The Game

Best-selling book The Game was written by writer and the (self-titled) greatest Pick-Up Artist in the world, Neil Strauss. The Game charts the author's rise as he delved into the sub-community of Internet-based seducers and Lotharios facing up to his own fears and anxieties about interacting with women- even if only to ask directions on the street- to bedding adult film stars and Hollywood celebrities.

The Game featured the most prominent Pick-Up Artists and Seducers from across the globe and though not intended to be interpreted as a 'how to' guide to picking up women it still managed to capture acclaim by featuring on the New York Times best sellers list during September and October 2005 and was the best selling book on Amazon.com in a short space of time after its release. Others making guest appearances of note include socialite Paris Hilton and pop star Britney Spears- who Strauss actually claims to have exchanged telephone numbers with during an interview for then employers Rollingstone magazine.

Sub-plots and adjacent story lines are integral to The Game with the author chronicling his pursuit of a military-style sleep regime and overt references to pop culture such as the alignment of the plot to the film Fight Club- incidentally, a famous Pick-Up Artist takes the pseudonym Tyler Durden in an apparent homage to the film's main character.

Publication of The Game was wrought with harsh criticism from many diverse interest groups. Members of the seduction community at the heart of the book became increasingly anxious that their sub-community would have the glare of the mainstream shone upon it highlighting their practices leaving them open to inspection by the very audience they wished to keep their activities hidden from. Some went so far as to suggest that Strauss' intentions were geared towards and influenced by the financial rewards of the book's publication as well as the opportunity to further his own writing career.

Criticism was also leveled from feminists who claimed that The Game was written with undertones of misogyny as the rating of the appearance of women using a scale of 1-10 to judge their value in the eyes of Pick-Up Artists objectified women. This was, however, countered by Neil Strauss who argued the claim that men were, in the same vein, 'valued' according to attractiveness by women using signals such as wealth and that rating a woman's appearance was merely an attempt at verbalising an evolutionary process that men undertake when assessing the suitability of potential mates.

The Game led the way amongst established media in terms of projects such as documentaries concentrating on the seduction community, one such project aired on British Television called 'Seduction School' featured 2 commercial Pick-Up Artists from the United States and their attempts at turning around the lacklustre love lives of 3 Brits. 

by Richard La Ruina - 17th July 2007

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Source: http://www.bb-articles.com

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