I was having this argument with my friend recently about award-winning novels. I find them stodgy and inaccessible. She thinks I’m not applying myself to the pages long enough to get it. In defense, I invoked a literary heavyweight—Martin Amis. He was quoted a few weeks ago as saying, “There was a great fashion in the last century, and it’s still with us, of the unenjoyable novel. And these are the novels which win prizes, because the committee thinks, ‘Well it’s not at all enjoyable, and it isn’t funny, therefore it must be very serious.’”
She tried to tell me that Amis has sour grapes from his Booker Prize near-miss in the early nineties. We need someone to settle this. —Paul Hawkins

It may have been sour grapes, but don’t you think Amis is right? The worst is when the judges of literary prizes try to legislate from the bench—flexing their “muscle” by giving a prize to some book that nobody’s ever heard of, or passing over a popular favorite because it’s “too obvious” or “doesn’t need it.” As I wrote the other week, when it comes to literary merit (or sex appeal) there is no such thing as too obvious. And most unfun novels are not much good. My heart sinks when I see a list of unknowns as finalists for a prize I care about. It is usually a case of committee work or telling people what they ought to like (and already know they don’t).Then there are wonderful exceptions, like Tinkers, a fine novel rescued from obscurity by the Pulitzer Prize. Or—a very different case—the most recent recipient of the Nobel, Mario Vargas Llosa, a writer who has been accused of many things, but never of being hard to read.

I am a terrible procrastinator. In order to avoid writing assignments, I clean, respond to e-mails sent months ago (which I neglected to reply to promptly because, well, you know), and watch hours of dubious television. Once I’ve actually started, I find the writing process pretty painless—even enjoyable. But I just can’t bring myself to open that word document and start working until the very last minute. Any advice? —Laurie

Are these assignments paying the rent? If so, then get cracking. The trick is to let yourself write badly—as badly as you need to, in order to make your word count and your deadline. At least, that’s what works for me. If these assignments come without a paycheck or a deadline, however, and if you find that you keep avoiding them, I think it’s worth asking yourself why. Maybe you don’t want to do them. Nothing feels better than walking away from a job you don’t want to do.

Or maybe it’s just your style to do things at the last minute. If you can swing it, well, congratulations. In that case, my only advice is to forget about your work until you do it. In the meantime, enjoy those reruns!

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