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Fight Club
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Mary Ann Evans, in the 1850s, spoke out against the notion that "lady novelists" were capable of producing only "silly novels" - precious, sentimental, illogical and improbable claptrap - while men produced high literature. She changed her name to George Eliot and wrote as a "gender neutral" narrator, highly educated and worldly, and mostly transparent (i.e., not silly).
The 1990s finds us again at a crossroads where literature is concerned, with the rise of Oprah's book club and the whole genre of "chick lit" on the one hand (in many cases just "silly novels by lady novelists" revivified), and a sort of phallic-anxiety heavy-on-the-masculine literature on the other. This second group, I like to call "guy crap." It's not a bad label ; there's some good stuff in guy crap, just like there is on Oprah's book list. Guy crap includes genre fiction (Dennis Lehane, Jonathan Lethem), as well as insistent intellectualism (David Foster Wallace, Martin Amis, Paul Auster) ... and, of course, the violent, psych-you-out, latter-day-Robbe-Grillet disturbances of Bret Easton Ellis and Chuck Palahniuk. Some of these are done well, and some of them are just as silly as the lady novelists' claptrap.
Fight Club is one of those novels where the unrelenting GUY-ness of narrator and storyline begins as an intriguing challenge and ends up fatiguing and gimmicky. In case there's anyone out here who hasn't either read the book or seen the movie, I won't spoil anything, I promise. It's a book about a bunch of young men, frustrated in their low-on-the-ladder white-collar day jobs and the emptiness of modern society, who meet routinely to pound each other close to death and plot destruction on a less personal scale. The novel is Palahniuk's testament to the counter-culture of yuppiedom, a world in which squalor and presentability, upward mobility and civil disobedience, live side by side and take each other's measure daily. Palahniuk asks pointed questions about the world we live in, and his prose is the strength of this novel - he keeps you interested, even when you realize how much you hate what he's saying.
And you should hate what Palahniuk is saying. Because at the heart of the novel sits a troubled foundation. It's not the acts of (juvenile, for the most part) sociopathy, or even the ultimate real pathology the characters fall into. What you should hate as (or after) you read is the book's central three-part idea, that (a) the disaffected youth of the video-game generation really do hold the truth about society ; (b) society in turn is nothing but a reflection of the video-game generation's disaffected world-view ; and (c) once a disaffected youth of the video-game generation, always a disaffected youth of the video-game generation - there is no improvement, there is no connection, there is no healing, there is no "out," because boys never grow up. Even the support-group conceit that could represent the narrator's redemptive attempt at relation turns out to be just a device, as egotistical for the character as it is ultimately for the storyline. Relation between people doesn't exist, not really : you don't talk about fight club. We're all just wandering bruised through the wasted LCD landscape, staking out our independence like rebel teenagers, promising to blow up whatever we disagree with.
Palahniuk has said he wrote this book as a kind of provocation, to get back at a publisher for turning down his earlier manuscript. I wonder if he peed in the publisher's soup, too : it wouldn't altogether surprise me.
The 1990s finds us again at a crossroads where literature is concerned, with the rise of Oprah's book club and the whole genre of "chick lit" on the one hand (in many cases just "silly novels by lady novelists" revivified), and a sort of phallic-anxiety heavy-on-the-masculine literature on the other. This second group, I like to call "guy crap." It's not a bad label ; there's some good stuff in guy crap, just like there is on Oprah's book list. Guy crap includes genre fiction (Dennis Lehane, Jonathan Lethem), as well as insistent intellectualism (David Foster Wallace, Martin Amis, Paul Auster) ... and, of course, the violent, psych-you-out, latter-day-Robbe-Grillet disturbances of Bret Easton Ellis and Chuck Palahniuk. Some of these are done well, and some of them are just as silly as the lady novelists' claptrap.
Fight Club is one of those novels where the unrelenting GUY-ness of narrator and storyline begins as an intriguing challenge and ends up fatiguing and gimmicky. In case there's anyone out here who hasn't either read the book or seen the movie, I won't spoil anything, I promise. It's a book about a bunch of young men, frustrated in their low-on-the-ladder white-collar day jobs and the emptiness of modern society, who meet routinely to pound each other close to death and plot destruction on a less personal scale. The novel is Palahniuk's testament to the counter-culture of yuppiedom, a world in which squalor and presentability, upward mobility and civil disobedience, live side by side and take each other's measure daily. Palahniuk asks pointed questions about the world we live in, and his prose is the strength of this novel - he keeps you interested, even when you realize how much you hate what he's saying.
And you should hate what Palahniuk is saying. Because at the heart of the novel sits a troubled foundation. It's not the acts of (juvenile, for the most part) sociopathy, or even the ultimate real pathology the characters fall into. What you should hate as (or after) you read is the book's central three-part idea, that (a) the disaffected youth of the video-game generation really do hold the truth about society ; (b) society in turn is nothing but a reflection of the video-game generation's disaffected world-view ; and (c) once a disaffected youth of the video-game generation, always a disaffected youth of the video-game generation - there is no improvement, there is no connection, there is no healing, there is no "out," because boys never grow up. Even the support-group conceit that could represent the narrator's redemptive attempt at relation turns out to be just a device, as egotistical for the character as it is ultimately for the storyline. Relation between people doesn't exist, not really : you don't talk about fight club. We're all just wandering bruised through the wasted LCD landscape, staking out our independence like rebel teenagers, promising to blow up whatever we disagree with.
Palahniuk has said he wrote this book as a kind of provocation, to get back at a publisher for turning down his earlier manuscript. I wonder if he peed in the publisher's soup, too : it wouldn't altogether surprise me.
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Greg
(last edited Aug 25, 2016 11:05AM)
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May 11, 2007 06:18AM
I think the actual term is "dick lit."
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Dick lit. Funny stuff. However, as I state in my review responding to your review, I think this is more pop-psych/soc than dick lit. 
You put into eloquent words what I couldn't articulate. I just can't accept Palahniuk's view of the world. And Fight Club is Palahniuk at his best.
I enjoyed Fight Club, and also agree with your review. This novel is why I won't order soup in Portland, Oregon.
I agree that the message should anger you. That's the point. It should make ou angry about yourself, especially if you're the kind of person who thinks the message is BS. The book is blatently masculine, but that's because it's dealing with the issue de-masculinity in our culture. Personally, I think it's something that more people need to recognize. I'm not a fan of this author, but I absolutly love what this book has to say about masculinity, consumerism, 12-step programs, life and modern society in general.
I agree entirely with Craig - you're completely missing the point of the book. Fight Club is all about self-uprising, et al. "Dick lit" isn't 'silly' - much of it is SUPPOSED to be vapid and repetitive, simply as a reflection of life.
I agree with Palahniuk's view on the world. It is a terrible place, we all are horrible in one way or another and there is no hope for humanity. We are stuck in a mindless void. I don't quote because it shows you aren't able to express your thoughts in a unique way, but if I did I would quote Palahniuk.
Yeah- I agree with Siobhan. This book is to be read the same way that you read Lolita...
I wrote this review years ago and find it very amusing that of the 242 novels I've read and commented on here on GoodReads, *this* is the one that gets the most attention and the most reaction. Umm, thanks? Perhaps as Kirill suggests I should reread the novel, if for no other reason than because it clearly has staying power on GoodReads.In response to Siobhan - My opinion on Palahniuk's novel is just precisely that : (a) an opinion, and (b) mine. I don't question the intelligence or the relevance of the novel - where in my review did I say it wasn't a good book? - but I do fundamentally disagree with its message.
I live in the same alienated, techno-centric, me-generation world as you, the one Palahniuk's characters inhabit and dream of destroying while letting themselves be destroyed by it. I suppose the difference is that I see this world-view as a dangerous mask fiction puts on to perpetuate isolation and self-loathing in the culture outside the book, like videogames that desensitize people to the violence they are required to commit against bodies (human, animal, ideological) in order to get ahead. The very best literature, in my opinion, is that which challenges the reader's assumptions about the world while still offering something that enriches human experience - not something that impoverishes or degrades it. I reject Palahniuk's conclusion that the Fight Club mentality is all there is. That is the gist of my review here. It is a weak mind that insists on having total agreement - if nothing else, Fight Club should have taught you that. In no way does my disagreement with either the novel or its fans mark me as "lack[ing] the knowledge to grasp anything" about anything. And, for the record, I am a literature *professor* with a complete brain.
Great review, I enjoyed reading your thoughts on this book.
I haven't read Fight Club, but I do agree with your assessment of Guy crap. As a man in my early thirties, I'm expected to like certain authors, but I honestly don't see the value in their works that others do. I try to keep myself open to reading the authors from this camp, but I'm finding it increasingly difficult because I know what I'm going to find.Excellent review.
I like the way you pigeonhole literature. I think it is simply darling how quasi-intellectuals have to classify and categorize everything. How adorable.
Ahhh Fight Club from a feminists view!
I haven't finished the book, but I love it so far. As an English teaching major I just wanted to say that your last comment (the one where you say the review is merely your opinion) explains exactly why I love literature. There is no right or wrong. Differing opinions can be equally valid. The symbols seen, the characters related to, the books enjoyed-- they are all unique to the reader and reflect his or her own life experiences. (I know my comment was a little off-topic, but I just wanted to say I appreciated your comments on the book).
Blah blah blah blah blah...Let me ask you. If all the characters were changed from men to women, would you still feel the same way?
I agree with the reviewer's sentiments on the central message of fight club (having only seen the film) but I'm surprised that fight club is taken to a didactic book. I had the impression (from the film) that it was a clever fun mirror held up to modern society, morphing the picture to a caricature, and exposing ironies in a nice way. But that, despite using the real world as a sandbox for these ideas and characters: like with a play, this world is hermetically sealed from a much more complex reality.Even if we still take the author's intention to be didactic, would it not still be very enjoyable to read the book? I enjoy the way the story is put together in the film, the way themes and philosophical phrases are repeated in different contexts, often in ways which expose a great irony, or show something to be multifaceted when you before thought you had it all figured out. The review strikes me as being an accurate analysis of the core beliefs, but hasn't convinced me that I shouldn't still read the book, for the reasons I have outlined.
I disagree. We should not be appalled by what he was saying. Doing so would be a blatant denial of truth in modern day society. And thus, fight club is born.
I disagree so heavily on all of your main points. I do like your voice - you are very clear and intelligent and you can take yourself away from the situation, not making it personal and keeping it intellectual discourse. The violence is the uniting fact that is missing in the men's lives. It's not sociopathy, it's not a bunch of idiots trying to kill each other. I think you really missed a huge part of the book there. Palahniuk is telling a story of how a group of men, dissatisfied and even disgusted with what society has labeled a healthy life, come to find meaning, fulfillment and brotherhood in tapping into the primal, biological instincts that live deep within men.
Women don't understand this at all, and it's sexist. The deepest biological instincts within women are childbearing and nurturing. This is evident and "normal" throughout nature. Men, on the other hand, are programmed to defend, compete and reproduce, yet society looks at all of this things as disgusting even though it's hardwired into our brains.
This book is that anger and resentment voiced, and even though you read the words I think you missed nearly all of the points of the book.
His Name is Robert Paulson.
Loved your review and referred to it. Completely on the spot.
Craig wrote: "I agree that the message should anger you. That's the point. It should make you angry about yourself, especially if you're the kind of person who thinks the message is BS. The book is blatently masc..."I agree with you. Everything that makes us angry with Palahniuk's story is exactly what he wanted us to be angry with. I think that he wanted us to recognize our own despair at our disability to truly change a society that stagnates in his own filth. And I loved it from beginning to end.
Danny wrote: "Craig wrote: "I agree that the message should anger you. That's the point. It should make you angry about yourself, especially if you're the kind of person who thinks the message is BS. The book is..."You give Palahniuk far too much credit. ;)
Its a book that supposed to make sheeple wake up. So either you wake up or you get made being told. So....
This hardly reads like a 2 star review. Furthermore, Palahnuik's message in the end is a refutation of the nihilism that Jack partakes in throughout most the book. As someone else said earlier in these comments, you're supposed to be upset by what's going on.
I agree. "Jack" was feeling crushed by the society and lifestyle he was in, and Tyler's methods seem to be the thing to deal with it... But ultimately it proved to be worse than living as a lifeless shell.
Wake up? All this book ACTUALLY does is preach (alphamale) violence in case you didn't notice. That may or may not be the wished-for authorial effect, unfortunately it *is* the effect. And that means it dumbs down people even more than they already are dumbed down.
Which is why Tyler's ideals and methods are well truly batshit insane. Readers were supposed to figure that out.
Since when does the majority of humankind "figure things out" the way they are supposed to? This book is exactly what ruzmari states, because that's the effect it has. I've lost count of the stupid, banal testosterone-fuelled inanities I'm forced to listen to the moment someone screams "the first rule of the Fight Club is?...". Usually some ode to unrestrained "true" masculinity sitting completely inside the US American male box.
Duh.
Simpletons take out of this book a alpha male violent credo. If we only attributed to fiction what simple minded people took from it, then we'd have a bunch of Dexter serial killers on out hand. Those who have more nuanced views of the world, like normal people, can clearly tell that this boom is not championing Durden' liberation nihilism.
When things get overheated (into memes and the like), lots of positive quality gets lost; for instance I love Red Dragon and The Silence of the Lamb very much, but I would avoid fans shouting about it. You're right about most people not getting things, though.
(I was responding to steelwhisper)
Am I supposed to consider books on the intent of the author? That would be truly nonsensical.And given the rest of Palahniuk's books I'm still absolutely not convinced your interpretation of what he wanted is more to the point than ruzmari's or mine.
I certainly don't think you should, we live in nobody's head but our own, after all.
Intent of the author is of some relevance so not completely nonsensical. Also, taking out of a book only it's sensational elements is a disservice to subtlety. The biggest reason a hyper masculine message was taken out of Fight Club is due the movie and not the novel. But regardless, it's clear what the point is. If man is beaten into a melancholic submission and existential malaise of meaningless, he's a possible powder keg. When we don't strive for true personal meaning, we may seek it in hedonism, lashing out against the world that we blame for our meaningless lives. Fight Club has a lot of adolescent angst underlying it, but that's kind of the point. These men were emotionally stunted and when people do that to themselves, they can latch onto just about anything for something that brings them to life and makes them feel purpose. Even unhealthy things. This happens to people all the time, joining cults, AA, living a life of addiction. Some are healthier than others. In the end I think the point of Fight Club is: start living a life of meaning before a Tyler Durden comes along with his form of false meaning that just amounts to hedonism. Jack and Durden are opposite ends of a spectrum and neither are healthy ways to exist.
Mike wrote: "Intent of the author is of some relevance so not completely nonsensical. Also, taking out of a book only it's sensational elements is a disservice to subtlety. The biggest reason a hyper masculin..."I agree with your comment. You explained it much better than me. :)
Mike wrote: "Intent of the author is of some relevance so not completely nonsensical. ..."I disagree there ;)
An author's intent may be of some value to the author, but his work gets judged by what the READERS take away from it. And in Palahniuk's and especially "The Fight Club's" case this is stereotypically the aggressive US-American masculinity ideals in the square.
And again, if I look--at all--at something like "author intent" I also look at an author's other books. And these do not give me the notion that Palahniuk wanted to do anything but what he actually achieved with "Fight Club". Pretty much the reverse of what you maintain he wanted. Nor are his books becoming less juvenile as he ages, on the contrary.
But if you see the Emperor in clothes there's nothing but state that to me he is naked, and that's just that ;)
Many people misinterpret pieces of work or they are frequently misunderstood. Durden is alluring, he's sexy, he feels like everything a purposeless person might want, that is the point. I agree there is a cult following for the film that reflects your disappointment with Fight Club as a book, but that doesn't change what the book is clearly about. If someone takes from Fight Club a manifesto and glorification of hyper masculine violence, they totally miss the point. You can find plenty of places online, philosophical essays, blogs, analysis that see Fight Club for what it is. You can hear from Chuck himself on the subject. You seem like a bright fellow, do you really think that this book is encouraging that we do the thing that Durden does? That was terrosistically chip away at the fabric of society with little consideration of the consequences of our actions? Come on, you can't be serious that you read this book and thought that Chuck P was saying "yes this is a good thing, yes do these things?" If someone read FC and wanted to be like Durden, they are suffering from the same sickness that Jack had in the book. They are empty vessels that will be vulnerable for being filled by anything to make them feel connected to life again. If anything this book is an indictment of the twisted and maladjusted masculinity that we have created in America. Men are more concerned with being "manly" than they are with living a life of meaning that has personal relevance. Don't boil down fiction to black and white through reductionist thinking.
Taken from the film: Brad Pitt gets visually fitter while Ed Norton gets thinner, and when "Jack" wanted to say no and revolt, that's when things really started to get uglier and he got beaten up by Tyler.
The mark of good literature - there are several contradictory interpretations of this book on this thread and people arguing passionately for their opinion - which means like me they thought about the book and cared about what it meant.Good review btw, even if I gave the book four stars rather than two.
I hope you realize Chuck Palahniuk is Gay (literally) no offense intended. To deny the stereotype of feminism homosexuals are in touch with is to deny what is evident. That being said, his views although incomplete in exposing the beauty of the world, are relevant and uplifting to modern society. You must get to the core of its meaning and see how his poetically put ideas are a way out of negativity. We are not special but this idea can be taken in a positive way when feeling we have horrible circumstances in life. That idea is one of Palahniuks in this book.
I don't think you are reviewing this book at all, you are giving your interpretation of the book which isn't the same thing. Especially lines 2-7 of your third paragraph in which you summarise the plot. I am not sure that this summary explains the plot very well at all, I'd go as far as to say it's slightly untrue. For instance the "bunch of white collar men" part. That's either an oversimplification or basically an assumption as the backgrounds of most of the men isn't discussed. I got the impression that the majority were quite the opposite, low paid service or blue collar workers. But if this were my review I would definitely point out that that was an assumption. You seem to have taken some liberties with 'summarising' the plot which is not fair to people who read the reviews here to find books they might like.
Spot on Christopher, his review was not a review of the book but a review of other people's poor interpretation of the book.
Which he mistook for being the correct meaning and interpretation of the book.
I get the "dick lit" remarks, really I do, but to be quite honest, when Fight Club came out it was surprising, unique, unusual. For years now, at least since the late 80's, there has been a resurgence in the feminist movement (which is fine), and a complete backlash against anything from a man that has any hyper masculine, or slightly misogynistic undertones to it. Fight Club, while reveling in both the hyper masculinity and misogyny of it's characters, was also provocative and thoughtful. Ripping open the underbelly of corporate and mainstream America, Palahniuk urges you to focus on the corporate greed, and unending consumerism. Basically what you have, and what you are eventually able to get, will never be enough. There is always a want for more. If you read this book strictly for the "fight scenes", you're missing out on a lot of highly intelligent commentary on what it's like to be part of America today. When it comes to the end, you know it's not really about fighting physically at all, but more the fight that goes on within.
Roxanne wrote: "I get the "dick lit" remarks, really I do, but to be quite honest, when Fight Club came out it was surprising, unique, unusual. For years now, at least since the late 80's, there has been a resurge..."Great comment.
You're obviously only reading the surface layer of the book in that case. Similar as someone above said, it is about 'rising up'. Nihilistic, but showing that there is more to life than materialism and doing what you dislike just because it's what society tells you to do. It's about becoming your own self. To class it as 'dick lit' may be true, but taking such a feminist stance in suggesting that that is a bad thing is completely wrong. Invisible Monsters works similarly for female gender stereotypes. Along with this, there are other underlying concepts in the book along with a kind of Marxist society where there is no leader - just a symbol (Tyler Durden) where no one strives for power, but instead fight for freedom and self actualisation that the 'symbol' embodies.
Your review of this book makes it really clear that you didn't understand it in the slightest. This book was, well all about being male. It dealt with so many issues about being a man and turning from a boy into a man that I would struggle to list them all here. Male attitudes, male relevancy, masculinity, sexual dimorphism, hereditary violence, male futulity, asolescence into adulthood, testosterone, patriarchal abandonment and so much more.This wasn't a book that any woman was really supposed to get. You really, really have to be a man to understand what this book is all about. The first time I read it I understood it completely, the book was talking about issues I had never even seeen mentioned in other books. It is an important work and your casual flippance of it as "guy crap" shows your disdain is more than likely for the masculinity of the book rather than its quality or content.
lol this review is pure gold. bravo
