William H. Gass

Strange, I thought someone had created a Gass thread but I couldn’t find one.

So I’m still eagerly awaiting the arrival of my copy of Gass’ “The Tunnel” (it had to be ordered from the good ole U.S. of A.). I know Twellman thought it was excellent. Anyone else read his work?

Oh yes, and guess what I spotted on the Dalkey Archive Press webpage. A free audio sample of the first part (50 minutes of audio) of “The Tunnel” as read by Mr. Gass himself.

[Right-click on the link and then click on 'Save Target as']

Reading of "The Tunnel"

there must be a Gass thread someplace
I know we've talked about him
and I'm sure I put up some of the titles
of his essay collections

I have read some of The Tunnel
but I got diverted
from completing this particular big Dig
I'll get back to it
eventually . . .

in part I got side-tracked by Omensetter

I've got two collections of his essays, and they are among the most dense and 'difficult' pieces i've ever read.

Thanks for the link, I'll listen to this at work later!! The Tunnel is a motherfucker. It's the kind of stuff that I aspire to write although not exlusively. A massive hunk of a dark prose, rambling, poetic, degenerate, beautiful, corny, caustic. It's got it all (and some would argue too much, or a whole lot of nothing). He also doesn't do many paragraph breaks, which I dig. Down with arbitrary paragraph breaks to appease weak minded readers! How many have given up on the Beckett triliogy I wonder when they get into one of his famous eight page paragraphs or the single slab or writing that is The Unnamable

Omensetter's Luck is a very interesting book. I don't know if I would say good, but it stays with you, at least.
The afterword thing made me think he might be slightly psychopathic, but that's not really relevant, I guess.

Someone said his essays are dense, I would have to agree with that, and also add that I think they are somewhat stupid.

I thought his essay on Literary prizes (mainly the Pulitzer) was great actually. But there it is, alas...

i'm curious now

have to have a read i do have a copy of omensetter's luck

in what way stupid? I've never read them

Incidentally, has anyone read the excerpt from his novel-in-progress 'Middle C'? It was published in some magazine, I forget which.

The Tunnel arrived today.

Feels appropriate for some reason....

I could quote reams from it but this is my favourite bit so far:

Spotted this on Literary Saloon: Gass receives the St. Louis Literary Award

A website:

http://tunneling.squarespace.com/

resource for all things Gasseous

Danke Schon!

Omensetter's Luck is a heck of a novel.

Reread portions of Omensetter's Luck and it's even better the second time around.

Makes me consider The Tunnel again.

an older thread can be found here

http://z11.invisionfree.com/thefictionalwo...wtopic=16&st=20

I'm in the middle of Omensetter's Luck at the moment and it's, well, trying, I guess. But just when I'm considering putting down the novel for good (there are more (and longer) crazy stream-of-consciousness-type passages than you'd get from Faulkner or Pynchon and frankly half the time I don't have a clue what's going on) it all starts coming together a bit, or there's an uncharacteristically lucid passage that really strikes me. I hope it coheres in the end (and I kinda suspect it will).

I read some of Gass's essays a while ago and noticed a similar lack of cohesion. The writing's great, but wordplay and wit will only get you so far. I don't know, maybe I shouldn't expect a logical, structured essay from him and just go with the flow.

I felt the same way
but I think it comes together beautifully at the end
while reading much of it I thought of it as an ok novel
but reading all of it reveals the greatness of it
or that may just be me
interested in yr opinion upon finishing it

I don't get the comment on the essays. I've read a couple of his books compiling essays and they never seemed non-logical or unstructured, quite the contrary. I'd even say it's some of the best writing on literature I've read!

I agree with Fausto about the essays.
I loved them.