“The critic’s pretence that he can unravel the procedure is grotesque. As well hope to start with a string of sausages and reconstruct the pig.’ B.H. Streeter
The world is divided into novelists who do and novelists who don’t. I don’t blame the ones who don’t: it’s not well-paid and it’s the quickest way to make enemies this side of the divorce courts. Incest some people call it, others denounce you as a hack. Why, they ask, just because you write books, should you want to review them? But if you write fiction yourself, I’d reply, what could possibly be more satisfying and exciting than the chance to respond in print to the work of your contemporaries? At its best, it’s an exhilarating exercise, attempting to explore in words why a novel scorched your heart.
I always do think of it as a response, not a judgement. Part of a feisty, ongoing dialogue – words fired at words. But I know I’m fooling myself. The dialogue can quickly turn to war. So I’m careful. I don’t review my friends or authors whose work I already know I don’t like. And I start every novel with a sense of hope. But then sometimes, for all your optimism, you just don’t like it. And then, yes, you have to say so. But as a novelist myself – who knows how it feels to have your life-force sucked out by the crushing power of a bad review – how do I ever justify pulling another author’s work apart?
Well, my theory is that if you dish it out (criticism that is), then you’ve simply got to be able to take it. So I made two rules for myself:
1. Read every review, even the good ones, once and only once – then file and forget.
2. Be very nice to People Who’ve Given You Bad Reviews. Shock them into liking you. Make them regret what they wrote!
And have I stuck to The Myerson Rules? Well, there was the dinner party where I realized as I walked in that the woman whose hand I was about to shake had given me The Worst Review I’ve Ever Had. Not just bad but personal too – she’d made assumptions about the rest of my work (and its apparently undeserved success) based on the one slim tome she’d read. Voodoo pins were not agonizing enough for this woman.
But had I read her review just the once? Hmmm. That’s a tricky one. I do know that as I was introduced to her, all her weasel words came sneaking back. But, I rallied, it’s a whole lot worse for her than for me. So I stuck to Rule Number 2. I never (of course) referred to her (ludicrous) review. I made as if I’d forgotten it completely. Instead I told her how much I liked her last book (unutterably dull), how interesting her new one (verging on pointless) sounded. I dazzled her, I flattered her – actually I think I scared her! A few days later, my reward plopped through the door: a sweet, hand-written letter from her apologizing for the original review. Two years too late perhaps, but hell, I wasn’t complaining. One Nil.
Sometimes as a critic you just take a deep breath and hope the author doesn’t remember it was you. I was sitting next to a really nice young man at a literary lunch, a formal affair with silver cutlery and waiters and a seating plan. ‘Why do I know your name?’ I asked him over and over as I stared at his place-card.
‘Oh,’ he said vaguely, ‘I write a kind of a column for …’ He named the paper.
‘No,’ I said, ‘I never see that paper. It’s not that. This is really getting to me. I’m convinced I know you from somewhere.’
After half an hour of this (me digging deeper, him frantically filling the hole), the poor man lit a cigarette and gave in.
‘Well,’ he said rather sheepishly, ‘I think I reviewed one of your novels. I mean – I know I did.’
I beamed at him. ‘Oh – well then!’
‘It wasn’t a very good review,’ he muttered quickly, ‘in fact it was rather scathing. I’m so sorry.’
I don’t know what he expected me to do. Move table? Slap him Bette Davis-style across the cheek? Break down and sob? No, I laughed and told him that it was quite alright. I told him that I think Authors Learn From Their Bad Reviews. ‘Quite often as the months or years go by, you realize a certain critic’s response was right, more or less.’
He looked relieved. ‘Really? You really mean that?’
I nodded sweetly.
Did I mean it? Did I really? Let’s put it this way: I tried very hard to. I still do. And this so-called reviewer and I got on extremely well and by the end of the lunch were the firmest of friends. I still know him. Last year he invited me to his birthday party. Two Nil. (So there’s another critic who’s going to have to think twice before dissing one of my books ever again.)