More Lies; Today's Literary Analysis: How Political Context Changes the Quality of a Literary Work

Allen, Webb, truth, fiction

The Traditional Values Coalition is calling on Jim Webb to withdraw from the Senate race in Virginia because of what it calls "XXX-rated writing" in some of his novels.

Never mind that Webb's novels are fiction -- or, as TVC's executive director puts it in the group's press release, "fiction." Never mind that the book singled out in TVC's press release -- Webb's "Lost Soldiers" -- was praised at the time of its publication by Republican Sen. John McCain, who said it "captures well the lingering scars of the war" in Vietnam.

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And never mind that leading lights on the right have written a fair amount of smut for smut's sake. There's a "pouting sex kitten," an "exotic mistress" and "after-bout inhalation" in Newt Gingrich's "1945. " In Lynne Cheney's 1981 novel "Sisters," the female heroine sees two women in a lesbian embrace and feels "curiously moved, curiously envious of them." And in Scooter Libby's 1998 book, "The Apprentice," a 10-year-old girl is placed in a cage with a bear that has been "trained to couple with young girls."

Link.

Conclusion: The quality of an unaltered literary work changes when the author changes his party affiliation! Amazing!