Steve Erickson
Author of Zeroville
About the Author
Steve Erickson teaches writing at the California Institute of the Arts and is also the film critic for Los Angeles magazine.
Image credit: Photo by Steve Rhodes
Series
Works by Steve Erickson
Full-Blooded Fantasy 1 copy
Black Clock 11 — Editor — 1 copy
Black Clock #1 & #6 1 copy
Black Clock 5 1 copy
Black Clock 6 1 copy
Black Clock 7 1 copy
Black Clock 2 1 copy
Black Clock 8 1 copy
Black Clock 3 1 copy
Black Clock 13 1 copy
Associated Works
The Vintage Book of Amnesia: An Anthology of Writing on the Subject of Memory Loss (2000) — Contributor — 217 copies
Pictures Showing What Happens on Each Page of Thomas Pynchon's Novel Gravity's Rainbow (2006) — Introduction — 188 copies
The Rose & the Briar: Death, Love and Liberty in the American Ballad (2005) — Contributor — 159 copies
Bomb 20, Summer 1987 — interview — 1 copy
Years Between Stations: The Dream of America in Steve Erickson — Novel Excerpts — 1 copy
Rolling Stone Magazine #724/725, December 28 1995-January 11 1996 — Contributor — 1 copy
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Legal name
- Erickson, Stephen Michael
- Birthdate
- 1950-04-20
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- USA
- Birthplace
- Los Angeles, California, USA
- Places of residence
- Los Angeles, California, USA (birthplace)
Topanga Canyon, California, USA - Education
- University of California, Los Angeles (BA|Film|1972)
University of California, Los Angeles (MA|Journalism|1973) - Occupations
- film critic
professor
novelist
essayist - Awards and honors
- Guggenheim Fellowship (2007)
Grantee, National Endowment for the Arts (1987)
Members
Discussions
Days Between Stations in The Clocks Have All Stopped (November 2016)
Why The Clocks Have All Stopped in The Clocks Have All Stopped (June 2014)
Rubicon Beach in The Clocks Have All Stopped (April 2012)
These Dreams of You in The Clocks Have All Stopped (March 2012)
Writers on Steve Erickson in The Clocks Have All Stopped (March 2012)
meat and meaning in The Clocks Have All Stopped (March 2012)
Reviews
Zeroville is an almost dreamlike meander through Hollywood... the neighbourhood, the business, the history, and the fantasy. Vikar, a sometimes violent, always film-obsessed, perhaps autistic young man with tattoos of Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift emblazoned on his shaved head is our guide.
We follow his journey beginning on the day that he arrives in LA in 1969 amid the background of hippies and surfers and the Manson murders through his becoming part of the studio system over the next decade and a half and watching him and his contemporaries navigate the turbulent years of Hollywood studios when everything was changing quickly.
This book is a veritable feast for any serious cinephile. It is overflowing with film references, Hollywood history, and thinly veiled characters. I absolutely love the movies but I don't consider myself anywhere near an expert and I enjoyed all the references and had fun figuring out who was who and what was what. I imagine that my many film savant friends would be in heaven with that part of it.
While the novel follows a standard timeline through the years, Erickson manages to make the sum of the parts feel diaphanous and perpetual much like the philosophy of Vikar in that "all the scenes of a movie are really happening at the same time. No scene really leads to the next, all scenes lead to each other. . . . 'Continuity' is one of the myths of film."
It wasn't my favourite Erickson novel but it still had that 'bit darker, bit deeper' quality which I can count on him for.… (more)
We follow his journey beginning on the day that he arrives in LA in 1969 amid the background of hippies and surfers and the Manson murders through his becoming part of the studio system over the next decade and a half and watching him and his contemporaries navigate the turbulent years of Hollywood studios when everything was changing quickly.
This book is a veritable feast for any serious cinephile. It is overflowing with film references, Hollywood history, and thinly veiled characters. I absolutely love the movies but I don't consider myself anywhere near an expert and I enjoyed all the references and had fun figuring out who was who and what was what. I imagine that my many film savant friends would be in heaven with that part of it.
While the novel follows a standard timeline through the years, Erickson manages to make the sum of the parts feel diaphanous and perpetual much like the philosophy of Vikar in that "all the scenes of a movie are really happening at the same time. No scene really leads to the next, all scenes lead to each other. . . . 'Continuity' is one of the myths of film."
It wasn't my favourite Erickson novel but it still had that 'bit darker, bit deeper' quality which I can count on him for.… (more)
Stunning. Having just re-read this a decade on from the first time, I was blown away once again by the visceral reactions that I had to Erickson's prose. His writing is beautiful and sublime and thought-provoking in the very same moments that he is describing horrors and tragedies.
The novel is an intricate and tremendously woven story for which I think the reader must be prepared to be open to. The storytelling is beautiful and there are full pages which I could read over and over for their elegance. There's no reason not to enjoy this novel on its surface... But try to walk into this novel without expectations and allow it to wash over you.… (more)
The novel is an intricate and tremendously woven story for which I think the reader must be prepared to be open to. The storytelling is beautiful and there are full pages which I could read over and over for their elegance. There's no reason not to enjoy this novel on its surface... But try to walk into this novel without expectations and allow it to wash over you.… (more)
Some guy wakes up nine years later and he's a completely different person? I can't.
Lists
Awards
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Statistics
- Works
- 37
- Also by
- 26
- Members
- 2,814
- Popularity
- #9,126
- Rating
- 4.1
- Reviews
- 64
- ISBNs
- 99
- Languages
- 8
- Favorited
- 24
It says something that one of the blurbs on this book is FROM Pynchon, rather than a comparison to his work. This is the real thing. Hilariously, there's also a terrible film adaptation of Zeroville starring James Franco which destroys the impeccable tone in the novel. Luckily it BOMBED.