Anyone here ever read any David Sedaris?

[alyxen]

Just starting on 'Naked', and pretty interesting so far. For some reason I am envisioning it being narrated by Mo Rocca, but I think that's just cause he has a cool voice (imho).

 

[trysail]

I read his first book and got a hoot out of it. He's got a more-than-slightly-offbeat (okay, BENT) sense of humor. I listen to him on the radio frequently. His tale of life working as a department store Elf ( assisting the store Santa Claus ) one season pretty much left me incapacitated in throes of laughter.

He seems to be making the rounds of the "speaker" circuit these days; I know he's scheduled to make an appearance in my town (Baltimore) come fall.

 

[john-the-author]

We saw him here in Eugene two years ago. We'd both read some of his stuff and heard him often on NPR. His appearance was screamingly funny. We just got an email ad from the local concert venue that he's going to be here in April, 2009, but tickets have just gone on sale; get 'em before they run out. They will, too.

 

[Trinique_Fire]

Omg.

Read Barrel Fever when it first came out in hardback...I must have been 9 or 10. Followed by Naked, Me Talk Pretty One Day, Holidays On Ice, and Dress Your Family In Courderoy and Denim. Saw him at every local book signing, as well as at the Chicago Theatre with Ira Glass from NPR. Own every NPR broadcast of him and every reading by him I can find. I wrote an extensive English paper on him. Basically there's nothing I don't know or love about David Sedaris.

If you'd like to hear him read, go to the NPR website. He should be in the archives, and he's most known for his readings of SantaLand Diaries.

 

[SlickTony]

I've only read a part of one of his books, but have heard readings of his on NPR. A very funny guy.

 

[Stella_Omega]

I've read parts of Me Talk Pretty, and the Santa Diaries. And a handful of his short stories that were published in The New Yorker magazine, and I found them pretty repellent, honestly. He seemed to me to be making funny out of self loathing; in the Santa Diaries, he was oddly respectful towards the upscale parents who brought their children to the store, and oddly contemptuous towards the poor shmucks supplying their entertainment.

And his young gay men made my stomach turn. Ignorance in a character is fine, but the storytelling rule is that change happens. And in Sedaris' stories, the change was usually microscopically small-- and downward in direction. It seemed like he actively hated his characters.
I really lost interest in The New Yorker around that time.

 

[NoJo]

I think he's really funny. I started a thread about him last year after I discoverd him: http://forum.literotica.com/showthread.php?t=522213

 

[damppanties]

Currently reading When You Are Engulfed in Flames. Don't find it terribly funny. Some parts are very good, but on the whole just kind of sad, with the meanness of certain characters. Kind of sad and pitiable.

 

[OhMissScarlett]

I've read both "Me Talk Pretty One Day" and "Naked", loved them both. MTPOD is one of the most hilarious books I've ever read.

 

[alyxen]

Just out of curiosity Stella....were you by chance Stellaaah in that original thread?

 

[Stella_Omega]

Just out of curiosity Stella....were you by chance Stellaaah in that original thread?

omigods, I'm posting MPD!

Yeah, that was me. I can't remember, I think we were having problems logging in. Cold Turkey is sooo ugly I couldn't take it. I had to make a new account.

My opinion hasn't changed, as you can see.