Book about myself..

Would I read a book about myself?

I’d like to say that if there were a book about me, I would have the courage to not read it, to maintain the mystery, serendipity, and beautiful imperfection of a life unscripted.

But that’s bullshit. If there were a book about my life, I’d camp outside the bookstore waiting for its release like it was the next iphone. I’d also probably cut to the end, which might set off a Being John Malkovich esque recursive loop of self-referentiality (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6Fuxkinhug). It’d be pretty weird to close analyze the character in that book. I dunno—I’m imagining every time I’m at a really important juncture in my life, or when I’m in an argument where someone alleges that I’m in the wrong, whipping out this book of my life as a source of ultimate authority. Aha. According to this life story, Andrew would actually never do that!

Incidentally, this prompt reminds me of an awesome hypothetical question from Chuck Klostermann’s otherwise unawesome book, Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs:

20. For whatever the reason, two unauthorized movies are made about your life. The first is an independently released documentary, primarily comprised of interviews with people who know you and bootleg footage from your actual life. Critics are describing the documentary as “brutally honest and relentlessly fair.” Meanwhile, Columbia Tri-Star has produced a big-budget biopic of your life, casting major Hollywood stars as you and all your acquaintances; though the movie is based on actual events, screenwriters have taken some liberties with the facts. Critics are split on the artistic merits of this fictionalized account, but audiences love it.

Which film would you be most interested in seeing?

As for the other prompt, whether anyone’s life could make an interesting story, again my instinct is to say one thing (yes, of course; everyone is special!) but to believe truthfully, no. There are people who are really fucking boring. Who don’t really do anything particularly compelling. Who never decide to do the difficult thing. Whose life story would read like watching cctv, or a never ending bad experimental film (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBOzOVLxbCE).

But the more I think about it, I’m inclined to say that everyone is interesting. Imagine someone for whom nothing happens—I mean, nothing, like solitary confinement nothing. Wouldn’t a life of insufferable boredom actually be interesting, from the right perspective. How could a soul deal with a life of such tedium; what sort of strong willed lies would someone have to tell themselves everyday to stave off that kind of killer boredom.

Didn’t Meursault from The Stranger say something to the effect of that he could have only lived for a day and have enough memory to live on forever?

Conversely, I believe that from the right perspective—or, rather, from the wrong narrative perspective—even the most exciting life can make a terrible story. I think of DF Wallace’s essay on Tracy Austin and larger meditation on athlete autobiography—how, according to Wallace, from the narrative self-perspective of a hyperfocused, completely unreflective athlete, even the tensest, most dramatic moments can be profoundly shallowly conceived experiences:

“The real, many-veiled answer to the question of just what goes through a great player’s mind as he stands at the center of hostile crowd noise and lines up the free throw that will decide the game might well be: nothing at all.”