I’m always trying to work my crushes into the Shameless Blog, so here’s Douglas Coupland‘s take on Halloween via a trailer for his new book, The Gum Thief. (By the way, I can vouch for the idea that people use “talking to a stranger’s dog” as a method of social interaction.)
Enjoy.
Plus: How to get published, pay for school, and bind your own books.
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eight comments
I've never before come across a trailer for a book. Oh Coupland, you so have your finger on the pulse of society.
Posted by Anna
October 30, 2007, 2:55 PM
Anna, your comment made me laugh out loud!
I think the reason why people talk to dogs and babies much more easily than to other people is because you're almost always assured that dogs and babies won't reject your attempts to be friendly.
Here's a question: what do we think of Mr Coupland's gender politics?
Posted by Thea
October 30, 2007, 3:20 PM
I don't know Thea, my dog is a bit fickle and unpredictable when it comes to choosing friends.
Coupland's gender politics? I don't think I could sum them up. Can you? I have a crush on him (and actually told him so), so I'm useless when it comes to "critical thinking."
Posted by Stacey May
October 30, 2007, 4:29 PM
Hm, I said ALMOST always assured of baby and dog love...it's true some dogs are discerning and some babies are grumpy.
I really liked Coupland when I was a teenager, but as I got older I started to resent numerous things about his books, in particular his portrayal of women. In most of the books I read his men were super developed (over developed, one could argue...) whereas his women were often two-dimensional or fantastical, or viewed completely through the perspective of his male characters.
The last thing I read by him was Ms Wyoming, and I just remember how almost the entire book is this really intricate, beautiful description of this one man's love for this woman. What upset me about this was that the woman hardly gets to talk about her feelings for him, except to say close to the end that "it would be fun to have a man's shaving kit in her bathroom again." What infuriated me was the presentation that men have all these complex, full emotions, while the female version is excitement about heteronormative bathing products.
Of course, it's been a long time since I've read any of his stuff, and I only read 4 or 5 of his books, so perhaps there still remain some feminist gems somewhere in his oeuvre...
Posted by Thea
October 30, 2007, 4:41 PM
Hmmm, I am reminded of "Superbad..."
Thea: Read "Eleanor Rigby" if you want a fleshed out female character. He does a really lovely job there of painting a woman not generally painted: middle-aged and single.
I think it's a case of "men writing women" - I wrote two male characters in my novel in the first person and that was a real challenge. I had to get a male writer to read it to see if it felt accurate. Not sure if I reall succeeded, but i can certainly say that it was a challenge.
Posted by Stacey May
October 30, 2007, 5:04 PM
I have to add that I find it interesting that you use the word "heteronormative" to critique Coupland's work, given that he's (at least personally) not hetero.
It's a matter of seperating the artist from the art, I suppose. Can a feminist make mysoginist art? Can a gay man write heteronormatively? These are heavy questions, no?
All because of a book trailer...
Posted by Stacey May
October 30, 2007, 5:43 PM
Hey Nostradamus! also has a great female narrator - she is probably the most likable, nuanced and fleshed-out of the four voices Coupland uses to tell the story. She is also the only one, it seems, who is capable of acting, of doing something to carry the story forward, rather than stewing in paralytic self-analysis (though it takes her much paralyzed self-analytic stewing to come to this point).
Posted by Anna
October 30, 2007, 6:45 PM
It's funny, I tend to find Coupland's male characters very intensely heteronormatively, dude-y straight in a Zach Braff kind of way.
The whole question of "writing what you aren't" used to plague me, until a writing instructor said to me that all we're supposed to do, as writers, is be a good witness to our reality. So we should transcribe what, if we're women, we've experienced of men, or what, if we're (for e.g.) not South Asian, what we've experienced of South Asians...you know, and to write in a way that is genuine, and truly witnessing, not regurgitate stereotypes. Maybe the hard part isn't being a good writer, but being a good witness...
One of my favourite female book characters ever was written by a man: Smilla in "Miss Smilla's Feeling For Snow" by Peter Hoeg. In fact both books that I've read by Hoeg (that one and "The Woman and the Ape") had amazing female protagonists.
Posted by Thea
October 30, 2007, 8:56 PM
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