{"id":4287,"date":"2017-12-05T13:57:09","date_gmt":"2017-12-05T21:57:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/?p=4287"},"modified":"2017-12-05T13:57:09","modified_gmt":"2017-12-05T21:57:09","slug":"los-angeles-review-of-books-david-sedaris-and-the-american-struggle-with-foreign-languages","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/?p=4287","title":{"rendered":"Los Angeles Review of Books: David Sedaris and the American struggle with foreign languages"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

\u201cTHE INEVITABLE finally happened,\u201d writes David Sedaris in his diary entry of April 6, 1999. \u201cMy French teacher faxed Andy at\u00a0Esquire<\/em>\u00a0saying\u00a0my article<\/a>has had the effect of a bomb at the Alliance Fran\u00e7aise.\u201d That piece, which became the title essay of Sedaris\u2019s 2000 collection\u00a0Me Talk Pretty One Day<\/em>, tells of the French classes he took at that cultural institution\u2019s Paris headquarters. It gives a starring role to his fearsome instructor, a fount of pronouncements translating to \u201cYou exhaust me with your foolishness and reward my efforts with nothing but pain\u201d and \u201cEvery day spent with you is like having a cesarean section.\u201d<\/p>\n

She even breaks the classroom\u2019s French-only rule in order to chastise Sedaris all the more harshly: \u201c\u2018I hate you,\u2019 she said to me one afternoon. Her English was flawless. \u2018I really, really hate you.\u2019 Call me sensitive, but I couldn\u2019t help taking it personally.\u201d While she does, on occasion, single Sedaris out for lavish praise \u2014 \u201cBravo,\u201d she once shouts, taking his hand and holding it up high, when he correctly answers a trick question about the\u00a0pass\u00e9 compos\u00e9<\/em>\u00a0\u2014 she also displays a penchant for hurling insults as well as pieces of chalk at her students, and she makes more than one declaration of hatred. \u201cI had used\u00a0falloir<\/em>\u00a0in the subjunctive rather than the\u00a0imparfait<\/em>,\u201d he reflects after enduring another, \u201cso I guess I deserved it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Traumatic though they may sound, Sedaris\u2019s learning experiences under this manic figure, first written down in his diary which in turn provided material for the\u00a0Esquire<\/em>\u00a0piece and others, fueled one of the bursts of popularity that has made him the best-known humorous essayist writing in English today. Still, as the class comes to its end, he confides in one entry that he wishes he\u2019d never published his account. \u201cI meant it at the time, but since then things have changed. She\u2019s still moody, but I think she\u2019s a good teacher. I can see that now, whereas I couldn\u2019t before.\u201d He regrets having \u201cfailed to mention her wit, and her skill as a teacher. That is what I have to apologize for, my laziness.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Read the whole thing at the Los Angeles Review of Books<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cTHE INEVITABLE finally happened,\u201d writes David Sedaris in his diary entry of April 6, 1999. \u201cMy French teacher faxed Andy at\u00a0Esquire\u00a0saying\u00a0my articlehas had the effect of a bomb at the Alliance Fran\u00e7aise.\u201d That piece, which became the title essay of Sedaris\u2019s 2000 collection\u00a0Me Talk Pretty One Day, tells of the French classes he took at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,72,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-language","category-los-angeles-review-of-books"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4287"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4287\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4289,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4287\/revisions\/4289"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.colinmarshall.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}