Authors pour worst scorn on each other

London Times ^ | 10/4/2009 | Richard Woods

[Saije]

IF you ever secretly think some books by famous authors are unreadable or just plain rubbish, take comfort. Many writers have thought the same.

A new book of “literary invective” has brought together evidence of how writers really view other writers. It shows that some authors are at their most inventive and scabrous when sinking their teeth into other literary stars.

Take Jane Austen, one of the most revered and enduring English authors. Mark Twain, the American writer, was so irritated by Austen that he wrote in one letter: “Every time I read Pride and Prejudice I want to dig her up and hit her over the skull with her own shin bone.”

Nor are cultural differences the cause of such insult: often authors are quite happy to trash literary heroes on their home turf. Norman Mailer, the pugnacious American who died in 2007, pulled no punches in reviewing Tom Wolfe’s bulky novel A Man in Full.

“It is a 742-page work that reads as if it is fifteen-hundred pages long,” Mailer wrote. “At certain points, reading the work can even be said to resemble the act of making love to a 300lb woman. Once she gets on top, it’s all over. Fall in love, or be asphyxiated.”

[Saije]

I always wonder about those blurbs from other authors on the back of a dust jacket. Do they really mean it? Did they even read the book?

[Tax-chick]

Mark Twain, the American writer, was so irritated by Austen that he wrote in one letter: “Every time I read Pride and Prejudice I want to dig her up and hit her over the skull with her own shin bone.”

One might almost think he'd come across a time-travelling copy of "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies."

Maybe he picked it up while visiting the Starship Enterprise.

[Clemenza]

I wholeheartedly concur with Mr. Clemens on Jane Austen. 19th Century Chick Lit at its worst.

Never really cared for any English literature post-Shakespeare and pre-Wodehouse/Waugh anyway.

[Tax-chick]

You either like Regency Romances or you don’t. My son was bored to death by “The Scarlet Pimpernel.”

[Rocko]

I always wonder about those blurbs from other authors on the back of a dust jacket. Do they really mean it? Did they even read the book?

Some of them must be skimmers, speed readers, or just blurbing for friends. It seemed back in the 1980s that a Stephen King quote was on the cover of every other horror writer published. Now that his leftist positions are so well known and he's excepted by the mainstream, he's often seen quoted on "literary" novels as well.

[Lancey Howard]

Mark Twain, the American writer, was so irritated by Austen that he wrote in one letter: “Every time I read Pride and Prejudice I want to dig her up and hit her over the skull with her own shin bone.”

"Every time I read Pride and Prejudice..."??
Twain sounds more tongue-in-cheek than insulting.

[FroggyTheGremlim]

I tried to read “Don Quixote” several times and I just can’t get past the first few pages.

[Saije]

“I tried to read “Don Quixote” several times and I just can’t get past the first few pages.”

There are many “literary masterpieces” I haven’t been able to get into at all. Ulysses (James Joyce), Heart of Darkness (Joseph Conrad) and Remembrance of Things Past by Proust to name a few.

[martin_fierro]

C'mon over to Ye Olde Martye Fierroe Booke Clubbe.

I got the Good Stuff.

[Tax-chick]

The good old days of publishing!

[mollynme]

This one I sneaked home and read under the covers with a flashlight. LOL!

[Donald Rumsfeld Fan]

“It is a 742-page work that reads as if it is fifteen-hundred pages long,” Mailer wrote. “At certain points, reading the work can even be said to resemble the act of making love to a 300lb woman. Once she gets on top, it’s all over. Fall in love, or be asphyxiated.”

[Tijeras_Slim]

Pride and Prejudice would rock if the dialogue was redone by the script writers of Deadwood.

[Hoosier-Daddy]

Watch ‘Apocalypse Now’ then read ‘Heart of Darkness’ make it a much easier read.

‘Ulysses’ I can get about half way thru and hit a wall. There are supposed primer footnotes to make it is easier, but really, that’s asking a awful lot from the reader.

[Knitting A Conundrum]

Watch Apocalypse now and then read Heart of Darkness, and you realize what Apocalypse Now was based on...

Feel similarly about Ulysses. It’s not that I can’t read it; I get bored.

[Knitting A Conundrum]

I liked the Scarlet Pimpernel. I get bored with Jane Austin...LOL.

[Knitting A Conundrum]

I did read the Sound and the Fury because I wanted to, not for school...tough reads are sometimes good reads. But I never got past the first chapter of To Kill a Mockingbird. Go figure. I had dodged the Scarlet Letter for years, based on hearsay of people who had hated it, then I saw one episode of a mini-series based on it, went out the next day, and read it in one gulp.

[LibFreeOrDie]

The blurbs from fellow authors on dust jackets should be replaced by comments from the students forced to read “literature.”

Honestly, how many of you had to read “Mill on the Floss” in high school, and how many of you really enjoyed it?

[Lizavetta]

I nominate Faulkner’s “Sound and the Fury” as the biggest literary hoax bought hook, line, and sinker in this century by pretentious English teachers everywhere.