Writers Behaving Badly: An American Scoundrel’s Success
by Jamie Grove - How Not To Write on June 18, 2008
Originally posted at: How Not To Write
tags: authors, literary, scoundrels, writing,Leave a comment
I happen to like scoundrels. Most of the writers I have known or read were, at some point in their lives, the most terrible scoundrels. I find their adventures and motivations interesting, shocking, and often amusing.
The Scoundrel Factor
One writer who is more than happy to share the depths of his scoundrelness is Chuck Palahniuk. Mr. Palahniuk’s latest book Snuff received a scathing review in the New York Times by author Lucy Ellman:
What the hell is going on? The country that produced Melville, Twain and James now venerates King, Crichton, Grisham, Sebold and Palahniuk. Their subjects? Porn, crime, pop culture and an endless parade of out-of-body experiences. Their methods? Cliché, caricature and proto-Christian morality. Props? Corn chips, corpses, crucifixes. The agenda? Deceit: a dishonest throwing of the reader to the wolves. And the result? Readymade Hollywood scripts.
So not only has America tried to ruin the rest of the world with its wars, its financial meltdown and its stupid stupid food, it has allowed its own literary culture to implode. Jazz and patchwork quilts are still doing O.K., but books have descended into kitsch. I blame capitalism, Puritanism, philistinism, television and the computer.
Mr. Palahniuk’s readers didn’t seem to mind though. His book was #5 on the bestseller’s list the week Ms. Ellman’s review was published.
Of course, the history of the scoundrel in American letters is long and storied…
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