‘I will hate you till the day I die!” Overheard in a playground, or towards
the end of a five-year-old’s birthday party amid the ruins of jelly and
ice-cream and general tiredness? Er, no. It was the rather high-pitched
response last week of the author Alain de Botton, aged 39½, to a negative
review of his latest book, The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work, on The New
York Times website.
All authors entertain unkind thoughts about their reviewers from time to time,
but de Botton made the mistake of writing them down and posting them in the
very public arena of the blogosphere. He accused the reviewer Caleb Crain,
also an author, of being “driven by an almost manic desire to bad-mouth and
perversely depreciate anything of value”, added, “you have now killed my
book in the United States”, and promised that, “I will ... wish you nothing
but ill will in every career move you make. I will be watching with interest
and schadenfreude”.
The painful irony is that de Botton, in person a mild-mannered and agreeable
man, writes books that commend philosophic calm and restraint in the face of
life’s vicissitudes. The story of his uncharacteristic outburst also
demonstrates the dangers and temptations of the new technology. Those
late-night blogs, texts and tweets are often ill-considered, unretractable
and spread like swine flu.
In the States, the highly acclaimed Alice Hoffman has just done far more harm
to her own reputation than any mean-spirited critic ever could. She has
reacted to a lukewarm review in The Boston Globe by twittering abroad the
reviewer’s personal phone number and e-mail address, inviting the reading
public to “tell her what u think of snarky critics”. Instead, twitterers
have responded by calling Hoffman a “psycho” and “douche-bag”. A spectacular
home goal.
What on earth makes authors react with such childish petulance — especially
given that so many of them moonlight as tough reviewers? Back in 1986
Hoffman herself gave a bad notice to Richard Ford’s The Sportswriter. Ford’s
response was very American — and very funny. He grabbed a gun and blew a
hole through one of Hoffman’s books.
If writers must counterattack, they should at least make it amusing. After
doling out one particularly bad notice, John Carey, our own chief book
critic, heard that the writer’s aggrieved mother, “who apparently lived near
me, had thought of inserting a pair of frilly knickers into the Carey
laundry to get me in trouble with my wife”.
The finest and funniest response to a bad review in all English literature
remains Byron’s splendid satirical blast, English Bards and Scotch
Reviewers, in which he says he has long since learnt “To spurn the rod a
scribbler bids me kiss, Nor care if courts and crowds applaud or hiss”.
Unfortunately, some authors still ignore his noble example.
Reviewing the second volume of Bevis Hillier’s exhaustive biography of John
Betjeman, in 2002, A N Wilson wrote that it wasn’t just badly written, “it
isn’t really written at all. It is hurled together”. Hillier took a revenge
so elaborate that some might actually admire it. Knowing Wilson was also
working on a biography of Betjeman, he pseudonymously sent him a fake love
letter supposedly written to the poet, which Wilson duly included in his
book, published in 2006. Only then was it revealed that the first letters of
each sentence in Hillier’s forgery spelt out the words: “A N Wilson is a
shit”. As a response, this is no more dignified than de Botton’s petulant
outburst, although it is infinitely more cunning.
Showing similar cunning, with added benevolence, is Andrew Roberts, the
historian, known for writing consistently kind reviews as well as
consistently well reviewed books. Might the two facts be related? While
carefully avoiding the giveaway term “log-rolling”, he offers some usefully
Machiavellian advice for negotiating the small but complex world of letters,
which de Botton might do well to consider.
“When you meet someone who’s written a vicious review of your book, always
pretend not to have read it. First, it will irritate them to think their
bile was wasted; second, it’ll come as more of a shock to them when —
perhaps years later — you duly take your revenge. Don’t wait too long; I
waited for nearly 20 years to revenge myself on David Cannadine [the
historian], but he kept bringing out excellent books. In the meantime I grew
to like him enormously, so I missed my opportunity for insensate vengeance
and now he’s something of a hero of mine.”
At the opposite end of the scale in subtlety stands Jeanette Winterson, the
noted femininist writer and former stockbroker. Enraged by a mildly critical
profile by Nicci Gerrard in The Observer, she and her then lover, Peggy
Reynolds, turned up on Gerrard’s doorstep late one evening: a calculatedly
threatening hour. There they hurled abuse, leaving Gerrard, in her own
words, “shaken” — a response that went far beyond spirited self-defence and
verged on bullying.
The novelist’s conduct sheds some light on the question: is oversensitivity to
criticism a sign of arrogance or modesty? Winterson had previously nominated
her own work for book of the year and proclaimed herself the greatest living
writer. Does she give out bad reviews? Only rarely. “In general,” explained
Reynolds to one books editor, “it is rare for Jeanette Winterson to take
time from the three things she cares most about: her work, her lover and her
garden. When she does want to review a book, it will be a book she has
chosen.”
As both writer and reviewer myself, I am in no position to resent negative
criticism. I gave a scathing review to Graham Norton’s book So Me, for
instance. Days later I received a card from him bearing the message, “Dear
Christopher, cheer up! Best wishes, Graham Norton” and a cheque for £500. I
have an irritatingly cheery disposition and, as it happens, I hadn’t slated
his book out of personal unhappiness but simply because I thought it was a
waste of paper. The cheque was a problem, though. Wouldn’t cashing it mean I
had lost all moral authority? Probably, I sighed, as I cashed it.
Not all celebrity authors turn out to be as artfully amiable as Norton. In
this newspaper, Giles Hattersley wrote a less than favourable appraisal of
Piers Morgan’s latest account of his rise to stardom, God Bless America:
“life-threatening lack of shame ... wobbling moobs ... lousy ... tired ...
maybe he’s just an arse?” Morgan’s response was to use his newspaper column
to label Hattersley a “camp, pint-sized toe-rag” and another reviewer as a
“lentil-munching little wretch”.
It may come as no surprise, however, that the thinnest skins and most
sensitive souls are to be found in theatreland. And because theatre people
are so passionate and visceral, physical violence is not unknown. Michael
Billington, the critic, was famously punched in the Royal Court (which must
have hurt) by David Storey, the briefly fashionable Yorkshire playwright and
former rugby player.
Steven Berkoff is well known for his menaces — and, indeed, proud of them.
Bumping into Nicholas de Jongh, the much-feared former critic of the Evening
Standard and The Guardian, he recalls: “I leant over and gave him a bit of
my old Stamford Hill repertoire, implying some kind of speedy demise. Of
course I was only acting but he took it seriously. So my acting did convince
him after all.”
As a theatre critic I’ve never been threatened, disappointingly, and have
received only one angry letter, telling me I was profoundly ignorant,
blinkered, naive, impertinent, cheap and dated. The indignant playwright
added: “Your ignorance explains why I am paid large sums of of money to
write or rewrite historical films while you are paid to write about me.”
That’s the kind of comment which, alas, reflects so much more badly on the
writer than anyone else.
The most chilling story comes from last year’s Edinburgh festival and sounds
like something dreamt up by the League of Gentlemen. It involved one of
those awful selfregarding collectives called Badac theatre which practises
“extreme political art”. To this end, it staged a piece of Holocaust
chic — sorry, “an extreme physical and emotional experience” — that sought
to “explore the process of extermination” by pushing the audience around the
Pleasance theatre, shouting “F****** move!” at them. Two critics,
independently, decided not to co-operate, which left the supposedly
innovative troupe almost comically at a loss.
The company’s revenge took the form of continuous intimidation of the two
critics for the following week — stalking, verbal abuse, physical assault —
until the police intervened with a warning. Oddly, Badac is appearing at
Edinburgh again this year.
The fact that you have happily never heard of Badac demonstrates one more
salient truth: all creatives get bad reviews occasionally, but only the
really minor talents waste their time on a squealing or vindictive response.
Even Shakespeare was derided in his early days by one Robert Greene. Did the
Bard plan a convoluted revenge or put an unpleasant character called Robert
Greene in his next play? Not to my knowledge. I imagine he shrugged,
murmured the Elizabethan equivalent of “Yeah, whatever” (“Fie, as you will”)
and went back to his work. Unlike Sebastian Faulks, whose most recent novel
features a venomous critic believed to be inspired — in part — by D J
Taylor, the reviewer. The two used to be friends. Taylor has professed
himself unhurt and uninterested.
Meanwhile, de Botton has said that he feels bad about his outburst and will
apologise to Crain for his comments “because it does not cost me anything”.
He added that he will respond to future criticism in the form of private
correspondence only. Some of our most learned writers still have a lot to
learn about how to take criticism.
SLUGGING IT OUT
- Nicholas de Jongh wrote that Steven Berkoff’s Hamlet was “fatally miscast”.
Steven Berkoff, on seeing de Jongh in a bar soon after: “Hello, Nick, I’m
going to kill you.”
- Giles Hattersley on Piers Morgan’s book God Bless America: “The
life-threatening lack of shame aside, being Piers Morgan these days sounds
exhausting — naff parties, D-list squabbles and pictures of your wobbling
moobs splashed across the tabloids — and for what?”
Piers Morgan’s response: “Giles Hattersley of The Sunday Times branded me
‘Paris Hilton in a fatsuit’. This coming from a Norton-esquely camp,
pint-sized toe-rag.”
- Christopher Hart’s review of Graham Norton’s autobiography: “It is merely a
laborious extension of Norton’s telly persona: ignorant, spiteful and barely
raising a laugh.”
Graham Norton’s riposte: a card saying: “Dear Christopher, cheer up! Graham
Norton” — with a cheque for £500.
- Nicci Gerrard on novelist Jeanette Winterson: “She’s come a long way from
playing tambourines in a missionary tent in Lancashire; she’s the ultimate
self-made woman — self-taught, self-improved, self-produced, self-invented
and oh-so-self- confident.”
Jeanette Winterson’s riposte: appearing with her then lover on Gerrard’s
doorstep one night and interrupting a dinner party with a round of abuse:
“Never come near me or my writing again, do you hear?”
- A N Wilson on Bevis Hillier’s biography of John Betjeman: “Some reviewers
would say that it was badly written, but the trouble is, it isn’t really
written at all. It is hurled together.”
Bevis Hillier’s revenge: a forged love letter from Betjeman to Honor Tracy,
which he forwarded to Wilson under the name of Eve de Harben (an anagram for
“ever been had”). Wilson was sufficiently impressed to include it in his own
biography of Betjeman. The first letters of each sentence in the letter
spelt out “A N Wilson is a shit”.
Compiled by Jessica Jonzen
