THE DOCTOR IS IN

WHO CARES?

In a recent In Character essay, Sam Schulman discusses the ways our knowledge of a writer's problematic personal life can influence our response to his work [all of his exemplars of bad behavior are male]:

A great majority of us have done discreditable, even cruel things in our lives, even after we have ceased to be children.  And the great majority of that majority find it in our hearts to forgive ourselves, and to think more about how we have been injured than the injuries we have made.  But it seems to matter more when a writer or artist behaves badly.  Why should it?  If my dentist loves one of his daughters more than any of his other children, or a Boeing engineer is having an affair with her best friend's husband, it is cruel.  But their cruelties don't impair the quality of my bridgework or disturb my tendency to sleep peacefully through take-offs and landings.  Why does the bad character of a writer or artist matters so much more?  And how does "mattering" work?  

Schulman points to Dickens's abandonment of his wife as a factor that makes it more difficult to appreciate the morality of his writing (though it is hard to understand how Shulman believes Dickens kept this act a "secret" when he published self-justifying announcements in both the London Times and Household Words).

Dickens's interpersonal callousness has never affected my appreciation of his novels, perhaps because I started reading him almost as soon as I could read, before I understood fully that books are written by regular people, not by God or the fairies. It's the same with Louisa May Alcott--her essentially sadomasochistic family life is difficult to read about , but this doesn't diminish the charm of the Marches for me.

But I came to Carolyn Heilbrun's writing as an adult, and enjoyed it a great deal until her suicide. Then the same pages seemed tainted with despair and hopelessness, and I didn't want to read her anymore. (I fully support her decision to choose her own end--it just disturbs me, in a way that Virginia Woolf's and Sylvia Plath's suicides don't, because her books are so hopeful.)

I never liked reading Günter Grass, but I had assumed the problem was mine, until the news broke of his youthful SS participation. Then I gave myself credit for unusual discernment, a finely honed bullshit detector, as Hemingway put it. Though really, his concealment is understandable, and I probably just wasn't sophisticated enough to appreciate him.

I truly believe that a work of art should stand on its own merits, independent of the creator's personal failings (or virtues). But like the fallible authors Shulman discusses, I find it difficult to live up to my own ideals. It's like learning that the dog licked a sandwich I've been eating. Same sandwich, same objective taste, but somehow I've lost my appetite for it.

(If this topic interests you as much as it does me, tune into Litopia After Dark this evening. I plan to ask my fellow panelists for their thoughts and experiences.)

Susan O'Doherty, Ph.D.,is a clinical psychologist with a New York City-based practice. A fiction writer herself,she specializes in issues affecting writers and other creative artists. She is the author of Getting Unstuck without Coming Unglued: A Woman's Guide to Unblocking Creativity(Seal, 2007). Her Career Coach column appears every Monday on Inside Higher Ed's Mama, Ph.D. blog, and she is a regular monthly panelist on Litopia After Dark. Send your questions to her at Dr.Sue at mindspring dot com.

 

Comments

[Robert Carraher]

I think all of us, mortals and artists, aspire to a standard that, perhaps, we can never fully attain. Deep down I think it is almost more important that we "know" what that standard is, than that we do live it in all aspects of our lives at all times. Our failures will be readily apparent to us as individuals, and we can fully realize what it is to be human.

[Melissa]

Perhaps we shouldn't care... but I realize that I do. I see it more in actors I watch than authors I read. I doubt you could pay me enough to watch another Mel Gibson film. (I stopped years ago when his initial anti-Semitic remarks came out.) There are others I won't watch due to their moral failings as well. I'm no easier on myself. I can have characters who do things I wouldn't do, but ultimately the themes of my books are true to my moral compass. And there are things that I will never do. I will, for example, as dog lover and dog trainer, never kill a dog in one of my books. I would give up a publishing contract before I would do that.

[Jack O'Doherty]

Ezra Pound always come to my mind when this issue of artist versus his or her art come up. Pound was a fascist anti-Semite --- I cannot read his works without thinking about this and it ruins anything good he might have to say. I can't watch "Going My Way" without thinking about what a creep Bing Crosby was in real life (Crosby's disciplining the boy's choir takes on a whole new dimention)--- and to this day I cannot pick up a wire hanger without thinking of Joan Crawford! My opinion is no, you cannot separate the art from the artist --- There are artists (like Pound)whose acts in their personal lifes were so egregious that they cannot be overlooked. Before you say it: Ezra Pound was NOT Crazy and he did reject his anti-Semitism before he died.

[Stephen D. Rogers]

Hey Susan,

Interesting question. I think it has to do with the fact that we look to artists for understanding life and how we should live it.

Stephen

[Katharine Weber]

I do think we hold artists to a higher moral standard because we look to art to help us with the endless dilemma of being human. Another reason for the life of the artist to be kept apart from the art. Picasso was a horrible father. Does that subtract from the impact of Guernica?

[Sarah]

I wonder if everyone has personal examples of when an artist's life impacts our view of their work, and when it doesn't- perhaps depending on how close the issue is to our own lives. I also think the reverse is true. For instance: understanding and sympathizing with how much Van Gogh suffered, impacts the way I view his paintings and my appreciation thereof.