Quick question

[yendi]

So, you're reading a fantasy novel, set in a world without our history or religions.

And there's a parsimonious, amoral banker/moneylender. Not an unusual character archetype, right?

And then that character is described as "hook-nosed."

Do you have a negative reaction to this?

Comments

[rm.livejournal.com]

Yes.

[heathrow.livejournal.com]

Deeply.

[martinhesselius.livejournal.com]

I'll likely roll my eyes.

[malinaldarose.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't have, had you not asked, because I wouldn't have given any thought to the description; it would merely have been a physical descriptor without any, er, freight. It took me a couple of minutes to figure out why you asked the question, even.

[yendi]

*nod* That's one of the reasons I try to be very cognizant of my own privilege when I hear someone complain about race, class, or other problematic writings, and not to jerk my knee in defense. It's so easy to overlook when you're not in group likely to take offense.

[greylistening.livejournal.com]

This!

[rain-herself.livejournal.com]

Exactly this.

[rubian77.livejournal.com]

Ditto.

But then, I'm somewhat blind/ignorant/otherwise clueless when it comes to certain things that other people "know" about certain creeds/races/ethnic groups/classes/stereotypes.

Person A: "Oh, that's a [group] (name/face/feature/trait)."
Me: (boggles) "How can you tell??"

I have no "gaydar," either.

[samhenderson.livejournal.com]

Oh yes.

[yendi]

Heh. Did I mention that it got a star from PW, and blurbs from Hugo and Campbell winners?

[samhenderson.livejournal.com]

I could see it happening with necessarily even thinking of the stereotype, just going automatically with the "hook-nosed miser" shorthand. But unless the author is terribly naive, I don't see how one could use that description without knowing what it implied - it's just so well known (whereas it seems to me more people wouldn't necessarily be aware, frex, about the word "gypped").

*nod*

[avivasedai.livejournal.com]

I try not to use that word either since I found out its etymology.

[spacehawk.livejournal.com]

Not surprised at all, given my line of work.

[rosefox]

Now I'm curious: which book is this?

Yup.

[avivasedai.livejournal.com]

Small thinking on the part of the author. If you want to write a fantasy book in another world with other whole societies, don't stick to your own prejudices or societal imprinting.

It would depend on how the whole thing was written, how long it would take me to get pissed off.

Re: Yup.

[yendi]

I actually missed it the first time (it's a looong book, and I went back to check a character bit), but I can't see how no other reader has caught it. Once I caught it, I couldn't let go.

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

Fuuuuuuuck yes.

[spacehawk.livejournal.com]

+1

[cbpotts.livejournal.com]

Yes. (Except for my knee-jerk mental image of this book being populated entirely by Muppets, with Gonzo as the banker in question, but that's probably not at all what you're talking about)

[yendi]

Heh. Gonzo would be the worst banker ever.

[cbpotts.livejournal.com]

but what a story THAT would be!

(The Economist: Now with Muppets!)

[creentmerveille.livejournal.com]

Please, somebody write this. :)

[chris-walsh.livejournal.com]

I love that you wrote this.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I've always assumed Gonzo is Jewish, personally.

Not because of the nose, but just because he reminds me of so many of my friends from Brandeis, including myself.

[greylistening.livejournal.com]

Hee!

[readingthedark.livejournal.com]

Barring a whole lot of context (there are 412 carefully described evil money lenders and one happens to have that nose shape, there are enough povs that this is the antagonist and we know a comeuppance awaits, the pov's super tight and the character's legitimately being used to explore stereotyping, etc.) I might give up on the book right then. There's no way that's unconscious even though it's often unconscionable. I have no problem with characters who hate people or have outgroups...but fantasy that's not focused on history or religions and just leans that hard on that kind of cliche is likely so badly written in other ways that I'd already be looking for an excuse to move on. (I start at least a hundred books a year and probably only finish about thirty and used to start three hundred and finish seventy-five.)

It's funny. If I type about this long enough, I'll come up with dozens of ways it can work for me. (Character's family was just burned alive by people of that type but they fall in love with a person of that type and see they were wrong, etc. (Cheesy on the surface, but could work if done on a small enough or grand enough scale.) I think racism (or cultural insensitivity, etc.) is fair game for fantasy--but I just know that whatever book you're talking about isn't doing any of the things that, in context, could potentially make it a viable move.

Simply, I believe writers should be able to try every trick and that characters are always based on something--but there's a point where being mean to score points or cut corners is sillier (and often even offensive) than it is useful.

Slow answer to a quick question. Sorry.

[yendi]

*nod* Had it been a prejudice voiced by a character, that would have been different. Even if I accept that it was unconscious (and I'm a little more willing to do so than you are), it's still unconscionable, and amazing that it could make it past the author's re-reads, editing, reviews, blurbs, etc. Especially since it happens in the first eight pages.

[spacehawk.livejournal.com]

and amazing that it could make it past the author's re-reads, editing, reviews, blurbs, etc. Especially since it happens in the first eight pages.

I'm not amazed at all -- I've run into quite a lot of racism etc. that's made it explicitly out into the pages of relatively recent (and well-read) books. I'd be amazed at a book that didn't have a racial/ethnic problem somewhere in it.

This status quo also pisses me off like woah.

[rafaela.livejournal.com]

Short answer: yes, it would bother me.

[jennythe-reader.livejournal.com]

If I thought they did it because they were lazy, or if this were the only character who's nose shape was mentioned, then I'd be annoyed.

Otherwise I probably wouldn't notice.

[creentmerveille.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't have assigned it any type of positive or negative association, would have just taken it at face value (pun not intended)-- the character had a hook-shaped nose.

But now, after reading the comments and understanding what MIGHT be intended by that, yeah, I suppose that's distasteful. It never occurred to me that it could be alluding to a stereotype before. :/

[grntserendipity.livejournal.com]

I'd want to throw the book at a wall. But I don't have much tolerance for anything like this.

[adam-0oo.livejournal.com]

Well now I do.

[spacehawk.livejournal.com]

Hell yeah.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I doubt it was intentional.

Which means that the author internalized it.

[marlowe1.livejournal.com]

Does he also talk with his hands and seem rather nervous?

[greylistening.livejournal.com]

Absofrackinglutely.

Mrr?

[dark-blade.livejournal.com]

Hook-nosed parsimonious amoral money people... Scrooge? Cyrano de Bergerac wouldn't really fit, but I recall he had a big nose. So did Captain Hook, though he was more in the business of swiping and hoarding money than lending it out.

Re: Mrr?

[yendi]

Scrooge's antisemitic roots have been noted many times, and are hard to overlook (following a long tradition going back to Shylock).

Neither Cyrano nor Hook fit the bill here -- neither of them combine the hook nose with other offensive Jewish stereotypes (not to mention, Cyrano was a real non-Jewish person).

Re: Mrr?

[dark-blade.livejournal.com]

They have been? I've never evaluated a Christmas Carol.. I don't think I've actually read it, either.

I seem to have a particular blind spot for most Jewish stereotypes. Conversation from early in college:

"For example, you shouldn't say 'Jew someone down.'"

Me: "What?? What does that even mean? I didn't think Jewish people proselytized."

A friend of mine mentioned something or other that made me remark, "Oh, I didn't know you were Jewish." He just kinda stared at me for a moment before asking, "Seriously?! My last name is COHEN." ... is that specifically a biblical surname? You're the only Cohen I know. "... YES." Ok. And? My last name (at the time was) Jackson but that doesn't mean I'm black...

My cultural sensitivity at the time was a desire to smack the jerks scrawling schwastikas on Abby's lunchbag during Passover upside their effin HEADS, trying to maintain some level of awareness of the holidays so as not to schedule a major rpg event on Friday nights or to conflict, and trying to remember food rules for different people.

Re: Mrr?

[rubian77.livejournal.com]

I seem to have a particular blind spot for most Jewish stereotypes.

OMG, I always thought it was just me!!

[omnia-mutantur.livejournal.com]

I honestly wouldn't have noticed, and couldn't parse it as racism until I'd read all the comments.

I'd be uncomfortable with it now, much as I became uncomfortable gypped when I learned where it came from, but I don't think I had any associations with hook nosed other than I'm pretty sure Cleopatra was said to have one and I don't know if that implies a cultural insensitivity. Which isn't to say that my ignorance makes it okay, just that, in answer to your question, some things pass me by.

[rubian77.livejournal.com]

Which isn't to say that my ignorance makes it okay, just that, in answer to your question, some things pass me by.

Right, exactly!! Because people are people. That's it, end of discussion. What difference is the rest?

[eilonwy.livejournal.com]

Do you have a negative reaction to this?

Yes. Yes I do.

[darknbitter.livejournal.com]

No.
But then again unless specified, I assume all characters look like me.
(Also I used to work in finance.)

Honestly...

[taura-g.livejournal.com]

I never really been sure waht people mean by the term "hook-nosed".

The image of a Hawk's beak keeps coming to mind.

[rosefox]

OH yes.

[matt_doyle]

Since I now know what book you're talking about, I know that I missed it myself -- but yes, the descriptor is problematic. I can see how it would slip by the author -- when I think of that character type, I think of Scrooge, and I do picture Scrooge the way he was shown to me, which is with a hooked nose -- but as you say, there are very well-documented antisemitic connotations here. An editor or proofreader should have caught it, even if the author didn't, and it bothers me that it seems to have slipped through so many presumed filters (including my own) unnoticed.

[bonnie-rocks.livejournal.com]

>_>

~*::Meow::*~