I like Everand (previously known as Scribd), for throwing at me books I wouldn’t read otherwise. I’m terribly bad at searching for something to read, however, in Everand I found a tool that constantly pushes me out of my comfort zone.
This time, it wasn’t much different. Everand knows how I love to read Bukowski and Miller, and without further ado, suggested reading Marco Vassi. It promised me a good time.
To be honest, with Everand it is 50/50. You never can be sure whether you’re going to actually like something or not. Sometimes it can be a gold like The Fuck-Up, and sometimes it is a disappointment like Pity the Reader (advertised to me like a novel written by Kurt Vonnegut, when in fact it wasn’t… low-blow). This time, it was Marco Vassi.
Marco Vassi is regarded, at least per Wikipedia and descriptions of his novels, as a key person of pornographic literature as a genre. And believe me, I am not a stranger to pornographic literature. In fact, I have written even a couple of entries about short stories I read (all suggested by Everand, by the way) and probably I’ll re-upload them again as my notes. He is put on the same pedestal as Henry Miller, and as I read this, I knew I have to give it a go.
I started with The Gentle Degenerates. The novel which is according to Wikipedia is his first novel. I think there’s no better way than to start an acquaintance with an author than to read one of his first novels. Usually these are still rough on the edges and lack some style. And believe me, I know what I’m talking about, I’m already feeling sort of shame for publishing Death Department, but I find it quite humbling. A subtle reminder that we all start somewhere and judgement is not a very good thing when it comes to art. Leave it to the critics, that’s all they have.
Anyway, I read it. And what can I say? I’ll be brief – it is not Henry Miller. Not even close. But it was a very silly idea to compare someone to Henry Miller. You just can’t be compared to the certified badass of the written word. And I think whoever compared Marco Vassi to Miller didn’t do him a favor, because when you expect the familiar cosmic flow of sentences entwined into the stream of consciousness with reflections on work, life, death, sex, love, and everything in between, but instead get pornographic journeys of a hippie-dude with flawed logic (sorry, I don’t buy into all this flower child cosmic crap), you’re going to leave disappointed.
In Gentle Degenerates, there was nothing that resembled Miller. You see, Miller’s novels very often described as pornographic, while in reality sex is far from the key element, it is rather an instrument in the orchestra, an additional tool in the master’s pallet. That’s why, after beating four chapters of Vassi’s novel, I realized my mistake, made a pause, took a deep breath, and read it as a more sophisticated pornography. And it actually worked.
We’re following the journeys of the nameless bisexual hero in New York, who’s moving through the spiderweb of personal insecurities, strange philosophy, random sexual encounters, and brief attempts to understand himself and others. In particular, he tries to get the grasp of his relations with Regina, the woman who is important to him, but he can’t say why exactly. All he has to do is wander and wonder while navigating the murky streets of the Big Apple.
I won’t go into plot details just in case someone wants to read it, but what I can say is that basically every chapter of the novel follows the same structure. Hero has some revelation or memory about Regina or event that somehow connected and then proceeds to spend the rest of the chapter banging his partner or partners. Describing the process from start to finish in all the exquisite details, sometimes reaching levels of fetish and perversion, I found a bit detached from the reality and sent straight to the world of the blue movies.
Now, I understand that this is Vassi’s first novel. That’s why I wrote before a paragraph about the first novel being the most interesting and very often the most disappointing. It disappointed me when I expected the level of Henry Miller, but on its own I guess it’s alright. Nothing mind-blowing. I wasn’t this surprised with sexual encounters or level of perversion, but let’s be honest here for a moment, it’s hard to beat Burrows and his Wild Boys.
All in all, I wasn’t that impressed, yet it doesn’t mean that this is going to be the end of my acquaintance with Vassi. No, in fact, after this novel I’m thinking of actually reading his autobiography, The Stoned Apocalypse. I think it might be interesting. And also a couple of his later novels. I’m curious to see how his style evolved while not really expect anything too deep out of this experience.