Modern-ish Romance as Explored by Aziz Ansari – Is Dating Dead?

It’s been just over 5 years since I last posted on this blog. Which is WILD. Have I read a book in the past 5 years? Erm… perhaps… a few. I quit my burgeoning career in publishing in 2015 (long story about glass ceilings and a disturbing lack of diversity) which may well be the reason why I’ve strayed from books these past few years. To give you an idea, that Aziz Ansari book (Modern Romance) pictured in my last post in October 2015 – I’m literally reading it now, hahaha. It only took 5 years.

I like the little that I know of Aziz Ansari. I’ve never watched his Netflix show but his sense of humour works for me. I wonder how I’d have felt about this book back in 2015 when I actually got it (free from work). Dating at the time, for me, wasn’t this laborious swiping that it is now. Perhaps I’d have been fascinated with the insights, maybe even disagreed with the notion of choice being a negative thing. However, reading it in 2020, I feel things have progressed since his time of writing so don’t feel as relevant now, and I also just felt it was affirming things I already knew quite well (though, to his credit, he explores the topics in a way that makes this affirmation feel rather warming knowing that your experiences are shared by millions – you are not the exception (points if you know which movie this line comes from)). Anyway, all the above is why I’ve called this review Modern-ISH Romance.

_{Look how dirty hardbacks with a white paper cover get when you drag them around for 5 years promising you’ll read them.}

Firstly, this book isn’t what I thought it was going to be. I thought it was going to be significantly more anecdotal than it actually is, it’s very much factual non-fiction with data and theories developed from scientific research and focus groups, albeit spliced with a lot of dry jokes and an attempt to explain certain observations with humourous individual examples.

It’s crazy to think how much has changed in the dating world in the mere 5 years since this book was published. At the time of writing, Aziz talks about apps in a hesitantly positive way whilst also acknowledging the perils of choice. Whereas now, I don’t know a single person who uses dating apps and thinks they’re a positive thing. I think 5 years on, in 2020, choice has become a burden that has left singles numb and so distanced from the hundreds of faces that are swiping across their screens that the apps don’t function the way they were initially intended. I speak from experience that I did not have in 2015.

_{The joys of technological romantic exchange}

“Searching for Your Soulmate” is perhaps the chapter that I enjoyed the most. It was really interesting (whilst also being quite depressing) to see how finding a partner has changed quite drastically from when our parents and grandparents were out there looking. The “soulmate marriage” is what most of us strive for today – finding someone we love truly, madly deeply and want to spend the rest of our lives with. Aziz explores this notion of the luxury of happiness and how only 50 or 60 years ago people married for simple reasons like the physical proximity of the love interest and for the ability to move out of their family home that marriage gave them. Like I said, these are things we already know, however, seeing the statistics and reading the research sort of solidifies things and makes it resonate.

“We want something that’s very passionate, or boiling, from the get-go. In the past, people weren’t looking for something boiling; they just needed some water.”

These “companionate marriages” of past generations allude to a life much smaller than that which most of us live now. We like to think we’re more worldly now. But it’s always this idea of the grass being greener isn’t it? I mean, I wouldn’t have wanted to marry someone who lived within a mile of my family home whilst I was in my early twenties (or even much later in life for that matter). I would have wanted the choice of living my own life first before settling. I would have wanted the choice of men from beyond my hometown, beyone my country, beyond my continent even. And we got all these things we wanted yet the finding has become significantly more difficult, significantly more laboured because our expectations have been distorted by too much choice. We are now simply fatigued.

The book deals with a bunch of subjects like cheating, sexting, settling down and the notion of monogamy. What makes it really readable is Ansari’s really dry, self-reflexive style of writing. He often goes off on hilarious little tangents as evidenced below with this old, stock photo couple who may or may not be in an open relationship.

In the book, Aziz also looks at dating/romantic culture in certain countries around the world. This is where I genuinely learnt something that I had no clue about prior. Maybe I’ve been living under a rock but I had no idea about what was (is?) happening in Japan with regards to dating and how people feel about the opposite sex. They’re so uninterested in it all that the government, out of fear that the Japanese race will be no longer due to a lack of interest in having sex and making babies, has intervened and funds several initiatives to get men and women to get together. Subsidised dating initiatives and marriage initiatives that involve actual cash rewards (!). It’s an honestly fascinating read that I couldn’t believe to be true. Did you all know this about Japan??  See the below for some shocking statistics:

_{The Japanese Dating ‘Crisis’}

Ultimately, I found the opening sentence of this book to be the conclusion of the study in its entirety: “Many of the frustrations experienced by today’s singles seem like problems unique to our time and technological setting”. However, Aziz’s advice is to “treat potential partners like actual people, not bubbles on a screen” resonated with me. I wouldn’t go as far as saying I was filled with hope about modern day romance and dating but it did reaffirm that we’re all in this together and that maybe soulmate finding should be viewed from a position of priviledge rather than burdern.

David Sedaris is My Bitch/Hero

So it turns out that I have a book blog and I haven’t posted anything on it in about six months. Yup. I think I passed the embarrassed stage about three months ago, now I just look at this blog fondly as a thing of the past. Get all nostalgic and sh*t about that time when I used to post more than once a week; it’s great. ANYHOW.

I recently (two months ago) went to a David Sedaris event. I wasn’t really sure what to expect as it was a ticketed event in a concert hall (wasn’t cheap) and it was titled ‘An Evening with David Sedaris’. Was he going to do some stand-up, read from his new book, mingle with his fans in a room of swirling cognacs? Turns out that is exactly what the evening was (minus the cognac).

I don’t remember the last time I had such a good time. So much so that I stopped feeling resentful about the money I had spent to go and see him. I laughed so hard throughout the evening, listening to David (we’re totally on first name terms now) recounting stories and reading diary entries in his surprisingly high pitched voice. I, honestly, fell in love with the man.

The evening was coming to a close and David said he’d be outside signing books for a short while. Which reminded him of a time when a young guy came to one of his events and said his mum was a huge fan of David’s and would he mind writing something outrageous in her copy of one of his books. Naturally, David wrote ‘Your son left teeth marks on my dick’. HAHAHA. The boy was horrified.

No photographs were allowed, but I was feeling rebellious…

My friend (whom I had very kindly introduced to the world of Sedaris) and I decided to get our books signed. The queue wasn’t moving particularly fast as some fans had his entire backlist with them that they wanted specially signed. Double sigh. So our moment finally came and my friend was nervous, which then made me nervous, which normally results in me talking too fast and laughing too hard at people’s jokes. And overcompensating for my quiet friend.

I asked David to write something outrageous in mine, and as I’m black, I wanted him to write something that was inappropriate and racist. He started telling me a story about a dog shelter run by some elderly people. Long story short, there was an important dinner being held and the words ‘black bitch’ were unknowingly thrown around in reference to a dog they wanted to move out of the shelter. This got us to the following inscription in my book:

Followed by this in my friend’s:

I have to say, it was funny how, in a matter of minutes, he picked up on the dynamics of the relationship between me and my friend.

We talked to him some more and then made our exit. I was really impressed with how he took the time to speak to each person in that very long line, not the usual “Thanks for coming” type sh*t, but genuine conversation. If ever you get a chance to go to one of his readings, I highly recommend you do.

Girls Who Read

What do you look for in a girl? Are you a chest man? An ass man? Or are you a book-in-her-hands man?

Book Review: The Deep Whatsis by Peter Mattei

By his own admission Eric Nye is an asshole, ‘and not loyal to anyone, not even [him]self.’ He’s what you’d get if American Psycho‘s Patrick Bateman and Mad Men‘s Don Draper gave birth to a man-child. “Chief Idea Officer” at Tate, a New York City ad agency, the bonus on top of Eric’s already six figure salary is dependent on him firing 50% of his staff – a task that he carries out with “HR Lady”, relishes and draws out for his own entertainment.

‘We pretend with each other in big, long sighs that it was difficult work, very hard, we would go out afterwards and have a nice meal and get shitfaced and take limos home and expense it because of how difficult it was.’

SO; all appears to have been going as well as could be expected in the life of Eric Nye until “Intern” entered his life. After an almost one night stand, Eric finds that despite the fact he can’t remember her name, she’s now interning at his agency. Intern soon begins to stalk him, turning up wherever he may be to the point where Eric starts to question who’s stalking whom. For no logical reason, he can’t seem to get her out of his head, leading to his slow unravelling… Another chance encounter leads to a complaint against him being filed with HR, but there’s something about Eric that makes it very difficult to believe everything he’s telling you.  Is the intern to have a cathartic effect on him?

Eric is a darkly fascinating character. A guy who says things like ‘For no reason I consider hitting on birch-like juice girl but I fear there is too high a chance she will say yes‘, and ‘I sit in a deck chair and face away from the beach; something about the ceaseless idiocy of one wave after another strikes me as profoundly unimaginative‘, and who dismisses a beautiful view of the New York skyline as it’s ‘trying too hard.’ That he’s a jackass is no question, but he’s a hilarious jackass. Or at least I thought so. Even when he’s making certain staff members jump hoops, knowing full well he’s about to fire them, you can’t help but laugh because his cruel indifference knows no bounds (especially because at the office, when he’s not firing people, he does absolutely nothing).

Living in a false world devoid of any real interactions, Eric struggles with his ‘unalterable inability to deal with [his] unreality.’ It doesn’t appear like he’s able to stay still; restless, deeply jaded and dissatisfied with what life has to offer:

‘Waiting, I realise, isn’t the time between things, it’s the thing itself.’

There are deep echoes of American Psycho here, but if you find the endless listing of material possessions to be boring, you’re missing the point entirely. That listing is what makes American Psycho a classic. The essential difference between Nye and Bateman is that Nye is mocking himself when he reels off his material possessions, aware of some of the absurdities, whereas Bateman loved himself (interestingly, Nye experiences self-loathing) and his possessions; full stop. What struck me as being quite amusing is that Eric neither desires or needs any of these ridiculously expensive items he owns, but he buys them because he can, and often bespoke so he can prove a point.

For all that Eric lacks in character, he makes up for with the precision of his societal observations. He mocks the Brooklyn hipsters in a way that is so scathing, so sharp; I could not have articulated it better myself:

‘Never before have I seen so many people in one place who are exactly the same: the same age, the same race, the same wardrobe, the same facial hair, the same taste in music, socioeconomic background, college experience, shoes, political beliefs, and hair; but I suppose what really unites them is the shared fantasy that they are rebels.’

He goes to an art show called “Show Us Your Tits!” which features ‘lots of photos (taken, it seems, by anyone who can push the button on a camera) of girls flashing their breasts…I can’t decide if I like this show because it’s not really art at all, it’s just stupid, or if maybe I hate this shit because it’s trying so hard not to be art and there’s nothing more arty than that.’ Haha. Every major city has these hubs; in London the equivalent is Shoreditch/ Hackney.

Underneath the layers of dark wit and narcissism is an intelligent commentary on corporate America where we are told that ‘Advertising is how corporations outsource their lies.’

‘You see, what I think is interesting about what I do is that I personally don’t believe in what I do, or should I say that I believe very strongly that technology is actually destroying us as human beings, it’s taking away the fundamental truths about our humanity and making us pay to get them back: it’s called Creating Value.’

Without spoiling too much, the example he uses was quite an eye opener for me, showing how we have learned to buy back what was fundamentally ours to begin with.

This is a highly entertaining read that is, in parts, hilarious, and although Eric is indeed an asshole of the highest degree (as it says on the spine of the novel, he’s ‘a character you’ll either love or hate. Probably hate.’) I couldn’t help but be taken in by his unashamed self-centredness.  And what, exactly, is the Deep Whatsis? Well, you’ll just have to read to find out.

I received my copy of The Deep Whatsis from the publisher (Other Press) via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Weird Things Customers say in Bookshops.

There are a lot of strange people in this world. Some of them make into bookshops and ask silly questions. Here are a selection of the most ‘omg-are-you-serious?’ questions and comments.

CUSTOMER: Did they make a film edition of the Bible when The Passion of the Christ came out? You know, the text of the Bible, but with Mel Gibson on the front cover?

 

CUSTOMER: Do you have an LGBT fiction section?

BOOKSELLER: We don’t have a specific section, but we do have LGBT literature – Sarah Waters, Jeanette Winterson etc Which author were you looking for?

CUSTOMER: Don’t worry, I’ll have a look through the fiction section – thanks for your help.

OTHER CUSTOMER: Sorry, did I hear you right? Did you just say that all the homosexual books are in with the normal fiction?

BOOKSELLER: All our fiction is one section.

(Other Customer looks suspiciously at the book she’s holding and slides it back on the shelf)

CUSTOMER (pondering): How much would a signed copy of the Bible be worth?

BOOKSELLER: Signed by whom?

CUSTOMER: Well…I don’t know. Not God, obviously. (Nervous laugh.) That would be silly…wouldn’t it?

 

CUSTOMER: Pride and Prejudice was published a long time ago, right?

BOOKSELLER: Yep.

CUSTOMER: I thought so. Colin Firth’s looking really good for his age, then.

 

WOMAN (holding a copy of a Weight Watchers book in one hand, and The Hunger Games in the other): Which of these diet books would you recommend most?

CUSTOMER (to her friend): What about this book? (holds up a copy of The Hobbit).

CUSTOMER: No. I don’t want to read that. It’ll spoil the film.

 

CUSTOMER: Do you have audiobooks on sign language?

 

CUSTOMER: I’d like to buy a book for my wife.

BOOKSELLER: Sure, what sort of book?

CUSTOMER: I don’t know. Something…pink? Women like pink stuff, right?

 

CUSTOMER: Urgh. Shakespeare. He’s everywhere, isn’t he? You can’t escape him. I wish he’d do us all a favour and just die already.

CUSTOMER: I’m looking for the fourth Fifty Shades of Grey book.

BOOKSELLER: There are only three in the series.

CUSTOMER: No, there are four. I saw it in another shop yesterday. It’s really big. It’s called Fifty Shades Trilogy.

BOOKSELLER: …That’s the box set.

 

CUSTOMER: Do you have a copy of Atonement? But not the film cover, please. Keira Knightley’s neck makes me want to punch things.

Peculiar Love: Anthropology by Dan Rhodes

101 short ‘stories’ (or paragraphs, really) each 101 words long, each one more bizarre than the last. I’ve had this book for years and find myself dipping into it whenever I feel like laughing. Each story is narrated by an unnamed man who is experiencing one difficulty or another with a girlfriend. The stories are disturbingly hilarious and undeniably dark with a common thread of absurdity running through them. Here’s a little taster; enjoy!

TRICK

My girlfriend told me she had been the victim
of nature’s cruellest trick, that although born
male she had always felt female. She said she
had started dressing in women’s clothes at
the age of seventeen, and three years later
had undergone the necessary surgery. I was
stunned, but told her that I loved her first and
foremost as a person, and that I would give her
all the emotional support she needed. She
looked horrified. She had only been joking.
She left me. She said she was going to find a
real man, not some queer little gayboy like me.

BINDING

I found my girlfriend smashing our two-year-
old’s toes with a rock. I told her to stop. ‘What
are you doing?’ I cried, above the baby’s
agonised wails.
‘You wouldn’t understand,’ she said,
winding a bandage tightly around the crushed
digits. ‘It’s a woman thing. It’ll help her get a
boyfriend.’
‘But darling, don’t you remember what the
doctor told us? It’s a boy baby.’
‘Really?’ She looked surprised. ‘Oh well.
Men look nice with small feet too. I expect
he’ll be gay, anyway. He’s got that look about
him. See?’ I had to agree that she had a point.

CHARGING

My girlfriend started charging me for sex. She
said she had to think of her future, and
anyway her friends did it so why shouldn’t
she? I didn’t mind too much because her basic
rates were very reasonable, although she
always expected tips for extras. Once, as she
was holding the banknotes I’d given her up to
the light to make sure they were real, I asked
her if she ever went with anyone else for
money. She was furious, and asked what kind
of girl I thought she was. I said one with
laughing eyes, and lovely long dark hair.

Where’d You Go, Bernadette: A Book Review

Who on earth is Bernadette, and where the hell did she go? Good question; this is how the novel opens:

This is Bee, a precocious young teenager who is the daughter of Elgin Branch, Microsoft guru; and Bernadette Fox, neurotic architectural genius. After getting top marks on her report card, Bee reminds her parents that they had said she could have anything she wants. This anything turns out to be a trip to Antarctica. And so kick off a chain of events, charted through a mixture of emails, letters, notes, instant messages and reports; that lead to the disappearance of Bernadette.

Bernadette is highly opinionated, highly antisocial (completely disconnected from the real world to the extent that she has a virtual assistant based in India who does everything for her, short of breathing), hates everything about Seattle (‘Sometimes these cars have Idaho plates. And I think, What the hell is a car from Idaho doing here? Then I remember, That’s right, we neighbour Idaho. I’ve moved to a state that neighbours Idaho. And any life that might still be left in me kind of goes poof.’), and doesn’t care that she’s disliked by all the parents from Bee’s school – a pretentious school of ‘Subaru Parents’ (trying very hard to become ‘Mercedes Parents) where the worst grade you can get is a ‘W’ – working towards excellence. Yeah, that kinda nonsense.

Everybody in this book is so incredibly self-involved it is positively hilarious. Their ability to over exaggerate every little small detail and turn it into a 3-page rant creates a novel that is pure, unapologetic satire. An example of this hilarious exaggeration is when Bernadette is telling Manjula, her virtual assistant, about the difficulties of trying to park her car downtown when forced to pick up a dodgy prescription:

‘It was the first time I’d been downtown in a year. I immediately remembered why: the pay-to-park meters. Parking in Seattle is an eight-step process…Step eight, pray to the God you don’t believe in that you have the mental wherewithal to remember what the hell it was you came downtown for in the first place. Already I wished a Chechen rebel would shoot me in the back.’

Maria Semple has written quite a bit of comedy for TV – this is obvious when you start getting into this book. The dialogue is sharp and witty if a little forced at times in that sitcom kinda way. And though Semple does it well, I have to say that there has already been a book written in this format, that I think pushes the humour button a little more naturally than ‘Bernadette’. This book is ‘E: A Novel’ by Matt Beaumont – a brilliantly funny book if you ever have the time.

So, together with Bee, the reader pieces together fragments of information from all these random bits of correspondence, to see if we can find out where on earth Bernadette has got to. Underneath the razor-sharp wit, this book has a lot of heart and is one of those unusual ones where you genuinely don’t know what’s coming next. The twists and turns seem so random yet they work really well together. The only thing I’ll say is that the final third or so didn’t quite match up to the humour of the first two sections and so was a bit of a let down. And I won’t say anymore than that, because part of the pleasure of reading (most of) this is the unexpected way in which the story unfolds.

Another thing that’s surprising is that this book has been longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction this year (formerly known as the Orange Prize). Though entertaining I didn’t think it was of that calibre….but then again, something shouldn’t have to be ‘serious’ in order to be considered prize worthy. Perhaps it’s the pure originality (minus the format) that has made the judges think twice.

Creative Constipation

Source: http://www.gapingvoid.com

For me, blogging has become that older relative that you need to go and visit but keep putting off, the longer you leave it the harder it gets, and then it reaches that stage where you’re too embarrassed to even show your face. And that’s where things are getting to with me right now. I can’t believe it’s been a month since I last posted. Life appears to have rudely interrupted my blogging. A day seems to have turned into a few more, into a week, into a month (hopefully not more), without me having noticed. Perhaps I’ll just blame it on the books I’m reading – not feeling strongly enough about them to tell you guys. I’ve given myself until Friday to get back on the Blogging Train. Choo choo.

 

I’ve been meaning to write…

…but I just haven’t got round to it. So instead of writing (although I appreciate this is also writing) I thought I’d share my favourite bookshops with you. There are only two.

Wandsworth Oasis Charity Bookshop

The first is the Wandsworth Oasis bookshop. It’s a second hand charity one that supports local people with HIV. I know I shouldn’t promote this cuz I work in publishing, but the books are so damn cheap, it’s  a friggin’ dream. Where else can you get five books for £3.50?! Some of the titles are indeed old, but what really stings is when, amongst the endless stacks, you notice that new-ish book you just bought for full price in the regular bookstore. This place is truly amazing. Last time I was there I got a total of seven books (including the latest Lionel Shriver in hardback) for £4.50 (after a lil’ negotiating)! Wandsworth Oasis is 100% responsible for my inability to fully open my bedroom door. And there’s something to be said for picking up and reading a book that you know has been passed through many hands: the pages that have been folded over, the little scribbles in the margins, the doodles on the cover, the yellow-stained pages, the private birthday/anniversary/thank you message penned on the opening page dating back to 1992 or 2005; all that history. I love it.

My second favourite is the Waterstones near Tottenham Court Road station. For no other reason than it’s quirky and cute and has signs like this:

Cult

Reading

You could literally spend hours in either of these places. I get excited just thinking about my next visit. I don’t think it’s quite possible to feel this way about Amazon. Clicking on the ‘Kindle Daily Deal’ button does not excite me (you’re bound to uncover trash). And on that note….until next time (which will hopefully be very, very soon).