Althouse: "I usually enjoy Ms. Weiner's contributions to the Times. But this is one of the most blatant 'humble-brags' ever."

June 11, 2016

"I usually enjoy Ms. Weiner's contributions to the Times. But this is one of the most blatant 'humble-brags' ever."

"Poor Jennifer: she went to Princeton, published a book (or books?) and writes for the NYT, but she's still learning to feel sufficiently good about herself. Blech!!!"

Top-rated comment at "The Snobs and Me," by Jennifer Weiner.

22 comments:

Curious George said...: She's knows she's still a fatass inside.; 6/11/16, 11:14 AM
mccullough said...: Most fiction is written by women and she's complaining that only 9% of Hollywood films last year were directed by women. What was the gross on those movies? Are men whining that most fiction is written by women? In a short essay about feeling insecure about writing popular literature, she can't stick to the topic.; 6/11/16, 11:34 AM
Michael K said...: I got about half way through, I guess. What is her problem ?; 6/11/16, 11:36 AM
Yancey Ward said...: Michael K,

I got halfway through it, too, and found myself agreeing with the commentator- it was nothing but humblebrag, so I stopped.; 6/11/16, 11:46 AM
Jaq said...: OK, I bravely took on the second paragraph after suffering through the first, but halfway through, like Sir Robin, I bravely ran away.

If her books are anything like her article, I am truly grateful to have never come across the open page of a single one of them.; 6/11/16, 11:48 AM
F said...: I got all the way through and wished I had not. That's ten minutes of my life I won't get back.; 6/11/16, 11:59 AM
Saint Croix said...: Althouse, I just wrote a beautiful funny comment and you are not to put it on the front page. I just want to make that clear.; 6/11/16, 12:12 PM
cubanbob said...: Yes she is a successful commercial writer and no she is not a writer of Great Books. Considering almost no writer of fiction is actually commercially successful nevermind a writer of a Great Book I fail to see what her angst was about.; 6/11/16, 12:50 PM
MayBee said...: Her books are the biggest bit of "Tell, not show" I've ever read. Or at least the one I read was. After that, I opted out. I read an interview she did, too, and it was the same way. She kept saying how she was so snarky (this was when snarky was new and we found it so funny) but in the whole interview, she wouldn't actually say anything snarky. It was like,
"I hate George W Bush. Oh! Sorry, I'm so snarky! It's just that I can't stand him. Sorry! Did I say that? I just can't keep my crazy mouth shut"; 6/11/16, 12:52 PM
Sebastian said...: Attending an Ivy is all about buying the right to humblebrag for the rest of your life.; 6/11/16, 1:07 PM
Brian McKim and/or Traci Skene said...: Philadelphia Inquirer readers had to suffer a weekly dose of Weiner back before she "blew up." She was mediocre then.; 6/11/16, 1:09 PM
Zach said...: I'll take another tack: the poor woman graduated from Princeton 25 years ago and she still hasn't seen anything except for the admissions brochure.

A commercially successful writer of beach novels is actually much better than average for any graduate of any English department, anywhere. But Princeton sells itself as being the cultural elite, so she docks herself for only writing beach novels. She's still responding to the brochure, even though she knows the actual people.

Similar story: a friend on Facebook confessed to being a little embarrassed by her place in life when one of our undergraduate professors visited the small college where she had recently been tenured. But in the current job market, a tenure track job in a place you would actually care to live in is a fantastic outcome! The professor himself was proud that a former student had done so well for herself.

Colleges sell snobbery, and it can mess with people's minds. I'm sure that Princeton employs a few professors whose talents would be wasted writing beach novels. But "Princeton Professor" is not even close to the expected outcome for "Princeton Student," and people shouldn't judge themselves by that standard.; 6/11/16, 1:15 PM
Thuglawlibrarian said...: That poor poor women...; 6/11/16, 1:17 PM
Eric said...: I read about four paragraphs and decided that, if this is how she writes, I'm just not interested.; 6/11/16, 1:55 PM
Earnest Prole said...: More “I, me & my” than an Obama speech. On the other hand she’s marketing the family business, and who can blame a girl for trying to make a living?; 6/11/16, 1:56 PM
gadfly said...: "How Donald Trump Bankrupted His Atlantic City Casinos . . . " is a much better story in the same isssue of the NY Times. Trump Trolls are hereby warned that Donald looks like an incompetent; 6/11/16, 2:43 PM
Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...: I got about half way through, I guess. What is her problem ?

She's privileged and self-absorbed enough to be a Republican politician. Just not self-important enough.

What's with the spaces before question marks? Why not give two spaces__? Or three___?; 6/11/16, 2:46 PM
Fred Drinkwater said...: Mr. Prole, I think you've hit on something. Obama's speeches and Weiner's text both have a certain hectoring, whiny, but vacuous tone. One could only have been seduced by O's "eloquence" by not actually listening closely to him. Weiner's article was not even a half-assed effort at covering her two main themes. (Reminds me of a Ron Swanson "saying": "Don't half-ass two things. Whole-ass one thing."); 6/11/16, 3:12 PM
Michael K said...: "Blogger gadfly said...
"How Donald Trump Bankrupted His Atlantic City Casinos . . . " is a much better story in the same isssue of the NY Times. Trump Trolls are hereby warned that Donald looks like an incompetent"

To lefties who could not do their own taxes.; 6/11/16, 4:16 PM
Chris N said...: It's like the Times is just a Weinermobile.; 6/11/16, 4:20 PM
Jaq said...: Trump Trolls are hereby warned that Donald looks like an incompetent

Well, were he running against a competent person, I can see how that might be a problem. Do you know of a competent person in this race gadfly?; 6/11/16, 6:30 PM
Ambrose said...: I saw the headline on the homepage and thought NYT was giving space again to Anthony Weiner.; 6/11/16, 11:36 PM