No e-book edition for new Stephen King thriller

[xg4bx]

Originally Posted by Barcey

Kidding, but I've given up on his books a long time ago. I was never a fan so I don't really care.

Same, I stopped reading him a decade ago. I also dislike his politics so I certainly won't be handing King any more simoleons in this lifetime. He could hand carve each copy into a stone tablet and it'd still be met by my unimpressed ''meh''.

I do like The Long Walk though, I think that's the only good thing he's ever written.

[DiapDealer]

King has politics?

[Prestidigitweeze]

Shunning a fiction writer for his politics is like criticizing a string quartet composer for not being a positive thinker.

I tend to choke on James Ellroy's politics, but that never stopped me from appreciating books like Killer on the Road.

[jhempel24]

Like I said earlier, I'll still buy it, but why does everyone think that it's just some way to stick a nose into eBooks? I could have sworn at some point he stated that pulp fiction like this should be read in paper format, and in keeping with the tradition of the old pulp crime novels he's only releasing it in paper form.

[applesauce]

It is out and out discrimination. It really annoys me when he thinks it is a choice of medium to read his books, thus is a choice he makes. Choice of medium is NOT something people with disabilities actually have. It is simply a fact that some people like me with vision problems need ereaders.
I read his books, and to be honest if it doesnt appear as an ebook at about the same time as the paperback comes out then to bad if it falls into my hands and he gets not a cent for it. I consider that his own fault. I am prepared to pay the hard cover price for an ebook.

applesauce

[haydnfan]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

Shunning a fiction writer for his politics is like criticizing a string quartet composer for not being a positive thinker.

This analogy is dreadful. It's so bad that I keep coming back to it, trying to make sense of what you've written.

Suppose you mean that writers are politically naive, then composers are optimistically naive? What!?

Suppose you mean that writers are inherently political. Then composers are inherently pessimists? What!?

Suppose you mean that writers are politically adept, then composers are masters of optimism? What!?

I can only conclude that you don't listen that much to classical music, and you thought you were being clever positing what you believed to be an oxymoron. For the above in order, counterexamples: (a) is just not logical, (b) Haydn, (c) Shostakovich. String Quartets are not intrinsically positive or negative, but instead run the whole gamut of emotional language, as they stand as the pinnacle of musical expression.

[DiapDealer]

I think you missed the point entirely, actually. Even after all that thinking.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

Shunning a fiction writer for his politics is like criticizing a string quartet composer for not being a positive thinker.

I tend to choke on James Ellroy's politics, but that never stopped me from appreciating books like Killer on the Road.

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I think you missed the point entirely, actually. Even after all that thinking.

I guess I'm missing it, too. I would have assumed Presti was being ironic again (I usually get his irony) but the James Ellroy comment makes me think the point was straight forward: Don't shun a writer for his politics (and by analogy, don't criticize a composer for his mindset.)

But if so, I disagree. I would have been behind the ironic take.

I WOULD criticize a composer because of his mindset because that tone is quite likely to be reflected in the music, and I might not like that, and a fiction writer is indeed quite likely to have his politics reflected in his fiction, and if I don't like the politics, I wouldn't want to read it, or support it by paying for it.

Or was the James Ellroy comment ironic after all, and I just don't get it? I have no idea who James Ellroy is.

ApK

[Kurt]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

Shunning a fiction writer for his politics is like criticizing a string quartet composer for not being a positive thinker.

I tend to choke on James Ellroy's politics, but that never stopped me from appreciating books like Killer on the Road.

I would never knowingly put a dollar in the pocket of Orson Scott Card

Won't miss the Stephen King book either but i have no idea what his politics are - the one and only book i enjoyed was Different Seasons

[Marcy]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

Shunning a fiction writer for his politics is like criticizing a string quartet composer for not being a positive thinker.

I tend to choke on James Ellroy's politics, but that never stopped me from appreciating books like Killer on the Road.

I understand the point. If you buy his books you are giving him money. And that money might then be funneled into causes you find distasteful.

So, it is a totally legitimate reasoning to me.

[BeccaPrice]

I feel that way about OSC and Anne Perry - those are the two writers I know most about who write in genres I read. I don't want any of my money going to either of theme. (well, I have no notion of Anne Perry's politics, but the notion of giving my money to a writer of murder mysteries who herself is a murderer kinda creeps me out.)

I don't mind listening to Wagner or reading Kipling because they're both dead, and so no money of mine goes to support causes I find reprehensible.

[Prestidigitweeze]

Originally Posted by haydnfan

I can only conclude that you don't listen that much to classical music, and you thought you were being clever positing what you believed to be an oxymoron. For the above in order, counterexamples: (a) is just not logical, (b) Haydn, (c) Shostakovich. String Quartets are not intrinsically positive or negative, but instead run the whole gamut of emotional language, as they stand as the pinnacle of musical expression.

The thing I enjoyed most about your response was your conclusion about my background: Failing to grasp the paradox in my analogy, you concluded I mustn't be qualified to make one!

"Mr. Christ, I've been mulling over your hyperbolic statement about a camel passing through the eye of a needle and, since I don't understand it, I can only conclude you know nothing about camel husbandry."

About the meaning of my comment: A string quartet is instrumental, therefore no words are involved unless the piece is very non-traditional (an exception being the suppressed version of Berg's Lyric Suite, which has corresponding autobiographical content that wasn't made public until the 1970s). The majority of compositions for string quartet fall into the category of absolute music, meaning that there is not content in the representational sense. To criticize a string quartet composer for not being a positive thinker would therefore be ridiculous, since no specific manifestation of positive thinking may be deduced from absolute music.

Instrumental music by a composer like Bach is often described as joyful, but that is because the tone of certain of his pieces seems exuberant, not because his compositional solutions to formal, harmonic and contrapuntal problems may be said to espouse literal positive thoughts. (Just the idea of it makes me laugh!)

For that, Bach would need to argue his point in words and, as John Ashbery once said, "Music is like a philosophical discussion in which the terms of the argument are not known."

The point of the joke is that literary accomplishment has as much to do with politics as absolute music does with an agenda of positive thought: Absolutely nothing. Ezra Pound was a Mussolini-worshiping fascist and T.S. Eliot was an anti-Semite, yet even the most humane critics do not condemn their work based merely on their beliefs. Richard Strauss was Hitler's pet composer, yet we still listen to him and his music is no worse for his personal toadying. Ditto Heidegger's more lasting ideas.

Now, about my background:

Normally, I wouldn't bring this up, but I'm the son of a violin and English teacher and began playing the piano when I first learned to walk. I received my first lessons a year after. I have a degree in classical composition and a minor in performance, have taught both piano and composition professionally, and have worked as a studio musician and arranger for most of my life. A few of my essays on music have been published by university presses; my most commonly quoted contribution concerns prosody and music notation.

Anyway, thanks for the laugh!

[ApK]

Originally Posted by Prestidigitweeze

The majority of compositions for string quartet fall into the category of absolute music, meaning that there is not content in the representational sense. To criticize a string quartet composer for not being a positive thinker would therefore be ridiculous, since no specific manifestation of positive thinking may be deduced from absolute music.

And you thought that would go without saying?!?

You do realize the point of an analogy is to make things EASIER to understand, right?

Show of hands from the crowd, please: Who got that?

Anythewho, on the point of authors and their politics, I'm guessing Ayn Rand would have preferred that the folks who reviewed "Atlas Shrugged" agreed with you.

I would not fault someone for enjoying a writer despite disagreeing with their politics, but it's certainly understandable if they don't. And while I'm not equipped to disagree with you about emotional reflection in string quarter music (though as an artist of sorts, I find it hard to believe that there is none), I can state with certainty that a writer's politics IS often reflected in their fiction, overtly or not.

ApK

[DiapDealer]

The very fact that it's possible for you to enjoy (or dislike) the work of an author whose "politics" you remain completely ignorant of should be more than enough proof that politics is not really a very important variable in the complex formula that determines whether or not you like/appreciate a certain literary undertaking. Unless you believe every single piece of literature you've ever liked/appreciated was written by individuals whose personal politics were indistinguishable from your own.

EDIT: do I really need to mention that those are rhetorical "you"s? I will just to be safe.

[Prestidigitweeze]

Originally Posted by ApK

You do realize the point of an analogy is to make things EASIER to understand, right?

Your defensiveness after having missed a non-sequitur joke says more about you than any vain appeal to the hivemind will ever say about anyone else. Everyone misses a joke from time to time. Only the humorless go after the person who happened to make it.

Show of hands from the crowd, please: Who got that?

Show of minds: Why would that ever matter to anyone but an anti-intellectual evangelist in the mood for a public burning?

Anythewho, on the point of authors and their politics, I'm guessing Ayn Rand would have preferred that the folks who reviewed "Atlas Shrugged" agreed with you.

Ayn Rand's fiction is overtly about politics, but that's not why it's bad. It's bad in the sense that Objectivist fiction (like the '30s proletariat novel and other sub-genres, such as pornography, when completely subservient to the grid of wish fulfillment) is not well written so long as its simplistic aim dictates all content (including, in Rand's case, the hilariously stilted dialog).

I can state with certainty that a writer's politics IS often reflected in their fiction, overtly or not.

You're looking for true confessions in an art which is intended to explore the subtleties of an artificial world.

The personality of the writer always does find ways in, political and otherwise -- but that has nothing to do with the merits of said fiction, which is all that matters unless the aim is propaganda.

Even then, when the writer is gifted, their chops can subvert whatever agenda they intended to pursue.

And then, of course, there's this: