More Booker fallout

The Belfast Telegraph is one of the many newspapers having fun with the fallout from Sir Howard Davies "cocking a snook at the literary establishment", specifically its reviewing culture. David Lister enacts his name with entertaining examples of "literary love-ins" between reviewers and authors. But these reveal not so much the incestuous nature of literary culture as a sour view of friendship.

Back in the primary source, Sir HD complains that too many reviewers are not brave enough to say a novel doesn't work. Even if this were true, by what criteria is a novel deemed not to have worked? Is it by the logic of the novel under review or by the standard of the kind of novel Sir Howard wants to recommend to the public? We're not told. Of course, I think it's the former. As I argued in my blog-review of JM Coetzee's latest novel - a book the Booker judges singled out for criticism - is, on its own terms, a success; that is, a necessary failure. It reverses what it means for a novel to "work". And that, I would say, is one of the distinctions of a literary novel, certainly so late in the literary day. It staggers me that Booker prize judges are so insensitive that they can't see this.

In the next line of his complaints, Sir HD adds that reviewers "don't care whether [novels are] readable or not". Again, what is "readable"? Diary of a Bad year is, I would say, relatively easy to read. On the other hand, I found the opening chapter of On Chesil Beach unreadable - a novel that received a high number of respectful reviews and made the Booker shortlist. Clearly there are different opinions here, but reviewing isn't just about opinion; it's about patient attention to the work. This tends to even out the kind of judgements Sir HD wants. Maybe the chairman unwittingly disapproves of patience. There is evidence to suggest it.

Sir Howard happily admitted to having read submitted novels at a rate of 80 pages per hour. Jeanette Winterson compares this to putting a record on at 78 instead of a 33: "if you've got some bloody idiot who thinks it's great to read at 80 pages an hour when it's not The Da Vinci Code, you're doomed! Well, I am." Sir Howard's responds by misquoting and misrepresenting the reason for her outburst.