tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post8232637059376312530..comments2023-12-31T13:47:05.758+00:00Comments on Fat Man on a Keyboard: It's all gone to the dogsThe Plumphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09244528534476387323noreply@blogger.comBlogger11125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-47933159555457033202007-07-09T20:41:00.000+01:002007-07-09T20:41:00.000+01:00kb playerNo 5 was by far the worst offence, I woul...kb player<BR/><BR/>No 5 was by far the worst offence, I would hate him forever. Take something readable next time.The Plumphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09244528534476387323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-47629166157601228252007-07-09T19:34:00.000+01:002007-07-09T19:34:00.000+01:00the plump:- thanks very much for your comments and...the plump:- thanks very much for your comments and for fixing the link.<BR/>Further thoughts on Eagleton's article:-<BR/>1. It's lazy<BR/>2. Larkin was to the right of Norman Tebbit but was hardly a political writer anyway. A good essayist on literature though.<BR/>3. Martin Amis is a lousy political writer, always giving the impression of having swotted up on the subject the night before. (In his articles. I can't get through his novels. Again, he's good on language and literature).<BR/>4. I would say that the essay and pamphlet writing of the past is now done on blogs. There's some good political writing there eg Shuggy, Shiraz Socialist. They are all children of Orwell when it comes to clarity of expression. However blog-writing tends to shortness and is not necessarily good for developing arguments.<BR/>5. I bear a grudge against Terry Eagleton as I once spoilt a holiday by trying to read Notes on a Revolutionary Criticism.<BR/>6. He doesn't mention E P Thompson, maybe because EPT was anti-totalitarian as well.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-58915012968480323132007-07-09T18:33:00.000+01:002007-07-09T18:33:00.000+01:00Yes, MacDiarmid was a grim old tankie who rejoined...Yes, MacDiarmid was a grim old tankie who rejoined the CPGB in 1956 having been expelled for nationalist deviationism at much the same time as he was expelled from the SNP for being a tankie. Early lyrics are wonderful, mind.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-71262282729886544172007-07-09T16:18:00.000+01:002007-07-09T16:18:00.000+01:00kb player's earlier fisking is indeed excellent. ...kb player's earlier fisking is indeed excellent. You need to use the html tags to make the link work so here it is: <A HFREF="http://rosiebell.typepad.com/rosiebell/2007/02/terry_eagleton_.html#more">Terry Eagleton</A> <BR/><BR/>There are other authors too that are interesting political writers - Jonathan Coe for example is one I have always enjoyed reading. <BR/>Oliver Kamm also had a fit of anti-communist indignation about Eagleton's praise of MacDiarmid. I must say, 'First Hymn to Lenin' sounds grim! <A HREF="http://oliverkamm.typepad.com/blog/2007/07/writers-and-pol.html" REL="nofollow">Writers and Politics</A>The Plumphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09244528534476387323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-25353076917488697512007-07-09T11:24:00.000+01:002007-07-09T11:24:00.000+01:00Thanks, Fat Man. You saved me the effort of a pos...Thanks, Fat Man. You saved me the effort of a post on this execrable article. I was truly disappointed by Eagleton, who seems to imagine that "engagement" means toeing a party line uncritically, viz, his mention of Brecht and Sartre, the latter of whom, in his unworldiness, threw in his lot with the communists just as everyone else was leaving. This is anything but ENGAGING with politics; it's naivete, a failure to recognize the complexity of political decision-making, instead adopting a consistent position based on predetermined categories, ironically, the very thing Sartre warned against in his <EM>Critique of Dialectical Reason.</EM> <BR/><BR/>As for "engaged" writers, well, I don't imagine Eagleton thinks of Rob Newman as a writer worthy of consideration, nor indeed that Newman's altermondism constitutes "politics" as he understands it, but then I for one think that's Eagleton's loss. He seems to be in a world of his own (but seeing as he's a Marxist, a Catholic, <EM>and</EM> an academic, why should we be surprised?).Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12272341393007849321noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-11056267752057180962007-07-09T08:19:00.000+01:002007-07-09T08:19:00.000+01:00Terry Eagleton is good on literature I think but w...Terry Eagleton is good on literature I think but when it comes to politics, he just chucks in words like "global capitalism" in an incoherent mix. When it comes to Islamism, he dances round it. I did a fisk on one of his Guardian articles here:- http://rosiebell.typepad.com/rosiebell/2007/02/terry_eagleton_.html).Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-13748784433706484052007-07-08T23:03:00.000+01:002007-07-08T23:03:00.000+01:00Every Slam poet and every song writer that I hear ...Every Slam poet and every song writer that I hear of a political persuasion is against the government and the Iraq war. Denouncing Bush and Blair is just about obligatory. <BR/><BR/>I would say that if you're wanting political writers they would be likes of Billy Bragg and Attila the Stockbroker.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-92047683962318834762007-07-08T16:25:00.000+01:002007-07-08T16:25:00.000+01:00The possibility of being a political writer is the...The possibility of being a political writer is there as a statement in Orwell, but his own attempts, apart from the strictly speaking biographical 'Homage to Catalonia' are less than satisfactory. The essays on the other hand are extraordinary, even sixty years later. <BR/><BR/>If Eagleton has decided that for a novelist only the overt political questions are important, what then of Ian McEwan's 'Saturday', set on the baleful day when leftists and Social Democrats linked arms with the avowed enemies of the open society? Perhaps too equivocal, middle class? Not engaged? <BR/><BR/>It will make interesting reading in years to come. How will today's fundamentalist huggers wriggle away from their pasts?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-44685336494534434652007-07-07T20:03:00.000+01:002007-07-07T20:03:00.000+01:00You forgot to mention Phiip Larkin, who put Hull (...<I>You forgot to mention Phiip Larkin, who put Hull (where is that place?) on the cultural and geographical map.</I><BR/><BR/>That is a bit hard on Andrew Marvell and William Wilberforce!<BR/><BR/>I agree with Eagleton on Larkin, I can't stand his misanthropy. Those who remember working with him can also attest to the fact that he wasn't putting on an act.<BR/><BR/>For me, to be politically interesting literature has to ask the awkward questions and not conform to a cosy ideological consensus and that was Orwell's strength. In this piece it strikes me that Eagleton was asking for just such a conformity.The Plumphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09244528534476387323noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-46631435356262718282007-07-07T18:15:00.000+01:002007-07-07T18:15:00.000+01:00Presumably, this is the same Harold Pinter who wro...Presumably, this is the same Harold Pinter who wrote this poem called 'Democracy':<BR/><BR/><I>There’s no escape.<BR/>The big pricks are out.<BR/>They’ll fuck everything in sight.<BR/>Watch your back.</I><BR/><BR/>They'll be studying that one in schools long after we've gone.Lord Pissfoot of Strathclydehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15741313593256138600noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36841665.post-10620222203665257282007-07-07T16:24:00.000+01:002007-07-07T16:24:00.000+01:00You forgot to mention Phiip Larkin, who put Hull (...You forgot to mention Phiip Larkin, who put Hull (where is that place?) on the cultural and geographical map.<BR/><BR/>Terry Eaggleton was and is my cultural hero, despite his hang ups about religion - damn those priests. He would have made a good and faithful member of the SJ, as he seems to always be ready to jump the the defence of the Catholic faith against atheists like that egotist Dawkins.telltheworldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07152489826414403547noreply@blogger.com