CONTRA KEILLOR

posted by James Reel

    In Slate last week, Sam Anderson tried to figure out the appeal of Garrison Keillor:

He has come to represent a crucial schism in the national taste—the Great Continental Divide between sarcasm and earnestness, snark and purity, the corrupt and the wholesome. The mere sound of Keillor's voice—a breathy baritone that seems precision-engineered to narrate a documentary about glaciers—is enough to set off warfare between the generations.

    Anderson, if I’m reading him correctly, ultimately comes down in favor of Keillor. Not me. About 20 years ago, I managed to enjoy his Prairie Home Companion for exactly four weeks before I got fed up with it. Keillor strikes me as a clumsy humorist, for reasons you can hear in his attempts to sing: He has a poor sense of pitch and pacing.
    Keillor’s voice is much more pleasant than the nasal whine of fellow Minnesotan Bob Dylan, but if I’m going to listen to singing that’s flat when it isn’t simply monotonous, I’ll choose Leonard Cohen, if for no other reason than Cohen conveys a sense of irony that Keillor can’t manage. Not only can Keillor not manage to hoist himself up onto the proper melodic line (and no, he can’t get away with the excuse that he’s singing harmony, particularly not in solos), but he’s consistently behind the beat to an extent that has nothing to do with expressive rubato. He’s just late.
    Similarly, too much of his humor is flat and poorly paced. I’m not even talking about his “News from Lake Wobegon” monologues. Just listen to his smaller-scale stories, and especially his parodies of commercials. The setup takes way too long; it’s a lot of treading water before he finally dives to the bottom of the lake and plucks up whatever rusty prize with which he’ll ultimately surface. Then, when the comic payoff finally arrives, Keillor can’t let go of the routine; he drags it on and on.
    My problem with Garrison Keillor is not his subject matter, boring Midwesterners. I wouldn’t think you could make boring people the fodder for much more than a movie the length of Napoleon Dynamite, but Keillor has managed to spin a 30-year radio career out of boredom and blandness. It’s a tremendous challenge, and I congratulate Keillor on his effort and perseverence. If only, after three decades, he had better mastered the basic craft of humor.