Will Self.

[cda]

I recently finished Dr Mukti and Other Tales of Woe. It'd been sitting on my tbr pile for some time, and I think I was put off reading it because I didn't enjoy How the Dead Live, which was the last of his I read. Shouldn't have worried though, as I found it perfectly twisted and grimy.

Anyone else here like Self?

[Philip Stein]

Yes and no. I picked up How the Dead Live off a friend who couldn't get through it, with few expectations, and really liked it. That was my first Self in a while, after I had previously got through a string of his earlier stuff - Quantity Theory of Insanity, **** & Bull, My Idea of Fun, Grey Area - with slowly declining enjoyment. I have Great Apes at home but haven't bothered with it. Dorian is supposed to be good though. Any takers for The Book of Dave?

[cda]

I'll be getting The Book of Dave. Dorian's OK, but drags a bit. Great Apes I thought was an amusing bit of twistyness. Is that a word? It is in this post anyhow.

[steffee]

Haven't read any full novels but have come across one or two short stories (as Dr Mukti... is?), and read his PsychoGeography in the Independent, which is quite interesting.

[Kell]

Another author that's new to me to be checked out. :) i always love hearing about different authors - it gives me ideas...

[cda]

Haven't read any full novels but have come across one or two short stories (as Dr Mukti... is?), and read his PsychoGeography in the Independent, which is quite interesting.

Yes - Mukti is shorts. However, the first story is more of a novella.

[Sarahrob]

I love to see interviews with Will Self. In person I think he is charming, witty and enormously original.

I tried to read Grey Area and hated it from the start. It just seemed so pretentious and self-important that I didn't even get through the first story. I was so disappointed that the man I so admired could have written such a book! :grr:

One of my friends has offered to lend me **** and Bull, but I've not yet taken him up on the offer. What if I hated that as much as Grey Area? At the moment I've still got a smidgen of a soft spot left for the guy - if I forced myself to read another book like Grey Area I could see myself growing to hate him!
Anyone got any views on **** and Bull?

[Philip Stein]

I know what you mean, Sarahrob. Self is much more likeable and amusing in person or in interview than he can be on the page. As I mentioned above, it was Grey Area which finally ground me to a halt with his stuff (though there was some stuff I liked in it, like the story Scale).

Having said that, **** & Bull is definitely his most accessible and entertaining. I would recommend it, far more enjoyable than Grey Area. (Or the first part of the first story anyway :wink: )

At the same time, even when he's not at his most entertaining, there's always a bracing cleverness to his writing. To me, it's nice to feel that sort of infusion of intelligence from above, knowing the author is much cleverer than I could ever hope to be.

[knitnurse]

I've never read anything by Will Self but I have to admit to having a crush on him :oops:

[Philip Stein]

A friend of mine lives around the corner from him in the Vauxhall area of London. He saw him one morning sitting on the front step in his pyjamas smoking. Thus proving that Will Self is not master of his own home.

[knitnurse]

Don't - you've set me off now :D

[Freewheeling Andy]

My Idea Of Fun was quite good, although felt very derivative - if you tried to write a Martin Amis book with Irving Welsh's attitude, it's where you'd end up. I tried the short stories (can't remember what they were called) and found it was more of almost exactly the same, which doesn't work if your trick is to shock.

[Sugar]

Anyone got any views on **** and Bull?

I've read **** and Bull. Very surreal, but very entertaining! It's quite short, so worth trying. At least then you would know if it's worth hating him for!

[Horsecorset]

There is no mention of this literary genius on this site so I'm presuming that nobody has heard of him. Check him out if you like a surreal read (he has a Novella -A **** an' Bull Story- about a woman who grows a penis an' rapes her husband, and a man who grows a vagina in his knee-pit an' is seduced by his Dr.).
I recommend also 'Book of Dave','Great Apes' & 'My Idea of Fun'.

p.s. keep a Dictionary by your bed for Mr. Self.

[Janet]

I've heard of him - he appears on Grumpy Old Men, doesn't he?!

[Renniemist]

I read The Book of Dave earlier in the year and posted about it on my BCF blog. It was certainly bit ...different:)

The novella you mention sounds a bit like an April Fools joke, but then I suppose that is just what Mr Self's writiing is like .

[prospero]

I like him - he's articulate, which is rare these days. There's only him and Russell Brand left! :lol:

[Horsecorset]

He's one of the few authors who is truly original. He also crafts beautiful sentences time after time. He is a heavyweight intellectual.

[Freewheeling Andy]

I enjoy reading his journalism, but when I read My Idea Of Fun, and a collection of short stories whose name I forget, it felt a bit too much like he was deliberately trying to shock, as a toadying acolyte of Marint Amis and Irving Welsh and Brett Easton Ellis.

Which was frustrating, as the writing was good and the ideas fascinating, if a bit unpleasant. It all felt a bit like reading SF, though. It was all about the idea, and not about the characters. It's setting entire novels on the basis of cleverness, rather than being about people.

[FishAndChips]

I've toyed with the idea of trying this author. He generally makes me laugh on Have I got news for you etc. After reading this thread I'm not sure his stuff would be my cup of tea though.

[Horsecorset]

To Freewheeling Andy, I get what you're saying - his work is an exercise in how utterly clever he his, this is an underlying theme, it doesn't mean the work is terrible or completely 'self-serving' (hehe, I made a pun).

[Freewheeling Andy]

Oh, it's absolutely not terrible. I actually like the playing with ideas. Although it definitely makes reading his books a bit more like reading Isaac Asimov or Philip Dick than reading, say Tolstoy or JM Coetzee.

I have more of a problem with the "Me Me Me Look At Me" stuff that comes from trying to shock.

[prospero]

Let's not turn this into a thread of Self-abuse.

[Esiotrot]

Found this today while looking for something else - http://www.bookclubforum.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=1245
HTH
Kx