he’s not just named as heir, he’s adopted by, and goes to live with, Ardais. Who is not an “old man”.
Yeah, this is the bit that made me go “WTF?”
This wasn’t clear to me at all. But then, it’s been 20 years since I read a Darkover book
You don’t think portraying Dyan as charismatic,attractive and so damn forgiveable wasn’t a positive portrayal?
:rolleyes: I read it, long ago, I don’t agree with your soft-coating of the central issue - everything is fine at the end because Danilo forgives his rapist (or near-rapist, I think) and everyone is cool with Ardais after that - never mind it’s clearly implied he’s done the same thing to other cadets, in fact has a reputation for it. But Dani forgave him (in fact, was bought out by him) so it’s OK.
Wendell claims not to be such a huge MZB fan (he just owns many signed copies of her work). So I’m assuming it’s just a philosophical stance for him.
That’s not Wendell’ stance AFAICT - he seems to be saying it’s never OK to examine an author’s life outside their creative output (he can correct me if I’m wrong).
I can see a case to be made for avoiding the work of a living author who you find deplorable. Orson Scott Card is very active in the anti-gay rights movement, which means that arguably any money he gets from me for his books has the chance of being used against me later on. That’s good enough reason fight there to avoid him.
But once the artist is dead? Who gives a shit. Reading a Marion Zimmer Bradley book isn’t going contribute to the rape of any children. No one is going to think, “Well, if people are still buying MZB’s books, maybe it’s okay for me to fuck this eight year old!”
It’s totally understandable if know facts like this about an author makes the book itself unenjoyable. But there’s nothing particularly moral about refusing to read them. Shitty people can still tell good stories, and if they’re not profiting from your attention, why not enjoy yourself?
Everyone’s so hung up on whether authors profit, and ignore another other reason people write: fame, reputation, immortality of a sort. That’s the part that I think should be obliterated for despicable creators - that their name never be mentioned without a caveat. “Oh, she could write…but she willingly covered up kiddiefucking” “He danced like a god - but he loved ‘sleepovers’ with kids at his fantasy playpark” “Oh, he could sing…but he beat up his girlfriend and was unrepentant about it*” “He tells a good story…but he was a homophobic bigot”. I desire these should be their epitaphs.
To turn the question around–do you think it’s immoral to read MZB’s work? This, I think, is what people are reacting to: it’s not that you might “ask” them not to, but that you may have decided that people who know about MZB and still read her works are showing they don’t really take pedophilia seriously, or at least not seriously enough to give up the mild pleasure of a book they might enjoy. There’s a pretty foul accusation buried in a very polite OP.
Personally, I have a sort of anti-anti-economic boycott policy. There are exceptions, but I think the economic boycott is fast becoming a social/class/cultural identifier, like a food taboo, and I don’t like the trend. People like us don’t own/shop/buy whatever bothers me, because I think when we get to the point where different people can’t coexist in the same grocery store, any hope of useful dialogue is over. I don’t worry where my money goes after I spend it.
In terms of mental hygiene, however, I do think there is value in watching what you expose yourself to. It’s hubris to think that as long as you are “on your guard” or “know what to look for” that propaganda is not effective. It also doesn’t have to be blatantly embedded to be a problem: some things are a lot more subtle. I don’t know MZB from a hole in the ground, but there are authors I avoid because I kind of feel like their personal views do percolate through their works in subtle ways that normalize certain attitudes–and I think they could be normalized in mine, as well.
No, I don’t. I think it’s …what’s the best word? Not nice? Not agreeable? Not desirable in anyone I cared about? But not immoral, no. MZB was immoral, Breen was, Waters is. MZB readers, no, not really. MZB fans who leap to her defence, by claiming she wasn’t guilty of what she admits doing, those I do find immoral, but that’s not the issue here, no-one’s done that.
I do think it’s immoral to want to stop people from telling the truth about her in public conversation, though. To claim that to do so is somehow wrong. That is immoral.
I come from a background of experiencing what can happen when economic measures are used for social justice. I favour boycotting very, very strongly when used for the right reasons.
Context - it’s a feudal society, Danilo has to learn to mange the Domain, it’s expected the heir lives at the main seat… but he always retains his family’s estate at Syrtis. If you read the following books in the series you find out that Danilo actually spends most of his life at the side of Regis Hastur.
Yes, it’s the weakest part of the entire novel, I’ll grant you that.
The christoforos were always a cardboard religion, they’re basically an expy of Christianity and make much of forgiveness, at least for men.
Danilo is spending too much time Regis Hastur’s bed to have time to screw anyone else. In subsequent books you get the impression Danilo never has sex with anyone other than Regis for the rest of his adult life.
Really, I’m surprised no one has commented on how Danilo functions as a damsel in distress and when Regis rescues him Regis gets the “girl” and they live happily ever after and the negative implications in that. Then there are the women who, upon marriage, are literally in chains for the rest of their lives - does that mean MZB promoted slavery and bondage?
Do you think child molesters in real life look like monsters? They often get away with it for years because they’re attractive and charismatic.
No, I didn’t think it was “OK”. I thought Danilo was nuts for being so forgiving, but then, I’ve never been all that much forgive and forget and turn the other cheek.
And Ardais is not a “near rapist”, he was, in fact, a genuine rapist AND he telepathically mind-fucked his victims on top of it. Yes, he had a reputation for it but, you know, it’s a feudal society and Ardais is a Lord so the common folks are his playthings to some extent. It’s no different than his peers screwing the young women in their Domains then leaving them, forgetting them unless, maybe, they give birth to a psychic bastard and maybe not even then. There is FAR more rape of young women and child marriage in that series than boys being raped but somehow that doesn’t translate into MZB supporting child brides. Or maybe themes of raping women and marrying girl children is so damn common in both literature and real life we’ve all gone numb about it and it’s considered an acceptable plot device.
She wrote a lot of books. In ONE of those books there is a character who is basically a raped teenage boy. Somehow that translates to her “promoting” child molesting and everything else she ever wrote should be piled on the trash heap? That seems entirely disproportionate. Again, if it weren’t for the fact she was married to a convicted child molester (and there was a crapload wrong about that) I doubt anyone would view Heritage of Hastur as “promoting” child molesting.
If you don’t like the book, and you’re judging it based on what’s in the book and how it’s written, fine, that’s as it should be. It’s been quite awhile since I read the book myself, but every time I’ve read it I’ve never put it down with the notion of “you know, being mind controlled into being raped by a superior officer who delights in causing me mental agony is OK” because it’s not doing that. Yes, I would have preferred Ardais being drawn and quartered and his bits hung from the battlements for the crows to eat but that’s not what actually happens in most cases, either in literature or real life.
Again, for those of you not in the know - Lord Ardais is a lot like Jerry Sandusky, a charismatic man overseeing young boys/men who targeted the powerless as his victims. His peers either knew or strongly suspected what was going on but made excuses and looked the other way for years. The main differences are that Ardais was frankly homosexual in a society that didn’t give a damn about it, and he wasn’t punished nearly enough by our standards - but then, he didn’t live in our society. In the novel in question Ardais is introduced to the reader as the new commander of the City Guard cadets and at the same time the rumors of abuse and mistreatment surrounding Ardais is brought up. It’s actually probably a more accurate portrayal (psychic elements aside) than the usual caricature of an ugly, creepy man lurking around a playground handing out candy.
Speaking as a molestation survivor, no, I definitely know better.
I thought he was a near-rapist of Danilo, specifically, as in hadn’t yet gone though with it. It’s clear Danilo wasn’t his first.
No. I’m not saying that one relationship is why her books should be on the trash-heap, that would be silly. Lots of people write scenes or relationships I find objectionable without me stopping reading them or advocating their shunning.
What Dyan is, for me, seemed far worse: you compare him to Sandusky? Do you not see another real-world parallel there:
Do you see what you get if you substitute “Walter Breen” for “Jerry Sandusky”? A somewhat redemptive arc for her ex-husband.
Even if he hadn’t gone through with the physical act - which admittedly is somewhat ambiguous, but it was published in 1975 when sex scenes of any sort were still largely taboo outside of porn - he clearly had invaded Danilo’s mind, which in the series was seen, if anything, worse than physical rape.
You may not feel that way, but some folks do. There are some people who adovacte shunning her books not based on their content but based solely on her real-life relationship with Breen.
Um… her ex-husband died in prison serving a sentence for child molesting. Sandusky is currently serving his sentence and given his age has a high probability of dying in prison. I’m not sure where the “redemption” angle comes in here. While both men may have done many good things in their lives (frankly, I don’t much about Sandusky, and even less about Breen) it doesn’t erase the great harm they caused as well. Yes, Dyan Ardais the fictional character was worse than either in some ways. Try not to overdo the analogy.
Maybe it was her relationship with a child molester that allowed her a more nuanced portrayal of a child molester than one normally sees in fiction. Is that good or bad?
I’ve read Heritage of Hastur as well and I have to agree with Broomstick’s take. I can see it in no way being a defense of pederasty, even if the mild WTF of the victim’s eventual forgiveness ( more explicit in the sequel ) is there. But even in that case it is somewhat logical in context. The rapist character never fully redeems himself by the way - he is show to have some good qualities, but ultimately remains an asshole, even if a less rapey one ( one assumes ).
I read MZB’s output ( most of it ) before I was aware of her more unsavory side and I stopped reading it because she was dieing/died and I wasn’t really interested in the ghostwritten crap. I don’t re-read it because I have somewhat lost my taste for her stuff.
But yeah, I wouldn’t boycott a dead author for their RL views/unsavory practices. A live one, possibly. But MZB was a complex character and her writing has some historical significance in the genre in its early treatment of homosexuality as a positive ( before her mind started to go near the end ). She was a pretty decent writer at her best, a weak one at her worst. I don’t think shunning her output is a moral necessity, even if perfectly reasonable.
As noted a lot of great artists have been dirt-bags.
Is anyone actually doing that? That seems to be what the thread title is about. OK, one guy said you shouldn’t bring it up in that other thread, but maybe that was because he thought it was off topic? I think it was off topic, and by your own account it became a temporary thread hijack. But other than that, by all means, shout it from the rooftops. I am officially on record as against adults having sex with under-age persons.
Maybe you could start a public-service thread in Cafe Society called “Artistic Works To Avoid Because Their Creators Were Evil People.” Maybe the mods would agree to make it a sticky.
Some of the more recently published novels, only partly or not at all written by MZB, are actually pretty good. One thing I like about them is less of the woe-is-us feminism, and some of the women actually do want families and a domestic life and the main conflict is not them trying to escape the bonds of tradition but rather them trying to get their lives in sufficient order they can settle down and raise the family they want to have. Nice change of pace. One of them takes us into the Dry Towns culture, feuding/dueling honor-obsessed men and chained women both and makes them more than just cardboard backdrop to some other story. It rounds out the Darkover universe a bit more with some different perspectives. I think the authors were more vetted than the earlier short story collections, many of which originated as fanfic.
With the possible exception of Neil Gaiman, I can’t think of a single literary figure whose personal life would stand up to the kind of examination this discussion seems to demand. Racism and antisemitism were the default position of society at large prior to WWII, and most writers of the eras reflected this.
Is there a literary equivalent of Pat Boone, a mediocre artist whose personal behavior was apparently above reproach? Our concern with a creator’s morality is by necessity an afterthought, an effort to understand the context of the worldview he presents.
Somewhat redemptive of his reputation/legacy, not himself. And only metaphorically
Bad. I’d prefer if her “nuanced portrayal” was - “Dyan did it once, someone found out and turned him in to the Comyn, he was punished to the full extent the law allowed, the end”)
Nope, he said no such thing in that thread (and hasn’t participated in this one) - his argument seemed to strictly be that creative and personal are completely separate and should stay that way, and that I was playing judge, jury and executioner, or something. It got a bit muddled for me when he started bringing the police into it, quite frankly.
It was the continuation of the discussion that was the hijack, hence this thread. But if someone is asking for book recommendations, I don’t think “I can’t recommend this author someone else recommended, they have some morality issues” is off-topic.
I’ve already named several: Terry Pratchett, Iain M. Banks, China Miéville. All of whom I am a fan of, all of whom I’ve read every work of, all of whom I have researched (Pratchett and Banks after the fact, Miéville before I ever picked up a book)
…and I don’t know about Gaiman, he was doing so well until he hooked up with Amanda Palmer ;)*
this is a joke. I can’t stand her, but this doesn’t colour Gaiman at all.