I was two second’s away from shaking Claudia down for some Snicker’s or something, or maybe just going to grab the Tylenol P.M.

August 6, 2010 6:22 PM

"The Baby-Sitters' Club: Chapter 1" by Bret Easton Ellis
posted by PostIronyIsNotaMyth (35 comments total)

Well, that was...timely.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 6:33 PM on August 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

Wow. The rarely attempted double parody, absolutely nailed.
posted by moxiedoll at 6:42 PM on August 6, 2010 [6 favorites]

I made it about 100 words in, so a pretty good imitation of Ellis.
posted by cjorgensen at 6:42 PM on August 6, 2010 [4 favorites]

Yeah, well played.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:46 PM on August 6, 2010

"I can't, I'm babysitting."

This is the first line of Babysitter Park and in its brevity and simplicity it was supposed to be a return to form, an echo, of the opening line from my debut novel, Kristy's Great Idea.

"The Baby-sitters club."

Since then the opening sentences of my novels -- no matter how artfully composed -- had become overly complicated and ornate, loaded down with a heavy, useless emphasis on minutiae.

My second novel, Claudia and the Phantom Phone Calls, for example, began with this:

"The evening was gloomy and windy, with rain streaming down from heavy clouds that blocked the moon."

As anyone who had closely followed the progression of my career could gimplse -- and if fiction inadvertently reveals the writer's inner life -- things were getting out of hand resembling something that according to the New York Times had become "bizarrely complicated ... bloated and trivial .. hyped up," and I didn't necessarily disagree. I wanted a return that past simplicity.
posted by geoff. at 6:46 PM on August 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

It was a dark and stormy night. And I had to babysit. Young children. My angst was palpable.
posted by Splunge at 6:50 PM on August 6, 2010

I guess this hits its slow-moving targets well enough, but it seems like it should have run in the May 1988 Details. That said, I would favorite this 900 times if it were actually about Bret Easton Ellis babysitting. Maybe he could start a babysitting club with Martin Amis and Jay McInerney.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 6:56 PM on August 6, 2010 [4 favorites]

McSweeney's worthy.
posted by Theloupgarou at 6:57 PM on August 6, 2010

Having not read Easton Ellis, I have no idea how well it parodies his writing -- is he known for really poor sentence construction? But, it's an amusing take on a series of books I absolutely devoured in grade school.
posted by jacquilynne at 6:59 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

This is a book I would read.
posted by betweenthebars at 6:59 PM on August 6, 2010

McSweeney's worthy.

It's not THAT precious.
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:00 PM on August 6, 2010 [5 favorites]

Having not read Easton Ellis, I have no idea how well it parodies his writing -- is he known for really poor sentence construction?

This really only parodies The Rules of Attraction, which is a lot more conversational in tone than the rest of his stuff. I didn't think it was dead-on, personally, but at least it wasn't another one of those Ellis parodies that's all 'Hey I saw American Psycho too!'
posted by shakespeherian at 7:36 PM on August 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

I remember reading American Psycho on the subway in NYC about a year after it came out. I was very aware of what I was reading and maybe it was all in my imagination... But people kept giving dirty looks. Like I was some kind of psycho for reading it.

Until the cute girl came up and told me how much she loved the book. Seriously, she was beaming. She insisted on writing her phone number in the book. And as she exited the F train she said, "Please call me."

I did not call.

I wonder today if she wanted to nail me to her floor or have me murder her in some violent way.

Or maybe it was a missed connection with a wonderful person.

I wonder if she reads craigslist?
posted by Splunge at 7:56 PM on August 6, 2010 [7 favorites]

This really only parodies The Rules of Attraction

WRONG. It also parodies the goddamn Babysitter's Club - that's the magic. Of Ellis' work, I've only read Less Than Zero, American Psycho (yikes!!), and Glamorama (awful!!) but I recognized the perspective of the narrator in the parody (and really think that I would have even if not alerted ahead of time). But that's not where the magic is. Making the substance of the piece the insane (and endlessly repeated) characterization provided in Babysitter's Club books pushes the parody into the land of comedy gold.
posted by moxiedoll at 8:02 PM on August 6, 2010

Kiddie lit writer/reader/scholar pedantry:

• "The Baby-sitters Club" has no apostrophe in it.
• It's "Stoneybrook"--what's up with the internal capitalization?
• They're in middle school, not high school.
• There's no dash in "Mary Anne."
• Kristy would never, ever not give a shit about a BSC meeting. Girl was obsessed, and anytime one of the members started to lose interest she pretty much went hose beast on them.

posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 8:06 PM on August 6, 2010 [17 favorites]

Also, the meetings were held in Claudia's room cause she had her own phone line, weren't they?

The jadedness of the narrator here suggests it would be funnier coming from Claudia. I mean, there were whole books about her thinking of chucking it all and focusing on her art. (As serious as a perpetual middle-schooler can be about her "art".)
posted by Tesseractive at 8:08 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

Also, the meetings were held in Claudia's room cause she had her own phone line, weren't they?

Yup.

Is "Marci" a play on a real BSC character? Would have been more spot-on if it had been that ho Cokie Roberts.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 8:10 PM on August 6, 2010

Who the heck is Marci? Did they mean Mallory?
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 8:14 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

The jadedness of the narrator here suggests it would be funnier coming from Claudia.

Naw... because Claudia's weird habit of socking candy all over her room is the closest thing to a (bloodless, BEE-protagonist observation of) addiction in the series.
posted by moxiedoll at 8:14 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

I'm drawing a blank on Marci. I never paid much attention to the "mean girl" villains...although they are portrayed pretty humorously in the graphic novels. (They're Hot Topic goths, as opposed to the virtuously quirky BSC...) And my google search is only turning up fanfic. Feh.
posted by Tesseractive at 8:15 PM on August 6, 2010

Hmm. Ok. Seems like she is a villain in an episode of the TV series. My guess is this person looked at the IMDB page to pick a villain, when clearly they should have Asked Metafilter. Which is what I will do the next time I write a BSC mashup double parody.
posted by Tesseractive at 8:18 PM on August 6, 2010

WRONG. It also parodies the goddamn Babysitter's Club

I was responding to a question about Ellis's style.
posted by shakespeherian at 8:32 PM on August 6, 2010

Wow. Okay, I really did not get this. Not. At. All.

*waves hand over head in "zoom!" motion*

Is there a short explanation, or several things I need to know about all at once?
posted by yhbc at 8:36 PM on August 6, 2010

First thing you need to know:

There is no short explanation, and you will never know it all at once.
posted by localhuman at 8:49 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

There is no short explanation, and you will never know it all at once.

Or, you know, you could like, go on Amazon and go read the first page or so of Rules of Attraction, and any of the Babysitters Club books. Then compare/contrast!
posted by Threeway Handshake at 8:56 PM on August 6, 2010 [2 favorites]

Needs more coke. (I say this as a girl who read and owned every. single. Baby-Sitters Club book, including Mysteries, Super Mysteries, and Super Specials.)
posted by punchdrunkhistory at 9:08 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

(I say this as a girl who read and owned every. single. Baby-Sitters Club book, including Mysteries, Super Mysteries, and Super Specials.)

Little sisters?

I ask mostly because Karen's Big Snort is a TOTALLY believable BSC:LS title. You know, given Karen, and all.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 9:21 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

I ask mostly because Karen's Big Snort is a TOTALLY believable BSC:LS title. You know, given Karen, and all.

That would explain so much about Karen.
posted by corey flood at 10:38 PM on August 6, 2010 [1 favorite]

I heard BEE interviewed on NPR over the last couple of weeks and he sounded like a parody of himself. Maybe he was, or maybe he was just feeling a little American Psycho because his dumb new novella has gotten terrible reviews.

Anyhows, it gave a case of the creeps, either way.
posted by angrycat at 4:23 AM on August 7, 2010

While we're on the subject, let me take a moment to link the BSC graphic novels There's four, link goes to the first one. I love them without any trace of irony.
posted by Tesseractive at 6:16 AM on August 7, 2010

Oh, come on, we can talk about Karen, but Claudia was obviously on E.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:35 AM on August 7, 2010

Oh, come on, we can talk about Karen, but Claudia was obviously on E.

I loved that special where, in kindergarten, Caludia(sic)'s teacher tells her to draw a self-portrait, and she draws a butterfly. And Mimi has to be all, like, she drew her soul.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 8:12 AM on August 7, 2010 [2 favorites]

Now, you can talk about who's on what drug all you want, but the real question is, how many of them grow up to be lesbians, and what kinds? Because Kristy really cares about Mary-Anne a lot, you guys. They're best friends. Also, I think Dawn is at the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival right now.

I'm days away from moving across the country, and I decided to give up my thrift-store acquired collection of BSC tv-show VHS tapes. Why did I do this???
posted by Tesseractive at 11:55 AM on August 7, 2010

Still kicking myself for not buying this shirt from the creator of Cat and Girl before it sold out.
posted by mendel at 8:21 PM on August 7, 2010 [1 favorite]

Just as long as Claudia's still stylin' and Mary Anne's still dating Logan.
posted by Mael Oui at 8:12 PM on August 8, 2010