As every 19th century heroine eventually learns, hatred and love can be interchangeable obsessions.
The word “arrogance,” uttered as a critique, announces the characters’ courtship. And so, with every post I write about Jonathan Safran Foer, I find my feelings towards him — like a caveman’s first, bacteria-laden roast — slowly warming. The thoughtlessness with which I’ve made jokes about him proves his vulnerability, and, in his vulnerability, I find someone …. sympathetic.
In a sense, then, we could also argue that the NY Post is learning how to like him.
From “So Over Foer,” by William Georgiades:
If Foer’s being the highest-paid author under age 30 isn’t reason enough to despise him, here are more than a dozen other reasons:
He plays up his “child prodigy” status. Though “Illuminated” was sold when he was 23 and published when he was 25, he told everyone that he wrote it when he was 20.
He was a lit-snob before he hit puberty. He sent fan mail to notable authors including Susan Sontag and Paul Auster, starting at age 11.
[…]His wife is a babe. Worse, [Nicole] Krauss is a commercially viable writer. Foer was moved to dedicate “Incredibly .. Extremely” to her, calling her “My idea of beautiful.” She, in turn, dedicates her second novel, out next month, to Jonathan, “My Life.” Imagine when they procreate.
They’re trading up. The couple just bought a 7,000-square-foot house on a triple lot in Brooklyn for $6.75 million. His agent said the house’s garden takes up two full lots.
From “Foer vs. Dr. Phil,” by Isaac Guzman:
Superhuman talent – or smarmy self-help guru?
Jonathan Safran Foer may be surfing a colossal wave of buzz, but it’s hard to separate his literary genius from the average self-help book.
Guess where the following pearls are from: Foer’s new novel, “Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close,” or Dr. Phil’s “Life Strategies”? …
(Here, by the way, are Foer’s thoughts on negative reactions to him — specifically, the NY Press‘s inclusion of him on their 2003 list of the “50 Most Loathsome New Yorkers”:
JSF: What is it that could possibly make me so loathsome? Clearly, like the person is [short hesitation] jealous. I can’t imagine it being anything else.
RB: Okay right. That would make you a very confident person. I agree that wasn’t a reader’s poll and that it was the staff sitting around deciding whom to take down. Nonetheless when someone says you are a stupid shit head some of it has to hurt and the more cleverly that it is said, the more I think it hurts.
JSF: Out of certain mouths it would bother me. Out of the mouth of that weekly it doesn’t bother me. It hurts me much more when a reader who seems to be intelligent and who seems to have read the book carefully critiques the book with me. If one of my heroes were to say to say it, it would bother me. But that newspaper is its own creation, it has its own motivations. Which I don’t really understand. I thought it was hilarious. I wanted to know why I wasn’t number four.
Incidentally, the NY Press makes it a rule to never repeat selections, but JSF inspired them to bend it.)
More on Foer: