August 24, 2004
Nicholson Baker
While the blogging world is all in a huff about Nicholson Baker's new novel Checkpoint (and Leon Wieseltier's review in the NYTBR), may I take a moment to express my disappointment in A Box of Matches, his last effort? Walter Kirn, also in the NYTBR, wrote: "“Wonderful. . . . An opportunity for heightened mindfulness. . . . Baker has made an astonishing specialty of showing just how much is going on in life, and in our heads, when it seems that nothing is.” I'm all for excavations of the everyday, but the problem is that a lot of what is going on in life, and in our heads, is not inherently interesting; it requires a mix of illuminating insight and scrupulous description to raise it to a level worth publishing. Sadly, Baker's book—with its attention to details like pulling aside one butt cheek to silence an impending fart—doesn't succeed. Perhaps I read so little fiction that I'm especially hard on what I do pick up. Maybe I ought to stick with the classics. Any recommendations?