“It’s a turgid welter of pornography (the rudest schoolboy kind) & unformed & unimportant drivel; & until the raw ingredients of a pudding make a pudding, I shall never believe that the raw material of sensation & thought can make a work of art without the cook’s intervening.”
— Edith Wharton
Interesting.
Reminds me of why I’m not wacky about Edith Wharton’s stuff even though I can recognize her skill.
Virginia Woolf’s comments on Joyce were even worse – and Gerturde Stein’s make me laugh.
Like: chill, Gertie, we know you were experimenting with the English language, we know … it’s just the thing is: JOYCE’S WORKED AND YOURS DIDN’T. Her comment was something like: “oh, please, I’ve been doing what Joyce just did for YEARS.”
Then … uhm … why wasn’t there a big hullaballoo about your work?
Nothing against these women. But I hear a lot of professional jealousy in their comments.
I love the comments from Hemingway, for example, one of which was : “Goddammit, Joyce has written a helluva book!”
Of course there was jealousy – all writers expressed envy – but many of them looked past their own egos (like the great quote from William Carlos Williams here on this page somehwere) and were able to comment from a purer place.
My opinion.
“Goddammit, Joyce has written a helluva book!”
Hemingway never really went for “subtle,” did he? ;-)