It’s true. 

I want to write a book that is banned with long stretching arms of censorship for a catalogue of reasons as a rationale.

I want to write something that readers will instantly recognize as insightful, or that makes people take stock of their own environment, fishbowl, or personal perspectives and invisible but ingrained biases.

I want to write something that causes people to ask questions to those who hold power over them.  I want young people to read it and allow themselves to throw away the nonsense idea that questioning a thought or concept is blasphemous simply because it’s in print or in a textbook.  I want thought leaders to read it and question whether or not they’re the antagonist or the protagonist.

I want to write something that upsets people enough to take action.  I want to stir the pots of cooking frogs and force them to leap out of their apathetic, slow burning pots.

I want to write something that shocks institutions because it challenges their authority over thought and information.

I want to write something that makes men in robes uncomfortable because it encourages questioning centuries-long authority based on “that’s how it has always been” and “it is not our place to question the divine.”  I want people to voice the questions they were always afraid to ask and not settle for “mystery” because no one has a logical, or reasonable answer.

I want to write something that makes people ask themselves if they treat their friends or family members with the respect they deserve.  Something that makes locker room comedy an embarrassment to everyone, not just the target of the joke, something that drives offenders to perhaps uncomfortable self assessment and evaluation.

I want to write something that will become outdated and irrelevant, and remembered only because of the impact it made on society and those who read it rather than because the issues will continue to be issues in the future.

I want to write something that people can burn ceremoniously because the challenges have been overcome.

Banned Books

It’s Banned Books Week, and I would be remiss if I didn’t point you to a list of some of the greatest works pulled from shelves for challenging ideologies, “values,” and social norms.  Go do yourself a favor.  Read a banned book.  Then give it to someone you want to inspire.

• BannedBooksWeek.org
• Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read (ALA.org)
• Banned Books Online (Great list and explanations on The Online Book Page)
• Wikipedia’s list of Banned Books
• Books that were banned or challenged in 2007-2008 (by Robert Doyle)
• Map of Book Bans and Challenges (2007-2009)

If you remember just a little while ago I posted about J.D. Salinger’s recent lawsuit to stop publication of Fredrik Colting’s novel Sixty Years Later: coming through the rye.  The same day I posted that, a good friend of mine located a copy of the book and had it sent to me.  Yesterday, Judge Deborah A. Batts issued a preliminary injunction based on her review of the documents, the book itself, and the cases presented that indefinitely bans the publication, advertising, or distribution of Sixty Years Later in the US.  Colting has already stated that he and his lawyers plan to appeal. 

Yesterday I also opened my mailbox to find a brand new, first edition, pristine copy of Sixty Years Later  along with the original Media PR sheet (which, interestingly enough, promotes the book as the long awaited sequel to Catcher in the Rye.  But that’s not what they said in the US court.  Oops.) 

Talk about timing!

I have a new copy of Catcher in the Rye to read over, and the hot little Sixty Years Later to follow it up with, and you can believe I’ll be posting a review and weigh in on the situation as soon as I’m finished!

As a side note, some oddities regarding the publisher (Windupbird Press) which is owned by Nicotext, which also owns SCB Distributor, the publisher/distributor in the US who was planning on printing and releasing the text this fall, seem to have gone unnoticed or unconsidered, except for the folks at Galleycat and Anne Trubek from Good.  For a company that publishes joke books and advertises that it seeks to thumb its nose at the literati, publishing under a newly “formed” company like Windupbird would make sense.  Oh, and just guess who is one of the founders?  You got it… Fredrik Colting.

We’re supposed to take Sixty Years Later seriously.  That was the reason behind the shell game with the publisher names.  And now their US “shell” was removed from the game.  We’ll see if it was worth it. 

Can’t wait to dig in to this book…

I’m surprised it took this long to happen. 

This weekend author Alice Hoffman took Roberta Silman’s book review to heart and attacked the Boston Globe reviewer through Social Media.  On Sunday night (apparently at about 4 am) Hoffman began a 27 tweet string of vitriol-laced updates to her Twitter account (which was deleted as of this morning) blasting the reviewer and attacking her credibility, her position, and even the reviewer herself.  One of the more shocking tactics that Hoffman used was publishing Silman’s email and phone number for “fans” to respond to the critic in a Tweet that read:

“If you want to tell Roberta Silman off her phone is (redacted). (Email redacted). Tell her what you think of snarky critics.”

Since the account was deleted, the string went into the void along with it, but the author didn’t move fast enough.  You can still read her string of attacks, along with interesting takes on the events, at Gawker, Mediabistro, Entertainment Weekly, The National Post, and the NY Times Entertainment section.  It’s clear that Hoffman realized that she, perhaps, went too far and whether it was through the advice of colleagues, lawyers, or agents, she deleted her Twitter account (@AliceHof).  Smart move, perhaps, but the damage was done.  In this age of instant gratification information systems, her attacks were read and re-posted and re-tweeted almost instantly, and everyone knows that once you open Pandora’s box you can’t delete the box and hope the bad things (i.e. personal attacks, off color humor/statements, unprofessional behavior, etc.) you let out disappear on their own.  No can do, sister.

So what’s the big deal?  Authors have been raging against critics for ages.  Very few, however, took to open forums to attack a critic for doing her job.  The review itself is far for scathing, and Silman mentions her admiration for Hoffman’s previous works.  So the review wasn’t what Hoffman wanted to read.  So what….

In another Tweet, Hoffman lashes out:

“Now any idiot can be a critic. Writers used to review writers. My second novel was reviewed by Ann Tyler. So who is Roberta Silman?”

….Newsflash, Alice….

Idiots “Average people”–otherwise known as YOUR READERS–have always levied criticism of their own.  The difference now is that with the explosion and ease of blogging and social networking sites like LibraryThing and even Facebook, EVERYONE is a critic, and EVERYONE can post reviews for the world to read.  But instead of embracing this opportunity, authors are finding this threatening.  More opinions can be heard.  More negative reviews can be posted.  Forget that more positive reviews can be posted too, and that fan page after fan page can be posted.  Forget that this gives authors, agents, and publishers a unique insight into the worlds and minds of the readers.  None of that matters when compared to the fragile ego of the author. 

Writers used to review writers?  True.  But there have always been literary critics who weren’t commercial fiction writers, or writers at all.  Do you seriously think that all film critics or all food critics made movies or were 5 star chefs?  Get a grip and come down from your pretentious high horse.  You’re not writing academic criticism for a small, very specific group of readers.  You’re writing for the masses.  To make money.  Your objective is to write what people will buy (and want to buy) for a living.  Everyone, artists included, receive criticism on a daily basis and the reality is that it’s not always sunshine and puppies.  You can’t please everyone, and when you lash out it makes you look like a child.  It makes other reviewers not want to read your books for reviews–good or bad–and what happens then?  You fall into obscurity or you are driven to go ask those “idiots” online to give you a review, any review, for the love of all that is holy I need my work to be talked about to sell copies!!!  And guess what… When you come knocking to the doors of people who watched you attack a critic publicly, and personally… no one is going to answer.

And for the record, Roberta Silman is a writer, in every sense.  She’s a critic and published author.