Monday, June 27, 2011

Author on Author Insults


http://flavorwire.com/188138/the-30-harshest-author-on-author-insults-in-history

Hat tip to Jim Chalmers for this list

I think this is my favorite quote although Curtis Sittenfield's review yesterday in the NYT of Monica Alli's book about Princess Di in suburban America may compete for overall nastiness. Could it really be that bad? Okay, the concept suggests yes, but still... She made the earlier review by "she who shall remain nameless" look kind.

Vladimir Nabokov on Joseph Conrad

“I cannot abide Conrad’s souvenir shop style and bottled ships and shell necklaces of romanticist cliches.”

If you can't say something nice, let someone else say it. That's my motto.

24 comments:

Gerard said...

Author on author insults seem very rare. An author must really dislike another's work to publicly berate them.

Anonymous said...

Patti - Those are some nasty insults!! Such a hard balance between honesty and mudslinging. There are ways to be frank about one's view without resorting to such mean-ness...

Dan_Luft said...

Nabokov felt so secure in his genius that he insulted nearly every author, living or dead. In his lectures on literature he even insulted the writers he loved.

Todd Mason said...

Actually, authorial insult to other writers is common. Publishing it is an in and out proposition.

Of course, it takes the gloves off somewhat if, as with Nabokov and Conrad, one comes from a similar situation and the writer under discussion is dead.

But there are writers praised to the skies whose work I often find inept at best, and it's better that the chorus of praise for these folks, particularly when they've shown they can do better, be punctuated.

I've taken both legitimate and mindless negative criticism of my own work, such as it has been, and so don't feel at all squeamish about pointing out the weaknesses, wrongheadedness, or stupidity (or combinations of these) when I see them...as anyone who's had the misfortune to read my nonfiction can attest. Very much including the geniuses when they're slumming.

Todd Mason said...

Ed Gorman had this up on his site, too.

Charles Gramlich said...

My favorite insult is "That's not writing, that's typing," about Jack Kerouac's work.

Todd Mason said...

As noted on Ed's blog, that was attributed to Capote about Jackie Susann, as well (and probably Harold Robbins).

pattinase (abbott) said...

In Kerouac's case since he wrote on on adding machine tape, it is doubly fascinating.

Anonymous said...

Me too, Charles.

Hemingway was known for knocking other writers and bragging about how he'd bested them, which I always found rather pathetic.

His late insults of Gertrude Stein, who did so much for him, are pretty unforgivable.

But then, he was a pretty awful person.

Jeff M.

David Cranmer said...

I cringe at the insults some authors make. Really despise them.

pattinase (abbott) said...

It makes Hemingway hard to read, doesn't it. A first class ingrate.

Unknown said...

Haha! I saw this list the other day; a friend sent me the link.

I love what Faulkner said about Hemingway - “He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to the dictionary.”

Since Mama always taught me "if you can't say something nice about someone, don't say anything", I won't comment further on Hemingway...(insecure... pathetic...thorough bastard...)

Sorry, Mama! :=)

J F Norris said...

I'm not a fan of Virgina Woolf, but her Joyce insult was pretty damn funny. I never knew that Auden could be such a bitchy queen. That slightly taints my opinion of him.

Todd Mason said...

I think it was a larger roll than adding machine tape, Patti, but I'll have to go look it up.

Hemingway an ass? Just every minute of his life, is all.

Chris Rhatigan said...

David, I generally agree with you. Although I find these funny because they're such Big Historical Figures that hearing them insult each other makes them a bit more human.

Paul D Brazill said...

Nabakov on Hemingway is my fave. 'Bulls, bells and balls'

David Cranmer said...

Patti, True but if I stopped reading all the big time authors who insulted others it would shrink my library considerably. (Maybe that would be a good thing.)

Dana King said...

You impresses(/) me most about the quotes is how little wit is shown. Some ("bulls, bells, and balls" is very good) but I'd think someone who prides himself on his writing enough to verbally bludgeon a peer would have demonstrated his own command of the language a little better.

Where is Churchill when needed? (My favorite insult of his, describing someone (I forget who) as "a humble man, with much to be humble about.)

Paul D Brazill said...

Dana, that's a beaut. Reminds me of Bob Monkhouse's 'A hard man to ignore, but well worth the effort.'

Xavier said...

When it comes to nastiness coupled with pretentiousness, no one can top the French writers of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries - readers of this blog who can read French might want to read Anne Boquel's and Etienne Kern's exhaustive "Histoire des Haines d'Ecrivains" for a sample. What writers of the stature of Victor Hugo, Gustave Flaubert, Anatole France or Marcel Proust said about each other has to be read to be believed.

pattinase (abbott) said...

Not the first time, I wished I had taken French for more than two years in high school. I can imagine their facility with language and wit would make their words even more lethal.

pattinase (abbott) said...

You have to wonder if sometimes they came up with a good line and then looked around for a writer to label with it.
I think Europeans value wit more than Americans so you get the best lines abroad.

Al Tucher said...

What, no Gore Vidal?

"Once again words fail Norman Mailer."

And he was flat on his back just after Mailer had punched him out.

pattinase (abbott) said...

Was that on Dick Cavet? Remember Lillian Helman and Mary McCarthy duking it out on there. McCarthy claimed most of Pentimento was a lie.