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Tuesday, 20 March 2007 15:28 |
| | David Forbes |
Guilty pleasures: every reader has them, whether one admits it or not. After all, much as plenty of us enjoy thought-provoking tomes or cutting-edge novels, thereís something to be said for just sitting down and enjoying the sheer pleasure of tearing through a story.
These exist in every medium of course (a movie-buff friend of mine calls the cinematic equivalent ìbig dumb funî) and so for this column, weíll leave aside discourses on the nature of reality or tragedy.
Instead:
hereís to the bodice-ripper, the swashbuckler, the whodunit, the
spine-tingler and the space opera. We should throw in gossip columns,
rants and slapstick too, while weíre at it. Let us give them their due.
The printed word was made for fun.
Here are some of
mine from various corners of the written world; one costs money and the
others donít. Enjoy ≠ó and never regret your pleasures.
As always,
responses are welcome and invited. What are some of your ìguilty
pleasures?î Let me know ó and Iíll highlight them in a future column.
Cannons, muskets and sabers oh my!
The Napoleonic
Wars remade the face of Europe and changed the course of history ó and
if you want high-minded fare about the events, go read Tolstoyís ìWar
and Peace.î I meant that seriously.
However, if
youíre looking for some page-turners, it doesnít get much better than
Bernard Cornwellís series of novels about grunt British infantryman and
all-around unsavory character Richard Sharpe.
While not exactly the
deepest fare out there, the whole series is completely addictive.
Over the course
of 23 novels (and heís still writing more), Cornwell takes the
gutter-born Sharpe from India to Waterloo and everywhere in between.
Along the way, he heists gold, wins battles, befriends a giant
Irishman, gets stuck in political intrigue, romances (and usually
loses) many women ó and kills in various brutal ways countless enemies,
not all of them fighting for the other side.
While the plots
are often a foregone conclusion, Cornwellís descriptive gifts give the
battles a truly visceral kick. He populates his stories with
unforgettable (if occasionally clichÈ) characters and an evocative
attention to detail. With 23 novels, the reader of course knows that
Sharpe will somehow win out ó but in the midst of the plot, thereís
total suspense. Thatís the very definition of a good guilty pleasure.
It should be
noted however, that page-turner does not mean shallow. Thereís some
real bite here ó and a cynicism about class and chivalry pervades the
series.
The best of the
series, in my humble opinion, are ìSharpeís Rifles,î (Penguin, 304 pp.
$14.00) which sees Sharpe stuck behind enemy lines in command of a very
distrustful unit, and ìSharpeís Battle,î (Harper, 368pp. $13.95) which
pits him against both incompetent aristocrats on his own side and a
ruthless French commander.
Strange Bedfellows
The above, of
course, are what politics makes for ó and ever since the distant days
when some philandering cave-dwelling chieftain started lying to keep
his job, theyíve been a ripe target for the most ribald variety of
humor.
This era, of
course, has taken political absurdity to a new low ó which makes the
scathing gossip blog Wonkette (www.wonkette.com) an absolutely
priceless guilty pleasure.
Originally run
by the brash, brilliant Ana Marie Cox and now by a host of other
similarly witty and inebriated writers, Wonkette loves to puncture the
powerful in the most demeaning way possible.
Check in on a
given day and youíll find embarrassing pictures, juicy gossip and some
of the sharpest writing around anywhere (ìTo Do: Murder, Rumsfeld and
Regional Differencesî and ìJesus-Loving Americans Totally Ignorant of
Jesus, Religionî are sample headlines).
Following the
news these days can be exhausting and frequently not pleasurable
(guilty or otherwise). Wonkette, however, is pure guilty pleasure.
A Ph.D. and a dose of complete insanity
Thatís also how
I would describe Camille Paglia, social critic, academic and
intellectual. A self-described egomaniac, Pagliaís written her fair
share of serious and controversial works, such as ìSexual Personaeî and
ìVamps and Tramps,î but her recently returned biweekly column in the
online magazine Salon (www.salon.com) is a guilty pleasure of the best
sort.
Frenetically
veering from culture to politics to celebrities before running amok in
someplace completely unexpected, Pagliaís columns are not sane. Bitter,
occasionally even brilliant. But not sane.
However, theyíre fun. Loads of fun, especially when she randomly inserts her personal life into whatever topic is at hand.
For example, a
priceless passage from her column just after Anna Nicole Smithís death
read: ìI heard the first bulletins about her death on the car radio as
I was driving home from campus last week. At the Popeyeís drive-through
(where I was ordering Cajun wings), I blurted in agitation to the
window lady, ëAnna Nicole Smith just dropped dead ó tell everyone!í ≠≠ó
which she promptly did.î
Paglia has
written at Salon (one of the best online publications out there) since
it was founded in 1995, though she took a hiatus beginning in 2001.
When her column returned, letters deluged the editors, many demanding
her column go back into limbo.
But sheís still
at Salon. I canít blame them. I frequently disagree with Paglia, and I
donít always like her style. But I canít let one of her columns go by
without reading it.
If thatís not a guilty pleasure, I donít know what is.
ï
This book is by
a local author. I am always interested in reviewing such works.
Suggestions and comments welcome at marauderAVL-at-hotmail.com.
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