Losing Literature: Bret Easton Ellis

Bret Easton Ellis is the type of author who doesn't leave you guessing where he draws his inspiration from. Most of his stories are framed around aspects of his real life; the most glaring example of this being his 2005 novel, "Lunar Park," which follows the exploits of an up-and-coming author by the name of, well, Bret Easton Ellis.

The chronicling of Ellis' life through his fiction has been characteristic of his writing since his literary career began 25 years ago when his first novel, "Less Than Zero," was published in 1985 before he had even graduated from Bennington College in Vermont.

A snapshot of Ellis' native Los Angeles in the mid-'80s, "Less Than Zero" was an indictment of the decadence and waywardness of the author's generation. The novel focuses on its young, perpetually despondent protagonist, Clay, as he returns home to L.A. for his college's winter break. Upon arriving in L.A., Clay reconnects with his high school friends and soon discovers that while he was away, many of them have become severely twisted by a combination of drugs, apathy and heartless entitlement.

On June 15, Ellis and Knopf Publishers released the follow-up to "Less Than Zero," titled "Imperial Bedrooms." Though Ellis maintains that he had never intended to write the next installment in the story of Clay, life intervened and brought his hand to the page.

"It took a couple years, in fact, to even get to the point to start making notes for 'Imperial Bedrooms,'" Ellis said. "During that time I was finishing 'Lunar Park' and I was also just wandering around thinking about a lot of things that were going on in my life: I was moving back to Los Angeles, I was working more heavily in the movie industry, I was reading a lot of Raymond Chandler, I was wondering where Clay was, and all these things kind of form a cloud that you become enveloped in and then you begin to write notes."

The sequel follows Clay, now working as a screenwriter, as he travels to L.A. 25 years after the events of "Less Than Zero" to cast roles for an '80s-themed flick which he penned. The book is a collage of the old and new, with many familiar faces returning from the original novel who are either suffering the consequences of their youthful debauchery or still indulging in it. It is not only a reunion for the characters in Clay's world, but also of Ellis and a straightforward, clean writing style he had long since abandoned.

"Part of the attraction of this project when I was thinking about it was how attractive it would be to go back to that kind of minimalism, in that style I haven't written in, I don't know, 25 years," Ellis said. "And that was very fun and exciting and after writing some verbose novels that were very long and were narrated by people who talked a lot. It was exciting to go back to this stripped, bare minimalism and just try to achieve an effect or a mood with few words as possible. It almost becomes kind of a game."

As the plot progresses in "Imperial Bedrooms," the story becomes less of a cautionary tale of the dangers of reckless excess and, instead, takes a noirish turn as Clay becomes obsessed with a young actress named Rain Turner during his casting calls. His infatuation leads him down a path of haunting paranoia, strange text messages and gruesome acts of violence.

Just the same, the world has been a little different for Ellis since "Less Than Zero" first hit the shelves. One of the main differences Ellis has noticed over the years is the reduction of an environment that has been essential to his career: that of the literary book culture.

"It's just a very different culture now," he said. "My friends, if you talked to them five years ago, at least they'd have a book going next to the nightstand and I'd be able to talk about a literary novel. I don't have those discussions anymore, they diminished by 70 percent and they say, 'Oh, yeah, my computer, or 'I'm watching movies.' It's a different culture now in terms of that kind of book. ... You can argue that it's kind of a transitional period; we're still figuring out how to make money off of technology and selling books. Maybe down the road, it'll be a different world, but right now, it's kind of shaky and I think people are a little freaked out by the general public's lack of interest in book culture."

How will the withering literary culture affect the writers Ellis writes about? Maybe a character will drop a hint in his next story.

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Written by Express contributor Topher Forhecz
Photo by Jeff Burton