Fortress of Tedium: What I Learned as a Substitute Teacher
This New England novelists’ view of the world is always singular. Baker recounts how he became a low-wage, revolving door educator in order to better understand American education and the ways it makes “interesting things dull.” “Explain your answer,” said the assignment. “No, thank you,” said Baker.
Longreads Member Exclusive: The Anthologist (Excerpt)
This week’s Longreads Member pick is Chapter 1 from Nicholson Baker’s 2009 novel, The Anthologist, published by Simon & Schuster. The excerpt comes recommended by Hilary Armstrong, a literature student at U.C. Santa Barbara and a Longreads intern. She writes:
“Someone I love once told me that they don’t understand poetry. It’s all random line breaks and rhythms she can hear aloud, but not read on paper—and what is a poem other than the observer of something beautiful showing off? What is there to condense in a poem that hasn’t been done already? Why is poetry so highfalutin and important?
“The Anthologist follows a man who loves poetry but is struggling with it, or, more specifically, struggling to write an introduction to a poem anthology. He talks about poems as song lyrics, as logical progressions, and as the backbeat to all art. He answers the common questions surrounding poetry, and clarifies some of the deeper ones. If you are a writer, reading this book has a similar effect that reading High Fidelity does after a breakup.
“In The Anthologist, Nicholson Baker accomplishes something amazing and resonant—reading it feels like having one of those really savory conversations with someone else, someone who ‘gets’ you like no one else at the party does.”
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A New Page
Can the Kindle really improve on the book?