All the rhetoric currently being thrown around thanks to the recent Franzen inspired media maelstrom about the commercial/literary or popular/serious dichotomies feel like the same tired arguments over legitimacy, popularity and media coverage being rehashed for us yet again. In part I feel like these discussions are intended to create hype for the publishing industry itself – look, we are still relevant, look at the impassioned discourse that is happening about our product, I mean, artform! – an industry struggling to maintain footing in a culture that is rapidly shifting toward a preference for the visual and the hypertextual. Thanks to uncanny timing, reading Jonathan Franzen’s essay collection How to Be Alone felt like his voice, strangely silent amid the social media mavens, and his position in the conversation. And yet, these essays were mostly written over ten years ago, when the technological landscape looked nothing like it does today.

The majority, and the best, of these non-fiction essays are written about literature, the book and its position in the society of the spectacle. Surprisingly, for a collection of pieces written at different times for different publications, it contains a strong thematic cohesiveness. “Imperial Bedroom,” an essay about the concern over the demarcations between public and private spheres is rich in foresight, having been written in 1998, that is, a pre-Facebook world. Franzen makes a compelling argument about the appearance of loss of privacy versus the reality of an increasingly isolated existence. Facebook is the medium that tirelessly intrudes on discussions of personal privacy online. Is Facebook a reaction against the privacy we’ve been given/worked for (personal isolation through architecture, landscape, transport, communication, etc.), is it a way to make ourselves visible in an imaginary “public” space, to make ourselves the tabloid stars of our own social circles? (In case it wasn’t obvious, I’m pretty anti-Facebook. It’s the internet for people who don’t know how to use the internet.) Intriguingly, it is Franzen’s personal anecdotes and observations in this essay that lends it its power.

Then there is the shining jewel in this collection, the apparently infamous “Harper’s essay” on the death of the novel, “Why Bother?” written in 1996. What a slow, horrible death the novel must be suffering! Again, it is Franzen’s personal input that gives the essay the extra level of understanding, he talks about his depression, his writing “process”, his own position as a reader; like many of us, Franzen feels he was saved by literature. For readers who constantly face accusatory remarks from people who don’t have time to read, “Why Bother?” is the ideal antidote, an affirmation. Franzen examines the cultural context and consumer economy that he sees as oppositional to the longevity of the book, the incompatibility between “the slow work of reading and the hyperkinesis of modern life.” He does suggest the problematic divide between “serious” and popular fiction, though doesn’t define his terms. I like to think of this as a technique to allow us to define the terms for ourselves: what does serious fiction mean to me? Despite reading “teaching us to be alone” as he states in a latter essay, it also ties us in with a disjointed communal group of increasing rarity: readers.

Readers aren’t “better” or “healthier” or, conversely, “sicker” than non readers. We just happen to belong to a rather strange kind of community.

While many of the essays struggle with the distinction between the personal and the public, the social and the act of reading, others focusing on unconnected topics can also be read through Franzen’s main concerns. An essay on the Chicago postal crisis of 1994 looks at the social, political and spatial issues that led to the decline in the services in the area; Franzen visits a small community disappointed that a new local prison hasn’t been the boom to their economy that they expected; the pleasures and contradictions of cigarette smoking; filming a segment for Oprah in his hometown, briefly touching on the scandal when he expressed discomfort at the Oprah’s Book Club label would discourage male readers. However, ultimately the best and most engaging essays in How to Be Alone are about fiction, and the possibility of it remaining a potent social medium. I loved it, the message, Franzen’s willingness to bear his vulnerabilities and thoughts, the erudite and considered style, and the obvious love of literature and reading.

Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Weiner should read it. I’m going to leave you with this quote from “The Reader in Exile”:

Elitism is the Achilles’ heel of every serious defense of art, an invitation to the poisoned arrows of populist rhetoric. The elitism of modern literature is, undeniably, a peculiar one – an aristocracy of alienation, a fraternity of doubting and wondering. Still, after voicing a suspicion that nonreaders view reading “as a kind of value judgment upon themselves, as an elitist and exclusionary act,” Birkerts is brave enough to confirm their worst fears: “Reading is a judgment. It brands as insufficient the understandings and priorities that govern ordinary life.”

You Know You Love Me is the second installment in Cecily von Ziegesar’s wildly successful Gossip Girl series, and although I still feel mildly embarrassed about reading these books, it is a small improvement on the first novel. The characters, their personalities and ranking in their social system now familiar, continue to play out their superficial dramas in the Upper East Side. Alongside the ubiquitous references to sex, alcohol, brands and bitchiness, the tribulations of college interviews, young romantic love and the pressures of the final school year add a level of verisimilitude that was missing from the first novel. And manages to add just a touch of reality for those of us that led a decidedly less chaotic adolescence.

Welcome to New York City’s Upper East Side, where my friends and I all live in huge, fabulous apartments and go to exclusive private schools. We aren’t always the nicest people in the world, but we make up for it in looks and taste.

Blair Waldorf is still an excruciatingly spoiled brat. Her mother Eleanor is gearing up for her wedding to the so not up to Blair’s standards, Cyrus Rose, and to further disappoint Blair, has announced the wedding will take place the same day as Blair’s all-important eighteenth birthday. Add to that, her attempts to lose her virginity – although her constant mentions of “doing it” in place of any actual reference to the sexual act itself grates on the nerves, and adds immaturity to her character. I wonder if this is to appease the teen audiences or (cough) intentional characterization – with her altogether unwilling boyfriend, the perpetually stoned Nate. Blair sees consumption and material gifts as the ultimate signs of her love. When her credit card is declined as her mother joins bank accounts with her fiancé, Blair steals a pair of cashmere pajama pants for Nate in order to show just how much he means to her. Nate, despite existing in a permanently drugged haze, recognizes this for what it is: a blatant demand for his attention toward her. Nate, meanwhile, is avoiding Blair and nurturing a rather sweet blossoming relationship with Jennifer Humphrey.

This was definitely not in the script.
And as she looked on in horror and fascination, Blair had the most starkly disappointing realization of her entire life. Worse even than the thought of not getting into Yale.
Nate wasn’t her leading man. He wasn’t going to sweep her off her feet and love her and only er. He was just a supporting actor, some loser who would drop off the screen before the final act. And if that was the case, she definitely didn’t want him.

Serena van der Woodsen is spending more time with Dan Humphrey, who pines and moans even when he has the girl of his dreams. Thankfully, Serena becomes suitably creeped out by Dan’s Young Werther shtick (although, apparently that kind of thing works for some: see Goethe as a seduction strategy!) and distances herself from him; he then realizes that Vanessa is the one he’s really supposed to be with – ah, that old “oh I’m really in love with my best friend, the artsy alternative girl with the shaved head and not the model-esque, impossibly perfect dream girl!” trope coming into play – Vanessa is clearly the most interesting character out of the lot of them, I wish she had more of a central role.

In between all the romantic entanglements, the kids go on separate and converging road trips to their desired college destinations; mostly spectacularly flubbing the interviews. Blair bonds with her new stepbrother, the potentially interesting Aaron Rose, and despite breaking down in her important application interview, a sweetly worded email to Daddy and a swift generous donation are sure to undo any necessity for hard work and effort. It’s this sort of reliance on money and its powers that contradict Blair’s drive to achieve perfection. Is it solely ambition? Or the desire to work for what she receives rather than have everything handed to her on a silver platter? An inferiority complex? Just completely unable to comprehend personal failure on any level? Apparently this conundrum is what makes Blair Waldorf such a multi-faceted character, although I’m not entirely convinced.

While it is very easy to get caught up on the lackluster writing (why does Blair’s middle name change from Faith to Cornelia toward the end of the book? Why the reliance on a gossip blog which only discusses the same six characters over and over, is the world of the Upper East Side teenagers so inane that they are only really interested in a handful of their peers?) and the trash value of the series, You Know You Love Me allows for a few hours of escapism into the petty, often spiteful world of the over-privileged children of the wealthy.

In The Nanny Diaries two former nannies, Nicola Kraus and Emma McLaughlin, have written a scathing attack on their chosen profession and those who employ them. Our heroine, twenty-one year old Nan, has been hired to look after the four year old son, Grayer, of a wealthy, successful couple, the Xes. The position is attractive, it fits in with her final year of college and she likes the child. The parents turn out to be dictatorial, increasing Nan’s responsibilities from part time child care to single handedly raising their child and running their personal errands. Blind to the needs of the young boy, the parents indulge in affairs and preoccupy themselves with work (Mr. X) or are simply negligent, refusing to accept the responsibilities of motherhood in favour of facials and shopping (Mrs. X). Nan attempts to balance her demanding workload with her personal life, including her eccentric (but comparably stable) family members and her romantic pursuit of the boy from upstairs burdened with the embarrassing moniker of Harvard Hottie.

At first Mrs. X’s demands are amusing, a little kooky, but quickly descend into madness. The excessive demands and lack of responsibility through Nan’s eyes, although written in a light tone, become really frustrating. Nan doesn’t want to leave because she doesn’t want to leave Grayer, who she has formed a real bond with, in the unloving family situation. After an unforgivably horrible holiday experience she does eventually leave, venting her frustrations to a secret nanny-cam Mrs. X has installed. She records over her initial vehement rant to leave a more careful message for the parents – doing this, while understandable, leaves a lot of necessary things unsaid. In all likelihood Mrs. X is going to treat the next nanny the same, and the next, and the next, and in doing so condemning Grayer to an unstable foundation. While Nanny is freed from the tyrannical reign of Mrs. X, what becomes of Grayer? A succession of nannies who leave without notice, a mother who refuses to take responsibility for him, a father who is emotionally and physically absent?

The story does leave a slightly bad taste, but for the most part it is a warm and amusing tale about the bonds between carer and child, however temporary. One just hopes that Grayer doesn’t turn out like those other Upper East Side children I’ve been reading about.

“Sometimes a critic’s aesthetic judgment is impossible to extricate from what you might call her cinematic libido. There are movies that bring us a pleasure that’s neither definable nor defensible. These used to be called “guilty pleasures,” but that phrase seems too judgmental, too pre-Vatican II, for our postmodern era of omnivorous cultural consumption. The distinction between high and low culture, between what we’re allowed to enjoy publicly and what we must sneak off to savor in private, has effaced itself to the degree that “guilty pleasures” needs to be replaced by a more morally neutral term. For our purposes here, I’ll go with a term that a friend and I coined in college and that I still deploy on occasion: movies we couldn’t intellectually defend but still unapologetically loved we called “juicebombs.”"

In her recent review of The Twilight Saga: New Moon, Slate’s film reviewer Dana Stevens faces a conundrum which I found myself confronted with while I read, and wanted to read, the first book in the Gossip Girl series by Cecily von Ziegesar. “I don’t believe in guilty pleasures” I always asserted, I believed in unashamed, unabashed pleasure in anything I enjoyed. Whether it be an apparently crappy movie – Showgirls was a favourite for a very, very long time – or television show, or music, if I liked it and was entertained by it, then it was worthy of my attention. I never looked at things in terms of “taste” or kitsch value, value was determined by my personal relationship with it. So, why was I so embarrassed to buy (yes, really) and read these novels? Why did I seek reassurance that I wasn’t committing some booknerd crime? Why did I consider excuses and alternate reasons for my purchase choice?

Because, Gossip Girl is, as Stevens would call it, a juicebomb of a novel. I cannot defend it. I cannot claim any intellectual or moral value of the novel; the writing isn’t great, the characters are ridiculous and their trials and tribulations are completely alien to me. The novel is populated with rich, spoiled brat 17 year old characters who act like middle aged women, are preoccupied with labels and social standing and who speak in the flattest dialogue I have ever read.

Serena van der Woodsen returns to her privileged Upper East Side social set after a stint in boarding school, only to find herself shunned and plagued by rumours from her form circle of friends. With their social movements charted by the anonymous blogger known only as Gossip Girl – a narrative choice that functions only as a gimmick, it offers no real perspective or comment on the happenings, maybe I expect too much – the group of teenagers tread the ground of adolescence with the hyper-awareness of public scrutiny. Blair Waldorf, Serena’s former best friend, is horrified by her return because she believes she will be relegated to second best in favour of the “perfect” Serena. Blair’s boyfriend, Nate Archibald, has a long standing attraction to Serena, a relationship consummated without Blair’s knowledge. The plot is substandard fare, the usual soap operatic tropes. Yet, for some reason I am still unable to define, it is compulsively readable and I am determined not to feel guilty about it.