Last summer I read The Bell Jar, but found Plath somewhat whiny and self-pitying (I despise whiny characters)- although honestly, I may not have been reading this book with the right context, as her perspective was skewed by her depression.
I picked up Girl, Interrupted, while at the library book sale last week, not expecting too much (having read some rather negative Amazon reviews), but still interested, and at $1, even my student budget could afford it.
It surpassed my (admittedly low) expectations with flying colors. I loved Kaysen's tone, short anecdotes, the lack of linearity that I usually find difficult to follow- basically, her writing style is fabulous.
Describing the regular checks that the nurses perform (in increments of 5, 15, and 30 minutes, depending on behavior), Kaysen says, "It never stopped, even at night, it was our lullaby. It was our metronome, our pulse. It was our lives measured out in doses slightly larger than those famous coffee spoons. Soup spoons, maybe? Dented tin spoons brimming with what should have been sweet but was sour, gone off, gone by without our savoring it: our lives."
Tell me you don't want to read something like that.
With such a strong positive reaction, I decided to hop back onto Amazon and see which reviews had given me such a bad impression. The main problem readers seemed to have with it were the lack of linear writing style and tear-jerking emotion.
These complaints aggravated me to no end, prompting this blogpost.
1) So the memoir is more of a collection of anecdotes than a completely connected story. So what? The anecdotes knit together well, and capture the setting at the mental hospital perfectly. Besides, the memoir was written long after her stay at McLean, and as she can't be expected to memorize every detail, I would much rather have her short, sharp, insights, than attempts to recapture time that she can't fully remember.
2) Tears are not an appropriate measure of the worth of a novel; while good books can cause tears, tears don't necessarily connote a good book (and really, I don't feel the need to be constantly emotional). When I was in middle school, I felt that a book that made me feel for a character and cry was the best type of book, leading me to read many Jodi Picoult novels. Nowadays, while I wouldn't necessary call Picoult a "bad" writer, I don't consider her books among my favorites. Many readers of Girl, Interrupted, were probably disappointed in their expectations of a book that would give every heart-jerking detail of a descend into- and, of course, difficult climb out of- insanity, but Kaysen focused less on her own "insanity" and more on the thin border separating "sanity" from what she calls "the parallel universe" of insanity. She doesn't want to cry, only to understand herself in that time, and in the present. So rather than providing tears, Kaysen gave me a look into the mind of someone who slipped into a completely new world, and despite emerging out of it, still feels its presence in her life.
Tl;dr: If you want a good writer with a fascinating story to tell, and don't want to keep Kleenexes near by, read Girl, Interrupted.
(No, this is not a promotion. I really did just enjoy it that much)
