The follow-up

The book I was talking about yesterday was Joe Abercrombie's Best Served Cold.

The evil banker -- incidentally, a completely gratuitous character, imho, there mainly because Abercrombie wanted there to be seven people against whom the main character seeks revenge, but who really has no reason to be there during the big betrayal scene -- is described as "hook-nosed within the first ten pages, then later is referred to as having a "hooked nose" right before he's killed (not really a spoiler; he's the second victim in the revenge story). I missed the term the first time (it's a 600-page book, and the opening few pages are not the most exciting in the world), but caught it the second.

No, I don't for a second believe that Joe Abercrombie is actively antisemitic; shit like that would have come out ages ago. But he's internalized a stereotype here, one that, as others have noted, at best shows lazy writing, and also indicates a mix of privilege and ignorance.

I also don't consider my anonymous PW colleague who starred the book, or George R. R. Martin or Lev Grossman (who blurbed it) to be incompetent for missing it; Abercrombie strengths are in his dialogue and action, and missing two descriptors in a 600+ page book is not unusual. Further, as the comments on my last post show, it's pretty easy to approach this from a privileged POV that doesn't even see this as a problem (and again, that's not a criticism of anyone who wasn't offended; it's simply an acknowledgement of the society we live in).

The lesson I'm taking away is to be more vigilant as a reader and a writer; I'll generally catch privileged and prejudiced works that toe the antisemitic line; but I've got my own share of privilege (many shares, in fact), and being aware of white and male privilege when I read is something I strive to do. I know I fail at times, though, and my goal is to fail less often. I hope that's the goal of other folks, too, including Abercrombie.

For the record, I tried to soldier on, but failed. Enjoyable as the book is overall, it's just not something I can overlook; some things can't be unseen.

The follow-up

The book I was talking about yesterday was Joe Abercrombie's Best Served Cold.

The evil banker -- incidentally, a completely gratuitous character, imho, there mainly because Abercrombie wanted there to be seven people against whom the main character seeks revenge, but who really has no reason to be there during the big betrayal scene -- is described as "hook-nosed" within the first ten pages, then later is referred to as having a "hooked nose" right before he's killed (not really a spoiler; he's the second victim in the revenge story). I missed the term the first time (it's a 600-page book, and the opening few pages are not the most exciting in the world), but caught it the second.

No, I don't for a second believe that Joe Abercrombie is actively antisemitic; shit like that would have come out ages ago. But he's internalized a stereotype here, one that, as others have noted, at best shows lazy writing, and also indicates a mix of privilege and ignorance.

I also don't consider my anonymous PW colleague who starred the book, or George R. R. Martin or Lev Grossman (who blurbed it) to be incompetent for missing it; Abercrombie strengths are in his dialogue and action, and missing two descriptors in a 600+ page book is not unusual. Further, as the comments on my last post show, it's pretty easy to approach this from a privileged POV that doesn't even see this as a problem (and again, that's not a criticism of anyone who wasn't offended; it's simply an acknowledgement of the society we live in).

The lesson I'm taking away is to be more vigilant as a reader and a writer; I'll generally catch privileged and prejudiced works that toe the antisemitic line, but I've got my own share of privilege (many shares, in fact), and being aware of white and male privilege when I read is something I strive to do. I know I fail at times, though, and my goal is to fail less often. I hope that's the goal of other folks, too, including Abercrombie.

For the record, I tried to soldier on, but failed. It's just not something I can overlook; some things can't be unseen.