Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Selected Program Notes from the Retrospective Exhibition of Theresa Rosenberg Latimer, by Kenneth Schneyer

This story is a kind of catalog story.  I usually like these, they are an interesting way to convey a mood or culture and free an author from plot constraints.  Some of my favorite philosophers (Wittgenstein, Heraclitus) wrote this way too.  But not so much with Selected Program Notes from the Retrospective Exhibition of Theresa Rosenberg Latimer.

This particular catalog story is really a catalog--told as an exhibition catalog for an artist, as the title explains.  I found it kind of meandering and didn't get the connection between the entries.

Then I read the brief notes at the end.  Mild Spoiler Alert: This story is an elaborate joke.  Not being any particular expert at exhibition catalogs, I didn't get it.  Still didn't get it after being told what the joke was.  So read this and see if you get the joke, before or after explanation.  I find it hard to be generous to jokes I don't get, so two stars for me.

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