The Mumpsimus

I must admit some surprise that the best book I've read about judgement, taste, and aesthetics is a book about Céline Dion . Carl Wilson's Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste is not only thoughtful and well-informed, it is also compelling in every sense of the word. (It's part of the ever-surprising and wonderfully odd 33 1/3 series from Continuum Books .) I don't know where I first heard about Wilson's book -- probably via Bookforum -- but it's gotten plenty of press, including a mention by James Franco at the Oscars and an interview of Wilson by Stephen Colbert. The concept of the book is seductive: Wilson, a Canadian music critic and avowed Céline-hater, spends a year trying to figure out why she is so popular and what his hatred of her says about himself. I kept away from the book for a little while because I thought it couldn't possibly live up to its premise, and that in all likelihood it was more stunt than analysis. ...

I find it mildly embarrassing to be so enamored of Bolaño these days. I picked up By Night in Chile and Distant Star back when they were the only Bolaño books available in English -- back in the dusty old days of, what, 2005? -- and they both perplexed me and impressed me; then when Last Evenings on Earth came out, I picked it up and was blown away -- something really felt like it exploded in my head, and I went back and reread parts of By Night in Chile and Distant Star and they felt so much richer than they had before. I had, in some ways, been teaching myself how to read Bolaño. There was great praise of Bolaño from the moment the first translations appeared, but the praise and admiration for Bolaño back then felt restrained and quiet compared to what would happen when The Savage Detectives came out -- suddenly it seemed like Bolaño had been made the saint of all literature. I was excited, yes, but also a bit fearful, and I resisted Savage Detectives for a while, partly, ...