"Mistakes We Knew We Were Making"

January 20, 2001 10:40 AM

"Mistakes We Knew We Were Making" Dave Eggers' new appendix for the paperback edition of AHWOSG, extends the self-analysis even further. "Typical conversation a month after publication: 'Would it be possible to remove my name?' 'Of course.' 'Why?' 'Well, no offence, but I really didn't think anyone would see the damn book.'"
posted by holgate (11 comments total)

I love Dave Eggers, and as someone accused of irony relatively frequently, I highly recommend the second bit where he refutes the ironic nature of his art. Three thumbs up.
posted by benbrown at 11:19 AM on January 20, 2001

Additionally, this revision gives the (um, 200,000) copies of the hardback edition a certain cachet, since they have the "original" text. Which is very McSweeney's in character.
posted by holgate at 1:32 PM on January 20, 2001

Am I the only Gen-Xer in the industrialized world that find Dave Eggers to be the most overrated writer of the decade? He's celebrated for his attitude and calculated-to-the-nth-degree pseudoirreverence, loved mainly for meshing well with the Zeitgeist of the moment (as determined by aimless Gen-Xers who desperately need an identity to latch on to). He's destined to be to the turn of the century what Bret Easton Ellis was to the 1980s.
posted by aaron at 2:36 PM on January 20, 2001

Good call, aaron. Every generation needs their "Less Than Zero," which is just about how I'd rate Eggers literary talent. Jackie Susann notwithstanding, brilliant self-promotion does not an author make...
posted by m.polo at 3:51 PM on January 20, 2001

m.polo, can you name an author under 30 you'd rather read? I can't.
posted by luke at 6:50 PM on January 20, 2001

Dale Peck.
posted by m.polo at 9:17 PM on January 20, 2001

Eggers writes: . . . to prove a point that one could be completely factual, and still tell a story that felt and read novelistic, somewhat timeless, at least fluid.

which is interesting on so many different levels.
posted by grimmelm at 11:20 PM on January 20, 2001

Hm, Dave Eggers. As a writer, yeah, overrated. But as a creative force, largely responsible for Might magazine and McSweeney's? Impressive as hell, and for that I think he's worthy of all the attention he attracts.
posted by wiremommy at 12:35 AM on January 21, 2001

I can't think of another writer under 30 I'd rather read than Eggers. But know what? That doesn't make me like his crap writing any more than I did before.
posted by beefula at 8:25 PM on January 21, 2001

aaron: i love you.
posted by Sapphireblue at 10:44 AM on January 22, 2001

has anyone mailed the article to Alanis Morissette (sp?) yet?
posted by reg at 9:10 PM on January 22, 2001