Just after Anne Enright won this year's Booker prize, I read the following headline: Why Prize-Winning Author 'Dislikes The McCanns'. I didn't read the article, but it immediately made me dislike Anne Enright and not want to read her book. I know it's unreasonable, but that was my knee-jerk reaction.
Happily reading Jen Lancaster's second book, Bright Lights, Big Ass, I was more than a little disconcerted to find her waxing lyrical about Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity and Fox News.
Earlier this week on the Guardian books blog, Ben Myers wrote a piece entitled "Do writers' filthy opinions soil their books?" with the subtitle "Reading the work of authors whose private opinions are unforgivably extreme is a very uneasy experience."
So are you bothered by the politics or opinions of an author? Would you read the books of someone with wildly opposing politics or would you avoid reading anything by anyone you wouldn't want to sit next to on a plane or at a dinner party (assuming you don't like to instigate food fights at dinner parties)?
Basically: Do you care about authors' personal opinions? Yay or Nay and Why?
[Don't forget it's Yay or Nay day at Hippyshopper, Bridalwave, Dollymix, Corrie Blog, Catwalk Queen, Kiss and Makeup, The Bag Lady, Shoewawa and Shiny Shiny, too!]
