Topic: Books you want to/have 'hate read'.

[gout_pony]

Ex-girlfriend bought it for me back when Bozier was a C&B in-joke of sorts and I was particularly agonising over my past relationship. Not entirely sure if she bought it for me because she thought I'd find it funny (which I mostly did!), so that I'd compare myself favourably to Bozier, or to just troll me.

Same ex-partner who once told me: "You deceived me. When I first met you, you seemed really confident and cool, but you're actually the most mentally ill person I've ever met."

[Monsieur Verdoux]

Same ex-partner who once told me: "You deceived me. When I first met you, you seemed really confident and cool, but you're actually the most mentally ill person I've ever met."

Haha I had an ex tell me exactly the same thing! I had to say guess what darling, you have to hate yourself to appear that confident

[gout_pony]

Haha I had an ex tell me exactly the same thing! I had to say guess what darling, you have to hate yourself to appear that confident

that's what I should have said!

I think I said that it's because I just go into automatic performance stand-up mode when I meet new people and I didn't want to do that around someone I loved, who got to see the real me... and she said that this meant that anyone in a relationship with me would clearly have a worse time than a stranger meeting me, which wasn't really on.

A fair cop, all told.

[bushwick]

I can think of two straight off.

On The Road - read it when I was 18, as you do. Regarding the Beats, I liked the wild occult chaos vibes of Burroughs but by God I hated this book. Self-indulgent as hell, cringey Boomer business. Tried reading The Dharma Bums years later and gave up after a few pages. Kerouac sucks.

Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance - again, read it when I was 18 coz it's a 'rite of passage' book apparently. Took me fuckin ages to get through it. Again, tiresome self-obsessed Boomer shite. Kinda got the general gist but it was painful. Would I get more out of it at 45, I wonder?

[Catalogue Trousers]

It tells you nothing about Britain and everything about Richard Littlejohn, because it's such a cartoonishly grotesque world that he creates. Despite purportedly pushing a message of wanting the country to be a kind, caring, understanding place again, there's not a shred of humanity in the book. Every page, every description, every bit of dialogue, is layered with ugly, simplistic hatred. It also doesn't hold together at all. His desire to force every one of his tired pet issues means the basic plot of 'a good, ordinary man is pilloried by the justice system for protecting his family from a robber' becomes so convoluted and enormous that it no longer resembles the simple Daily Mail miscarriage of justice story it's supposed to be. The best thing you can say about it is it's quick and easy to read. The writing is so simple and basic that you can zip through it easily.

I wrote a review on here a while back but I can't find it now, sadly.

Almost a decade ago, the now sadly defunct 5 Chinese Crackers blog wrote an excellent three-part review of it. If you want to chance it (be warned, if you seriously plan on reading the thing, then serious spoiler warnings), part one is here, and should have links to the others...

http://5cc.blogspot.com/2010/07/to-hell-in-handcart-part-i.html

The same blog also has a nice three-part dissection of one of Littlejohn's appalling 'columns collections' from the Daily Mail. Enjoy.

[Ray Travez]

Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance - again, read it when I was 18 coz it's a 'rite of passage' book apparently. Took me fuckin ages to get through it. Again, tiresome self-obsessed Boomer shite. Kinda got the general gist but it was painful. Would I get more out of it at 45, I wonder?

I dunno. I've read it three times. There seem to be three main threads- one about travelling through the landscape on a motorbike with his son and his friends; these bits are GOOD. Some reflections on motorcycle maintenance and how they relate to Zen, these bits can be interesting. And finally, there's the parts where the author bangs on about Quality and his old pal Phaedrus who went mental; these bits are BAD*. The last time I read it, I just stuck to the travel bits, everything else can fuck off.

I think there are some interesting ideas in there, but they are swaddled in waffle.

Totally agree with you about On the Road, I only read a chapter or so, and I thought 'fuck this'. Some kind of poster boy for the beats maybe? There was one line something like "I want to be like the wild and crazy ones who never sleep but explode across the sky like a firework and everyone says 'aaah!'" Fuckin ellllllllll


*or maybe I'm wrong and they're very very wise

[Famous Mortimer]

And finally, there's the parts where the author bangs on about Quality and his old pal Phaedrus who went mental; these bits are BAD*.

Phaedrus is the author, though, right? You've read it three times (me, only once, 25 years ago) so I'm probably misunderstanding summat of your recap. I remember working in a pub and the bus ride home was just long enough to read a chapter, so I got through it that way.

[Ray Travez]

Phaedrus is the author, though, right?

Yes. I thought I'd avoid mentioning that though, as it's a MASSIVE SPOILER ;)

I suppose it's a bit like [redacted]; his crazy pal was him all along. I remember feeling a real chill when I first read it.

[Famous Mortimer]

Yes. I thought I'd avoid mentioning that though, as it's a MASSIVE SPOILER ;)

I suppose it's a bit like [redacted]; his crazy pal was him all along. I remember feeling a real chill when I first read it.

Oops. Although seriously, it's 2019, if you've not read it by now you're probably never going to.