Day Sixty-Eight

6/8

The Book: Snow White by Donald Barthelme

ISBN: 0-684-82479-5

Suggested By: Brandon Shuler

Where: Home

When: 7-730P

Music: None

Company: Alone

Pages: 56-111 (55)

The Lead In: Ever meet that guy who was convinced he was a genius so he used the most difficult words he could think of, making communication incredibly irritating. Barthelme may be one of those types of writers. He’s outthinking the form. I’m sure I will irritate the hell out of my English major buddies, but I’m not sure I enjoy this book.

The 411 on the 55: Snow White is tiring of the daily bump and grind (see that? nice, huh?) and begins wishing that her prince charming (Paul) will come and save her from her life with the seven pervs. To do this, she begins waving her hair out the window.

Paul also writes poetry, and his sections in the book are riddled with bad poetics and irritating sections of words disconnected from each other. The dwarves know something is up and are already planning on life without Snow White.

Again, at the end of section one, there is a 2 page questionnaire on the book so far. I find that a little smart-ass. Drop the game, buddy, write a book. Maybe I am too much of a snob to tolerate people tinkering with the genre.

Line of the Day: “Now it is necessary to court her, and win her, and put on this clean suit, and cut my various nails, and drink something that will kill the millions of germs in my mouth, and say something flattering, and be witty and bonny, and hale and kinky, and pay her a thousand dollars, all just to ease this wrinkle in the groin. It seems a high price.” pg 70

The Fact on the Fiction: Holy Crap! “In the December 2001, writer Paul Limbert Allman accused Prof. Donald Barthelme of orchestrating the 1986 attack on Dan Rather, citing unusual passages in Barthelme's writing, including the phrase "What is the frequency?", a recurring character named Kenneth, and a short story about a pompous editor named Lather. Allman admits that he finds his own theory "difficult to accept," and that the assailants could also have been "loose cannons armed with quotes." Wikipedia