Comments on: Thru the 4th Wall: Salvador Plascencia, author of The People of Paper

By: Elkanah

Elkanah — Tue, 21 Mar 2006 10:50:07 +0000

The People of Paper. Yes. Wow. (pause) Damn! (silent reflection) This was the unexpected feast of literary substance that I had been hungry for. Apologies for leaving a comment so long after the original thread began, but I located this link in a late night search for more Plascencia. This, after multiple readings of the novel. The power, the skill, the poetry, the weakness, the innovation, the shortcomings; this book sits on my top shelf among my favorites.

By: caaf

caaf — Wed, 28 Sep 2005 17:32:24 +0000

Ah, excellent link, G. Not to be all "This reminds me of Pale Fire" and "you know another good book? Pale Fire." all the time, but I was just thinking how the unusual forms in People of Paper, Pale Fire, and Wittgenstein's Mistress, work to provide structure to what is basically anguish. That is, without the distance and form that the experimentation provides, it'd just be a waterfall, almost soapish onslaught of heartbreak. Selah Saterstom's novel, The Pink Institution, does something similar. Very Southern Gothic story, all sliced and diced and experimented with. And it disarms the reader because you're not approaching the story anymore with all the baggage from other Southern Gothic stories, she makes you see it new. Harder for traditional narrative to do.

By: Gwenda

Gwenda — Wed, 28 Sep 2005 16:27:40 +0000

I’m almost done with The People of Paper (Wow, as I said to Carrie), and it doesn’t feel crazy experimental to me either. That may well be because I read so much wacky genre fiction, but I think that it feels very straightforward (with tantalizing hints of mystery as well — a requirement for a successful narrative, imo). I never feel like the author is playing a game or holding something back in a false way. I’m finding it practically accessible. It actually reminds me a little of the work of Eduardo Galeano, especially his sort of political miscellany Book of Embraces (my favorite book EVER), or, to be more accurate, it provokes the same feelings of recognition and surprise that book does for me. I had a dream a couple of nights ago about Little Merced, but I didn’t realize it was her at first — I thought, that’s in a book I’m reading and I went through them all, thinking, not People of Paper; but of course it was, and it was trace-back-able to that heartbreakingly real time early on when she has head lice and her dad realizes the things that have slipped since her mother left.

Anyway, that wasn’t what this comment was supposed to be about. I was going to quote something a spec fic writer named Ben Rosenbaum said in a recentish discussion about genre and realism at David Moles’ blog: “… the high lit world is awakening from the long, cold sleep of realism.” I love that and feel it’s true. The quote I took that from is here (which will get you to the whole discussion).

Thanks for doing this, Rake and Carrie (and Salvador and Eli!).