Last week, I argued for the relevance of books. This week, we begin to construct our very own ultimate college student book collection!
I'm going to start in familiar territory with a couple of my favorite books by my favorite author. Let's break it down into Twitterverse-like pieces…
Author: Bret Easton Ellis
Titles: "Less Than Zero" (1998) and "The Rules of Attraction" (1998)
Number of Pages: 208 and 288
Years Published: 1985 and 1987
Movie Versions: Awful and awesome
Bret Easton Ellis was born and raised in Los Angeles, shooting to literary stardom at a young age. His books are dark, satirical and controversial for their violent and graphic exploits. Not surprisingly, considering his relative proximity to Hollywood, several of his works have been made into movies. Ellis himself attests that "Rules of Attraction" (2002) is a close portrayal of his work. However, he also admits that "Less Than Zero" (1987) is a loose interpretation, ultimately telling a different story with the same character names.
I urge you to first check out the books and turn to the movies only as a counterpart. Much of the lyricism of the words, the ambiguity in the stories and the contemplative sections are lost in the film versions.
There are so many reasons to include Ellis' two novels in our collection. Firstly, he wrote "Less Than Zero" when he was in college! Rumor has it he assembled an assortment of shorts from his creative writing class into the novel itself. It was published when he was only 21. Can you imagine? That guy next to you in English 0013 comes out with a book on the pieces he work-shopped. These books are literally written by an '80s version of us.
Secondly, these books are about college and its students. In "Less Than Zero," we are placed into the mind of Clay, a freshman returning home during winter break. Not only is there a dichotomy between his schooling on the East Coast and his home on the West, but there is also a clash between his high school friends and the life he now knows.
This feeling of unknowing resonated with me in my freshmen year, and I'm sure you can empathize as well. How do you take care of the people you've grown up with when you're gone more than half of the year? How do you fight the natural push to grow apart? Can you really ever shake these friends, when it seems you've known them more intimately than the boarders at university?
The same coming-of-age plot is in The Rules of Attraction, which follows three characters engaging in the enthralling but dangerous hook-up culture. Ellis captures the excess of youth in scenes rampant with sex, drug use, and binge drinking during parties with killer names like Dress to Get Screwed or End of the World. Someone needs to throw these parties in Hillsides.
Lastly, both these books are poignant, showing us the world of ‘80s college students, which still feels familiar today. In some ways, these stories are perhaps too over-the-top, with enough cocaine to be mistaken as piles of snow and with less-than-sympathetic characters. But at the core of these novels are heartbreaking stories of loneliness and the college-age plight of defining who you are.
With vacant, underdeveloped parents, unrequited love and unreliable friends, "Less Than Zero" and "The Rules of Attraction" offer real and sincere young adult characters. We can relate to the plight of characters who feel alone without ever admitting it. At the same time, we also can turn a critical eye toward our own lives, seeing that maybe we are lucky we never had infinite possibilities and zero responsibilities.
