V S Naipaul

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This geezer's just won the Nobel Prize for Literature. But being one of them philistines, all I see of him is him being rude about other writers in the newspapers. What are his books like?

― Tom, Thursday, 11 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Postcolonial. I've only read Guerillas. Didn't like it much.

On a tangent, does anyone know when the Booker winner will be announced?

― nickie, Thursday, 11 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

nickie dear - Oct 17. So exciting!

VS Naipaul - don't like the sound of him.

― Nick, Thursday, 11 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

boring, elegant, snooty, reactionary, un-PC, dated.

― mark s, Thursday, 11 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

What Mark said. His big spat's with Paul Theroux, who's no piece of joy either (just ask his kids).

― suzy, Thursday, 11 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I would if I could.

― Nick, Thursday, 11 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Much of his later work, especially the travel writing, is cold, repetitive and drably written. His earlier novels such as The Mystic Masseur and The Suffrage of Elvira are great. A House For Mr Biswas, however, is the finest novel of the 20th century - ahead, even, of Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man. Nonetheless, considering their recent track record of rewarding writers for the 'progressiveness' of their politics, I'm surprised Naipaul got the Nobel.

― Sweetie, Thursday, 11 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Oh, they made up for it by giving the Ted Turner Award to Khofi Annan and the UN. What a joke!

― Kris, Monday, 15 October 2001 00:00 (twenty-three years ago)

four years pass...

all I see of him is him being rude about other writers in the newspapers

To be sure.

Novelist Sir VS Naipaul has lambasted literary greats from Jane Austen and Charles Dickens to "the worst writer in the world" Henry James.

Naipaul said Thomas Hardy was "an unbearable writer" who "doesn't know how to compose a paragraph".

And Ernest Hemingway "was so busy being an American" he "didn't know where he was", he told the Literary Review.

...

The author slates Dickens for his "repetitiveness" and cites the experience of reading Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey as a revelatory one.

"I thought halfway through the book, 'Here am I, a grown man reading about this terrible vapid woman and her so-called love life.'

"I said to myself, 'What am I doing with this material? This is for somebody else, really."

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 14:34 (nineteen years ago)

Shakespeare: "Who cares about these whiny kings and their power issues?"

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 14:39 (nineteen years ago)

paul theroux claims that the only piece of writing that Naipaul ever praised when they discussed literatrue was the opening paragraph of 'The Blue Hotel' by Stephen Crane

― Ward Fowler (Ward Fowler), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 14:53 (nineteen years ago)

And even then he probably thought there were too many punctuation marks.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 14:56 (nineteen years ago)

Naipaul OTM about insufferable Jane

― Thomas Tallis (Tommy), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 15:05 (nineteen years ago)

(oo x-post) i have to agree wrt Northanger Abbey though.

― Britain's Obtusest Shepherd (Alan), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 15:06 (nineteen years ago)

I really, really like Naipaul and have read quite a bit. He's a classic curmudgeon, but the writing is very, very good. Sometimes perfect, even.

Mr. Stone and the Knights Companion is probably my favorite, but odd for him because it's actually set in the UK instead of some steamy bend in the river. The Middle Passage is great travel writing, Miguel Street is an early and very readable short story collection. Biswas is his best known but might not be the best place to start as it's quite long, compared to a lot of his stuff.

Definitely worth the effort -- if you like that style, check out Moritz Thomsen as well, who is as good as anybody I've read, if a little depressing at times.

― andy --, Wednesday, 29 March 2006 17:34 (nineteen years ago)

(That said, 'Conradesque' is my favorite word so bear that in mind.)

― andy --, Wednesday, 29 March 2006 17:37 (nineteen years ago)

ps they've just done a radio drama for 'Biswas' on Radio 4:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/

― andy --, Wednesday, 29 March 2006 18:04 (nineteen years ago)

I've only read three books by him, and each one was excellent.
A House For Mr Biswas and A Bend In The River are postcolonial novels narrated from the POV of the colonized. Among The Believers is a survey of radical Islam, a dazzling mix of travel writing, journalism, social history, polemic and more. Published in 1981 and even more prescient than you might suspect.

― m coleman (lovebug starski), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 21:44 (nineteen years ago)

I find his journalism more useful than his novels.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 22:21 (nineteen years ago)

I don't know that I've ever found any novel "useful" anywhere, unless the use were "filling empty hours between now & the inevitable hour of my death"

― Thomas Tallis (Tommy), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 23:07 (nineteen years ago)

More tea anyone?

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 23:10 (nineteen years ago)

I don't know that I've ever found any novel "useful" anywhere, unless the use were "filling empty hours between now & the inevitable hour of my death"

The only use I can devise for them. Moreover, I'm not sure what use I can find in a writer whose intelligence, sympathy, and, yes, malevolence are best manifested in non-fiction instead of Conradian narratives.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 23:21 (nineteen years ago)

I actually really enjoyed Theroux's Sir Vidia's Shadow. An interesting, enjoyable book even if you're not a huge Naipaul fan. He does paint him as an ass but obviously was very fond of their ill-fated relationship.

― andy --, Wednesday, 29 March 2006 23:29 (nineteen years ago)

Alfred did you read Guerillas? It, especially when contrasted with the essay he wrote about his source material for that novel, sort of plays to Naipaul's strengths (although there are some pretty thorny colonialism issues raised by both, and I'm never quite sure where exactly Vidia stands on the question)

― Thomas Tallis (Tommy), Wednesday, 29 March 2006 23:53 (nineteen years ago)

No. What's it about?

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn (Alfred Soto), Thursday, 30 March 2006 00:01 (nineteen years ago)

I've read the essay about the Trinidad hoods but not Guerillas. It's not one of his better books, is it? I've heard it's sort of painful to read.

― andy --, Thursday, 30 March 2006 00:03 (nineteen years ago)

Naipaul OTM about insufferable Jane

I'll fight you all! Seriously, this is crazy talk.

I irrationally hate Naipaul though I've read nothing he's written.

― horsehoe (horseshoe), Thursday, 30 March 2006 02:24 (nineteen years ago)

Guerillas isn't one of his best novels, no - he's trying to sort of hijack Joan Didion's mojo but with a rather more moralistic tone, but at the same time it's quite elegantly constructed. Alfred, it's about the ideological bankruptcy of a guerilla camp on a post-colonial island, and how such bankrupty is a blank canvas for people who wanna idealise/romanticise rebellion. It's based on a true story he researched for some time.

― Thomas Tallis (Tommy), Thursday, 30 March 2006 02:29 (nineteen years ago)

a bend in the river was very good, but i've no doubt that he (and paul theroux too) are complete cunt(s).

― mookieproof (mookieproof), Thursday, 30 March 2006 03:46 (nineteen years ago)

six years pass...

http://www.tnr.com/article/110946/vs-naipaul-the-arab-spring-authors-he-loathes-and-the-books-he-will-never-write

― your damn bass clarinet (Eazy), Wednesday, 19 December 2012 01:25 (twelve years ago)

Ha yeah I quoted his wife's delightful remarks last week

― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 19 December 2012 01:35 (twelve years ago)

And the business about the cat being heartbreaking and irreplacable, unlike the first wife...

― your damn bass clarinet (Eazy), Wednesday, 19 December 2012 01:44 (twelve years ago)

great writer in being a real-life hateful asshole shocker

― (REAL NAME) (m coleman), Wednesday, 19 December 2012 10:59 (twelve years ago)

sounds like he's in a right state

― You Just Haven't Formed It Yet, Babby (King Boy Pato), Wednesday, 19 December 2012 11:17 (twelve years ago)

five years pass...

He's dead!

― morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 12 August 2018 00:38 (six years ago)

It had to happen sometime. As for his books, I am not inclined to praise the few I've read. They were readable enough that I finished them. But I was never interested enough to seek out more of them, as I usually do when an author shows a great command of their craft, combined with an interesting outlook on the world they write about. He didn't meet that standard for me as a reader.

― A is for (Aimless), Sunday, 12 August 2018 00:55 (six years ago)

Have you tried his non-fiction? His essay on the 1984 GOP convention is droll. I'm a fan of his Peron essay too.

― morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 12 August 2018 01:01 (six years ago)

Given his undoubted ability to despise others, it seems like the GOP would be an excellent fit for his innate talent in that direction.

― A is for (Aimless), Sunday, 12 August 2018 02:56 (six years ago)

RIP big man

― the late great, Sunday, 12 August 2018 03:28 (six years ago)

His great talent for hating was undiscriminating, Aimless.

― morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 12 August 2018 11:18 (six years ago)

rip vs pritchett

― jeremy cmbyn (wins), Sunday, 12 August 2018 11:52 (six years ago)

(lol i just sold my first book on ABE thx to this sad news)

― mark s, Sunday, 12 August 2018 11:54 (six years ago)

Keith Rowley using a certain amount of creative license in his tribute when describing him as “a proud son of Trinidad and Tobago”.

― Wag1 Shree Rajneesh (ShariVari), Sunday, 12 August 2018 12:02 (six years ago)

rip vs pritchett

^^^^

― Father Ted in Forkhandles (Tom D.), Sunday, 12 August 2018 12:02 (six years ago)

i'll always remember naipaul mostly for his being namechecked in robert wyatt's "born-again cretin", a wonderful song

― Arch Bacon (rushomancy), Sunday, 12 August 2018 12:06 (six years ago)

Ha -- was gonna cite Wyatt.

― morning wood truancy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 12 August 2018 12:11 (six years ago)

I might give Mr Biswas another shot. I put it down after the (excellent) opening about his childhood and future.

― adam the (abanana), Sunday, 12 August 2018 12:40 (six years ago)

I've only read "Bend," but found it very powerful.

― Groove(box) Denied (Raymond Cummings), Sunday, 12 August 2018 14:08 (six years ago)

huh

so apparently this dude was also an asshole

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/11/cruel-and-unusual/307073/

― F# A# (∞), Sunday, 12 August 2018 16:45 (six years ago)

Nobody's perfect ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

― Father Ted in Forkhandles (Tom D.), Sunday, 12 August 2018 16:53 (six years ago)

ya not saying don't RIP him but was an interesting read

― F# A# (∞), Sunday, 12 August 2018 16:57 (six years ago)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgttPt_1IG0

― Blecch, where is thy Zing? (James Redd and the Blecchs), Sunday, 12 August 2018 16:57 (six years ago)

A nephew of his--not sure what degree of nephew; same last name, but maybe branched off a little in the family tree--was in my grade six class (four years ago, I think). He was very precocious when it came to film--he was watching Scorsese and Tarantino films at 12--and two years later, in grade 8, he made an excellent student film that looked to be imitative of The Revenant.

― clemenza, Monday, 13 August 2018 00:05 (six years ago)

few are so sublimely gifted as to scale such heights in both literature *and* assholery

we shall not see his like again

― mookieproof, Monday, 13 August 2018 00:32 (six years ago)

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