Charlie Brooker
Monday February 26, 2007
The Guardian:
Abridged Version: You can read the whole article here
You know how sometimes you develop an obsession with a writer's work, and decide to seek out their entire oeuvre and inhale their every word, even if you don't really know what an "oeuvre" is or what it looks like? Well, I do that for masochistic reasons. I actively enjoy reading people I can't stand. When they write something particularly horrid, a wave of nausea surges through me and my pulse quickens. I am hooked on it, like a base jumper compelled to leap off chimney stacks for the adrenaline rush. Consider it a sickness.
Previous obsessions have included Liz Jones of the London Evening Standard (specialist subjects: new age spa treatments and marital despair), and the Barefoot Doctor, who used to write for the Observer.
The latter took over my life for several months. Everything he said incensed me. He gushed a wild river of bullshit, which I swam through open-mouthed, savouring the taste. I even bought one of his books - a "guide to urban survival"; an incredible how-to manual apparently designed to help shallow, cosseted airheads become even more self-obsessed, justifying their unhinged narcissism as spiritual development.
It outlined concepts such as "people-surfing" - which seemed to involve deliberately developing superficial relationships for personal gain - and "visualisation". If you wanted a new laptop, he said, you should picture yourself throwing a magic lasso around it, and before long it would be yours in real life (assuming you walked into a shop and bought it at some point).
And now I have a new obsession, this time with a blogger. Not just any old blogger, mind - this one's a showbiz journalist with a celebrity girlfriend. He is called Joe Mott and he writes for the Daily Star. His blog, archived at dailystar.co.uk/blog , is the single most dazzling body of work I have encountered in years. I urge you to read it yourself. It heaves with demented beauty.
At the top of the page squats a photo of our hero, grinning like a man who has just found £10,000 up his arse, beside the legend "Joe Mott's HOT". The word "HOT" appears to be made of gold. Over this, a little textual strap informs us that Joe Mott's HOT is "AWARD-WINNING". Sadly it is not clear what sort of award it was. Perhaps he entered a competition to see who could devise the most infuriating byline imaginable. If so, he deserved to win.
The byline on its own is enough to trigger my coveted puke-surge, but beneath it, thrillingly, Mott has actually written several hundred words about his incredible life. Within seconds he is describing a rowdy night out with some "fellow journos" and bragging about getting a Lotus Europa ("it's small, fast and arousing"). Slightly annoying, but this is Mott Lite. Scroll further down and you strike gold.
Mott recounts his night at the Baftas. He starts by ticking off "charmless man" Daniel Craig, who "had less charisma than the spotty youth who took my ticket on the way in ... come on son, you're James Bond ... you could have larged it at the parties afterwards ... sort it out."
Previous obsessions have included Liz Jones of the London Evening Standard (specialist subjects: new age spa treatments and marital despair), and the Barefoot Doctor, who used to write for the Observer.
The latter took over my life for several months. Everything he said incensed me. He gushed a wild river of bullshit, which I swam through open-mouthed, savouring the taste. I even bought one of his books - a "guide to urban survival"; an incredible how-to manual apparently designed to help shallow, cosseted airheads become even more self-obsessed, justifying their unhinged narcissism as spiritual development.
It outlined concepts such as "people-surfing" - which seemed to involve deliberately developing superficial relationships for personal gain - and "visualisation". If you wanted a new laptop, he said, you should picture yourself throwing a magic lasso around it, and before long it would be yours in real life (assuming you walked into a shop and bought it at some point).
And now I have a new obsession, this time with a blogger. Not just any old blogger, mind - this one's a showbiz journalist with a celebrity girlfriend. He is called Joe Mott and he writes for the Daily Star. His blog, archived at dailystar.co.uk/blog , is the single most dazzling body of work I have encountered in years. I urge you to read it yourself. It heaves with demented beauty.
At the top of the page squats a photo of our hero, grinning like a man who has just found £10,000 up his arse, beside the legend "Joe Mott's HOT". The word "HOT" appears to be made of gold. Over this, a little textual strap informs us that Joe Mott's HOT is "AWARD-WINNING". Sadly it is not clear what sort of award it was. Perhaps he entered a competition to see who could devise the most infuriating byline imaginable. If so, he deserved to win.
The byline on its own is enough to trigger my coveted puke-surge, but beneath it, thrillingly, Mott has actually written several hundred words about his incredible life. Within seconds he is describing a rowdy night out with some "fellow journos" and bragging about getting a Lotus Europa ("it's small, fast and arousing"). Slightly annoying, but this is Mott Lite. Scroll further down and you strike gold.
Mott recounts his night at the Baftas. He starts by ticking off "charmless man" Daniel Craig, who "had less charisma than the spotty youth who took my ticket on the way in ... come on son, you're James Bond ... you could have larged it at the parties afterwards ... sort it out."
This, and other meaty Brooker archived gems(?) can be found at the Guradian Unlimited
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