's the sort of book that I'd say could be 30 pages or 300 pages, no matter. The full idea can be got across in 30, but equally it could go on much longer. Indefinitely really. Such is the liberation of plotlessness, as long as it is amusing. And this is fairly amusing, though I admit, I like Story. I like Plot. So I'm giving it 3 stars, though I'm also going to start the second book in this trilogy without hesitation.
And that's not exactly true either, there is a nod to Plot, in that Lars's apartment is being taken over by Damp. A mysterious damp that he muses may be a living entity, expressing itself through his dripping walls and ceilings. None of the experts he calls in can find the cause of this damp, and it has a Kafkaesque ring to it, who, naturally, is one of our heroes' heroes.
It's the sort of book that I'd say could be 30 pages or 300 pages, no matter. The full idea can be got across in 30, but equally it could go on much longer. Indefinitely really. Such is the liberation of plotlessness, as long as it is amusing. And this is fairly amusing, though I admit, I like Story. I like Plot. So I'm giving it 3 stars, though I'm also going to start the second book in this trilogy without hesitation.
And that's not exactly true either, there is a nod to Plot, in that Lars's apartment is being taken over by Damp. A mysterious damp that he muses may be a living entity, expressing itself through his dripping walls and ceilings. None of the experts he calls in can find the cause of this damp, and it has a Kafkaesque ring to it, who, naturally, is one of our heroes' heroes.
November 29, 2016
'Spurious' has two characters named Lars and W, both apparently working in mid-level academia. They are close friends, despite W's constant browbeating of the apparently placid Lars. Both are obsessed with the apocalypse and messianism, which they discuss endlessly, alternating between delight and despair. Their relationship reminded me more than a little of 'Withnail and I', as did the descriptions of Lars' flat. Actually, the terrible damp and mould in Lars' flat was my favourite part of the book. It reminded me strongly of the last house I lived in, which likewise appeared to be in a constant state of decay. Our houseplants died and mushrooms grew in their plots; my bedroom curtains developed a paisley-esque mould pattern. It was terrible. Thus, this passage in which W visits Lars made me laugh with a certain bitterness:
The constant carping and obsessiveness, as well as the quasi-mystical mould takeover, made me wonder if this is what my future would be like if I stay in academia. Well, I do already have a fixation with the apocalypse. 'Spurious' is very amusing. Although it doesn't really go anywhere, I think that is the point.
'"What did you do to those plants? Desecrate them?" and then, "What's hung over your washing line? What was it, before it started rotting?", and then, "Were those bin bags? My God, what have they become?"'
The constant carping and obsessiveness, as well as the quasi-mystical mould takeover, made me wonder if this is what my future would be like if I stay in academia. Well, I do already have a fixation with the apocalypse. 'Spurious' is very amusing. Although it doesn't really go anywhere, I think that is the point.
August 4, 2014
If you:
...read too much Heidegger, Spinoza, and Kierkegaard in your formative years which then caused all experiences from puberty onward to become internal debates, crises of consciousness, self-reflexive moments that forced you to pull a Hamlet and dwell in your head rather than enjoy life without over-thinking it like those who read, say, Judy Blume in lieu of Kafka.... well, then, you must hastily get your hands on a copy of this and begun reading your way through Iyer's trilogy tout de suite.
...have ever gotten drunk and thought that you were the Messiah.
...have ever gotten drunk and thought that your interlocutor was the Messiah.
...think that B��la Tarr is the Messiah.
...prefer your action rendered as "action" and thereafter rendered in Socratic dialogue, punctuated by ejaculations of "moor!" and "river!"
...think that we are in the end of days.
...are a fan of Derrida & co. and need a laughingly perverse bout of crying or a cryingly perverse bout of laughing.
...have a problem with damp in your flat and make not mountains out of molehills but allegories out of mold spores.
...admire your best friend more than yourself (as does he).
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