In Which Your Guide To Fine Realist Literature Is Tao Lin

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Tao Lin Guide to K-Mart Realism

by Tao Lin

“K-Mart Realism” is a term a New York Times journalist or I think probably Tom Wolfe made up to group a lot of writers together in a shit-talking way. I think the main people in “K-Mart Realism” are Raymond Carver, Ann Beattie, Joy Williams, Frederick Barthelme, Mary Robison, Bobbie Ann Mason. I think Larry Brown isn’t really included since he was perceived as poor and so had real problems. He was also a fireman which means he contributed to society, I think, which I think disqualifies him from being a “K-Mart Realist,” and he wrote about war sometimes I think, which also disqualifies Barry Hannah and some other people. I would not include Amy Hempel, Diane Williams, Sam Lipsyte, or most of the people who had taken some instruction, or something, from Gordon Lish (more below) as “K-Mart Realism” people because to me their writing does not have the same tone. Amy Hempel is often called a “minimalist” though.

lipsyte and ben marcus

“K-Mart Realism” has also been called “minimalism,” “dirty realism,” and something with diet coke in the term, I cannot remember. “K-Mart Realism” has been shit-talked by Tom Wolfe, Madison Smartt Bell (he said “less is less”), Frederick Busch, and other people. Raymond Carver was friends with Don DeLillo who is probably almost the opposite of a “K-Mart Realist” excluding non-realism things. Don DeLillo has dialogue that is like “K-Mart Realism” dialogue I think sometimes. I think Don DeLillo was friends with Raymond Carver or something because he was friends with Gordon Lish, who edited Raymond Carver and also published many “K-Mart Realism” writers in Esquire.

kendra malone and tao

“K-Mart Realism” was at its “height” maybe in the mid to late-80’s. Frederick Barthelme had 20-30 stories published in the New Yorker, Mary Robison also had many stories in The New Yorker, and Gordon Lish was publishing other people’s books and stories as an editor at Knopf and Esquire around then. I wrote a blog post about “K-Mart Realism” in 2005, it received no commentary.

The funniest and most detached and existential “K-Mart Realism” person to me is Joy Williams I think. They are all funny and capable of controlling themselves from using dialogue tags not “said,” sarcasm (or just describing something without judgment), and a sense of hopelessness beyond what is acceptable in the mainstream today, I believe, I just looked at the list of names. I believe that none of those people are religious. Frederick Barthelme has stated that he enjoys reading Jean Rhys and Jane Bowles. I think the people who wrote similar things to the “K-Mart Realism” people, but earlier, are James Purdy (“Color of Darkness”), Jean Rhys, Jane Bowles, Ernest Hemingway (“The Sun Also Rises” and some short stories), and Richard Yates (his later stories).

I didn’t do research for this article, some things might be wrong. To me only Ann Beattie’s first three or four books were “K-Mart Realism-like.” I like “K-Mart Realism.” In the memoir “Double Down” (about losing two hundred thousand dollars or so at casinos) by Frederick Barthelme and Steven Barthelme they said they did not think of themselves as “writers” or even “professors” (they have both been teaching for over 20 years, Frederick Barthelme is the director of the MFA creative writing program at University of Southern Mississippi), which is something that seems true to some extent to all “K-Mart Realism” people based on me reading their writing and thinking about them. I think my writing is most influenced by “K-Mart Realism” though also it has been influenced by “Tea Towel Fiction” (someone called Lorrie Moore that, I think) and Matthew Rohrer.

Tao Lin is a writer living in Brooklyn. This is his first appearance in these pages. His blog is here. He has written more about Joy Williams here.

K-MART REALISM READING LIST

K-MART MUSIC PLAYLIST

"Everybody Nose (remix)" - N.E.R.D., Kanye, Lupe Fiasco (mp3)

"Number One (Yayo dub mix)" - Pharrell & Kanye (mp3)

"American Boy (Passport dub mix)" - Kanye West & Estelle (mp3)

BUY THE BOOK

cognitive-behavioral therapy:

tao interviews noah cicero

interview at bookslut

interview

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reviews:

here

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here

from the book:

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joy williams

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