SPOILER ALERT
skip this post if you haven't yet read B O H and don't want
the story
spoiled
My first thoughts on this are that it's a straight
down-the-line
misogynist text. Why the hell would Berenice persist in a
relationship
with a shit like Figueras?
I don't know if misogyny is a theme maintained throughout
Willeford's
writing as this is the first I've read. I have a library copy
of the
omnibus, so I'll flick through one of the other two
stories---probably
Pick Up---to see how Willeford comes off.
As far as BOH goes though, the text doesn't really persuade
me with the
story of art-critic turned hoaxer. (Though it is a really
interesting
plot.)
I'm not really convinced by Figueras's actions---the only
plausible line
the plot can take after Figueras torches the studio is for
him to write
a speculative piece on *why* D---[name?] 'does a Hammett' and
stops
producing. The twist *ought to be* presenting the engineer of
the theft
with the blank canvas. If Figueras is a hot as he tells us he
is, the
blank canvas should allow him to go beyond his
'structuralism'---whatever that is meant to mean here---to
wax
poststructurally about D- producing the ultimate readerly
(painterly?)
text, the blank canvas.
FWIW, the low-point is surely that ludicrous line about not
allowing for
the thickness of Berenice's hair when striking the first blow
with the
tyre-lever.
Still, it's pulled me back on to the reading list.
ED
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