Morning:
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Patrick French has just published an unflinchingly honest biography of Nobel prize-winning writer VS Naipaul, who comes across as unpleasant and stuffed with conceit. That, I guess, is true of many other authors, too. But Naipaul is exceptionally malevolent, a man without grace or humanity, sadistic to those who have dared to love him. So why do we tolerate such behaviour in writers?
His first wife, Pat, was devoted until she died horribly of cancer. He refused to make love to her, so she never could have children. He humiliated her by publicly confessing he used prostitutes. Now he admits: "It could be said that I killed her." Too late, sir.
He treated his mistress, Margaret, just as badly. He beat her, sometimes so badly that his hand was swollen for days and her face was pulped beyond recognition. When she got pregnant three times he told her to go off and "arrange the little murders".
This year Naipaul went to Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda for the Commonwealth Book Prize. He was last there in the mid-Sixties, when the university, where I studied literature, was among the best in the world. I saw him then with my lecturer, Paul Theroux, extraordinary writers but both congenitally gloomy. Yet I loved the work of both.
Naipaul's A House for Mr Biswas was the first novel I had ever read on the lives of diaspora Indians, people like my ancestors, taken from their homelands by the British to work fields, build railways and run small shops. His family ended up in Trinidad, mine in East Africa.
Since then, his books have got increasingly bigoted and nasty; he was moved more by hate than love, and an ugliness repeatedly broke through his beautifully written prose.
The man and the writer are not as easily separated as critics would have us believe. Writers don't have to be saints but they do have to have empathy and live as civilised beings within the rules that apply to us all. What would we do if we found Richard Branson beat his mistress and drove his wife to death? Or if the BBC's director general spoke of his addiction to paid sex? Artists are part of our world and must be judged as others are. They cannot claim immunity from decency.
I certainly will not buy another book by this egomaniac. The literary cabal can protest all it wants but Naipaul deserves the contempt many of us now feel for him.
Reader views (5)
There can be no better aid to the rise of the bnp than the way in which the 'British' media is riddled with ranks of these ghastly ethnics, of no relevance to anything British, and invariably carping at one another, in pursuit of publicity. For god's sake ignore them and hopefully they'll go away.
- John Russell, England, 06/04/2008 14:57
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I agree with you Yasmin. It has been common in recent years for consumers to register their political dissent by refusing to buy, eg, goods from countries which have poor human rights records. This fell into disrepute when it was acknowledged that the only people this hit were the populace who needed it, since the leaders of such regimes made sure they did not go short themselves. However, if we refused to buy books by people who have shown their contempt for women (in Naipaul's case, prostituted women, wife and mistress) publishers would soon bring their influence to bear on culprits by withdrawing business, instead of encouraging their cruel behaviour with unalloyed adulation and support. A protest like the one you propose would hit the perpetrators where it hurts - in their pockets.
- J Wood, London, England, 04/04/2008 21:10
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Sour grapes from the sourest vine in modern writing. Presumably, "the literary cabal" is Yasmin's euphemism for "nobody likes me". I'm sure Naipaul will be inconsolable to hear Ms Alibhai-Brown is no longer buying his books.
- M, London, 04/04/2008 15:21
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"people like my ancestors, taken from their homelands by the British to work fields, build railways and run small shops" This is getting so tedious! She is like a broken record. Will someone please shut her up? All feel sorry for poor Yasmin (who incidentally has done very well out of the "British", as she likes to refer to us)!!
- Anthony, London, W2, 04/04/2008 12:35
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"Unpleasant and stuffed with conceit?" quite right... but look who's talking! The nastiest woman in the media.
- David, Crawley UK, 03/04/2008 20:12
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