Well Earned, Huzzah!

Call it come-uppance, long in coming, but finally arrived. Someone who expresses public contempt for another whom he claims to be an ignoramus incapable of cracking open a book to educate, entertain and lose himself in the wonder of creative literature, feeling himself an exemplar of that creative process is in dire need of a pinprick of critical deflation.

Even though the old saying goes that "those who can, write; those who cannot criticize", there are more commonly now critics who also write, and very well, too. From the perspective of their own creative writing ability they sit in literary consideration of others' creations, and occasionally pronounce their unflattering conclusion.

Yann Martel, who boorishly and loudly seeks public notice for himself as a creative intellectual has long sought to bring scorn raining down on the head of Prime Minister Stephen Harper for his presumed lack of interest in matters literary. Presumptively mailing off condescending notes accompanying Mr. Martel's choice of educational reading material to Mr. Harper.

Mr. Martel may be a skilled writer with a sterling imagination, but he is also a right royal jack-ass. His egotistical search for the limelight, continually slagging Prime Minister Harper, is not one hugely appreciated by everyone. He has managed, in fact, to anger many, and those many are now quite delighted that Mr. Martel's latest publication has received the blessing of many stink-laden literary reviews.

His pretentious literary superiority toward a political figure whose intellect may tower above his own has, dare we hope, been taken down a peg or two. But perhaps not. When his literary credentials were questioned with respect to plagiarism in his highly acclaimed "Life of Pi", he metaphorically shrugged. The startling resemblance of his novel to one written by Brazilian Moacyr Scliar, was no coincidence.

His idea of creativity lacks some authenticity, in fact, since he admitted that Mr. Scliar's novel served as the inspiration for his own. Which novel in fact, he claimed, he had not read, but rather a review of the book. And from there expanded his own version of a quite similar story. "I saw a premise that I liked and I told my own story with it." Ah, but the premise is the story.

Latterly, Mr. Martel was inspired by an oft-told story; the Holocaust. And, realizing how often it has been examined like a fascinating prism with countless highlights, told from a wide variety of perspectives ranging from historical documentation to personal experience, felt he could forge an entirely new perspective, witnessing the horrors from the perspective of animal liberation. And writing in an abstruse, quasi-mystical manner.

So it is intriguing and fairly satisfying to see Mr. Martel's complacent boorishness remarked upon in an entirely other way, through comments such as that from a reviewer intent on speaking his mind because "nobody was willing to call a clear turd out for what it was". Another well-wisher suggesting, "May he move on to smaller topics with larger meanings", and "Reviewers will be puzzled and some will damn with faint praise. Unfortunately they will have good grounds for this response".

To which Mr. Martel responds, "You either want something to be positive or negative. You don't want indifference, because that means you haven't stirred them in any way". Well, Mr. Martel, no one can honestly claim you haven't stirred your critics. They suggest that whopping seven-figure advance owes nothing to this book's content and everything to your previous Life of Pi success.

And come to think of it, consider your statement in the context of your odiously unforgivable hounding of Canada's current prime minister. He is indifferent to your pestiferous advances. You have failed to stir him. He may not even notice your very existence. That seems to trouble you.

Judge not lest ye be judged; perforce, art thou judged.