Reading for February, 2008

Fight Club (1996) by Chuck Palahniuk. Pointless. This is the second book I’ve read by Palahniuk, and I think I get the gist: although he doesn’t care much about writing, it is a good way to make a living.
Other reading for the month: Made some progress on A Prayer for Owen Meaney. Also started Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh, as well as the classic Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger. I read Brenda Richardson’s essay in Jennifer Bartlett, Early Plate Work, which unfortunately diminished my enthusiasm for her work somewhat. And I have a copy of Steven Pinker’s latest “linguistic” exploration, The Stuff of Thought. Here’s a taste, from the introductory chapter:

A name points to a person in the world in the same way that I can point to a rock in front of me right now.

What a wretched analogy.