Culture

Reviewing Roberto and Rupert

February 04, 2009
Wiping the smile of Rupert's face…
Wiping the smile of Rupert's face…

Two of our reviews are free to read online this month. In the first, I join the ranks of those writing about Roberto Bolaño's Latin American epic 2666: a 900-page monster of a text that appeared in Spanish in 2003 and that has been trailing clouds of glory towards the English-speaking world ever since—a momentum that has if anything been enhanced by the tragic death of Bolaño himself, in 2003. It's a mad, tremendous book; as much as anything, though, I was fascinated by the force of its critical reception, and why such a wild and demanding work should have hit such "a masochistic sweet spot in modern sensibilities."

Secondly, we at Prospect were delighted to give a home to Kim Fletcher's wry take on Michael Wolff's equally wry biography of Rupert Murdoch, The Man Who Owns the News. Originally written for the Telegraph, the piece failed to see the light of day there—perhaps because it cuts a little too close to the tender bones of the newspaper profession—but it's a loving dissection of Wolff's strategy. As Fletcher puts it, "Wolff does one of those things that journalists can still do. He speaks truth to power. At least, he speaks the truth as identified by a smartypants liberal New York writer." Murdoch and his variously mocked hench-people have, one gathers, taken a rather different view of the matter.