Christopher Hitchens
I wrote this about eight years ago for “In the Library.” It hints at why I hope Christopher Hitchens stays around.
Christopher Hitchens is a standing reproach to people who write the odd essay now and then. He is like some sort of crazed writing machine, he seems to average three or four longish essays a day, along with reading everything ever written and remembering all of it, knowing everyone worth knowing on most continents, visiting war zones and trouble spots around the globe, going on television and overbearing even noisy Chris Matthews’ efforts to interrupt him, and irritating people. And what’s even more painful is that this torrent of prose is nothing like the torrents of people like Joyce Carol Oates or Iris Murdoch, badly written in proportion to the torrentiality – no, this is a torrent of learned, witty, informed and informative, searching, impassioned history on the hoof. If Hitchens is a journalist then so were Gibbon and Thucydides.
Unacknowledged Legislation is a collection of essays on writers in the public sphere, as the subtitle has it. The essays are many things, but one of the most noticeable is that they are unexpected. The essay on Philip Larkin for example entirely declines the opportunity to express easy outrage, and instead digs much, much deeper. The one on Martha Nussbaum’s Poetic Justice wonders why she didn’t mention Mill’s autobiography and then at the fact that she seems unaware of the element of caricature in Dickens’ Hard Times. ‘When the utilitarian teacher M’Choakumchild – perhaps a clue there? – tells Sissy Jupe etc.’ Hitchens misses nothing.
Christopher Hitchens, Unacknowledged Legislation, Verso: 2000.
I was just rereading parts of Unacknowledged Legislation today. It’s delicious.
Thank you for this. I have not read a lot of Hitchens. The first book of his that I did read is god is not Great. I had promised not to buy any more books this month, but I have ordered Unacknowledged Legislation. I hope he sticks around too. (Anyone, by the way, who has not noticed the caricature in Hard Times has not really read it.)
Hahaha. Quite. That’s the weird thing about Nussbaum – she’s very literary in a way, but man she has a tin ear. And she’s very very earnest…maybe wit is just lost on her.
Cool that you’re a fan too Zach. Great minds! :- )
Unacknowledged Legislation is brilliant and I love the Larkin essay because among other things it gives Eagleton a good kicking. I ardently hope that this treatment works on Hitchens – the world will be a dimmer place without him. There’s no-one around who can combine the literary and political like he can.
I’ve actually skipped “God is Not Great,” preferring to read his essays and opinions. I love Hitch’s stuff — and most especially when I don’t agree with him. I hope to read a lot more essays from him that looks at things differently from the way I do, in the future.
I’ve actually skipped “God is Not Great,” …I love Hitch’s stuff — and most especially when I don’t agree with him.
The reason I haven’t read Godis Not Great either. It’s much more important to read people or writings we don’t agree with- it helps us work out what we think and why we think it more effectively. Who said we should choose our enemies much more carefully than we choose our friends?
Ophelia: Maybe I missed something somewhere, but I read your post a few hours ago and did not understand why you made the comment about Hitchens staying around. A few minutes ago I read in another site that Hitchens is being treated for cancer. I hope that he recovers quickly, so as to continue annoying us, but perhaps you could say something about his illness in your heading.
Hi amos,
Hmm, I had it in News, and I kind of wanted to leave it unstated here. Maybe you’re right…I’ll think about it.
Love, Poverty and War is also another brilliant collection of essays. His essay on Mel Gibson is hilarious!
I gave my copy of <i>Love, Poverty and War</i> away as a present. Though I don’t regret giving it away, I certainly need to buy a new copy.
Kirth, I was the same way. I only read <i>god is not Great</i> (and <i>The God Delusion</i>) because I consistently found myself being treated as (a bad caricature of) Dawkins and Hitchens in arguments. I bought these to defend the authors against misrepresentation when required. I particularly remember a nasty Youtube exchange where Hitchens was accused of wanting to put a little boy’s penis in his mouth. For those who have read <i>god is not Great</i>, they’ll recognize from where that passage was ripped. It was in response to this exchange that I bought the book.
Similarly for <i>The God Delusion</i>; I was tired of being called a “Dawkinsite” without ever having read Dawkins.
@ Zachary — I can sympathize. I read TGD mostly just to see what all the hype was over, was impressed at Dawkins’ wit and humor (“humour”?), and then kept a copy to give to the people who are always calling him “strident” and “militant” and “angry” and the like. It’s amazing how many people immediately assume that one becomes an atheist because of reading “blasphemous” anti-scripture of atheist “high priests,” rather than by thinking about religious cant and realizing that it’s not even internally consistent, much less divinely inspired.
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