Ex & The Single Girl & Elitiest Attitudes

[redbrunja]

So a while back, Ex & The Single Girl by Lani Diane Riche was offered as a free kindle download, which I totally took advantage of.

As romances go, it's a decent little romp. Nothing particularly unexpected, nothing really offensive, amusing enough.

With one exception:

First, the heroine of Riche's novel thought that Marlowe was Shakespeare and BOOM, so much sympathy lost.

The only people who actually fucking think Marlowe was Shakespeare are elitist fucks whose argument boils down to, 'my classist sensibilities can't handle sophisticated plays being written by someone who didn't have a high level of formal education.'

At the end of the novel, the heroine switches her dissertation topic from writing about Pride & Prejudice (so cliche) to writing about how Marlowe was Shakespeare which, aside from offending me so deeply, is also a fucking terrible subject for a dissertation. Because there is nothing new to say about it and no actual proof that Marlowe was Shakespeare. 'Why otherwise intelligent people think Shakespeare didn't write his plays and what that says about their classist pride and ivory tower prejudices' - that would be a good subject for a dissertation.

Comments

[just-shai.livejournal.com]

I once read a romance novel where Shakespeare was Elizabeth's bastard daughter. XD

[edgeoftheocean8.livejournal.com]

Hahaha so much love for that rant. I hate when people don't see that the "Shakespeare can't have been Shakespeare" thing isn't just some clever conspiracy theory but actually pretty offensive.

[deathmallow.livejournal.com]

Ugh. Look, if Abraham Lincoln could be one of our most highly esteemed presidents, an extremely astute politician, and a talented wordsmith whose speeches have lasted, with less than a year of formal education to his credit, Shakespeare can fucking well be written by Shakespeare. Or are we arguing that Lincoln really wasn't Lincoln either?

[tigerpetals.livejournal.com]

Last week I read an ebook romance called The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo by Zen Cho. It's on Amazon and Smashwords for other ereaders. Jade Yeo is a Malaysian writer in the twenties, making her living in Britain. The pIot starts when her negative review of a book by a well-connected author gains attention. I found it a fun and witty book that criticized colonialism as well as having a romance I actually loved.

[lokifan]

THANK YOU. PRECISELY.

I get so utterly enraged by this. I mean, if someone else was Shakespeare, it wouldn't matter at all - but yes, the argument is ALWAYS 'uneducated people from the Midlands can't write beautifully.'

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

I get so utterly enraged by this. I mean, if someone else was Shakespeare, it wouldn't matter at all - but yes, the argument is ALWAYS 'uneducated people from the Midlands can't write beautifully.'

Right? And Shakespeare, as a person who existed, is RIDICULOUSLY well-documented for a person of that era. There is NO REASON to think that he didn't write the play attributed to him. (Except elitist douchebaggery.)