most of what i read about richard yates made me think it would be like shoplifting from american apparel. the tone feels similar, but the book is very different and more focused
almost every scene in richard yates has interactions between the characters haley joel osment and dakota fanning. there are scenes of haley by himself peeing, showering, or doing push-ups, but those scenes are rare and almost feel out of place to me
i liked reading the ongoing jokes between haley joel osment and dakota fanning
"I keep staring at Richard Yates' face on the back of The Easter Parade but not having any reaction to it. Just looking." Haley Joel Osment said "Party girl" which was a term they had for people who did not speak in a quiet monotone and were not severly detached. Inanimate objects and situations and animals and boys could also be party girls. Dakota Fanning said if they wrote a book about a party girl called Party Girl they would be rich. "I just searched it on Amazon and there's like 4 books and 3 movies call Party Girl," she said. "Party Babe would make us the most rich probably."
Haley Joel Osment said "Slut Babe."
"Slut Party," said Dakota Fanning.
and dakota fanning referring to her mom at first
"I will talk to fried Nicholas Sparks cheese beast."
"That is good," said Haley Joel Osment. "Cheese beast."
"I kept looking at 'cheese beast' and ignoring the rest."
"Me too," said Haley Joel Osment.
"Let's refer to her as a cheese beast now," said Dakota Fanning. "Like tape man or headbutt girl."
"Sometimes we can call other people cheese beasts too," said Haley Joel Osment.
Dakota Fanning said the name of a person and said the person was a cheese beast.
there are a lot of things in richard yates that are also in cognitive-behavioral therapy by tao lin or sometimes my heart pushes my ribs by ellen kennedy
as i wrote in a review of sometimes my heart pushes my ribs, and in a comment to an 'auxillary text' to shoplifting from american apparel, i like the experience of reading about these events and people in multiple fictional accounts. in each account, there is different information
i also liked reading about the origin of tao lin's 2006 blog post about dark literature
Haley Joel Osment [...] went to a computer and typed an essay on his blog about Nicholas Sparks and suicide. The essay was directed at Dakota Fanning's mother and mentioned a King Kong DVD he had seen in Dakota Fanning's mother's bedroom. The essay said Nicholas Sparks could also cause people to hurt themselves.
this reading experience is possible because tao lin (as well as ellen kennedy) writes about his own life
knowing that tao lin writes about his own life also makes richard yates feel very painful. during reading richard yates, i had many experiences of looking up from the book and feeling pain
there is a power imbalance in richard yates between haley joel osment and dakota fanning. haley joel osment tells dakota fanning she should take caffeine instead of sleep so she can stay awake longer when they are together or talk longer on gmail chat. haley joel osment gets upset when dakota fanning doesn't offer to carry his bag and when she doesn't mail him things every day
when reading richard yates, i thought, 'if haley joel osment is tao, is tao really this mean? or was tao only like this in the past, primarily, and he wrote a book that shows how destructive that kind of behavior is?'
mostly i think richard yates is painful to me because i have also done things like haley joel osment does in richard yates. and when i read haley joel osment doing them, i don't want him to do them. and after reading haley joel osment do them, i don't want to do them. it is maybe similar to the feeling of watching footage of slaughterhouses. i want to be a nicer person after i read richard yates
richard yates website (has links to excerpts and reviews); tao lin's blog; tao lin's twitter; tao lin's tumblr; tao lin's art blog
related content:
+ notes on 'cognitive-behavioral therapy' by tao lin
+ notes on 'sometimes my heart pushes my ribs' by ellen kennedy
+ notes on 'during my nervous breakdown..." by brandon scott gorrell
