The Earl of Rochester

• Authenticity: Do you have it? Do your favorite writers have it? Has any individual in the history of humankind had it? “What do we mean by authenticity? Since we can hardly ask for documentary accuracy from fiction, what is it exactly we’re looking for? … All Dickens is packed with orphans or people in uncertain relation to family groups, or clubs. It’s impossible to read anything he wrote without feeling that the question of belonging was a major issue for him … Whether or not we like the books and quite regardless of any verisimilitude, it’s clear that the author is writing directly from his personal concerns.”
• The Earl of Rochester wrote directly from his personal concerns, too. Those concerns included dildos, premature ejaculation, drunkenness, and scatology. He was very authentic.
• And Camus, who had a few questions of his own about this sort of thing, is perhaps more relevant than ever today, in no small part because of the Arab Spring: “For the many Americans who grew up with ‘The Guest’ and The Stranger, what lies ahead is a literary, political, and cinematic revival of a writer whose work has found new urgency in the embers of the Arab Spring. For readers and writers throughout the world, Camus remains an open book.”
• While we’re questioning some of the basic tenets of writing—what do writers owe their subjects? “Do we have the right to tell their stories at all? Such complications become even more vivid when we consider them through the lens of privilege: the privilege of the storyteller to control or shape the narrative.”
• Maybe it’s easiest to circumvent these questions by trusting the state to tell us which stories are okay to tell. They know what they’re doing! That’s why a Tennessee lawmaker is moving to make the Bible his state’s official book. It’s a classic, after all.