In today’s Rocky Mountain News Patty Thorn writes about the Quill Awards and makes some very salient points that I agree with. ( She also uses a lot of ink talking about how authors look – but moore on that later.)
Thorn writes: “Searchlights slice the Manhattan skyline as the stars arrive on the red carpet. There's Art Speigelman sucking on a cigarette and running a hand through his unkempt hair; Anne Lamott brushing the dreadlocks from her face; Philip Roth, dressed in tweed and shooting Mary Hart a scowl as he passes by.”
She goes on to say: “You gotta admit a nationally televised awards show for authors has its challenges. Let's face it, most honorees are just a tad lower on the recognition-o-meter than your average Gwyneth Paltrows and George Clooneys.
“But for some, that's just the start of the problems with the Quill Awards, which, in the book world, has managed to strike as many nerves as the plastic surgeon who paralyzed Joan Rivers' face.”
She refers back to last years NBA and explains how the Quills were born in the wake of that award show when there was so much angst about the obscure nominees. And then she gets to real conundrum of the Quills:
“For the Quills, 6,000 booksellers and librarians were asked to nominate titles. The only books eligible were those that had appeared on chosen best-seller lists (Publishers Weekly, Book Sense, Barnes & Noble, Borders), had earned a starred review in Publishers Weekly or had been singled out by the Barnes and Noble Great New Writers or Borders Original Voices programs or as a BookSense pick.”
I agree with her when she writes:” With this setup - titles dependent on mass appeal for votes - an obscure book has about as much chance of prevailing as Dennis Kucinich in the last presidential election.”
“In other words, we're back to where we were last year: commercialism vs. quality. Do we honor high culture at the expense of more accessible works? If we cater to the masses, will our minds atrophy?”
It’s a valid question and Thorn raises it - and others - that are worth contemplating.
But then she writes “Meanwhile, I'm having great fun imagining Joan Rivers commenting on the parade of pasty- faced authors shuffling to their seats on the big night. These are people, after all, who are used to sculpting sentences rather than thighs, injecting wit into their problem areas rather than botox.
“Vera Wang? Valentino? If the authors I've met are any indication, we're more likely to see gowns from the Dress Barn.”
It certainly shouldn’t matter but since Thorn brought it up - the clichéd image of authors as frumps is just that- a clichéd image. We may not be fashion victims or go under the knife as often as Meg Ryan does but has he ever seen Zadie Smith, Michael Chabon, Laura Lippman, Lisa Tucker, Lee Child, Jennifer Egan, Laila Lalami, John Searles, Chris Rice, Chris Mooney or Barry Eisler just to name a very few?
Sure what we say matters more than how we look but I and my Armani jacket take umbrage.
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