Post #3

Book: Dry

Pages Read: 118-293

Summary: Augusten thinks he is just fine out of rehab. He does his job, he doesn't drink  and he's even making himself go to AA meetings. His friend from rehab is living with him and seems to feel a little controlling, especially when Augusten meets a cute, off-limits fellow addict, who is nothing but trouble. Things are going alright though, until Pighead gets the hic-ups, which turn into a cold, which turns into an immune-system failure. Augusten buckles up and takes on the role of care-taker for Pighead through his final weeks. Augusten's friend moves out and when Pighead dies, it is too much for him to handle. He relapses and starts drinking again for almost a year, maybe even worse than before. Then one day, he gets a call from a jewelry store, saying that his friend Pighead had something made for him. He goes to the jewelry store and gets a gold trinket in the shape of a Pig's head incsribed: "I'M WATCHING YOU. NOW STOP DRINKING." Augusten stops drinking by himself, and becomes very sick in the process. He lies in bed hallucinating, breaking out in a fever and hives. Fast forward some time, and Augusten is working hard to stay sober again, he has a freelance advertising job, and his friend Jim is newly sober. 

Analysis: A theme through this half of the book is: if it's not difficult, it won't work. The first time Augusten got sober, he found it pretty easy not to drink. He didn't even need AA meetings. Then he relapsed just as easily.  The second time he got sober, he didn't have the cushion of rehab for the initial sobering and he had to force himself to attend AA meeting everyday. This hard work pays off and gives him a firmer, longer-lasting sobriety. 

Post #2

Book: Dry by Augusten Burroughs
Pages Read: 118

Summary: The author, Augusten, has developed a drinking problem. It's so bad that he often shows up to work the next day still drunk. He works in advertising and his partner has asked him to cut down on his drinking before, but this time his boss initiates and intervention. In order to keep working there he must go to rehab for a month. Augusten denies he has a problem but agrees to go to save his job. He picks a known gay rehab and fantasizes about his glamorous stay there. He gets there and faces the reality of it all, and hates the whole thing. Eventually, he warms up to the idea and acknowledges that he has a problem. He makes a very close friend at the facility and when he gets out, the friend moves into his appartment. Throughout the story we learn about Augusten's relationship with his best friend, Pighead, whom he was once in love with. Pighead has AIDS and that makes Augusten subconciously distance himself.

Analysis: The theme so far, seems to be identifying psychologic problems. First, the reader is exposed to Augusten's actions and either realizes Augusten's psychological motivation before he does or understands once Augusten sees it for himself and explains it. An obvious example is Augusten's drinking problem, we see it before he does. Other issues surface as the book continues. Augusten loves Pighead, so when he learns that Pighead has AIDS, Augusten subconciously decides to distance himself from him. He does this so if Pighead dies, it won't be as painful, since he isn't as close to him. In a way, his drinking problem stems from this same desire to distance, because it distances himself from the painful aspects of life.

Passage:

"Two Ketel One martinis, straight up with olives," I tell the bartender and then turn to Jim. "What's so bad about jumpers?" I love this man.
"Because when you move their limbs, the bones are all broken and they slide around losse inside the skin and they make this sort of..." Our drinks arrive. He takes a sip and continues, "...this sort of rumbling sound."
"That's so fucking horrifying," I say, delighted. "What else?"
He takes another sip, creases his forehead in thought. "Okay, I know--you'll love this. If it's a guy, we tie a string around the end of his dick so that it won't leak piss."
"jesus," I say. We both take a sip from our drinks. I notice that my sip is more of a gulp and I will need another drink soon. The martinis here are shamefull meager. "Okay, give me more horrible," I tell him.
He tells me how once he had a female body with a decapitated head and the family insisted on an open casket service. "Can you imagine?" So he broke a broomstick in half and jammed it down through the neck and into the meat of the torso. Then he stuck the head on the other end of the stick and kind of pushed.
"Wow," I say. He's done things that only people on death row have done.

I really liked this passage because of Augusten's reaction to Jim's story. He makes it very clear that he is very morbidly interested in the story by showing, not telling, us that it excites him. It's a nice touch, because it makes him seem very honestly human. Everyone wants to hear a gross story and often people won't admit to it, so it's very refreshing to see that. I think this passage is a great example of how good the author is at noticing and describing emotions that we all have but often don't even recognize in ourselves.

Post #1: American Author Proposal

The author I would like to do for my American Author project is Augusten Burroughs. I have read one of his books before and I relate to a lot of the things he writes about. He writes about extreme situations, which I have not experienced personally, but the way he writes about his reactions and observations to adversity hits home for me.
Burroughs fills the criteria for American Authors because he is American and writes about issues that are very stereotypically American, such as look-obsessed celebrities and television shopping networks. He is a prose writer who writes both fiction and non-fiction work. He has three books, 2 memoirs and 1 novel that fill the requirements. His work is well recognized, due to his fame acquired from the feature length film based on his memoir, “Running with Scissors.” Another of his novels, “Sellevision,” is currently in production to be released as a feature length film this year.
Burroughs has a unique writing style, which is entirely dry and matter-of-fact. He writes on taboo and uncomfortable subjects in an objective way that creates a false sense of normalcy. I think that focusing specifically on his writing style could make for some interesting theses.