Book, song or movie by your worst enemy

Cafe Society
1

Hypothetical:

Let’s say that you read a book, listen to a song, or watch a movie. And you think it’s utterly marvelous - almost perfect, fascinating, one of the most enjoyable books/songs/movies you can ever remember experiencing. 5 out of 5 stars isn’t enough.
You think, *“I got to find out who created this!” * And then you find out it was written/composed/produced by…someone you utterly hate and despise.

  1. Would this dampen your enjoyment of the book/song/movie?

  2. If you knew the creator’s identity beforehand, would you still want to read, listen to or watch this book/song/movie?

2

If I found out afterwards, my reaction would be, “I enjoyed the book. Too bad the creator turned out to be a jerk.”

If I knew the reputation first, it would depend, but most likely I’d look for something else.

The obvious current example is Bill Cosby. I still love his work as a comedian, even if he’s a horrible human being. I probably wouldn’t go to any of his concerts (but I wouldn’t even without knowing – too expensive).

3

I’m only able (or willing) to divorce the reputation of the creator from his work to a certain degree.

If an author/painter/director/whatever is a mild jerk, then I’ll swallow that and enjoy the work.

If the creator is a serious, major-league, asshole-level jerk, then I won’t touch his or her work, and will post about it here on the SDMB.

4

Yes.

An analogy - it’s like seeing a vintage video clip Victorian porn, and really ahem enjoying it. Then, afterwards, as the credits role, you recognize that the actress was your great-grandmother. You may have enjoyed it at the time, but now, it’s retroactively tainted…

No.

5

Some jerk I know did write a book, a ‘true account’ of his difficult :rolleyes: life and he hopes his book will inspire faith and hope in the suckers who read it.
I heard I am mentioned in the book, evil person that I am.
While I would love to see the spin in his story and I’m curious as to just how evil I really am, I refuse to buy the book because I don’t want to contribute to his income.
If I could get a copy without paying for it I’d read it for the laughs.

6

Back in college, a woman I’d never met promoted herself and her lesbian feminist activist group by singling out a cartoon I drew for the campus humor magazine and accusing me of “promoting rape culture” in several letters to the editor of the school paper, harassing our advertisers, etc. I swear we never would’ve bothered putting out a second or third issue were I not motivated by pure spite.

Years later, she put out a book of poetry. I hear it’s pretty good.