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Oh vanity, thy name is VA Naipul
Jun. 8th, 2011 08:09 pmWho states that no woman is his literary equal. He especially singles out Austen, criticising her 'sentimental ambitions, her sentimental sense of the world'.
He said: 'I read a piece of writing and within a paragraph or two I know whether it is by a woman or not. I think [it is] unequal to me.'
My first response is: tee hee, I know artists have to have rock solid egos but are you kidding? Without even venturing into the twentieth century, better than Austen? Charlotte Bronte? Emily Bronte? Elizabeth Gaskell? George Eliot? Sapho? A woman who suggested that all men - from Dickens to Heinlein - were also-rans would be laughed out of the room.
My more considered response is: I would suggest that women do often (though not always) write about matters that are different to those chosen by men. These are not inferior. To paraphrase Virginia Woolf (another author Naipul claims to be superior to) writing about war is somehow regarded as lofty, large scale and important, while writing about the feelings of women in a drawing room is hermetically sealed and unimportant.
And my final thought is: I haven't read Naipul and, after this, am not likely to. But I'd suggest that however good he might consider his own writing, he clearly sucks at reading if he thinks of Austen as sentimental. Austen is a woman who started a novel with this line: 'It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.' Not what I'd call sentimental.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/jun/02/vs-naipaul-jane-austen-women-writers?CMP=twt_gu
He said: 'I read a piece of writing and within a paragraph or two I know whether it is by a woman or not. I think [it is] unequal to me.'
My first response is: tee hee, I know artists have to have rock solid egos but are you kidding? Without even venturing into the twentieth century, better than Austen? Charlotte Bronte? Emily Bronte? Elizabeth Gaskell? George Eliot? Sapho? A woman who suggested that all men - from Dickens to Heinlein - were also-rans would be laughed out of the room.
My more considered response is: I would suggest that women do often (though not always) write about matters that are different to those chosen by men. These are not inferior. To paraphrase Virginia Woolf (another author Naipul claims to be superior to) writing about war is somehow regarded as lofty, large scale and important, while writing about the feelings of women in a drawing room is hermetically sealed and unimportant.
And my final thought is: I haven't read Naipul and, after this, am not likely to. But I'd suggest that however good he might consider his own writing, he clearly sucks at reading if he thinks of Austen as sentimental. Austen is a woman who started a novel with this line: 'It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.' Not what I'd call sentimental.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/jun/02/vs-naipaul-jane-austen-women-writers?CMP=twt_gu
