Tuesday, Mar 19, 2013 9:12 PM UTC

Literature meets television in Slaughterhouse 90210

The popular Tumblr celebrates its four-year anniversary this week SLIDE SHOW

By Prachi Gupta

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Topics: slideshow, slaughterhouse 90210, Tumblr, blog, literature, Television, Pop Culture, Entertainment News

“Even among men lacking all distinction he inevitably stood out as a man lacking more distinction than all the rest, and people who met him were always impressed by how unimpressive he was.” ― Joseph Heller, "Catch-22" (Credit: Slaughterhouse 90210)

If you’re a) a literature nerd and b) a pop culture junkie and haven’t yet discovered Slaughterhouse 90210, go check it out right now. It’s a Tumblr founded in 2008 by Maris Kreizman, editorial director of digital content at Barnes and Noble, that, as its name suggests, pairs poignant passages from literature with popular moments on TV — and the result is hilarious.

Kreizman told Salon via email:

“Slaughterhouse 90210 is a celebration of books and TV and they ways they intersect, blending high and low culture to create something entirely new. I’ve been an avid reader all my life, and I love TV too–I don’t think the two have to be mutually exclusive. I love discovering new writers and raving about their books, and if pairing their quotes with photos from Mad Men or Girls or Jersey Shore exposes these authors to new audiences, all the better.”

Slaughterhouse 90210 just surpassed 100,000 followers. Of the growth, Kreizman says, “[Tumblr is] the right place for a visually based blog to really thrive, and it’s helped me find a community of book and TV junkies who want to follow and turn my posts into a bigger conversation. None of what I post is in my own words, but I think the point of view — the criticism, the sense of humor — is very much my own.”

Literature meets television in Slaughterhouse 90210

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"Talent is everything. If you’ve got talent, nothing else matters. You can screw up your personal life something terrible. So what. If you’ve got talent, it’s there in reserve. Anybody who has talent they know they have it and that’s it. It’s what makes you what you are. It tells you you’re you. Talent is everything; sanity is nothing.” ― Don DeLillo, "Americana"/"30 Rock" Slaughterhouse 90210
“We love each other, that’s true whatever it means, but we aren’t good at it; for some it’s a talent, for others only an addiction.” ― Margaret Atwood, "Dancing Girls"/"Mad Men" Slaughterhouse 90210
“”If they invent a car that runs on stupid jokes, you could go far.” — Haruki Murakami, "Sputnik Sweetheart"/ 85th Annual Academy Awards Slaughterhouse 90210
“I wondered if I would spend the rest of my life inventing complicated ways to depress myself.” ― Miranda July, "No One Belongs Here More Than You"/"Louie" Slaughterhouse 90210
“It is one of the blessings of old friends that you can afford to be stupid with them.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Journals"/70th Golden Globe Awards Slaughterhouse 90210
“You understood that there was no better thing in the world than to be kissed in the way she was kissing you, that this was without argument the single most important justification for being alive.” ― Paul Auster, "Invisible"/ "Downtown Abbey" Slaughterhouse 90210
“It is easy to say how we love new friends, and what we think of them, but words can never trace out all the fibers that knit us to the old.” —George Eliot/ "Freaks and Geeks" Slaughterhouse 90210
“Sherman made the terrible discovery that men make about their fathers sooner or later… that the man before him was not an aging father but a boy, a boy much like himself, a boy who grew up and had a child of his own and, as best he could, out of a sense of duty and, perhaps love, adopted a role called Being a Father so that his child would have something mythical and infinitely important: a Protector, who would keep a lid on all the chaotic and catastrophic possibilities of life.” ― Tom Wolfe, "The Bonfire of the Vanities"/"Arrested Development" Slaughterhouse 90210
“I always had a fantasy of meeting a girl… who was as serious as I was.” —Sheila Heti, "How Should a Person Be?"/"Daria" Slaughterhouse 90210
“Even among men lacking all distinction he inevitably stood out as a man lacking more distinction than all the rest, and people who met him were always impressed by how unimpressive he was.” ― Joseph Heller, "Catch-22"/"Parks and Recreation" Slaughterhouse 90210
“Never was an age more sentimental, more devoid of real feeling, more exaggerated in false feeling, than our own.” — D.H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley’s Lover Slaughterhouse 90210
“‘I’m a monster,’ Buster bellowed, and his parents did nothing to dissuade him of this belief.” —Kevin Wilson, "The Family Fang"/"Arrested Development" Slaughterhouse 90210
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Image and caption credit: Slaughterhouse 90210

Prachi Gupta is an Assistant News Editor for Salon, focusing on pop culture. Follow her on Twitter at @prachigu or email her at pgupta@salon.com. More Prachi Gupta.

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