"a decade in review" re Tao Lin, ages 16 - 26
2000 Reads ~7 Kurt Vonnegut books in succession. Graduates high school. Eats Wendy's Spicy Chicken Sandwich while taking bath in afternoon sunlight. Listens to Satanic Surfers, Strung Out, Choking Victim, Propagandhi on repeat.
2001 Enrolls at NYU. "Sleeps through" 9/11. Makes "controversial"/"insensitive" 9/11 comment in staircase to attractive girl in dorm who grins re comment. Walks around Greenwich Village, East Village at night feeling despair/loneliness listening to The Emo Diaries Vol. 1-4, "Don't Break Me" by Samiam, Mineral, Blacktop Cadence, The Weakerthans on repeat. Eats ramen noodles often. Reads "Reasons to Live" and "At The Gates of the Animal Kingdom" by Amy Hempel repeatedly.
2002 Enters relationship with NYU student. Writes Palahniuk-esque short-story set in office. Begins ~100,000-word novel. Seems to finally comprehend the word "abstract." Meets Carles. Reads White Noise, Nicholson Baker, Lorrie Moore.
2003 Relationship ends. Reads The Broom of the System, Why Did I Ever. Completes ~100,000-word novel. Seems to finally comprehend the word "categorically." Reads Jean Rhys. Moves to New Jersey. Reads Kafka's diaries. Begins Bed. Eats at Vietnamese restaurant alone in Jersey City. Writes whale poem. Feels "severely depressed"/"cripplingly lonely."
2004 Eats Chinese food alone in room on carpeted floor. Listens to Azure Ray, Jejune, "Lifted" by Bright Eyes on repeat. Feels "very alone." Reads Chilly Scenes of Winter, Joy Williams, Frederick Barthelme, Bobbie Ann Mason. Called "post-modern" derogatorily in Advanced Fiction. Completes Bed. Moves to Wall Street. Begins you are a little bit happier than i am.
2005 Begins blog entitled Reader of Depressing Books. Begins Eeeee Eee Eeee. Reads Richard Yates, Noah Cicero. ~25 editors reject Bed. Enjoys flax seeds on pasta. Reads Matthew Rohrer. Completes you are a little bit happier than i am.
2006 Completes Eeeee Eee Eeee. Begins Richard Yates. Eats nutritional yeast on okra. Begins cognitive-behavioral therapy. Moves to rural area of Pennsylvania. Reads Peter Singer, Kobo Abe, "Disturbing the Peace" by Richard Yates.
2007 Moves into "decrepit" room in Brooklyn. Reads Ben Lerner, biography of Maxwell Perkins, ~20 graphic novels. Completes cognitive-behavioral therapy. Writes essay re Cho Seung-Hui's killing rampage. Sees "Cache" with Brandon Scott Gorrell in Seattle. Reads James Purdy. Eats cupcakes from Baby Cakes. Writes essay for The Stranger linked by Gawker.
2008 Begins Shoplifting from American Apparel. Reads in Kansas. Receives $12k selling shares in 2nd novel. Quits job at Angelica Kitchen. Orders $800 mattress online. Cancels order next day. Listens to Modest Mouse, Line and a Dot, Rilo Kiley, The Stupid Stupid Henchmen on repeat. Completes Shoplifting from American Apparel. Starts Muumuu House.
2009 Blogs "from" Germany. Publishes sometimes my heart pushes my ribs, TBBC, during my nervous breakdown i want to have a biographer present via Muumuu House. Attempts to retroactively "go viral." Writes essay re good/bad in art. Drinks first green smoothie. Is interviewed by Michael Silveblatt. Reads Pan. Completes final edits re Richard Yates.
2001 Enrolls at NYU. "Sleeps through" 9/11. Makes "controversial"/"insensitive" 9/11 comment in staircase to attractive girl in dorm who grins re comment. Walks around Greenwich Village, East Village at night feeling despair/loneliness listening to The Emo Diaries Vol. 1-4, "Don't Break Me" by Samiam, Mineral, Blacktop Cadence, The Weakerthans on repeat. Eats ramen noodles often. Reads "Reasons to Live" and "At The Gates of the Animal Kingdom" by Amy Hempel repeatedly.
2002 Enters relationship with NYU student. Writes Palahniuk-esque short-story set in office. Begins ~100,000-word novel. Seems to finally comprehend the word "abstract." Meets Carles. Reads White Noise, Nicholson Baker, Lorrie Moore.
2003 Relationship ends. Reads The Broom of the System, Why Did I Ever. Completes ~100,000-word novel. Seems to finally comprehend the word "categorically." Reads Jean Rhys. Moves to New Jersey. Reads Kafka's diaries. Begins Bed. Eats at Vietnamese restaurant alone in Jersey City. Writes whale poem. Feels "severely depressed"/"cripplingly lonely."
2004 Eats Chinese food alone in room on carpeted floor. Listens to Azure Ray, Jejune, "Lifted" by Bright Eyes on repeat. Feels "very alone." Reads Chilly Scenes of Winter, Joy Williams, Frederick Barthelme, Bobbie Ann Mason. Called "post-modern" derogatorily in Advanced Fiction. Completes Bed. Moves to Wall Street. Begins you are a little bit happier than i am.
2005 Begins blog entitled Reader of Depressing Books. Begins Eeeee Eee Eeee. Reads Richard Yates, Noah Cicero. ~25 editors reject Bed. Enjoys flax seeds on pasta. Reads Matthew Rohrer. Completes you are a little bit happier than i am.
2006 Completes Eeeee Eee Eeee. Begins Richard Yates. Eats nutritional yeast on okra. Begins cognitive-behavioral therapy. Moves to rural area of Pennsylvania. Reads Peter Singer, Kobo Abe, "Disturbing the Peace" by Richard Yates.
2007 Moves into "decrepit" room in Brooklyn. Reads Ben Lerner, biography of Maxwell Perkins, ~20 graphic novels. Completes cognitive-behavioral therapy. Writes essay re Cho Seung-Hui's killing rampage. Sees "Cache" with Brandon Scott Gorrell in Seattle. Reads James Purdy. Eats cupcakes from Baby Cakes. Writes essay for The Stranger linked by Gawker.
2008 Begins Shoplifting from American Apparel. Reads in Kansas. Receives $12k selling shares in 2nd novel. Quits job at Angelica Kitchen. Orders $800 mattress online. Cancels order next day. Listens to Modest Mouse, Line and a Dot, Rilo Kiley, The Stupid Stupid Henchmen on repeat. Completes Shoplifting from American Apparel. Starts Muumuu House.
2009 Blogs "from" Germany. Publishes sometimes my heart pushes my ribs, TBBC, during my nervous breakdown i want to have a biographer present via Muumuu House. Attempts to retroactively "go viral." Writes essay re good/bad in art. Drinks first green smoothie. Is interviewed by Michael Silveblatt. Reads Pan. Completes final edits re Richard Yates.
49 Comments:
seems all there
an impressive decade
2000-2009: Unable to stop lying or distinguish reality from fiction. Despite accomplishments, remains self-obsessed pathetic mess.
2010: Drinks and iced coffee and changes his philosophy from the Utilitarian view: 'Greatest good for the greatest number of people' to something more rationally egoist, like 'I only know that which exists and that which I can prove. Therefore I can draw conclusions like consciousness is the only thing that I know and have, and the thing I use to sense the rest of the world. It is me and my life and without it there would be nothingness. That is what the evidence shows. Therefore I should protect it. I can make conclusions like 'I want this experience to be positive instead of negative. (I want to feel emotions like happiness and contentment rationally, not loneliness and depression.) Instead of giving control of your free will and consciousness to something external like religion or existentialism (I am a victim to the human condition). You realize that you are not at the whim of external factors, but in fact in control. Consciousness is to choose. Reality is reducing the infinite experience to manageable terms. You choose what to ignore and what to focus on (using logic and reason, filtering accordingly). If you choose to only focus on sadness, despair, loneliness, than that is your idea of what man (and what life) is and ought to be: a hopeless, pathetic existence, floating in an endless universe. The other choice would be to focus on the greatness of the human mind and that which it can achieve, and the beauty in life, in art, in human relationships, in emotions. Rationally, it would make sense to choose the latter, because in the context of your life, and the goal of 'a positive life experience,' the things you define as contributing to that positive life experience will 'good.' This is almost universally defined as 'happiness,' 'contentment,' or 'satisfaction,' regardless of your culture. Defining what makes you happy (or what makes a 'positive life experience') is a personal reflection, and rather subjective.
Happiness is rational. Self-Esteem is rational, especially for someone who has defined their own philosophy. If you put value in someone else's experience, then that is moral, and a valuable character trait, However if you do it at your own expense, you rank their conscious experience as more important as your own. How can you feel that another person's sense of the world and sensory experiences, which you do not think or feel, can take value over your own consciousness, the only thing you have to experience and feel the world? (Plus, wouldn't you be able to help a greater number of people if you yourself had self-esteem instead of self-hatred, and energy instead of lethargy?)
2011: Realizes that the events of the previous year showed no regard for consistency in tense and that it switched from 1st to 3rd person somewhere. Shit-talking ensued. Rational Happiness ensued.
What you said about sleeping through 9/11 was really funny
I wrote this as a response to your previous graph where you talked about suicide and loneliness, that was pretty funny
as a teenager im inspired by your romantic story
youve proved that adolesent infatuation can ripen and deepen into mature & profund love
its great that passion and fascination dont have to die with age
i know you & your loved one will spend many precious years to come alone together
cool
good job
slightly unnerved by our similarities in development. according to this i'm heading into "depression"
nice
lived in new jersey...
Bro. 'Carles' should be on your timeline.
Kafka's diaries are great
@Carles:
Don't expect a taoline of Time's life to include someone he knows personally.
Bearfish understands this. She's disposable and you are too. You'd better figure this out too if you know what's good for you.
@Carles,
One more thing, bro. Don't EVER wear a t-shirt that says 'I am Tao'
Know your place, little bro - ur the jr partner only
i like the taoline
i also like the giant
lorrie moose
rrr...
sweet
meaningful decade, tao. inspiring response by anon. wary w/r/t projecting into the future. think maybe we shouldn't do that. recently dreamt i was reading sfaa. remember seeing 'tao lin' on the cover. then i was walking my dog and his 'tail' fell off. we cried. anybody else have castration anxiety dreams involving the name 'tao lin'?
kim testani
@erik sweet
@shane sweet
@anonymous can you elaborate
@anonymous sweet
@anonymous sweet
@jonny sweet
@jordan sweet
@ames sweet
@bearfish sweet
@thomas sweet
@carles sorry bro, added you
@chris sweet
@anonymous damn
@anonymous damn
@marie sweet
@jessev sweet
@joe sweet
@ryan ray johnson
'merry christmas tao'
wonder if you are vegetarian in association with reading peter singer
i don't care for singer now but used to. now i don't like him
i am a vegan tho
don't believe anyone shld be used without their consent
ive read ben lerner quite a lot. some of his writing i like. sometimes i don't like it. i don't know. my friend likes it a lot
attn tao
how to sell was kind of lame
not sure why you would choose to promote it
I'd forgotten about those blog posts you did from Germany. They were good.
Pan is an incredible novel. Probably my favourite of Hamsun's. I saw a bust of Hamsun by Gustav Vigeland last weekend. His moustache looked like a rodent.
There's a piano missing from this chronology, but overall: good job.
@david thank you
@steve i probably first felt things about the effects of eating meat after listening to propagandhi or propagandhi-like bands in middle or high school
@abrupt i liked 'how to sell'
@giles sweet
@maximum thank you
that's cool man
maybe i should make a diagram like this
okay Tao, I'm pretty sure I wrote this somewhere on one of your previous posts but I can't find it soherewego.
My brother is older than you by one day and his name is Tao as well. Our last name is Luo, so it's the same amount of letters and begins with L.
his career path is very different from yours, he majored in computer science. But I still feel as though you two are "kinda twins", so I support you and your background.
coolio...that's all I really wanted to say. I'm purchasing your work soon, and !, you are an inspiration to me. the insecurities and self-doubt all add up to something somewhere!
alone
@masande
awww....
So, when did you go vegan?
damn, re a lot of things
re 'Pan'
Were u drunk when ordering the mattress?
In 2000 I also binge read Vonnegut. I read everything published up to that point. I think it was 15 books.
I am not writing this to say "look how much more I read than you" but as a warning. Don't ever do this. I felt sad that I had read them all and there was nothing left. I am trying to put spaces between author's books from now on.
awesome
the following are missing but are reported to part of your reading for the decade. would you be willing to 'date' them?
stephen dixon
thomas bernhard
walker percy
jonathan franzen
lydia davis
todd hasak-lowy
We think you are amazing.
unrelated
just finished 'shoplifting from american apparel'
ordering everything else
fantastic//thank you
"the following are missing but are reported to part of your reading for the decade. would you be willing to 'date' them?"
yes
"stephen dixon"
~3 books ~2005/6, ~2 books ~2007/8, ~2 books 2009
"thomas bernhard"
~2 books ~2006/7
"walker percy"
'the moviegoer' ~2005
"jonathan franzen"
~15 pages of 'the corrections' ~2007
"lydia davis"
'break it down' and 'almost no memory' ~2004, 'the end of the story' ~2005, 'varieties of disturbance' ~2008
"todd hasak-lowy"
'the task of this translator' and 'captives' ~2 months after they came out
"We think you are amazing."
sweet
[who all] are you
i clicked your website, seems complicated
i liked 'Cache'.
Mr. Lin, Have you seen the movie AFTERSCHOOL -- http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1224366/
????
If you enjoyed CACHE and your books, you may enjoy it.
i didn't like 'cache' that much
i liked 'the piano teacher'
It might be like THE PIANO TEACHER, as there is really awkward sexual momentum throughout the film.
You leave no mention of the publishing of your books.
hm.
i liked 'The Piano Teacher' more than i liked 'Cache', i think.
i liked not completely 'getting' 'Cache' and i wanted to watch it again and look for things, but then i didn't.
the white ribbon = very very good.
unsure
i think one before 1960
I, Seamus Goldshark, am a very large fan of your novellas etc (large both in stature and importance). I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate you on a decade well-spent fighting for Good, or some such thing. Huzzah!
nice music playlist.
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