Subject:
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Re: How to conduct an interview and not actually listen
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Mon, 20 Aug 2001 20:04:33 GMT
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Viewed:
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188 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Dave Schuler writes:
> In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Larry Pieniazek writes:
> > http://www.salon.com/books/feature/2000/02/03/card/index.html
> >
> > Wow, I think that is about the most self serving piece (and worst interview)
> > I've ever seen in Salon...(1) IMHO this interviewer epitomizes much of
> > what's wrong with american journalism in one nice neat package.
> > 1 - which is very damning, since Salon is pretty bad, overall
> > 2 - Focus on [Minkowitz's] technique, not the interviewee, if you would.
>
> I haven't previously read much of Salon, so I can't speak to complaints
> about its overall style, but I agree that--as a straightforward
> interview--this one is lacking. However, it *is* an interesting exploration
> of several forms of textual critique.
OK... Wasn't billed that way though.
> Minkowitz spells out her intent to interview Card as a way of engaging in
> biographical literary criticism, and along the way wades through political
> and psychoanalytical criticism, as well.
But did she let the *subject* in on this intent? I don't think so, it looks
like to me that it was billed (to Card) as just a normal interview. Card, in
a perfect world, would have read some of her previous work, and would have
been better prepared for her manipulative gamesmanship, I suppose. But we're
all busy, I guess.
> She makes the excellent excellent
> excellent point that the author is not the work, nor does the author's
> political/social/sexual/religious philosophy have anything to do with the
> quality of a work.
I would agree with this, it IS a pretty profound observation. Doesn't make
up for the rest though.
> Her statement on page two that "I don't want to know if
> the book he wrote is so different than the beautiful one I read" is
> fantastic, since it crystalizes the truth that an author's intent is
> separate from his finished work. (I'd go on, but I can hear everyone snoring
> already...)
It would have been better if she had more clearly stated what book it was
she actually perceived it as.
> Again, I don't know how Salon usually operates, and Minkowitz hasn't
> penned anything like a conventional interview, but if you're not looking for
> a conventional interview then there's no problem. It struck me less as an
> interview and more as an article about a reader's expectation of an author
> based on his works versus the reader's experience of an author based on
> face-to-face conversation. In that capacity it works very well, if one can
> look past Minkowitz's own proselytizing in the meantime.
It was worse the proselytizing, in my book, it was distortivism. If she
really truly wanted to explain what was going on, perhaps an aural interview
wasn't the way to go, but rather something written down with multiple
exchanges (kind of what we are doing here). This may actually be the
exception to the rule that direct communication is better than written...
> > Card isn't perfect (someone who thinks communitarianism is a good idea has to
> > be somewhat suspect, and I'm not sure I agree with him about gays being
> > biologically defective (if that's what he said, I can't be sure)...)
>
> You're right--it's unclear if that's what he means, but he clearly (and
> preposterously) identifies homosexuality as a mental aberration.
That's where we diverge all right... It MIGHT be an aberration in a few
cases but for the most part I see it as a lifestyle choice more than
anything else. One that deserves no special treatment (in either direction).
> He
> bristles at the charge of "homophobe," but from this article, at least, he
> seems like a textbook case. That in itself doesn't make him a good or bad
> writer, of course, anymore than his religion makes him a good or bad one.
Not in itself, agreed. We all can dig up examples of those we agree with who
are poor at their art and those we disagree with who are good at their art,
surely.
But... (and here I disagree with myself a bit) if the author lets their
viewpoint color everything, it makes for bad writing. Such as L. Neil Smith,
for example, who lets his libertarianism color his work so badly that it's
(at least to me) total schlocky dreck.
Or (self referentially) such as Ms. Minkowitz, the subject of my diatribe.
++Lar
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