what are 'hipster' books?

bulgakov isnt a . author hes a 'cool nerd' author which is p different

zamyatin is probably closer to being a . author

i think this is totally backwards

really? idk i feel like ppl itt arent making a distinction btw like kinda 'alt' av club reading 'pop cult omnivores' who care a lot abt top ten lists and 'quality' and who ime wld be the main consumers of like eggers and bulgakov and 'say anything' and like actual 'hipsters' who are in part defining themselves against those ppl

Stevie, your list reminds me that you told me that CHRONIC CITY was full of references to the CHRONIC TOWN ep, and when I read it I couldn't find a single one.

Maybe I was reading the REM-free edition?

hipsters should read rebel inc. and city lights and new directions and payback press and nyrb pub imo

confederacy of dunces is like the Pabst Blue Ribbon of books

― brrr-icane aye-rene (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, August 28, 2011 6:10 PM (40 minutes ago) Bookmark

irl loling ty

zvookster otm tho

like if we are discussing the hipster subcategory 'literary hipster' rather than just 'what books does a hispters have'

really? idk i feel like ppl itt arent making a distinction btw like kinda 'alt' av club reading 'pop cult omnivores' who care a lot abt top ten lists and 'quality' and who ime wld be the main consumers of like eggers and bulgakov and 'say anything' and like actual 'hipsters' who are in part defining themselves against those ppl

right - one of the big aspects 'hipster' (at least the ilx use of the term, which isn't necessarily universal) is 'into obscure stuff'. if you took 100 'hipsters', looked at their book/record/whatever collection and made a list of the things they had in common, your end result would be the least 'hipster' list possible. no matter what's on the list, it's 'things people agree on' and (our use of the word) hipster is someone reactionary towards things people agree on.

idk i feel like ppl itt arent making a distinction btw like kinda 'alt' av club reading 'pop cult omnivores' who care a lot abt top ten lists and 'quality' and who ime wld be the main consumers of like eggers and bulgakov and 'say anything' and like actual 'hipsters' who are in part defining themselves against those ppl

― Lamp, Sunday, August 28, 2011 7:40 PM (10 minutes ago) Bookmark

i think the cultural phenomenon 'HIPSTERS' only exists bc of this confusion. without the mass of footsoldiers no-one would have heard of hipsters. im sure tru hipsters define themselves against the others but that's always the way with these things. except that by now og hipsters are too old to be worrying abt this shit, or so youd think?

what's the difference between a "hipster" and an "alt"?

don't think there really is a concept of og hipsters cause

a. by definition nobody can self-identify as a hipster

b. more than that I think nobody really 'is one' in the same way that you could have been a hippie or punk rocker or whatever - it makes more sense as an adjective than a noun.

c. the whole thing is sorta a slow shift starting w/ 80s/90s era attitudes and trends and you can't really draw a line as to when this started. I guess you could arguably use the term to describe someone who was acting like a hipster back before the concept existed.

lol how did this turn into this again

btw, since like 2006 "hipster" has been a vague catch-all that now includes even neckbearded Muppet-shirt-wearing AV/Club commenter saddos, thus making the convo even harder to have

yeah pinefox is sitting back rubbing his hands together i imagine

by definition nobody can self-identify as a hipster

because no one would or because if you claim to be then really you ain't one?

xpost. whiney i don't know, i feel like the conversation can happen but it just involves establishing a taxonomy of 'hipster' first and then allotting books to each entry in the taxonomy. which is what we're doing, i mean, it's not curing cancer or anything

both xp

www.youtube.com/watch?v=pWa0dZMHYeE

establishing a taxonomy of 'hipster' first and then allotting books to each entry in the taxonomy.

http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172219146l/150790.jpg

(read this in the store at 14, which probably explains a lot)

lol how did this turn into this again

― *steens furiHOOSly* (BIG HOOS aka the steendriver), Sunday, August 28, 2011 12:11 PM (6 minutes ago)

truth

genuine attempt to define hipster?

http://nplusonemag.com/pamphlet-3/

hipster book

or at least

hipster pamphlet

the whole 'define a hipster' game is kind of a moot issue b/c, let's face it, we all generally know one when we see one, but any theory anybody puts up is gonna be poked full of holes by one of the next five posters or whiney, whoever comes first.

btw, since like 2006 "hipster" has been a vague catch-all that now includes even neckbearded Muppet-shirt-wearing AV/Club commenter saddos, thus making the convo even harder to have

― brrr-icane aye-rene (Whiney G. Weingarten), Sunday, August 28, 2011 12:14 PM (5 minutes ago)

yeah, isn't the concept of the "hipster spectrum" or the "hipster continuum" what spawned hipster puppies?

otm

its something you literally can't define on something like a message board because it always means something different based on your own place in the world and the ways you self-identify

I read the n+1 thing and it's like 20% awesome insight hidden inside 80% twaddle

like i can propose some tiered system like:

1. people who are more concerned with and knowledgeable about what is cool than i am = hipsters
2. me
3. people who are less concerned with and less knowledgeable about what is cool than i am = maybe hipsters?
4. people who are even less concerned and less knowledgeable about what is cool than the category above = normals
5. my mom

but it's totally subjective

post something abt books or self-ban imo

the fact that you can't get one universal definition doesn't mean that it's useless to talk about the various uses of the word! it's an interesting chameleon word and its existence says something* about our time and place in the world.

*not so positive

anyway, confederacy of dunces. i think we solved this one.

Sarahel, your top 3 categories all appear to be hipsters.

so i like a lot of these books and like comparing to don delillo to radiohead is fucked up

there should be a law

It is quite interesting to think that the original take on this thread was 2003, which seems or is ages ago, and in the n+1 discussion apparently belongs to an earlier era.

So the people posting in 2003 might by default be considered to have some kind of intuitive knowledge that we in 2011 don't.

I like DeLillo like everyone does, but he and Radiohead both 'became more experimental and abstract as we entered the anxious 2000s'?

all right, have at this one:

hipster is a tendency of (mostly) white kids with (mostly) college educations in their (mostly) 20s who identify (mostly) with a few narrow social trends including (but neither exclusively nor limited to) 'indie' and faux-indie and experimental/electronic music, DIY-craftiness and pastiche art, 'dirtbag style' and retro pop-cultural aesthetics and artistic reappropriation, the whole local-organic-sustainable food matrix, have a high degree of internet, videogame, and telephone savvy, and stay up late to go dancing, see live music, or sing karaoke. there are ideas-germs-'memes'-fads that support/challenge/coincide with this lifestyle, and many of them are represented in a particular band of literature: this literature is not intended to span the spectrum of hipster-dom (which, by the way, is a dumb idea), but represent the 'average' taste of an 'average' hipster –– and represent no actual person.

defining hipsters is like playing that dinner party game where you see if any person is different from the host in more than three categories out of 'religion' 'level of education' 'racial/ethnic identity' 'income bracket'

oh i forgot 'sexuality' and 'political party'

So, Vonnegut, Pynchon and DFW.

sounds like a swell party!

don't disagree with your definition.

Nah, comparing Pynchon and Vonnegut to bands that have only been around less than a decade isn't really apt

So, Vonnegut, Pynchon and DFW.

― brrr-icane aye-rene (Whiney G. Weingarten),

I'd argue against Pynchon on the ground that a lot fewer people read him than own him, but maybe I'm being defensive b/c he's the only one on the list I really like? As I said upthread I'd add 'Confederacy of Dunces/Master and Margherita/Perks of Being a Wallflower to the list, but Vonnegut and DFW would be good inclusions too.

Vonnegut = Merle Haggard
Pynchon = Zappa

Nah, comparing Pynchon and Vonnegut to bands that have only been around less than a decade isn't really apt

― sarahel, Sunday, August 28, 2011 3:40 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Fine, they're like Gang Of Four and R Stevie Moore.

I'd argue against Pynchon on the ground that a lot fewer people read him than own him

this is about "hipsters" right? Does actually reading the book matter so much as owning it?

^ probably true

I think when it comes to understanding Hipsters ca. 2011, I think me, sarahel, Lamp and MFB are like professors with tenure

well it is technically your career

I can't imagine that's a point of pride, Whiney.

Tbh its low level sense of accomplishment on the level of "returning all your Netflix envelopes," "getting the last coffee before they close," and "only having to wipe once"

outstanding post ^

maybe a more fruitful discussion would be how are books successfully marketed to hipsters, or what the 'hipster' looks for in a book, or trends in hipster lit ... i dunno. Like "Shoplifting from American Apparel" reminded me of "Generation X" in some ways, and i feel like it functions similarly.