{"id":2591,"date":"2008-10-01T16:50:51","date_gmt":"2008-10-01T20:50:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/?p=2591"},"modified":"2008-10-01T16:50:51","modified_gmt":"2008-10-01T20:50:51","slug":"the-price-of-popcorn-pimp-hats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/the-price-of-popcorn-pimp-hats","title":{"rendered":"The Price of popcorn pimp hats"},"content":{"rendered":"

In my previous post, I mentioned how little of a crap I give for contemporary literature. There are very few works of fiction published this decade that particularly impressed me. Two of those books were Lush Life<\/a>\"\" and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao<\/a>\"\".<\/p>\n

In what seems to be an attempt at taking over the New York Sun<\/em>‘s slot as Official Media Venue of Gil Roth, New York Magazine<\/a> got Richard Price and Junot Diaz, the authors of those two books, to sit down for a conversation about New York City<\/a> in the mag’s 40th anniversary issue. The rest of the annivesary issue<\/a> looks mighty impressive, but I sat down to read this piece before any of the others.<\/p>\n

NY: You must have seen neighborhoods evolve in all kinds of ways over the last 40 years.<\/p>\n

RP: When you go to Harlem now, all the franchises are there\u00e2\u20ac\u201dStarbucks and Linens \u00e2\u20ac\u2122n\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Things. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the same eight stores that are metastasized everywhere. And in neighborhoods where people have money, they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll say, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Oh, a Starbucks, another fucking Starbucks.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d But in Harlem, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s like, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcHey, Starbucks, man! H\u00c3\u00a4agen-Dazs and Baskin-Robbins! Yowee!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re all thinking There goes the neighborhood, and they\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re thinking Here comes the neighborhood.<\/p>\n

JD: Me and my girl beef about this. I know this is a weird thing to desire, but when you feel locked out of the larger culture, even if it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a consumer-capitalist one, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a lot, bro. You know, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not a bookstore, and there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not a place you can go if you wanna spend $5 for coffee. It weighs on people, man. It feels like you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re isolated, and you are. My girl loved it when a Starbucks opened up. But I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m one of those fuckers who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s like, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Naw, man, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s corporate!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m like an idiot.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I gotta sit down and read Diaz’s short story collection somedarntime.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In my previous post, I mentioned how little of a crap I give for contemporary literature. There are very few works of fiction published this decade that particularly impressed me. Two of those books were Lush Life and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. In what seems to be an attempt at taking over … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “The Price of popcorn pimp hats”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,19],"tags":[119,361,360],"class_list":["post-2591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-literature","category-urban-issues","tag-junot-diaz","tag-new-york-magazine","tag-richard-price"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-FN","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":14829,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/episode-459-tess-lewis-and-alta-price","url_meta":{"origin":2591,"position":0},"title":"Episode 459 – Tess Lewis and Alta Price","author":"Gil","date":"November 10, 2021","format":"audio","excerpt":"Virtual Memories Show 459: Tess Lewis & Alta L. Price \"'Turn And Face The Strange' is a pretty ideal theme not just for the era we're living, but the particular books we chose for the festival.\" They were among the last people I recorded with before lockdown, and now translators\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Chicago"","block_context":{"text":"Chicago","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/chicago"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/tessalta2021comp.jpg?fit=1200%2C774&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/tessalta2021comp.jpg?fit=1200%2C774&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/tessalta2021comp.jpg?fit=1200%2C774&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/tessalta2021comp.jpg?fit=1200%2C774&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/tessalta2021comp.jpg?fit=1200%2C774&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":13193,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/episode-370-alta-l-price","url_meta":{"origin":2591,"position":1},"title":"Episode 370 – Alta L Price","author":"Gil","date":"April 20, 2020","format":"audio","excerpt":"Virtual Memories Show 370: Alta L. Price \"Books were my first drug.\" Translator Alta L. Price joins the show to talk about co-curating the 2020 (now 2021) edition of Festival Neue Literatur with Tess Lewis. We talk about the bureaucratic snafu that led her into a life of translation, how\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Architecture"","block_context":{"text":"Architecture","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/architecture"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/altapricecomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C529&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/altapricecomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C529&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/altapricecomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C529&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/altapricecomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C529&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/altapricecomp.jpg?fit=1200%2C529&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":2606,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/pale-fire","url_meta":{"origin":2591,"position":2},"title":"Pale Fire","author":"Gil","date":"October 4, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Adam Kirsch, my favorite book critic at the now-defunct New York Sun, has landed at Slate. It doesn't say if he's going to have a regular spot there, but I hope that's the case. I also hope he's given as much range in his assignments as he was at the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "literature"","block_context":{"text":"literature","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4307,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/unrequired-reading-aug-7-2009","url_meta":{"origin":2591,"position":3},"title":"Unrequired Reading: Aug. 7, 2009","author":"Gil","date":"August 7, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Looking for links in all the wrong places? Just click \"more\"! The Eightiesologist eulogizes John Hughes. (Note: I am the only American who was a teenager in the 1980s and who never saw The Breakfast Club.) * * * In yo' FACE, Hazlitt! * * * Somewhat technical but very\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Big Business"","block_context":{"text":"Big Business","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/big-business"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9515,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/episode-159-burton-pike","url_meta":{"origin":2591,"position":4},"title":"Episode 159 – Burton Pike","author":"Gil","date":"March 14, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Virtual Memories Show #159: Burton Pike \"When you translate, you are digging into not so much the psyche of the author but the psyche of the author's use of language.\" Translator and emeritus literature professor Burton Pike joins the show to talk about his lifetime in the arts, the musicality\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "literature"","block_context":{"text":"literature","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature"},"img":{"alt_text":"25540193895_62b4490de7_z","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/25540193895_62b4490de7_z-620x425.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/25540193895_62b4490de7_z-620x425.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/25540193895_62b4490de7_z-620x425.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":514,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/to-the-editor","url_meta":{"origin":2591,"position":5},"title":"To the editor","author":"Gil","date":"March 7, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"On March 7, the New York Times published an article entitled, \"Literary Novelists Address 9\/11, Finally\", on the occasion of several new novels about the attacks and their aftermath.Unfortunately, your writer seems not to have researched this matter well enough. In September 2003, I published Paul West's novel, \"The Immensity\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "literature"","block_context":{"text":"literature","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2591"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2591\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2594,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2591\/revisions\/2594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}