to think that this is a really weird premise for a novel? (Lionel Shriver)

Ah, yet another intelligent successful woman being attacked on social media because she’s dared to defend women’s freedom of speech / satirise trans fanaticism. 🥱

Gah! You keep missing the point completely

@AllProperTeaIsTheft summed it up in this post, about the fifth one on the thread:

She's not trying to say that we are a millimetre away from lauding stupidity or banning anyone for saying some people are less intelligent than others. It's a thinly-veiled criticism of the fact that people are censoredand cancelled for saying that men can't be women. I'm pretty sure I read in an interview with her that she said the trans debate is the closest thing to what she's depicting in the book.

A genius can be a hopeless semstress and a magnificent painter may be a bit dumb. Really, an obsession with any aspect of personality loses perspective. One person is good at something but bad at something else. This, I think, is ALWAYS true. You have to find what you yourself are good at.

In this way, we are all equal. You cannot elevate one thing above all others, it's a ridiculous position to do so.

She’s writing satire. We don’t need to agree with her or like her but the quality of her writing and intellect is excellent in my opinion and this (minor) furore here just goes to show how apropos this work is. I look forward to reading it.

I really liked "So Much For That". Very real.

Of course there isn't free speech in the UK, there never has been, she knows that perfectly well. D notices anyone? No broadcasting of terrorist voices? It's one of the major legal differences from the USA. She's being very selective in complaining about it.

Sounds like an update of Harrison Bergeron by Vonnegut. 1961.

I like Lionel, me. She's hilarious. Also in person kind of looks like Harrison Ford.😊

How much Lionel Shriver have you actually read? Her novels are all issue-based, often involving satirical, slightly- skewed alternative universes or near futures, egThe Mundibles is set in 2029 after the US has gone bankrupt and Mexico builds a wall to prevent US migrants crossing the border. She’s been entirely upfront about her dislike of what she terms ‘woke’ politics, and says there is no longer free speech in the UK.

Lionel Shriver’s biggest issue has always and will always be that she isn’t the universally acclaimed intellect she thinks she is.

She got lucky with Kevin and since then has been on a one track road to be as offensive for attention as possible, rather than letting her writing garner the validation and fame she’s desperate for. I don’t disagree with the comparison to Katie Hopkins but I think Katie would at least have the self awareness not to be as anti immigration and xenophobic as Shriver is whilst being an immigrant.

For all her self assured genius, Shriver can be incredibly thick when it comes to common sense.

@nojudge

I think underneath it all, she's very odd, and most likely ND

Why do you think she is ND? Are all people who are odd ND?

I hate LS politics but still love her books. The last one I read was Should We Stay or Should We go? which was published in 2022 and was excellent. I'll probably read this book too.

What exactly from The Handmaid’s Tale do you think is perilously close in the US?

Remember that neither the UK nor Ireland has a right to free speech or a right to unlimited access to information, and if there was a reason for removing records of M A S's activities during the peace negotiations in Ireland it would have been done thoroughly.

See also the activities of Sue Gray.

But that (M A S) is what she was known as, and given a public voice as. I'm sure there is plenty of documentary evidence south of the border but have long noted the way her NI records have been airbrushed out. Clearly friends not just in low places, but in official places.

Yes. It’s surely not that difficult to grasp.

Yeah, I looked up “Margaret Ann Shriver” with “Northern Ireland” and I’m finding zip.

I don’t think she has claimed to cancelled though. She does comment on what she observes happening more widely. My point is, she is an exceptional fiction writer ( in my opinion). Her politics are irrelevant as far as me choosing to read her books or not.

I like Lionel Shriver. Often don’t agree with her but she’s one of the few writers who is brave enough to say what she thinks about things and to continue to make the case for fiction as fiction and for freedom of speech.

@nojudge As an American, I think we’re quite a ways away from assigning fertile women to elite men, changing their names, and forcing them to submit to rape in front of the elite men’s wives so they can have babies they’re forced to hand over. 🙄 There are serious discussions to be had about women and reproduction in the US, but “OMG, it’s practically The Handmaid’s Tale!” is overwrought fear-mongering. And yes, before you ask, I say the same thing to American women who make your same comparison.

"Google" doesn't have it as anything. Multiple websites state it. Was she not known as Lionel when she was in Northern Ireland?

@Yanksplaining, she was 'Margaret Ann Shriver' on Irish radio during the 1990s, when she was in her 30s or 40s. She may have used the name Lionel in some contexts, and certainly published Kevin under it, but she uttered her support for violent paramilitaries in Ireland as Margaret Ann.

I really like Lionel Shriver, and some of her writings have made me feel slightly uncomfortable and jumped back into my mind months later - surely that’s the impact a thought provoking author should have? I will read her new book. She has rightly commented about the chilling of free speech in western democracies and the subversion of language to cater to current political correctness. People should be able to to state challenging and controversial views (and be challenged right back if you disagree) without being harassed, cancelled or pilloried. She also seems justifiably irritated by the current celebration of victim status culture.

Definitely OTT about covid lockdown restrictions in my opinion, no-one had a clue what was likely to happen at that time so no point going on about things after the event.

I wouldn’t choose not to read something fictional just because some people (or me) disagree with their political views.

Personally, I'm totally cool with her changing her name.

I'm not cool with her wholesale adoption of right-wing anti-immigrant views.

I suspect the name change (well into her 30s if not 40s, not 'age 15' as Google has it, was a deliberate ploy to make her earlier comments and commentary unsearchable when she left Belfast after the Good Friday agreement and in the comparative peace and prosperity that followed. She supported some very dangerous people - the likes of Taylor, Robinson and Donaldson used to disassociate themselves. Scary woman.

What’s your issue with her name? She’s gone by Lionel since she was fifteen and I’m pretty sure that’s been her legal name for some time.