America's got Guts!

Chuck Palahniuk’s short story “Guts” is relatable to British transgressive fiction in various ways, but there are a few notable elements that distinguish the piece as a work of American literature. The most interesting that I found is the variation of tone, where Palahniuk’s work emphasizes more of a freedom of language that is more personally provocative towards the reader. With lines like “Sticking stuff inside yourself. Sticking yourself inside stuff. A candle in your dick or your head in a noose, we knew it was going to be big trouble” the tone is less “magical”, and more confrontational than that of British transgression.

Reading the “Guts effect” Palahniuk reflected “My goal was just to write some new form of horror story, something based on the ordinary world. Without supernatural monster or magic.” He attaches levels of exaggerated honesty onto main ideas of value in American life (family, sex, money, success). He shows their temporality of glory that can be lost in a single moment. I think the fact this story was published in Playboy changes a lot of the type of auidence this story may be targeting. Like Money, Crash, or Nights at the Circus, this story is acessible to nearly anyone. It encapsulates the desire of sex in an animalistic and pornographic way as the UK novels do, only the “art of distance” does not seem employed here. The reader is put in a position where Palahniuk assumes his reader can find a commonality in the absurd choas and unsettling images in the story. Lines like “If I told you how it tasted, you would never, ever again eat calamari” would make anyone laugh for there is a certain “on-point” comparision in his choice of comparing the large intenstine to calamari.

It seems like there is an extra level of personal connection between Palahniuk and the reader. He plays on the idea of the true lack of freedom tied to the “American Dream” whether it be through commidity or self exploitation in pursuit of temporary desires. Examples of this can be seen in lines like “This is the baby they brought home from the hospital thirteen years ago. Here's the kid they hoped would snag a football scholarship and get an MBA. Who'd care for them in their old age. Here's all their hopes and dreams.”

Palahniuk juxaposes images that provoke an ambience of a surban atmosphere where the animalistic qualities of human condition are placed into the framework of wealth. He explores the relationship between money and inner desire and how the two correspond and humilate each other. This can be seen in events like the the narrators large intestine being ripped out by a ‘sucking’ pool clearner, the lamb skin condom as an intestine,the vitamin he sees inside of the cleaner that “saves his life”, or paying for a bladder operation with a college fund . I found his ideas

Operating on an American sense of realism as opposed to British trangression, the work itself possesses no limits to its madness, and contains almost a greater sense of literary freedom. After reading “The Guts effect” I got a clearer understanding that the free nature of this piece is the result of Palahniuk’s idea that books aren’t a “mass medium” like television, for they require a greater level of intimacy. He reflects, “A book is as private and consensual as sex. A book takes time and effort to consume - something that gives a reader every chance to walk away” and that society is seeking a more false form of intimacy. Perhaps, the pornographic nature of intimacy suggested by the piece. He thinks that it is from the present day’s disregard for reading, that books contain a boundaryless freedom.