The Hipster Thief

Tao Lin’s internet stunts and public fights with editors have made him a gonzo lit icon. He talks to his former roommate, Nick Antosca, about his new book, Shoplifting From American Apparel.

The first time he got arrested, Tao Lin was trying to steal a shirt from American Apparel. He spent an evening in jail, did community service, and wrote a short story about the experience for New York scenester bible Vice magazine. Then he turned it into the central event of his new novella, Shoplifting From American Apparel, coming out September 15 from Melville House.

At 26, Tao has published one brilliant novel (Eeeee Eee Eeee, in which dolphins club Elijah Wood to death), one collection of short stories, and two books of poetry. His literary style is a kittenish hybrid of Lorrie Moore, Ann Beattie, and (although he might disagree) Haruki Murakami, and his writing has been lauded by hipster superstar Miranda July, gay literary icon Dennis Cooper, and Lemony Snicket author Daniel Handler. New York magazine declared him the “New Lit Boy” in their 2009 “All New” issue. He also has a worshipful cult of followers on the internet—and a horde of vehement detractors, who frequently post angry comments on his blog, www.heheheheheheheeheheheehehe.com.

“Shoplifting can be justified morally. I was shoplifting from publicly traded companies and spending the money I gained at independent stores that were socially conscious, such as organic vegan restaurants.”

I first met Tao in 2005 at a poetry reading for Opium Magazine. We had both just graduated from college, and soon afterward he sublet a room in my apartment for eight months. During that time, I learned that he was an experienced shoplifter.

“My technique for shoplifting was to take two or four packages of batteries or Moleskine journals and put them in my back pocket,” he said, “then walk out of the store, sometimes faking talking on my cellphone. This went on for maybe a year, and I probably made more than $10,000 [selling stolen goods on eBay]. Shoplifting can be justified morally. I was shoplifting from publicly traded companies and spending the money I gained at independent stores that were socially conscious, such as organic vegan restaurants.”

Shoplifting from American Apparel By Tao Lin 112 Pages. Melville House. $13. Shoplifting From American Apparel is marketed as fiction, but Tao says it was essentially nonfiction with the names changed. “Offhand I don’t think that I made up anything. I edited down what happened in reality in the same way I might edit down a massive first draft of an entirely fictional book.”

A retreat from the wild inventions of Eeeee Eee Eeee, the book is a chronicle of several months in the life of Tao’s alter ego as he drifts into and out of emotionally stunted relationships and is twice arrested for his theft habit. There is no plot in the traditional sense. The sentences are deliberately stricken, numb, and declarative. “If I do affectless prose,” Tao says, “I want to do in the extreme.”

When we lived together in 2006, Tao used to wake me up around 4 a.m. maybe once a week by setting off the fire alarm. I’d stagger into the kitchen to find him whacking at the ceiling with a broom while some sort of tofu-vegetable assembly burned on the stove. Once the noise had stopped, he would mumble a few words and flash a shy, apologetic grin. I was always suspicious of that grin. Why did I have a feeling he was actually pleased to have caused a ruckus?