While I feel sorry for the loss of her husband, and the utter disappointment and hurt that comes with writing a poorly-reviewed book in memoria for him, I don't feel the least bit sorry for the fact that people are jumping on her head. (In fact, I posted the link to Metafilter, so I'm certainly responsible for helping spread it.) Nevertheless, I've read most of her books, I very much enjoy them, but I don't feel bad about the response to this because of this:
You are interrogating this text from the wrong perspective. Indeed, you aren't even reading it. You are projecting your own limitations on it.
Pretty simply put: if you don't like my book, you have a limited mind, and you're reading it wrong, and no, I'm sorry- that's not how it works. Some people are sloppy readers, so an author can ignore it if one person says "Y doesn't make sense, X doesn't work," but if fifteen, or fifty, or a hundred people have exactly the same issue- they're not reading it wrong. The author didn't write what she meant.
This happens all the time- you have the whole story in your head, and it makes sense because you know the details, but somehow, those details don't make it onto the page. That's still not the readers' faults. She sunk her own ship by pointing out multiple times that her work is perfect when she turns it in, and she doesn't need any editor but herself, consequently anybody who doesn't get it is dumb.
Again, I understand being hurt when people don't like your work (in my case, I'm a screenwriter, so I get to understand that at about six thousand points from turning in my final draft to watching it being filtered through an entire production crew and cast, *then* the critics and the audience, it's *murder*,) but I cannot and do not understand believing in a "perfect manuscript," nor do I understand the inability to admit that sometimes, as a writer, you just didn't succeed.
She dished out a heaping plate of smack to a lot of people in a public forum; she should pretty much expect to get her own dish at the dinner shortly thereafter. I would feel exactly the same way if she were a random Joe who shows up at a peace rally to howl about the nobility of war- sure, she gets to vent, but the people she's yelling get to yell back. She knew going in that she's not just some random Joe on the street, and she still made the choice to spit at the crowd.
The Internet is not real life- you have to type all of your words, and then you have to consciously decide to press submit. She had all kinds of time to reconsider whether she really wanted to expose herself like that, and she decided she did. I can't feel sorry for somebody who volunteers to be a whipping boy.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2004-09-22 08:17 am (UTC)You are interrogating this text from the wrong perspective. Indeed, you aren't even reading it. You are projecting your own limitations on it.
Pretty simply put: if you don't like my book, you have a limited mind, and you're reading it wrong, and no, I'm sorry- that's not how it works. Some people are sloppy readers, so an author can ignore it if one person says "Y doesn't make sense, X doesn't work," but if fifteen, or fifty, or a hundred people have exactly the same issue- they're not reading it wrong. The author didn't write what she meant.
This happens all the time- you have the whole story in your head, and it makes sense because you know the details, but somehow, those details don't make it onto the page. That's still not the readers' faults. She sunk her own ship by pointing out multiple times that her work is perfect when she turns it in, and she doesn't need any editor but herself, consequently anybody who doesn't get it is dumb.
Again, I understand being hurt when people don't like your work (in my case, I'm a screenwriter, so I get to understand that at about six thousand points from turning in my final draft to watching it being filtered through an entire production crew and cast, *then* the critics and the audience, it's *murder*,) but I cannot and do not understand believing in a "perfect manuscript," nor do I understand the inability to admit that sometimes, as a writer, you just didn't succeed.
She dished out a heaping plate of smack to a lot of people in a public forum; she should pretty much expect to get her own dish at the dinner shortly thereafter. I would feel exactly the same way if she were a random Joe who shows up at a peace rally to howl about the nobility of war- sure, she gets to vent, but the people she's yelling get to yell back. She knew going in that she's not just some random Joe on the street, and she still made the choice to spit at the crowd.
The Internet is not real life- you have to type all of your words, and then you have to consciously decide to press submit. She had all kinds of time to reconsider whether she really wanted to expose herself like that, and she decided she did. I can't feel sorry for somebody who volunteers to be a whipping boy.