I

Little solace comes
to those who grieve
when thoughts keep drifting
as walls keep shifting
and this great blue world of ours
seems a house of leaves

moments before the wind.
                        

¹ The first time I had heard of House of Leaves, it was through an online friend that I had back when I was around 13 or so. I've always sort of been interested in ARGs, unreality type stuff, and my friends back then were no different. I don't know for sure, but I am fairly certain this friend probably discovered House of Leaves through EverymanHYBRID, one of those Youtube series/ARGs from 'back in the day' that had capitalized on the growing popularity of creepypasta, in this case mostly Slenderman.

Due to my living situation at the time, acquiring the book was not easy, but I was finally able to pick it up a few years later. Given my current enthusiasm, you might assume I devoured the book in one go, but you'd be wrong. It took me forever to get through it my first time through, but I have fond memories of puzzling over it throughout my sophomore year of high school, turning the book upside down and sideways, careful to make sure no one was looking over my shoulder during the raunchier parts, annotating my thoughts as I went. (The annotations were my friend's idea, and I thank him for that.)

When I finally finished it, my teenage self, having no concept of subtlety or moderation, was enthralled. This here was a book worth rereading. And I did. I read it a lot, each reread faster than the last². I finally had to get a second copy a few years back because my original copy was being held together by gaffer's tape and my tradition of writing a new layer of annotations into the margins meant that the book was quickly becoming more commentary than story.⁴

² "Knowledge is hot water on wool. It shrinks time and space."³

⁴ It may not surprise you to know that I related strongly to and very much enjoyed JXXXXX TXXXXX's character. His story of obsession to the point of insanity, his inherited familial bullshit, and his inclination towards the weird, the abandoned, and the kind of pretentious were all things I saw reflected in myself. It was a huge shock to see, years later, that many people absolutely despise his sections of the book and see them as a waste of time. I've even seen people recommend skipping his parts entirely.

Initially I wrote this off as a certain subsection of readers being prudish, but in later readings I took to reading the book through a more feminist lens, and I can definitely understand why a reader that is not already personally invested in the character would be put off by him, if not Danielewski's writing. I love the way that Pelafina haunts the narrative⁶, and I enjoy Karen as a character more and more after each reread. I love Thumper as a character and wish we saw more of her. That said, three of the primary female characters being a madwoman, a cheating model, and a stripper, while the rest of the women in the story act more or less as props to JXXXXX's narrative... It isn't a good look. I think we're supposed to view JXXXXX as a shitty, or at the very least deeply troubled person, but⁵ the outlook for the women depicted in the book is bleak regardless of who we're supposed to be rooting for.

⁶ As for what I think actually happened... That fluctuates, I think. Personally, I am of two minds most of the time. Maybe this whole thing is just some more bullshit that JXXXXX made up on the fly, or it's something that Pelafina herself came up with. Maybe this whole book is the result of a graphomanic, grieving mother. Maybe she doesn't even have a son. Either way, I don't think Zampano, as a character, exists. He's a character of convenience to support the existence of the rest of the plot⁷ and that's it.

⁷ I will probably be adding to this page more over time. I'd like to add a more academic layer on top of this, a la The Navidson Record/old man Z's side of the story. I appreciate House of Leaves as a commentary on academia as well, but I just don't presently have the brain power for that, sorry.