Auster’s art of the appalling cliché
Paul Auster has acquired the reputation of being a deep-thought writer
Fiction: 4 3 2 1, By Paul Auster, Faber & Faber, €20
"First thought, best thought,” wrote Jack Kerouac, offering perennial encouragement to the sort of writer who never has any thoughts at all. Since anyone’s first thought about anything is likely to be a cliché, the business of literature should be to look for the last thought – or, at the very least, to declare war on the stock response.
Paul Auster ...