Hmmmmmmmm.

Burying the Hatchet: The Death of the Negative Book Review

(illustration by Jordan Awan for The New Yorker)

I'm an editor at a micropress publisher (of POETRY, for god's sake), a huge supporter of my friends in the literary and visual arts, and a de facto agent for my wildly talented poet husband, so you would think I'm down, but I just can't play.

In a nutshell: I fear we are becoming a people who cannot take a punch, or give or receive criticism, or who are increasingly discouraged to practice intelligent discernment. Yeah, I rail against social media and the 140 character thought too, and lament what I think it is doing to us individually and culturally, but the hallowed book review shouldn't pander to the lowest common denominator, regardless of perceived bloodsport, or the possibility of the reviewed's death knell, or any comment on the self-worth of the author of the review.

Sorry for my obsession with this text at the mo', but I find it a bit micro-meta that the author mentions Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil. Sigh.

(UPDATE 9/16/2013: The transcript of The Guardian's original interview regarding Cumberbatch's views on Manning, et al has been placed on their site, and though his misguided quotes are still there, this does serve to soften via muddling his position a bit.

What to take away? The internets: never what they seem -- even this -- and designed for hits, full stop. Actors' -- even the smartish ones -- opinions: still generally not a great foundation to base your own views on, and who knows what they're actually thinking, though good on Cumberbatch for recognizing his power and reach, and/or simple need to preserve his reputation in attempting to clarify that he isn't a daft monster. Cumberbatch does truly own the internets, and damn, I wonder how much his publicist makes.

If you're still wondering about why anyone would care about what someone like Benedict Cumberbatch thinks is at all important: The Banality of Systemic Evil)

Okay, okay.

Giving 26 interviews a day, being thrust into the spotlight because of a starring role in something that tackles extremely complex issues, and being just a plain old human with human vanity and human verbal diarrhea are probably factors. But still, I hate when this happens.

Benedict Cumberbatch: Chelsea Manning Got What She Deserved

Ugh, so disappointing.

But [her] superiors might have been right to say to [her], it’s not your position to be worried about it within the hierarchy of the military organisation, which is why [she] had to be sentenced. [She] took an oath, and [she] broke that oath.

Lesson numero uno, actors: don't open your pie holes when it comes to politics unless you're extremely well-versed in your comprehension of the issue, and your name is Matt Damon.

If they are saving lives, how can we say that’s less important than civil liberties?

Ummmm, maybe I should just stop reading about your opinions and just enjoy the shiny shiny? Oh god, can't. stop. reading.

Isn’t it hypocritical to say, we should know everything about you as a government, but the government can’t know anything about us?

For the reals? Mayday, mayday, hurtling uncontrollably toward becoming un-Batched. Sad panda.

And now a word from our author:

What is heartbreaking about this set of sentences? Aside from the abandonment of the notion that individuals are obligated to the best of their ability to discover and struggle for what is right—especially as they grow up—it’s the contradiction involved in simultaneous claims to sympathy for one’s fellow humans and unthinking deference to authority. With this statement, Cumberbatch leaves us to wonder whether he understands that governments are run by groups of individuals who often use state power for their own underhanded purposes[...]America’s founders accepted a measure of mass insecurity to preserve the personal liberty they knew was essential to democracy and human dignity and happiness. Cumberbatch is not an American, but one could think that the last two-and-a-half centuries of Western fealty to this idea might have made an impression on him.

Thank you for writing what I've been thinking, Alexander Reed Kelly.