The Sex Was Better Than It Felt: The Literary Power of the Barb

By
Glenn W. Smith
– February 2, 2010Posted in: Literature

MARK TWAIN 459382gm b 300x168 The Sex Was Better Than It Felt: The Literary Power of the BarbOf  Wagner’s operas, Mark Twain said, “Wagner’s music is better than it sounds.” That’s a lot like a disappointed lover saying, “No worries. The sex was better than it felt.”

Twain could shoot, and he was hard to hit. William Faulkner called Twain:

[a] hack writer who would not have been considered fourth rate in Europe, who tricked out a few of the old proven ‘sure fire’ literary skeletons with sufficient local color to intrigue the superficial and the lazy.

Faulkner falls a bit short of Twain in the critical barb business.  I almost want to seek out a tricked out skeleton. Anyway, nothing in Faulkner’s criticism of Twain is as good as Twain’s remark about James Fenimore Cooper:

In one place in Deerslayer, and in the restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offences against literary art out of a possible 115. It breaks the record.

Martin Levin of the Globe and Mail has a piece about writers’ attacks on writers, “You Suck and So Does Your Writing.” Levin includes some fine examples, including this one:

Consider Tibor Fischer’s celebrated execution of a Martin Amis novel: “Yellow Dog isn’t bad as in not very good or slightly disappointing. It’s not-knowing-where-to-look bad. … It’s like your favourite uncle being caught in a school playground, masturbating.” The review gained Fischer more attention than his novels ever had.

Ouch. Then there’s this:

Virginia Woolf saw Somerset Maugham as “a grim figure; rat-eyed, dead-man-cheeked, unshaven; a criminal I should have said had I met him in a bus.”

Now, Ralph Kramden would say that’s just an ad hamana hamana hamana criticism. There are some good reasons to be afraid of Virginia Woolf; I’m not certain what I should have said had I met her in a bus. But Maugham’s writing is left unmolested by her. Still, her observation made me smile.

Unsurprisingly, Henry James was rather skilled at invective.  Comparing Edgar Allan Poe with Charles Baudelaire, James found Poe to be the:

vastly the greater charlatan of the two, and the greater genius.

Now, who would you rather be, Poe or Baudelaire? Either way, you would probably prefer Henry’s brother William, who just seems easier to get along with. For instance, William once said:

A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.

Rearranging our prejudices can leave us feeling a little like the grumpy husband of habit who keeps bumping into the furniture after the room’s been redecorated. No matter. The well aimed barb is worth a skinned shin or two.

Gore Vidal and Truman Capote had a famous feud. Vidal, I think got the better of the match. When Capote died, Vidal said, “Good career move.”

Sometimes, the barbs drip with such bitter poison that they might slip right off the target. I think that’s true of Mary McCarthy’s comment about Lillian Hellman:

Every word she writes is a lie, including and and the.

Whether or not the definite article can be true or false, in this case the definite accusation of falsity got McCarthy sued for defamation, a suit dropped after Hellman died.

We need to provoke more of these literary wars. Without them, our literature would not be better than it is.



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About Glenn W. Smith

Glenn W. Smith has spent the past 30 years in journalism and politics, where he’s made a name for himself as a writer, campaign manager, activist, think tank analyst and, as Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas says, a “legendary political consultant and all-around good guy.” “There’s no one like him,” says author George Lakoff. CNN commentator Paul Begala says, “He has unmatched experience, a graceful pen (or pixel nowadays) and deep insight into the best and worst of us.” Novelist Sarah Bird speaks of his “lucid and lyrical” prose. And, she says, he’s fun. Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington says Glenn writes with “grace and abundant humor” and “uses his colorful experiences in Texas to enlighten us all.”

Smith led Ann Richards’ successful 1990 campaign for Governor of Texas. He worked for former Texas Lt. Gov. Bill Hobby and U.S. Senator Lloyd Bentsen. Earlier, Smith was a political reporter for the Houston Chronicle and the Houston Post. He’s coordinated national campaigns for groups such as MoveOn.org. In 2004, he authored the highly acclaimed book, The Politics of Deceit: Saving Freedom and Democracy from Extinction. He also wrote Unfit Commander, a book that detailed George W. Bush’s mysterious disappearance from military service.

In 2004, Smith was featured in the film, Bush’s Brain, a documentary about Karl Rove. Smith provided commentary on Rove’s role as then-President Bush’s senior advisor. He has made numerous media appearances with Chris Mathews on Hardball, Joe Scarborough, Brit Hume, and many others. He writes a regularly for top national web sites, including FireDogLake and Huffington Post.

As a senior fellow at George Lakoff’s prestigious Rockridge Institute in Berkeley he studied, wrote and taught on the power of metaphor and narrative in political communications. He also lectured on religion and politics at the Starr King School for Ministry in Berkeley. As a sponsor and organizer, he has pulled together numerous national events with progressive religious leaders. He also organized a celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King at Riverside Church in New York City as well as “Freedom and Faith” bus tours, which was a nationwide campaign for social justice and progressive values.

Smith’s play, Double Play, which explored American Western myths and legends, was held over to sold-out audiences. He’s even written and performed songs in the Americana tradition, such as his best-known song, “Helping Marty Robbins,” a tribute to his hometown, Houston.

Most recently, Smith is the creator of DogCanyon, a political and cultural web site covering state, national and global issues from a Texas perspective. DogCanyon is an exhilarating and unique site that gets the connections between politics and culture and explores both the personal side of politics and the ups, down, craziness and beauty of “life its ownself,” as humorist Dan Jenkins would say. DogCanyon offers heartfelt personal essays, hard-hitting political analysis, and, most importantly, laughs.

As Paul Begala said, Smith writes in “the finest, firmest, fearless tradition of Texas essayists like Molly Ivins.”