How wonderful to find someone who appreciates Pinkwater even more than I do! Fantastic. I agree about Alan Mendelsohn, but I'd put Baconburg Horror higher up. I'm fine with absurdity and no enlightenment sometimes, or perhaps a Ferris wheel on fire is the transcendent experience?
Also , you say that a jitterbug is a food, and imply that a borgelnuskie is perhaps a fictional version. What is a jitterbug?? Just try googling for it and you'll see that the internet is no help with this question. (What is real, and what is not? I will never forget my astonishment, in 1990, when I saw an actual Wartburg car. I'd always assumed it was a fictional name.)
Your analysis also made me think about the sad lack of weirdness and enlightenment in wider American society today. I have always thought that Pinkwater ought to be better known, and that disaffected weird teenagers should not have to go through life without him, which most of them do. Self-proclaimed incels perhaps suffer most from this and I can't help thinking that reading Lizard Music and so on would be better than living in the darker corners of the internet.
Yeah, Baconburg Horror has a lot of great stuff, but I think it suffered from being a bit of a let down after Avocado of Death, which was in my teenage years my favorite DMP book.
A jitterbug is all too real—white bread with ground meat, mashed potatoes, and gravy on top. I found one on a diner menu here: https://thepalacediner.com/menus/dinner/
I always assumed borgelnushkies were something different, like (because they're footlong?) sausages? I don't really know anything about Eastern European food.
I mention somewhere in the bowels of this essay that someone in a comic store once told me that DMP was a kind of stepping stone to Vonnegaut who was a stepping stone to Illuminatus! which was a stepping stone to Pynchon (and I tried to make my first novel a bridge between DMP and Vonnegut, perhaps to the chagrin of my editor at Houghton Mifflin)…I was never so into Vonnegut, but surely without Discordianism and Robert Anton Wilson my high school years would have been much less weird, and much duller for it.
One of the (few?) neat things about the modern world is that when DMP talks about an old song you can now just go listen to that old song.
But the other fun thing about DMP is reading through, not getting a reference and then years later realizing there's a book called The Dharma Bums and suddenly Dhrama Buns Cafe makes sense, after all these years!
I tried to find out once if borgelnuskies were real and I think he made them up -- a sort of supernaturally incredible version of a foot-long sandwich. I'd forgotten about the bread/meat/potato thing! But yes, one of the great joys of life is finding which ones are real and which are jokes. The Dharma Bums, I was well into adulthood before I found that out, and I am a librarian. (Modern American lit, not my strongest area.)
I love both of the Snarkout books (and avocados) but for whatever reason, the Baconburg Horror wins for me. Maybe just because I was able to read it more often at the right age.
Pinkwater is probably why I love some of Pynchon; I couldn't deal with Gravity's Rainbow but I adore Lot 49 and Vineland. Vonnegut is fine too. But...have you ever read Boris Schulz?
Also my book blog (still active, though not very) bears a Pinkwater name.
Much thanks for giving me an overview of DMP that I can use. I have been meaning to take his books from the library but wasn't sure where to start (and, of course, they don't have all of them there anymore...)...
As I read your list, I was struck by uncertainty about a foundational question: did I know who DMP is? I had definitely read The Big Orange Splot, while others sounded vaguely familiar. The art style(s) rang some bells. However, DMP's name didn't trigger any memory senses.
I have been reading some of the shorter books and, so far, sampling longer ones. Is your ranking order also the order in which you would suggest reading DMP's books?
It seems that DMP's life is nearly as comically absurd as some of his books. To give a sense, from Wikipedia:
"[he] was training to become an art therapist, but found he was unsuited to the work and dropped his studies. However, he attended a meeting of an unspecified cult with a therapy client. He and his wife Jill later joined the cult, then eventually left it.
[...]
He adopted the name Daniel in the 1970s after consulting his cult's guru, who said his true name should begin with a 'D'."
Part of what really gets me about this is the total lack of identifying detail about the cult.
However, to my taste, the most ridiculous episode concerns the use of one of his short stories in a standardized test fiasco. To whet your appetite, consider facing the following question on a SAT-like exam:
"When the moose said that the pineapple has some trick up its sleeve, he means that the pineapple
How wonderful to find someone who appreciates Pinkwater even more than I do! Fantastic. I agree about Alan Mendelsohn, but I'd put Baconburg Horror higher up. I'm fine with absurdity and no enlightenment sometimes, or perhaps a Ferris wheel on fire is the transcendent experience?
Also , you say that a jitterbug is a food, and imply that a borgelnuskie is perhaps a fictional version. What is a jitterbug?? Just try googling for it and you'll see that the internet is no help with this question. (What is real, and what is not? I will never forget my astonishment, in 1990, when I saw an actual Wartburg car. I'd always assumed it was a fictional name.)
Your analysis also made me think about the sad lack of weirdness and enlightenment in wider American society today. I have always thought that Pinkwater ought to be better known, and that disaffected weird teenagers should not have to go through life without him, which most of them do. Self-proclaimed incels perhaps suffer most from this and I can't help thinking that reading Lizard Music and so on would be better than living in the darker corners of the internet.
Yeah, Baconburg Horror has a lot of great stuff, but I think it suffered from being a bit of a let down after Avocado of Death, which was in my teenage years my favorite DMP book.
A jitterbug is all too real—white bread with ground meat, mashed potatoes, and gravy on top. I found one on a diner menu here: https://thepalacediner.com/menus/dinner/
I always assumed borgelnushkies were something different, like (because they're footlong?) sausages? I don't really know anything about Eastern European food.
I mention somewhere in the bowels of this essay that someone in a comic store once told me that DMP was a kind of stepping stone to Vonnegaut who was a stepping stone to Illuminatus! which was a stepping stone to Pynchon (and I tried to make my first novel a bridge between DMP and Vonnegut, perhaps to the chagrin of my editor at Houghton Mifflin)…I was never so into Vonnegut, but surely without Discordianism and Robert Anton Wilson my high school years would have been much less weird, and much duller for it.
One of the (few?) neat things about the modern world is that when DMP talks about an old song you can now just go listen to that old song.
But the other fun thing about DMP is reading through, not getting a reference and then years later realizing there's a book called The Dharma Bums and suddenly Dhrama Buns Cafe makes sense, after all these years!
Thanks for reading!
I tried to find out once if borgelnuskies were real and I think he made them up -- a sort of supernaturally incredible version of a foot-long sandwich. I'd forgotten about the bread/meat/potato thing! But yes, one of the great joys of life is finding which ones are real and which are jokes. The Dharma Bums, I was well into adulthood before I found that out, and I am a librarian. (Modern American lit, not my strongest area.)
I love both of the Snarkout books (and avocados) but for whatever reason, the Baconburg Horror wins for me. Maybe just because I was able to read it more often at the right age.
Pinkwater is probably why I love some of Pynchon; I couldn't deal with Gravity's Rainbow but I adore Lot 49 and Vineland. Vonnegut is fine too. But...have you ever read Boris Schulz?
Also my book blog (still active, though not very) bears a Pinkwater name.
I know nothing of Boris Schultz (what a DMP-centric name!). I can’t find him anywhere…Bruno Schultz do you mean (I haven’t read him either)?
If I were going to rank all Pynchon books (not something I’d rule out) 49 and Vineland would be my #1 & #6 respectively.
What’s your book blog? I love books!
I'm an idiot. Bruno. Too many Uncle Borises hanging around my head I guess!
Howling Frog Books -- www.howlingfrog.blogspot.com Prepare to read a lot of mentions of Diana Wynne Jones.
Oh nice! Your CC Spin list has some books I've been meaning to get to, too. (And I see DWJ gets reduced to her initials, DMP-style.)
If you ever want a free ebook of one of my books (with the hope but not the requirement of a write-up), let me know. Er…don't tell anyone.
Thanks for the offer! I shall ponder. Also, I'm pretty sure my readership is now miniscule 😁
Much thanks for giving me an overview of DMP that I can use. I have been meaning to take his books from the library but wasn't sure where to start (and, of course, they don't have all of them there anymore...)...
The good news is that some of the best books are reprinted in the omnibus volume Five Novels (easier to find).
Great. Omnibi don’t get enough respect….
As I read your list, I was struck by uncertainty about a foundational question: did I know who DMP is? I had definitely read The Big Orange Splot, while others sounded vaguely familiar. The art style(s) rang some bells. However, DMP's name didn't trigger any memory senses.
I have been reading some of the shorter books and, so far, sampling longer ones. Is your ranking order also the order in which you would suggest reading DMP's books?
It seems that DMP's life is nearly as comically absurd as some of his books. To give a sense, from Wikipedia:
"[he] was training to become an art therapist, but found he was unsuited to the work and dropped his studies. However, he attended a meeting of an unspecified cult with a therapy client. He and his wife Jill later joined the cult, then eventually left it.
[...]
He adopted the name Daniel in the 1970s after consulting his cult's guru, who said his true name should begin with a 'D'."
Part of what really gets me about this is the total lack of identifying detail about the cult.
However, to my taste, the most ridiculous episode concerns the use of one of his short stories in a standardized test fiasco. To whet your appetite, consider facing the following question on a SAT-like exam:
"When the moose said that the pineapple has some trick up its sleeve, he means that the pineapple
A is wearing a disguise
B wants to show the animals a trick
C has a plan to fool the animals
D is going to pull something out of its sleeve"
The reading and test questions: https://usny.nysed.gov/docs/the-hare-and-the-pineapple.pdf
A New Yorker article about the incident: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/05/07/food-groups