{"id":465,"date":"2007-05-03T13:19:10","date_gmt":"2007-05-03T13:19:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/index.php\/2007\/05\/03\/this-book-really-sucked-ass\/"},"modified":"2007-05-03T13:23:10","modified_gmt":"2007-05-03T13:23:10","slug":"this-book-really-sucked-ass","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/2007\/05\/03\/this-book-really-sucked-ass\/","title":{"rendered":"“This Book Really Sucked Ass”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Have you ever scrolled through the user reviews on Amazon and noticed that no matter how overwhelmingly positive the general trend is, there\u2019s always one jerk who gives a vitriolic one-star review? Even where the book in question is a classic, an acknowledged masterpiece, you can usually find one of these guys, denouncing an adornment of human accomplishment with poorly-spelled scorn, expressing only regret that Amazon does not allow for no-star reviews. What\u2019s this guy\u2019s problem? Is he just being contrary for the sake of it? Or is his review an honest one? Perhaps, uncowed by critical consensus, he is reading the book with fresh eyes, and shouting out to Amazon customers that the emperor has no clothes. Let\u2019s face it, there are plenty of classics that have left me cold, and probably plenty of others that I might never have read had I not known of their exalted status. Maybe Ulysses is<\/em> a bit too showy. Maybe War and Peace does<\/em> go on a bit. What follows is a fresh approach to the literary canon, The Great Works of Western Literature as reviewed by That Asshole From Amazon.<\/p>\n

War And Peace \u2013 Leo Tolstoy<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Too Long yet still can be interesting”<\/p>\n

“Consider carefully before you take this on…,”<\/em><\/p>\n

The author of the second review shown here gave five stars for \u201cSensational Knitted Socks???<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ulysses \u2013 James Joyce<\/strong><\/p>\n

“New Rule: nobody needs to read James Joyce. He was not a good writer. He was all show-off and gimmick. There is no substance to his writing. It is a waste of time. It is pompous. It is boring. Accept reality people.”<\/em><\/p>\n

This man, if his star rating is to be trusted, thinks that \u201cI\u2019m With the Band: Confessions of a Groupie<\/a>??? by Pamela Des Barres is four times better than Ulysses. I haven\u2019t read the former, so I can\u2019t say with certainty that he\u2019s right. He loves his Rock & Roll, this guy. I am beginning to notice that a dislike of canonical literature often goes hand in hand with a passion for heavy rock.<\/p>\n

Pride and Prejudice \u2013 Jane Austen<\/strong><\/p>\n

“SO boring!”<\/em><\/p>\n

Like many negative notices of classics, this review is from a school kid, and therefore not representative for several reasons. Firstly, books that one is ordered to read for school are rarely as enjoyable as those read by choice. Secondly, not everyone is the bookish type, and some people might just be bored by all books. They are not representative readers, as they wouldn\u2019t be reading at all were it not enforced. What I am interested in here is the person who is actually interested in books, the guy who actually went to the trouble of buying the book, reading it all the way to the finish, and then posting a negative review.<\/p>\n

The author of the below review is a classic example of the kind of critic I\u2019m after. Not only is she not a school-kid, she\u2019s something of an Austen scholar, including in her review some recently unearthed biographical material previously unknown even to Austen experts<\/p>\n

“Pride and Prejudice: a book for the bored,<\/p>\n

Basically, the whole book is about an 18th century girl whining about her upper middle class life. Of course, at the end, she gets exactly what she wants and everyone lives happily ever after. There is credit to be given to Jane Austen, since she wrote the book in an American household in the early 1800s, with no support from any of her family. She had to hide her writing under knitting or sewing whenever someone approached. She then had a friend publish the books she wrote, without telling her husband. Considering all that, the story really isn’t that bad, but in general, if you were looking for a book by Jane Austen, Emma would be a better read. If you want a predictable love story, “Pride and Prejudice” is a good book for you.”<\/em><\/p>\n

No, she\u2019s not joking.<\/p>\n

The Third Policeman – Flann O’Brien<\/strong><\/p>\n

A speciality type of bad Amazon review is the \u201cI think I\u2019m at the wrong meeting??? review, as where a reader denounces that the volume<\/a> he paid good money for is written in English, and contains very little about tractors and their history. This would never appear on amazon.co.uk, where the more easily embarrassed buyer would rather die than admit what this critic so casually tells us in his final sentence:<\/p>\n

“Too Weird for Words<\/p>\n

Obviously, from all the reviews, this book appeals to many people. I am not one of them. Perhaps it’s because I don’t care for science fiction. I found the writing stilted, the footnotes distracting to the point I stopped bothering with them, the story boring, and the ending (covered in the introduction) to be a Twilight Zone cliche. If, like me, you want to read the book because it has some connection to bicycles and cycling you will be disapppointed.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Great Expectations – Charles Dickens<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is perhaps the most vitriolic review I have yet come across. This guy actually seems angry with someone (Amazon? Dickens? School?) for making him read the book.<\/p>\n

“how dare you call this a literary masterpiece. this is swill. i can’t believe i wasted the time, effort, and money on this book.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Ouch! His other reviews reveal that he has read two other books, both by Stephen King, and loved them both. But in general, he\u2019s more into Rammstein<\/a>, thus providing further evidence for the heavy rock\/book-hater thesis.<\/p>\n

But perhaps I am being unfair. All these reviews come from Amazon in the states. The readers may prove more receptive to classic works of American literature. It is to these that I next turn, and I am immediately rewarded.<\/p>\n

The Sun Also Rises \u2013 Ernest Hemingway<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Now I See Why Ernest Hemingway Killed Himself,<\/p>\n

This is a terrible book. Never read it for the following reasons: <\/p>\n

1. It is BORING. All the characters do in the novel is get drunk and have sex. If I wanted to read a book filled with nothing but that, I’d pick up my copy of “I Hope they Serve Beer in Hell” by Tucker Max, thank you. <\/p>\n

2. The love scenes are amorous and unrealistic. At one point in the book, Brett tells Jake that love is “hell on earth”. <\/p>\n

3. This book, along with almost all of Hemingway’s books, is about himself. If Hemingway was an interesting person that would be all right but he’s not. He should have just taken all of his novels and made them into one big autobiography. It would have saved many high school students like myself who have are assigned his crap in English a lot of misery. <\/p>\n

4. He is not that great of a writer. His style is short, simple, with not a lot of difficult vocabulary. Because of his style, his characters are two-dimensional and dull. <\/p>\n

This supposed masterpiece helped establish Ernest Hemingway as the most overhyped writer of the 20th century. If there is anything rewarding about this novel, it is that you can finish it real fast and get this self-indulgent drivel over with.”<\/em><\/p>\n

What an awesome review! I couldn\u2019t agree more. This guy has a future in the New York Review of Books.<\/p>\n

The Great Gatsby \u2013 F. Scott FitzGerald<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Uninspired<\/p>\n

It grieves me deeply that we Americans should take as our classic a book that is no more than a lengthy description of the doings of fops. <\/p>\n

You would do better reading the Iliad.”<\/em><\/p>\n

This man takes an interesting tack. Where most panning of classics is done for populist reasons, our critic here takes the elitist approach. His disapproval of “the doings of fops” is a wrong-headed but all too common confusion of the moral worth of characters with the artistic worth of the work. Still, the Iliad reference suggests a fairly high-brow sensibility. I click on his “see all my reviews” link, eagerly awaiting a treasury of classics. His only other review, a rave, is of the soundtrack to the Tom Cruise movie, The Last Samurai.<\/p>\n

Finally, I get to the core of things. A psychological profile of the Amazon Asshole is helpfully provided by the author of the following.<\/p>\n

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain<\/strong><\/p>\n

“Huck Finn – The True Cure for Insomnia.
\nThis book really sucked ass”<\/em><\/p>\n

I take a look at his other reviews. Apart from the rather depressing fact that only rarely has he seen, listened to or read anything meriting more than two stars (action movie The Rock and, of course, some heavy metal records being the only things he\u2019s ever actually enjoyed), what\u2019s most apparent is that this guy is more than just an unimpressed reader. His slating of Huck Finn rather is symptomatic of a more general hatred of all<\/em> classic American Literature. To Kill A Mockingbird, Charlotte\u2019s Web, Melville\u2019s Billy Budd, Wharton\u2019s Ethan Frome, Thoreau’s Walden and Arthur Miller\u2019s The Crucible all get the one star treatment, The Crucible tellingly described thus \u201cLike most classics, it sucks???. Wow, this guy really hated school, didn\u2019t he? All these years he\u2019s resented having to read this crap, perhaps nursing a sense of inferiority that he didn\u2019t \u201cget??? the books in question. Now, with the coming of the internet and it\u2019s democratizing of opinion, his view is as good as that of any university scholar. Now his miserable times in English class can be reworked with a revisionist sheen. It was the books\u2019 fault, not his. Take that Twain, you smart-ass! And that, four-eyes Miller! Essentially, this is a form of sublimated schoolyard bullying, and comes from the same resentful, frustrated origin. If the Amazon Asshole could find a way to steal Herman Melville\u2019s lunch money while dissing his books, have no doubt that he would do it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Have you ever scrolled through the user reviews on Amazon and noticed that no matter how overwhelmingly positive the general trend is, there\u2019s always one jerk who gives a vitriolic one-star review? Even where the book in question is a classic, an acknowledged masterpiece, you can usually find one of these guys, denouncing an adornment of human accomplishment with poorly-spelled scorn, expressing only regret that Amazon does not allow for no-star reviews. What\u2019s this guy\u2019s problem? Is he just being contrary for the sake of it? Or is his review an honest one? Perhaps, uncowed by critical consensus, he is reading the book with fresh eyes, and shouting out to Amazon customers that the emperor has no clothes. Let\u2019s face it, there are plenty of classics that have left me cold, and probably plenty of others that I might never have read had I not known of their exalted status. Maybe Ulysses is a bit too showy. Maybe War and Peace does go on a bit. What follows is a fresh approach to the literary canon, The Great Works of Western Literature as reviewed by That Asshole From Amazon. War And Peace \u2013 Leo Tolstoy “Too Long yet still can be interesting” “Consider carefully before you take this on…,” The author of the second review shown here gave five stars for \u201cSensational Knitted Socks???. Ulysses \u2013 James Joyce “New Rule: nobody needs to read James Joyce. He was not a good writer. He was all show-off and gimmick. There is no substance to his writing. It is a waste of time. It is pompous. It is boring. Accept reality people.” This man, if his star rating is to be trusted, thinks that \u201cI\u2019m With the Band: Confessions of a Groupie??? by Pamela Des Barres is four times better than Ulysses. I haven\u2019t read the former, so I can\u2019t say with certainty that he\u2019s right. He loves his Rock & Roll, this guy. I am beginning to notice that a dislike of canonical literature often goes hand in hand with a passion for heavy rock. Pride and Prejudice \u2013 Jane Austen “SO boring!” Like many negative notices of classics, this review is from a school kid, and therefore not representative for several reasons. Firstly, books that one is ordered to read for school are rarely as enjoyable as those read by choice. Secondly, not everyone is the bookish type, and some […]","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[662],"class_list":["post-465","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tuppenceworth.ie\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}