The best writers say more with less.
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Brevity is the soul of wit and writ.
Good writers adhere to Strunk and White’s timeless dictum: Omit needless words. Where they (good writers) differ is in whether a given word is needed. This difference of opinion manifests differences in their writing styles.
I feel certain McCarthy would contend that every word he’s published was needed to convey the story in which it was set.
Pretentious:
ABANDON ALL HOPE YE WHO ENTER HERE is scrawled in blood red lettering on the side of the Chemical Bank near the corner of Eleventh and First and is in print large enough to be seen from the backseat of the cab as it lurches forward in the traffic leaving Wall Street and just as Timothy Price notices the words a bus pulls up, the advertisement for Les Misérables on its side blocking his view, but Price who is with Pierce & Pierce and twenty-six doesn’t seem to care because he tells the driver he will give him five dollars to turn up the radio, “Be My Baby” on WYNN, and the driver, black, not American, does so.
“I’m resourceful,” Price is saying. “I’m creative, I’m young, unscrupulous, highly motivated, highly skilled. In essence what I’m saying is that society cannot afford to lose me. I’m an asset.” Price calms down, continues to stare out the cab’s dirty window, probably at the word FEAR sprayed in red graffiti on the side of a McDonald’s on Fourth and Seventh. “I mean the fact remains that no one gives a shit about their work, everybody hates their job, I hate my job, you’ve told me you hate yours. What do I do? Go back to Los Angeles? Not an alternative. I didn’t transfer from UCLA to Stanford to put up with this. I mean am I alone in thinking we’re not making enough money?” Like in a movie another bus appears, another poster for Les Misérables replaces the word—not the same bus because someone has written the word DYKE over Eponine’s face. Tim blurts out, “I have a co-op here. I have a place in the Hamptons, for Christ sakes.”
“Parents’, guy. It’s the parents’.”
“I’m buying it from them. Will you fucking turn this up?” he snaps but distractedly at the driver, the Crystals still blaring from the radio.
“It don’t go up no higher,” maybe the driver says.
Timothy ignores him and irritably continues. “I could stay living in this city if they just installed Blaupunkts in the cabs. Maybe the ODM III or ORC II dynamic tuning systems?” His voice softens here. “Either one. Hip my friend, very hip.”
He takes off the expensive-looking Walkman from around his neck, still complaining. “I hate to complain—I really do—about the trash, the garbage, the disease, about how filthy this city really is and you know and I know that it is a sty . . .” He continues talking as he opens his new Tumi calfskin attaché case he bought at D. F. Sanders. He places the Walkman in the case alongside a Panasonic wallet-size cordless portable folding Easa-phone (he used to own the NEC 9000 Porta portable) and pulls out today’s newspaper. “In one issue—in one issue—let’s see here . . . strangled models, babies thrown from tenement rooftops, kids killed in the subway, a Communist rally, Mafia boss wiped out, Nazis”—he flips through the pages excitedly—“baseball players with AIDS, more Mafia shit, gridlock, the homeless, various maniacs, faggots dropping like flies in the streets, surrogate mothers, the cancellation of a soap opera, kids who broke into a zoo and tortured and burned various animals alive, more Nazis . . . and the joke is, the punch line is, it’s all in this city—nowhere else, just here, it sucks, whoa wait, more Nazis, gridlock, gridlock, baby-sellers, black-market babies, AIDS babies, baby junkies, building collapses on baby, maniac baby, gridlock, bridge collapses—” His voice stops, he takes in a breath and then quietly says, his eyes fixed on a beggar at the corner of Second and Fifth, “That’s the twenty-fourth one I’ve seen today. I’ve kept count.” Then asks without looking over, “Why aren’t you wearing the worsted navy blue blazer with the gray pants?” Price is wearing a six-button wool and silk suit by Ermenegildo Zegna, a cotton shirt with French cuffs by Ike Behar, a Ralph Lauren silk tie and leather wing tips by Fratelli Rossetti. Pan down to the Post. There is a moderately interesting story concerning two people who disappeared at a party aboard the yacht of a semi-noted New York socialite while the boat was circling the island. A residue of spattered blood and three smashed champagne glasses are the only clues. Foul play is suspected and police think that perhaps a machete was the killer’s weapon because of certain grooves and indentations found on the deck. No bodies have been found. There are no suspects. Price began his spiel today over lunch and then brought it up again during the squash game and continued ranting over drinks at Harry’s where he had gone on, over three J&Bs and water, much more interestingly about the Fisher account that Paul Owen is handling. Price will not shut up.
Actually, I kind of liked it, enough that I googled the first line to see what it was (ATTRIBUTE YOUR SHIT POR FAVOR). So Ellis had this to say about it:
I reread that book in the summer of '03. . . . And I hadn’t looked at that book either since '91. And I was dreading it. I thought it was going to be a really terrible novel. Everything everyone had ever said about it was going to be true. . . . And I started reading it… and I was surprised. It was good. It was fun. It was not nearly as pretentious as I remember I wanted it to be when I was writing it. Not nearly as weighted down with the importance that I thought I was investing it with. I found it really fast-moving. I found it really funny. And I liked it a lot. The violence was… it made my toes curl. I really freaked out. I couldn’t believe how violent it was. It was truly upsetting. I had to steel myself to reread those passages.
I may pick it up, if I remember. Something about it reminds me of JD Salinger.
So because it does, and because I’m procrastinating doing my overdue chart notes, I was motivated to google the two of them “vs” and what do I find but a shit storm over Ellis’ celebration of Salinger’s death.
I reread the book 4-5 years ago and still don’t care for it. I really, really disliked the violence, found the constant brand dropping distracting, and think the characters are grotesque. I’m still convinced that Ellis, like McInerny name drops as a way of pandering to the reader. The reader gets a vicarious thrill for a moment of recognition ("holy shit, I too did blow in the 3rd stall at Limelight in '85!).
That being said, The Rules of Attraction is both a better book and movie.
Journalists write stories.
I found my college copy of American Psycho and thought I’d give you a short excerpt straight from the source.
It’s nothing like Salinger. I hated this book and don’t even have a shred of appreciation for the writing. I’ve read books I haven’t liked but I can appreciate the craftsmanship and skill that went into writing it. This book is a big steamy pile of shit.
The 4 pages below are disturbing, please don’t read them if scenes of sexual mutilation, dismemberment, and death bother you. Heck, don’t read them if you’re just a normal human being who doesn’t get off on wholesale misogyny masquerading as modern American Lit.
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Wow. Wow! That sucks, entirely. I’m stunned that it’s achieved what it has.