A Memoir of Hampshire College in the Twilight of the '80s
October 29, 2009
Following his student career at America's last great hippie school, Hampshire College, in the waning days of the 1980s, author Rushfield (On Spec), west coast editor of online media gossip magazine Gawker (gawker.com), wanders through a land of optional majors and obligatory drug use that's only fitfully engaging. None of Rushfield's characters come off as particularly likeable: not the humorless administrators, the painfully politically-correct students, or the rebellious, pot-addled group of friends ("the Supreme Dicks") with whom Rushfield runs. Even Rushfield himself annoys, making decisions, like the one to skip most classes his first semester, without much explanation or self-examination. Rushfield makes the autobiographer's mistake of being too easy on himself and too rushed with his narrative, leaving readers with questions like why, exactly, he was so ostracized from Hampshire society. Though Rushfield hits some perfect notes in the details of college life-stepping into his first dorm, "the soon to be familiar smell of moss, stale beer, and laundry detergent introduced itself"-those without a connection to Hampshire probably won't find this memoir of much interest.
October 1, 2009
Vanity Fair contributing editor Rushfield (On Spec: A Novel of Young Hollywood, 2000) recounts his years at Hampshire College in Amherst, Mass., in the late 1980s.
The author, a Los Angeles native, attended the liberal-arts college from 1986 to 1991, and discovered early on that he only rarely had to attend classes or complete assignments. The college's alternative-education program—loosely based around evaluations rather than distribution requirements or GPAs—attracted a variety of students from a wide range of counterculture groups, from hacky-sacking hippies to punks to postmodernists to political activists. Rushfield became a part of a much-reviled clique, the Supreme Dicks, who were almost cultish in their dogma of vegetarianism, celibacy, atonal music-making and a studied lack of interest in most other activities. The author's college life consisted mainly of hanging out with his friends, listening to hip music, pursuing relationships with noncommittal college girls and faking his way through classes on Miami Vice and Michel Foucault. Rushfield's circle of friends, and the politically correct, alternate-reality atmosphere of Hampshire, is great fodder for a hilarious memoir. But while Rushfield the novelist has shown a keen talent for satire, Rushfield the memoirist is much more cautious with his barbs. He gets all the band names and pop-culture references right, but offers little perspective on the shallowness of his younger self and his acquaintances. The book's biggest problem, however, is simply a lack of interesting material. Rushfield references Bret Easton Ellis's 1985 novel Less Than Zero early on, and this memoir shares that novel's tendency toward static scenes and vapid, aimless dialogue. In one overlong section, several pages detail a relatively uneventful trip to a Denny's restaurant. Rushfield's nostalgia for his school days often overwhelms his ability to tell a compelling story.
A dull memoir of college life in the'80s.
(COPYRIGHT (2009) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)