Morose Memoirs and Blander Biographies.

A friend of mine and I were recently discussing a biography he was reading about Warren Buffet and how horrifically boring his life and more importantly the book about his life happened to be. Yes, he is a brilliant man, yes he is rich beyond belief, no he is not that interesting. The last biography I read was The First American: The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin by H.W. Brands. Franklin, much like Buffet, has become more of a legend than a human being but Brands illustrated the humanity in Franklin. His struggle to remain faithful to his wife, his inability to maintain very close friendships, and his quest to improve the life of the new America and her inhabitants. A biography that explains the life of a mythological creature much like Franklin and or his contemporary George Washington is understandable. Their lives were so much different than the lives of us, not only because of their extreme successes but also because of our inability to comprehend what life must have been like in their era. A writer trying to make a quick buck writing a biography on a figure that is merely a sparkle in public eye for fifteen minutes is deplorable. The reason there are biographies written for Sarah Palin, Paris Hilton, Jay Leno et al. is mind numbing.

This leads me to the subject of memoirs and their current popularity in the publishing world. The Los Angeles Diaries by James Brown was the last memoir I read (with the exception of Jack Kerouac's On the Road which is breathtakingly brilliant). James Brown's life was marred with death, suicides, homelessness, addiction, and depravity. He had not lived a life of normalcy and had been surrounded by a cast of extremely interesting characters. The book was well written, sharp and honest. I have no problem with memoirs of astonishing human accomplishment being published: overcoming obstacles, beating cancer, etc. but I am so sick of fiction being sold as fact (e.g. the Tiny Little Pieces guy) and mundane being sold as magnificent.

Happy Day After Super Bowl
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