Teaching Moments with Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club

NB: I’ve worked about 65 hours this week on only 20 hours of sleep. Much as I want to run the review that I have planned, I don’t trust my editing abilities in this state. Next week should be a return to normal Page of Reviews programming. For now, I offer a story about Scotch and Fight Club.

Date: Thursday June 28, 2012

Location: Oakwood Resort. Grand Bend, Ontario.

Time: 8:15am

After working a twelve hour night (can’t say that my summer job isn’t interesting that way) I needed a change of scenery. Armed with a breakfast Scotch and a copy of Fight Club on my Kindle, I sat down by the pool. My plan was to spend an hour reading before retreating to the vampire suitable darkness of my room.

Fifteen minutes passed before another resort guest, also armed with a breakfast cocktail, sat down in the pool chair two abreast of mine.

““Morning,” she said.

““Hello,” I answered.

I got to the end of the page before she asked, “What are you drinking?”

““Scotch.”

““Wow,” she said. “Having an early start to the day?”

I shifted my gaze to her glass as I raised an eyebrow.

““Yeah, me too,” she confessed.

I got through two more pages before she asked, “What are you reading?”

I am Adam’s inability to deal with people when he wants to be left alone.

““Fight Club.”

A moment or three past before she asked, “Wasn’t that a movie?”

I nodded.

““Isn’t it old?”

““About fifteen years old,” I answered, desperately wanting an end to conversation.

““So, why read an old book of an old movie?”

I won’t like, part of me wanted to commit a sin of utter rudeness and change seats. But some voice in my head suggested another plan.

““Did you see Fight Club?” I asked.

““When I was in high school,” she cautiously answered.

““Do you remember what it was about?”

““Terrorists and fighting and blowing up buildings.”

I nodded before asking, “What buildings were they blowing up?”

““Businesses, I think.”

““Tyler,” she raised an eyebrow as I said the character’s name. “Brad Pitt,” I corrected myself. “Wanted to blow up credit records so that everybody would have to start over on an even keel. He wanted to give people who work for a living a chance to be on par with the upper class.”

My companion seemed to think for a moment before tapping a finger on her chin.

““Sounds a lot like what the Occupy movement wants. That’s pretty amazing for fifteen years ago.”

And for the first time during the entire conversation, I offered her a genuine smile. “And that is why I’m reading the book,” I said.

““I think I want to read it now, too,” she said, raising her glass to mine.

It’s nice to know that when Chuck Palahniuk opens his royalty cheque next month, I’ll have made an indirect contribution.

Next week on the Page of Reviews: fantasy fights a war with science fiction, horror pulls a Kobayashi Maru, and I look at some web series that never were.