Polaroids From the Dead by Douglas Coupland

As I pick up the book and watch the cover I know this is something which is done in true Coupland style. The design is always different, cut to stand out from the rest of the books in my shelf. And so is the content.

The book is actually (as often with Coupland) a collection of several short stories, loosely interacting. Some have earlier been published in magazines, some are true, other fiction. I don’t like them all, some are better than others, and some I reread missing the point again. Coupland has away to be really serious about everything. I’m thinking and pondering, and that’s what I like about this writer, making me ponder over simple, just everyday things. He gives it a complexity I didn’t see earlier.

The Polaroids are pictures of Frateful Dead concerts, Madonna and Curt Kobain. He tries to analyze the spirit of the late American century, and the icons of our world seems to be Marilyn Monroe, Curt Kobain, Madonna, and O.J. Simpson. I don’t always recognize myself. Perhaps I’m to far away from America to recognize myself in its culture. Perhaps I’m not really into reading any analyses of this century. Perhaps it’s the weather.