{"id":30,"date":"2003-07-31T10:56:00","date_gmt":"2003-07-31T14:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vmalt\/?p=30"},"modified":"2005-12-04T08:22:15","modified_gmt":"2005-12-04T13:22:15","slug":"tough-crowd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/tough-crowd","title":{"rendered":"Tough Crowd"},"content":{"rendered":"

I stepped into the elevator at the college<\/a> library one afternoon, around 10 or 11 years ago. Another student walked in behind me. As the doors closed, he said, “You’re the literature guy, right?”<\/p>\n

“That’s me. Literature’s my middle name,” I responded. I held out my hand and said, “The Guy: pleased to meet you.”<\/p>\n

He shook my hand, nonplussed. Then he asked, “I was just wondering: have you read much by Camus?”<\/p>\n

I said, “Not really. It’s been my belief that most of French existentialism prior to World War II just presaged the fact that the French would fold faster than Superman on laundry day when the Germans rolled in. And all of it after the war was an attempt at justifying that fact.” [Note: I realize that this is an unfair characterization, and if you’d like to call me out on it like a bitch, click here<\/a>.]\n

“Oh,” he said. “So you don”t read Camus’ books?”<\/p>\n

“No. When you get down to it, I’m a Stranger<\/a> to Camus,” I replied.<\/p>\n

Dead silence.<\/p>\n

“Really, I avoid Camus like the Plague<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

Uncomfortably dead silence.<\/p>\n

“Well, maybe I’ll get around to reading him in the Fall<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

The elevator doors opened. I expected to hear crickets or see tumbleweeds rolling by. I had bombed before, but this was worse than Dresden<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Anyway, this was a little preface to mention that, while killing time in Rutherford, NJ yesterday evening, I bought a copy of The Plague<\/strong> and sat in a little cafe, where I read the first 40 pages or so (and drank a double espresso).<\/p>\n

I have no idea if the book is responsible for this, or if it’s more because of the four G&Ts I socked down in the city at my buddy’s birthday party (on an empty stomach), but I had some of the most vivid and disturbing dreams I’ve had in months.<\/p>\n

But the book’s actually not that bad so far.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I stepped into the elevator at the college library one afternoon, around 10 or 11 years ago. Another student walked in behind me. As the doors closed, he said, “You’re the literature guy, right?” “That’s me. Literature’s my middle name,” I responded. I held out my hand and said, “The Guy: pleased to meet you.” … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Tough Crowd”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"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":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-u","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":49,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/camus-redux","url_meta":{"origin":30,"position":0},"title":"Camus Redux","author":"Gil","date":"August 7, 2003","format":false,"excerpt":"In response to \"Tough Crowd,\" VM reader Tom Spurgeon writes:\"Don't you have it exactly backwards? I thought that Camus was in the resistance, and spent a lot of time after the war writing brutal letters and essays indicting the godly institutions for being cowards and supporting Nazi brutality.\"And he's right!\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":14805,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/episode-458-robert-emmet-meagher","url_meta":{"origin":30,"position":1},"title":"Episode 458 – Robert Emmet Meagher","author":"Gil","date":"November 2, 2021","format":"audio","excerpt":"Virtual Memories Show 458: Robert Emmet Meagher \"As I grew as a thinker, as a scholar, as a teacher, I took Camus with me, and my appreciation of him grew as I did.\" With Albert Camus and the Human Crisis (Pegasus Books), professor Robert Emmet Meagher distills a half-century of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "literature"","block_context":{"text":"literature","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/meaghercomp.jpg?fit=1145%2C800&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/meaghercomp.jpg?fit=1145%2C800&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/meaghercomp.jpg?fit=1145%2C800&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/meaghercomp.jpg?fit=1145%2C800&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/meaghercomp.jpg?fit=1145%2C800&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":8498,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/podcast-102-the-sprinter","url_meta":{"origin":30,"position":2},"title":"Podcast 102 – The Sprinter","author":"Gil","date":"January 12, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Virtual Memories Show: Claudia Young - The Sprinter \"Being in a wheelchair didn't change me; it just made things harder to do.\" From the Flora-Bama to Vietnam, Claudia Young has sprinted through life. We got together to talk about running songwriting workshops in Nashville, redesigning the menu for the hippest\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Adventures in Gin"","block_context":{"text":"Adventures in Gin","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/adventures-in-gin"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com\/e\/ir?t=voyantpublishing&l=as2&o=1&a=B002SQJLA4","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8882,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/episode-124-dont-fall","url_meta":{"origin":30,"position":3},"title":"Episode 124 – Don’t Fall","author":"Gil","date":"July 6, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Virtual Memories Show #124: Jonathan David Kranz - Don't Fall \"I feel some frustration with contemporary literary fiction: there's stuff that's well written without really being good writing. Lovely prose, but stories that feel flat and empty.\" Jonathan David Kranz joins the show to talk about his new novel,\u00a0Our Brothers\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Architecture"","block_context":{"text":"Architecture","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/architecture"},"img":{"alt_text":"brotherssea","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-content\/uploads\/brotherssea.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":194,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/sure-just-pile-on-the-totalitarian-dictator-when-hes-down","url_meta":{"origin":30,"position":4},"title":"Sure, just pile on the totalitarian dictator when he’s down. . .","author":"Gil","date":"April 29, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Kofi Annan, feeling the heat: \"If you read the reports, it looks as if the Saddam regime had nothing to do with it. They did nothing wrong--it was all the U.N.\"Nah, it wasn't all the U.N., Kofi. 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