Matthew Yglesias » A Happy Marriage — Slightly More Brilliant, and Much More Highbrow Than 500 Days of Summer

Jul 14th, 2009 at 1:01 pm

A Happy Marriage — Slightly More Brilliant, and Much More Highbrow Than 500 Days of Summer

My dad suggests via email that his appearance in New York’s approval matrix “may be as cool as your Pop ever gets”:

Reproduced here is just the upper-right quadrant of the chart, containing things that are both “brilliant” and “highbrow.” As you can see A Happy Marriage is slightly more brilliant that 500 Days of Summer (the preview looked pretty awesome) and way more highbrow. So go buy it!

Comments
26

26 Responses to “A Happy Marriage — Slightly More Brilliant, and Much More Highbrow Than 500 Days of Summer”

right Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
Congrats to your pop. Also, The Hurt Locker was pretty awesome.
DTM Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:16 pm
I dunno–how’s the soundtrack?
Anon Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:21 pm
The Hurt Locker was fantastic and should be getting more press on the television. The NYT had an article on the director but I really haven’t seen much. It’s a great movie that I think is getting overlooked and will certainly have you thinking.
SEK Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:22 pm
Dude, your dad wrote Fearless, which wasn’t just one of the best novels of the ’90s, but is a book without which there wouldn’t be Lost. Lindelof and Abrams credited your pop for the angstiness of the first (and still best) season. I think we can safely say that your father’s been cool for quite some time now. (That said, that’s got to be an awful read for you, inasmuch as the better it is, the more painful it’ll be. So congratulations to your father, and condolences to you on his success.)
grumblefish Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:26 pm
As you can see A Happy Marriage is slightly more brilliant that 500 Days of Summer (the preview looked pretty awesome) and way more highbrow.

Yeah, maybe we could…if the axes were labeled!!!
Halfdan Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:27 pm
I dunno. Will it make me cry? If so, I will buy it but not read it.

Also Hem is not a “folk band.”
Connor Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
Agreed about ‘Fearless.’ What a beautiful (tragically underrated) film.
tim otte Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
Is this a political/social blog or a nepotistic commercial whore site?
Duvall Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:45 pm
Is this a political/social blog or a nepotistic commercial whore site?

It’s obviously both, as well as an NBA blog and a Megan McArdle/Dave Weigel fetish site. Try to keep up.
rea Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:58 pm
Is this a political/social blog or a nepotistic commercial whore site?

Evidently it’s a haven for bitter, nasty, despicable old trolls, willing to respond to a post discussing a book about the death of the bloggers’s mother with a reference to “nepotistic commerical whore”
poptarts Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:58 pm
Zooey Deschanel rocks.

I think we can safely say that your father’s been cool for quite some time now.

And he wrote Death and the Maiden which was prescient about the torture issue. Happy to see the book’s getting buzz.
Brent Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 1:59 pm
So go buy it!

I had no idea Matt hated his father. He’s giving his book the Heads In The Sand sales kiss of death.
Helter Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
Matt, you’ve got to learn to promote things. Why don’t you tell your readers something about the book that might intrigue them before suggesting they go out and buy it?
bob mcmanus Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
Shit, I looked up your grandfathers’s op-ed letters to the Times and petitions, and even beyond the precocious novel, your father has been waycool since 1970. (Got arrested for a NY college sit-in, IIRC)

I like stuff that makes me cry. A lot.
drjimcooper Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
Well known trust-fund scumbag Matthew Yglesias shamelessly tries to increase the size of his scummy trust fund by shamelessly promoting his father’s novel. What a scumbag /Petey
skidaddle Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 5:44 pm
And he wrote Death and the Maiden which was prescient about the torture issue.

Not really… Though he worked on the film vesion, surely any plaudits for prescience should be given to the Chilean playwright, Ariel Dorfman.
tim Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Hey rea:

Please explain to me why anyone who doesn’t kiss a blogger’s ass in comments is dismissed by said bloggers sychophants as a “troll.” I read this blog every day and often enjoy Matt’s writing, so fuck you.

Thanks.

Pushing your daddy’s books as part of your blogging is commercial whoring; I don’t care what the damn book is about.
JH Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 7:01 pm
Pushing your daddy’s books as part of your blogging is commercial whoring; I don’t care what the damn book is about.

All the lonely people. Where do they all come from?
JC Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 7:03 pm
Tim,

The trolling is “not caring what the book is about”. In this case, though I understand the principle you espouse, yu lack heart and ‘empathy’, to use the current overused word – in your criticism.

So yeah, you don’t give a sh*t, I get that. I’m saying, given the whole context, you should.
KingstonC Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 7:03 pm
Tim:

Saying “I’m proud of my father and all the attention he is getting” =/= commercial whoring
linus Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 7:29 pm
Normally I don’t read books without pictures but that one looks good.
Richard Steven Hack Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 9:25 pm
And absolutely nothing on that chart is of interest to me except the bit about True Blood.
Mike Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 11:23 pm
What in the Flying F–k is the Old Map App doing way up there further up and further right than Mr. Yglesias’ novel? Just on the face of it, thqt doesn’t seem possibly more brilliant or highbrow than a good book of any kind.
Mike Says:
July 14th, 2009 at 11:28 pm
P.S. – If your dad writes a well-received book, and you have a blog, and the former doesn’t appear on the latter, not only are you doing blogging wrong, you’re a bad son on top of that!
Joe Says:
July 15th, 2009 at 11:53 am
My issue with Tim’s comments are simple – I don’t think they’re kind. Tim, would you say the same thing to Matt’s face?
On a related note, I bought the book and have just started it and like it – vivid language and good dialogue.
W. Kiernan Says:
July 15th, 2009 at 1:05 pm
Ha, so looking at old yellow maps is “highbrow,” eh? Us red-necked land surveyors have got to think that’s pretty cool.