Crudo (novel)

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Crudo
First edition
AuthorOlivia Laing
CountryUnited Kingdom
LanguageEnglish
PublisherPicador (UK)
W. W. Norton & Company (US)

Crudo is a 2018 novel by Olivia Laing. The book, Laing's first novel, incorporates autobiographical elements and details from the life of American author Kathy Acker. The novel was well-received, winning the James Tait Black Memorial Prize.

Composition and writing

Laing originally did not intend to publish the book, saying she was "writing it for herself".[1] She has referred to the book as an "experiment",[2] and in order to "[...] smash the mold of the kind of book she might be expected to produce".[3] While writing the book, Laing followed two rules: that she had to write daily, and that she could not "[...] edit or reshape the material".[2] She wrote the book "in a frenzy" over a period of six weeks.[4] She included news events, mostly drawn from her Twitter feed, as they occurred during the days she was writing.[5]

Laing's inspiration for the book came while she vacationing in the Val d'Orcia region of Italy.[2] During the trip Laing read a biography of Kathy Acker by Chris Kraus and was intrigued by Acker's deliberate plagiarism and appropriation of the works of other authors, such as Charles Dickens and Miguel de Cervantes. Laing had previously read some of Acker's work.[6] Laing has referred to the novel's protagonist as a "[...] hybrid Frankenstein composite of me and Acker".[6] The book includes references to Acker's works, such as Blood and Guts in High School.[7]

Reception

Critical reception

Sally Rooney wrote in The Guardian "I don't think I'll ever forget the day I spent reading Crudo." She described it as "a beautiful, strange, intelligent novel."[8] Dwight Garner, in a review written for The New York Times, referred to the novel as "less persuasive" than Laing's non-fiction work.[9] Garner noted that Crudo is Laing's first novel, and that it seemed she was "[...] still feeling her way" into fiction.[9] In her review for The New Yorker, Alexandra Schwartz praised the book as a "funny, fervent" novel.[10]

Dilara O'Neil, writing for The Nation, compared Crudo unfavorably to Ben Lerner's novel 10:04.[11]

Honors

Laing won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for the novel.[12] A judge for the prize, Alex Lawrie, praised Crudo, saying it was "[...] a bold and reactive political novel that captures a raw slice of contemporary history with pace, charm, and wit".[12]

Rather than retain the £10,000 award for herself, she chose to split it with the authors shortlisted for the prize. Laing has said that choosing a single winner for an artistic prize can be "corrosive...part of a capitalist model that has no place in art".[13] She also reiterated a claim made in the novel that "[...] competition has no place in art".[12] The authors with whom Laing shared the prize were Will Eaves, Jessie Greengrass, and Nafissa Thompson-Spires.[12]

Crudo was featured as one of 2018's best novels in lists compiled by The New York Times '[14] and New Yorker[15]

References

  1. ^ Goh, Katie (5 July 2018). "Olivia Laing - Crudo - Interview - The Skinny". The Skinny. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  2. ^ a b c Dhanda, Sukhi (4 August 2020). "Our Sense of Time: An Interview with Olivia Laing -". 3:AM Magazine. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  3. ^ Zafiris, Alex (8 May 2020). "Mysterious Unfixable Elements: Olivia Laing Interviewed by Alex Zafiris - BOMB Magazine". Bomb Magazine. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  4. ^ Slone, Isabel (12 May 2020). "'I Don't Think the Artist Longs For the Emergency': An Interview with Olivia Laing". Hazlitt. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  5. ^ Wang, Mary (4 October 2018). "Olivia Laing: "It turned out to be an exercise in structure, in how to assemble objects in empty space."". Guernica. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  6. ^ a b Kraus, Chris (11 September 2018). "Becoming Kathy Acker: An Interview with Olivia Laing". The Paris Review. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  7. ^ Sarazen, Lauren (22 November 2018). "Los Angeles Review of Books". Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  8. ^ Rooney, Sally. "Best Summer Books of 2018". The Guardian.
  9. ^ a b Garner, Dwight (24 September 2018). "'Crudo' Is a Novel With a Real-Life Novelist in Thin Disguise". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  10. ^ "Olivia Laing's "Crudo" Is Made from the Raw Material of the Present". The New Yorker. 10 September 2018.
  11. ^ O’Neil, Dilara (3 December 2020). "Olivia Laing's Banal Avant-Garde". Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  12. ^ a b c d Flood, Alison (19 August 2019). "Olivia Laing splits James Tait Black prize win with fellow shortlistees". The Guardian. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  13. ^ Sheehan, Dan (19 August 2019). "Olivia Laing calls out Boris Johnson, splits £10,000 literary prize with fellow nominees". Literary Hub. Retrieved 16 July 2021.
  14. ^ "100 Notable Books of 2018". New York Times.
  15. ^ "More Books We Loved in 2018". New Yorker.
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