american sucker

I suspected I wouldn't like "American Sucker" by David Denby and it did give me a queasy sense of disgust. It's about his foray into the stock market in 2001 - the bubble and burst of tech stocks.

I think it's bad enough to have the stated goal of making a million dollars in a year in the stock market - that is as dumb as entering a casino with the same ambition. And then to write a book agonizing over every detail of the market going up or down - yuck. It's a major turn off. He's a great writer, the film critic for The New Yorker, and makes lots of highbrown allusions to Falstaff or Achilles or Aristotle. But it's still just gross to read his endless self justifications for putting his family's funds into fiber optics or biotech. It's because his wife is leaving him! It's because risk makes you alive! It's the American way! Etc.

The biggest irony is that he ends up selling a 7-room apt in Manhattan after losing to much in the stock market - this in 2001, such surely was the wisest decision he ever made.

I was interested in the hectic culture - he befriended star analysts and CEOs - including the ImClone guy who got Martha Stewart convicted of insider trading. And then he was shocked and saddened to learn they were hucksters and criminals. They were very charming anf threw great parties! Who would guess they shouldn't be believed as they peddled their "get rich quick" schemes?

Denby is horrified by the modest, self-sacrificing people who live on small means. He thinks they are depressing and pathetic and obsessed with money. It's not that "get rich quick" is a moral evil. He argues over and over that taking risks in capitalism and seizing opportunities is what made our country great. Right. It's just that "get rich quick" does not work. He spent over a year trying it and ended up out a million dollars. All those tacky people with budgets and canned food avoided that fate.

The book is a peek into the envious and greedy big city culture and it makes me very glad to be removed. One time in my life, I was dedicated to the dream of a being a NY journalist. A job at The New Yorker - who could imagine anything greater? But then I read this guy's gruesome narrative. He's so unhappy. I'm glad to be away from the high pressure flashy big city lifestyle.