McSweeney's Issue 31 (McSweeney's Quarterly Concern) [Hardcover]

Dave Eggers (Editor)

Book Description

Series: McSweeney's Quarterly Concern

Barthelme said that "The Novel of the Soil is dead, as are Expressionism, Impressionism, Futurism, Imagism, Vorticism, Regionalism, Realism, the Kitchen Sink School of Drama, the Theatre of the Absurd, the Theatre of Cruelty, Black Humor, and Gongorism." But he left out, pointedly, the Biji, the Nivola, the Graustarkian Romance, the Consuetudinary, the Whore's Dialogue, the Fornaldarsaga, and the eighties, which are not dead; they are all in McSweeney's 31, as rendered by Douglas Coupland, Joy Williams, John Brandon, Shelley Jackson, Mary Miller, and Will Sheff, along with other fugitive genres recaptured by our finest writers, as part of a project to bring them back alive (except for the eighties, there is actually nothing about the eighties). In an oversized format, with annotations, illustrations, and pantoums, Issue 31 aims to introduce you to all the genres you never knew you loved.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 300 pages
• Publisher: McSweeney's (June 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1934781347
• ISBN-13: 978-1934781340
• Product Dimensions: 11 x 8 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,037,031 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars McSweeney's equals awesome, January 25, 2011

By 

granimal - See all my reviews

This review is from: McSweeney's Issue 31 (McSweeney's Quarterly Concern) (Hardcover)

Another mind blowing issue of McSweeney's. This issue is all about story forms that aren't used anymore. Each section included a description of the style, an example and then new stories using that style done by current authors. The new stories have notes in the large margins expanding on themes in the types of stories or giving examples from the original works.

1- Pantoum

My absolute favorites were pantoums, which is a form of poetry where lines from each paragraph are repeated in the next paragraph. According to the book it used to be a game about who could most skillfully manipulate these lines in their poems. The more I read the more I liked them. I'm guessing Eggers did too as he both starts and ends the issue with pantoums while every other style only has 1 section.

Jack Davis by Tony Trigilio was amazing about the Kennedy assassination. Joel Brouwer's Direct also stood out amongst a strong group.

2- Whore Dialog

This was erotic writing in the 16th through 18th centuries that was instructional based graphic dialog between an innocent woman and a more experienced married woman. It was supposed to be instructional as well as pornographic. Mary Miller writes a funny story called A Dialogue Between Two Maids In The Twenty-First Century, One Of Whom Is Skeezer. I think you have to love a story that includes skeezy as an unwritten rule of nature.

3- Legendary Saga

These stories were from Iceland in the 13th through 15th centuries that were basically tales of war & conquest. While good they kept making me think of world of warcraft for some reason.

4- Biji

I'm a little fuzzy on how Biji truly differentiates itself from other more general storytelling but was written from 220-1912 AD, which in is a really long time to just die out. It's characterized in the book as musings, anecdotes, quotations, "believe-it-or-not" fiction, social anthropology. What I do know is that Survivor by Douglas Coupland is fantastic. It's about a camera man working on a season of Survivor when World War III breaks out. The story was one of the funnier tales I've read in a while.

5- Nivola

These were a series of books written by Miguel de Unamuno between 1914-1930 AD that according to McSweeney's were meandering, plotless & playful. I'm not sure I buy this being a genre. Joy Williams wrote a story about a woman named Snow that was certainly plotless and rambling. The best part however was a note in the margins from a book of Unamunos called Abel Sanchez where a doctor is jealous of his artist friend. The doctor laments that all he can do is delay death where the painter can capture the person on canvas and make them immortal.

6- Senryu

These are Japanese poems that are 3 lines long, no rhymed & deal with human nature. I've never read a lot of haiku and there have been so many jokes about them that I wasn't expecting much but these were great.

7- Socratic Dialogue

These are from ancient Greece and Rome and are conversational in tone revolving around philosophical issues. After Citizen Kane by David Thomson was about a conversation in present time between Susan Sontag, Franz Kafka, Charlie Chaplin, Earnest Hemmingway & Viginia Wolf. They are all drinking at a cafe but they make reference to having died. It's an interesting story.

8- Graustarkian Romance

These romantic stories are from the late 19th and early 20th centuries & are set in an imaginary old fashioned country in Europe. They are described as have this characteristics of Victorian utopianism, swashbuckling & courtly intrigue. Fun light read but not my favorite.

9- Consuetudinary

These were essentially lists of basic tasks and rituals performed in monasteries between 970-1700 AD. The sample story bored me terribly but Shelly Jackson's story was pure genius and ended up being one of my favorite stories in the issue.

On another note, while the book was a little awkward to read sometime due to its size I loved the cover art with the gold waves on white leather.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Old Becomes the New, May 18, 2010

By 

Sam Quixote - See all my reviews

This review is from: McSweeney's Issue 31 (McSweeney's Quarterly Concern) (Hardcover)

McSweeney's 31 is about bringing back old forms of storytelling by getting contemporary writers to craft stories in that form once more. And it's a success!

The best story was Douglas Coupland's "Survivor" written in the Biji style, a sort of rambling tangential tale, about a cameraman filming the reality show "Survivor" only to find the world outside of the remote island has erupted into full scale nuclear war. Suddenly the remaining humans left on the island have to survive for real. Coupland's narrator is instantly likeable, both jaded and glad of the small things in life, and utterly funny, it's almost worth getting the book for this story alone.

David Thomson's story "After Citizen Kane" written as a Socratic dialogue is a joy to read. He puts Kafka, Hemingway, Woolf, Sontag, and Chaplin into debating the merits of "Citizen Kane" and whether it deserves to constantly win polls that make it the best film of all time. It's clever, witty, and thoroughly enjoyable, it's another great story in this book.

Mary Miller's story is written in the style of the "whore dialogue" with a virgin and an experienced woman talking about sex. It's a medieval approach with 21st century sensibilities and is great fun.

Will Sheff's "Black Metal Circle Saga" is written in the style of the "legendary saga" and reads like it should, vast and epic with vikings killing one another in gruesome ways. Good stuff.

Despite a couple of misfires I won't go into, it's a very strong issue from the guys at McSweeney's. Brilliantly inventive stories presented in a well produced hardback with excellent page design and layouts, if you're thinking about whether it's worth reading or not, it definitely is.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A great idea, with some good pieces, September 19, 2009

By 

C. Federico Escobar - See all my reviews
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This review is from: McSweeney's Issue 31 (McSweeney's Quarterly Concern) (Hardcover)

McSweeney's 31 started off with a great idea: reviving feeble or deceased literary forms. The forms chosen are quite different, from poetry (pantoums) to prose (nivolas, Icelandic sagas). I thought the revivals worked best when they were set in contemporary settings, exploiting the form in light of present concerns. Some forms proved tough to revive. Some were funny and clever. My favorites: Mary Miller's whore dialogue, Douglas Coupland's biji, and John Brandon's Graustarkian romance.