I did not get a $400.00 haircut during this campaign.

In fact, you likely did not get any haircut during this campaign, seeing that it was sefirah.

So you read cyberpunk, Robert?

Kishke:

What about Lag Ba'Omer? I had a chance for a $400.00 Beverly Hills haircut, but , y'know, since I'm a Republican, hence fiscally responsible, went with Jose, and my $25.00 special.

Read Cyberpunk, nah, not really. Hot babes in leather pants battling evil corporations in cyberspace. Read one you've read them all.

True, Lag B'Omer.

I never appreciated cyberpunk, although I'm thinking of giving it another try. But last summer I worked my way through a masterwork by a guy who I thought was a cyberpunk author, on the basis of one book, but I now see is much more. I'm referring to Neal Stephenson, and the book is the three-volume (and massive volumes they are) Baroque Cycle, and they cover the period in which Newton and Liebniz lived. What an incredible book! Smart, funny writing, backed up by really impressive knowledge of science, cryptography, coinage, and just about everything else under the sun. I then read his terrific Cryptonimicon. Some writer.

Kishke:

Yes, I've read the Stephenson trilogy and of course, he's on a much higher madrega than the flash-in-the-pan cyber-punk punks. He's a real novelist with plot and ideas.

He's a real novelist with plot and ideas.

But from reading his Snow Crash you'd never know it.

Cryptonomicon is interesting. It was written before the trilogy, but the characters are descendants of those in the trilogy, so there's some added flavor in reading it second.

Kishke:

Snow Crash, crash! Well, we all have to learn our craft don't we? I like Cryptonomicon. It's all over the map, but in the end, it does hang together—sort of.

All over the map is exactly right. As is the Baroque Cycle. Half the fun is keeping track of the dozens of characters. I read it over the first month or so of summer, and then, casting about for something else, came across a Chricton novel. It was so horrible (by comparison and otherwise) that I could not finish it. Chrichton has good ideas, but his characters are deader than a doorknob. (Did I once say this to you before? I'm either experiencing deja vu, or I'm repeating myself.)

Kishke:

It's almost depressing finishing a massive and complex trilogy like the Baroque cycle. You feel like you've really gone through something, accomplished something, worked hard at a labor and now—what? You cast about for something to replace the experience and end up with a Crichton and it's like, oh gosh, what does a guy have to do to get some brain food around here?

My answer in two words: Marcel Proust.

"my $25.00 special"

i hate to break it to you, but $25 is not a special for a men's haircut. this is what you get for leaving brooklyn. i sometimes pay $12, which is expensive here for a barber.

Robert, I agree with everything you wrote, except for this: "worked hard at a labor." Reading Baroque was pure enjoyment; else I could never have done it. Which is why I'm afraid to tackle Proust. But due to your influence I am considering Austen, which I read as a kid, and certainly did not appreciate properly then.

Ari:

When I tell my friends in the film industry that I get $25.oo haircuts they look at me like I'm a bug. Really, what kind of respectable person spends that kind of money in Beverly Hills. They are outraged that I pay so little. If I told them of a $12.00 haircut I'm pretty sure they'd go Braveheart on me—you know, draw and quarter me.

Kishke:

I should have been more precise about working hard. The trilogy are, ahem, heavy books to schlep around :)

Austen, absolutely. Shidduch making at its wildest.