I’m hoping to God that it’s just temporary, but for whatever reason, the book blogs are suddenly all worried about ethics, whether it’s what to do about reading writers with objectionable opinions or whether writers should base characters on people they know. Some of their thoughts below:
Over at TOR, a discussion on what to do with great books by evil writers.
Conversational Reading doesn’t like A.S. Byatt’s thoughts on “put(ting) people into stories.”
Speaking of ethical problems, here’s another reason to dislike Amazon. This time, it’s the way they do their best-seller lists (via Powell’s).
Aditya Sudarshan at The Hindu asks, “Why is it that we are willing to grant young writers ‘potential’ but not ‘insight’?” Good question. (via The Book Bench)
And in one of those rare victories for the side of good, that “whitewashed” cover of Liar by Justine Larbalestier has been discontinued. The book will now have a cover featuring an African-American girl.
In other news, Nick Cave will sing his new book (and my crush on him will soon become unsafe for both of us), a look inside the homes of science fiction writers (via Bookninja), Courtney Queeney on being a woman poet, and George Saunders first short story goes online (via The Elegant Variation).
One response
Great news about Larbalestier’s book; too bad it only happened after a lot of hollering from writers and activists instead of just being company practice.
About the TOR piece: I try, when I can, to separate the artist as a person from the art that he or she creates. Maybe that’s because I know so many writers–many are good friends and decent people, and many are the kind of folks, to quote James Carville, that I wouldn’t piss down their throat if their hearts were on fire–and the quality of person doesn’t necessarily translate into quality of writing. But what does happen, I think, is that over time, authors can’t keep that ugly side out of their writing, and that makes me turn away from them.
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