Friday, May 27, 2016

Geoff Dyer’s Creative Boredom

According to a book review in Time Magazine, the writer has two great gifts – he is easily bored in places everyone else finds exciting, and can cleverly convey his sense of insufferable boredom. Beijing’s Forbidden City? “Jeez, it went on forever, and every bit looked axactly the same as every other bit.” Time spent in a small Norwegian town promising a unique view of the northern lights? “It was like a lifetime of disappointment compressed into less than a week, which actually felt like it had lasted the best – in the sense of worst – part of a lifetime.” Polynesia? It “translates as ‘many islands,’ all of which you wish you were on instead of the one you actually are on.” Apparently, this goes on and on. So what would it take to get Mr. Dyer mildly excited? More dopamine binding in his mesolimbic pathway, I guess – though this could get in the way of his wry humor.