Sarah Gerard is clearly talented. To take a story about a drug-induced killing in a community of Bohemian misfits and turn it into a riveting read takes great skill. I’m ideologically Gerard’s opposite, yet I enjoyed reading Carrie Carolyn Coco enormously. She simply knows how to write.
Gerard is also a very good, generous person. Among the acquaintances she describes, she’s the only one with a real talent. Yet she so sweetly refers to the pretentious hacks in her circle as artists and treats their sad creative efforts with such gentleness that one can only admire the depths of her magnanimity. I’m not nearly as good of a person and I openly admit it. I made fun of the ethnobotanical literary critic because I know what literary criticism is and couldn’t contain my reaction to ethnobotanicist’s theorizing. Gerard, on the other hand, benevolently tolerates the freak show that surrounds her and treats its participants as if they were her equals.
If only someone guided her away from #BLMing and #MeTooting crap and towards Great Books (which she rubbishes as being racist and sexist) and valuable ideas, Gerard could grow into a serious artist.
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“Gerard is also a very good, generous person.”
Not sure if that’s actually a virtue… I’m reminded of the Agatha Christie novel where a very, good, kind and generous person… ends up murdering three people and is caught trying to add a fourth to the list….
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It’s extraordinary how she can take all these people seriously. Of course, part of it must be guilt. She’s white, from a wealthy family. Very liberal. The sense of guilt must be crushing.
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Gerard makes the character Carolyn Bush to full life on page. Unlike traditional true crime stories, Bush a dazzling young poet navigating NY city. The tragedy of her life robbed from humanity. The trial proves that courts and justice have totally divorced themselves from one another. Though it surely does not provoke throwing a molotov cocktail at the US legal system the reek of high corruption pisses me off.
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I provided a quote from the “dazzling poet” in question in an earlier post. Her – or anybody’s – violent death is a tragedy. It’s also a not very shocking conclusion to a disordered life conducted on the margins of society.
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poets … something similar to a famous artist who cut off his ear.
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