Also, that Virginia Wolf was beautiful.
ping
Now really, there is always some writer, somewhere, who thinks some other writers are drek, it’s called “diversity”.
Pretty good company. There’s probably a similar list for “Politicians that other politicians love to hate”
a brilliant piece.
I love how they have a damning comment from one writer, and then that writer is the subject of condemnation in the next entry....
I especially liked this one:
“Have you ever heard of anyone who drank while he worked? You’re thinking of Faulkner. He does sometimes – and I can tell right in the middle of a page when he’s had his first one.” — Ernest Hemingway
For Hemingway to criticize Faulkner for drinking while he wrote is laughable. Most of the World War II war correspondents couldn’t stand Hemingway.
That Grapes of Wrath book is the most ridiculous piece of commie propaganda I ever read.
It's bad enough that I'm sure they still make the kids read it in school.
This piece is like listening to a family of incest participants stranded on an island somewhere and slowly going insane.
Surprised no one went after F. Scott Fitzgerald or Sinclair Lewis. Not that I don’t like them just that nobody took a shot.
How was Norman Mailer left off the list?
"Her hips waved a happy hello."
Some of these aren’t necessarily put-downs. Waugh’s “desperate jauntiness of an orchestra fiddling away for dear life on a sinking ship” was a quality he wanted in his prose and something Wilson appreciated. The remarks about Pound and Orwell catch aspects of their personality that might not have affected Stein’s or Connolly’s appreciation of their work. Also, why the long awkward quote from Wallace about Updike when “just a penis with a thesaurus” does the job so much better.
“[A] hack writer who would not have been considered fourth rate in Europe, who tricked out a few of the old proven ‘sure fire’ literary skeletons with sufficient local color to intrigue the superficial and the lazy.” — William Faulkner
Only having read a few short stories by Faulkner, I tried one of his novels. Could not stand the schmaltzy prose. Faulkner does not stand the test of time like Twain does.
Great list,great fun.
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Truman Capote was a really weird little fellow but he sure could write.
Besides being very entertaining, this article reminds me of just how competitive most these well known writers were. When all is said and done. they are but human, and don’t want to share the limelight too much. Today, such a list should include Anne Rice. and Steven King. Both very popular writers I tried to like, but found most their work almost “Proust-Like”, with endlessly entertwined monolouges spoken by somewhat disgusting Protaganists who elicited little empathy or sympathy from me. I was impressed with the stylization of their prose, some of it fine, flowery and florid. Nobody talks like that anymore, or if they do, it’s usually restricted to print form communique.
Bookmark
something about bells, balls and bulls, and loathed it.” — Vladimir Nabokov
LOL that’s wonderful.
And Stephanie Meyers wasn’t mentioned?
She’s certainly hated...
Oh, wait....they’re talking about writers...and she ain’t one. More like a talentless hack.