Marina Warner is right – gold stars for writers leads to creative death | Rebecca Nicholson
The distinguished novelist and historian is right to deprecate the notion of creative people being ‘virtuous’
The novelist and historian Marina Warner has raised concerns about the increasing pressure on authors to be “virtuous” people and the growing use of “morality clauses” to insist on good behaviour in writers’ contracts with publishers. “Striving to be good is not the same as good writing,” she said in her presidential address at the Royal Society of Literature’s summer party last week. “Engaging in fictive truth-telling is not the same as winning gold stars for conduct.”
Though it has been happening for some time now, #MeToo and Time’s Up have hastened a reckoning for public figures accused of misconduct, be that the debate on whether Woody Allen is “cancelled” or the arguments over continuing to listen to R Kelly in light of the multiple allegations of abuse against him.
