JKR's essay wins Russell prize

[TheChampagneGalop]

www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-55350905
"JK Rowling is almost certainly the greatest writer of English children's fiction of her generation, and a remarkable humanitarian. It turns out she writes exhilaratingly powerful prose too.

In a blog about the transgender debate, she offended many people. Offence is the price of free speech. Those offended felt she was questioning their identity and even attacking their human rights, which they argue is a form of discrimination or hate speech.

I take absolutely no view whatsoever on the issues that she raises.

I do take an issue on abuse and trolling, and Rowling has achieved the inglorious honour of topping many a league table for those. The deluge of hatred that she faced before writing this blog made it brave, and it was nothing compared to what came after. Talking about bravery, so too, by the way, was Suzanne Moore's engrossing, long, personal essay for Unherd on why she left the Guardian.

We should all applaud bravery in writers - even those with whom we disagree. And Rowling's essay contained moments of both real beauty and piercing honesty, as when she revealed that she is a survivor of domestic abuse and sexual assault.

What the judges - that is, the voices in my head - most admired about the writing was the plain English. It is an interesting fact about rhetoric that if you want people to understand something, plain, mono-syllabic words are usually your best bet: "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country".

Or think of the final line from Enoch Powell's most notorious speech: "All I know is that to see, and not to speak, would be the great betrayal."

I'm not endorsing the argument; but the rhetorical power of that line comes from the fact that there are 16 words, the first 15 of which have one syllable, and the last of which has three.

Compare it with this line in Rowling's essay: "So I want trans women to be safe. At the same time, I do not want to make natal girls and women less safe."

The rhetorical power from those two sentences derives partly from the plainness of the English. Only "women" (twice) and "natal" contain more than one syllable.

If you're ever editing copy that seems verbose, go through it and think about cutting syllables while conveying the same meaning. Plain English has power. JK Rowling gets that.
In his essay for Rolling Stone, Wade Davis captures what he believes is the end of American pre-eminence"

[AskingQuestionsAllTheTime]

MoltenLasagne
It's differentiating between women and transwomen. That's not acceptable. Nor is it acceptable to say natal women, when transwomen were born women but just had a different genital configuration. See also, claims to female and, amusingly, latest claims to being cis-women.

The people I showed it to were not I suppose the wokest of the woke, just ordinary people not looking to find offence where there is none.

[ArabellaScott]

@lionheart

The twitter swamp is seething.

Standard.

[WinterIsGone]

The story has made its way into the Mail today...
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9098827/Transgender-critics-slam-BBC-naming-JK-Rowlings-sex-gender-essay-good-writing-prize-list.html

[ArabellaScott]

Only two comments. How odd, especially as one of them that says 'I'm behind JKR 100% of the way.' has over a thousand up-votes.

[lionheart]

Just saw this (rumour):

meaww.com/jk-rowling-transgender-publisher-hodder-stoughton-dropping-ickabog-pulling-out-source-new-book

[AnyOldPrion]

Little-Brown published the Ickabog, so hopefully it’s false. They also stood up to some of their staff who threatened to strike over it before publication.
Seems unlikely they’d withdraw it now.

[EdgeOfACoin]

Also, why would they pull out now rather than a few months ago?

I'm sceptical.

[NotBadConsidering]

Well I bought a beautiful hardback copy of The Ickabog the other day from, of all places, an actual book shop! It’s fantastic and the drawings in it from children a just lovely.

[SulisMinerva]

It’s also a bestseller so it would seem financially foolish to withdraw it.

[ArabellaScott]

Seems highly unlikely.

[lionheart]

It would be daft on so many levels.

[WarOnWomen]

Highly unlikely since Ickabog is number 48 on the children's best sellers list on Amazon. In fact, out of the 9 fiction books in the top 50, 8 of them are JKR's books. The rest are all study skills books.

As far as I am concerned the whole article is clickbait.

[AngryBananaSund]

That’s interesting, the url used to lead to an article saying that the book was going to be withdrawn, now it only says it’s price is going to be dropped

I wonder why the change

[lionheart]

Backtracking.

[Labobo]

Not one person I know who is outraged by JK Rowling's essay has read it. I always suggest they do before they judge her, because it is a model of calm, compassionate, fair and rational argument. They always make excuses and change the subject.

[ArabellaScott]

What utter twaddle. Books get discounted after they've earned out their advance/costs, in the usual course of things. Although Rowling's such an unbelievable outlier that I daresay things may work very differently when it comes to her (inevitable) bestsellers. Someone is reaching so hard they're in danger of turning themselves inside-out and wearing bollocks for earrings.