Absurd Fiction

I've recently become aware of what I think is a new style of writing, that I've dubbed "absurd fiction", for lack of knowing if the genre has already been named. The writing of Jeff Rowland, author of Wigu, is a good example, and really the only example of this style that I've yet read. People posting at his blog where he posts his writing, have mentioned another author with a similar style, Mark Leyner, but I have not read any of his work. Yet.

It's fiction, it's comedic, and it tends toward the absurd. It's deliberately breaking the rules of realism, believability, and credibility -- and it's very entertaining in the process! Another thing I find amusing about Rowland's writing is the illustrations -- illustrations that usually have little or even nothing to do with the story! In my humble opinion, this new style of writing could do for literature what the various abstract movements of the early to mid 20th century did for painting.





P.S. 6/2/04 I just read some Mark Leyner, "I Smell Esther Williams". To continue with my metaphor of abstract painting, Mark Leyner seems to be even a bit more abstract than Jeffrey Rowland. Leyner's style is more disjointed and not quite as amusing as Jeff's, imho. You have to pay close attention! The subject, setting, and characters continuously keep changing entirely, as if the story is either not quite sure what it wants to be, or the author is channel surfing in his head. You could miss an entire little story if you miss one sentence! That, by the way, is one thing that annoyed me about Franz Kafka too -- some of his stories were so short they were over before you had entirely focused your attention on them.

Leyner does more than break the rules of realism, believability, and credibility -- he stretches continuity of story line to the breaking point as well. At least in this one disjointed collection of tales. But having only read the one so far, I have to say tentatively, that if Jeff Rowland is like Rene Magritte, Mark Leyner is like Salvador Dali. I need to read this again. Maybe a third time too.





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