Peut-on encore aimer les oeuvres de Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, Roman Polanski et Michael Jackson ? Dans cet essai qui a fait beaucoup de bruit lors de sa sortie aux États-Unis, Claire Dederer, critique de cinéma pour le New York Times, explore un malaise qui s'est installé dans toutes les conversations : certains de nos films, livres et musiques préférés ont été créés par des « monstres ».
À la fois ode au plaisir d'une journaliste cinéphile qui raconte avec passion les oeuvres et confession d'une fan qui s'est sentie trahie, Les Monstres développe l'idée de « taches » sur les productions artistiques, aussi soudaines qu'indélébiles, devenues impossibles à ignorer. Il ne s'agit pas de dresser une liste noire de créateurs mais plutôt de proposer une réflexion sur la rencontre entre la biographie d'un artiste et celle de son public - dans la diversité des expériences et des traumatismes individuels. Claire Dederer examine une société post-romantique où le génie, qui avait été auréolé d'une gloire toute virile, n'est plus exempté de jugement moral.
Une oeuvre peut-elle être destituée à cause des actions répréhensibles de son créateur ? Quel que soit son contenu ? Et si elle a été réalisée avant le passage à l'acte de l'auteur, cela doit-il infléchir notre jugement ? Mais surtout, peut-on continuer à aimer ces oeuvres malgré tout ?
Véritable best-seller aux États-Unis, l'essai de Claire Dederer est une contribution essentielle au débat public. Conçu comme un Contre Sainte-Beuve contemporain et féministe, Les Monstres pétille de drôlerie et d'érudition, sans jamais tomber dans le relativisme ni la caricature.
Traduit de l'anglais (États-Unis) par Carine Chichereau
''How rare and nourishing this sort of roaming thought is and what a joy to read'' MEGAN NOLAN, Sunday Times
''An exhilarating, shape-shifting exploration of the perilous boundaries between art and life'' JENNY OFFILL
Pablo Picasso beat his partners. Richard Wagner was deeply antisemitic. David Bowie slept with an underage fan. But many of us still love Guernica and the Ring cycle and Ziggy Stardust.
And what are we to do with that love? How are we, as fans, to reckon with the biographical choices of the artists whose work sustains us?
Wildly smart and insightful, Monsters is an exhilarating attempt to understand our relationship with art and the artist in the twenty-first century.
''An incredible book, the best work of criticism I have read in a very long time'' NICK HORNBY
''Part memoir, part treatise, and all treat'' New York Times
From the author of the New York Times best seller Poser and the acclaimed memoir Love and Trouble, Monsters is «part memoir, part treatise, and all treat» (The New York Times). This unflinching, deeply personal book expands on Claire Dederer's instantly viral Paris Review essay, "What Do We Do with the Art of Monstrous Men?"
Can we love the work of artists such as Hemingway, Sylvia Plath, Miles Davis, Polanski, or Picasso? Should we? Dederer explores the audience's relationship with artists from Michael Jackson to Virginia Woolf, asking: How do we balance our undeniable sense of moral outrage with our equally undeniable love of the work? Is male monstrosity the same as female monstrosity? And if an artist is also a mother, does one identity inexorably, and fatally, interrupt the other? In a more troubling vein, she wonders if an artist needs to be a monster in order to create something great. Does genius deserve special dispensation? Does art have a mandate to depict the darker elements of the psyche? And what happens if the artist stares too long into the abyss?
Highly topical, morally wise, honest to the core, Monsters is certain to incite a conversation about whether and how we can separate artists from their art.
A passionate, provocative, blisteringly smart interrogation of how we make and experience art in the age of #MeToo, and of the link between genius and monstrosity. - From the author of the New York Times best seller Poser and the acclaimed memoir Love and Trouble "Thrillingly sharp, appropriately doubtful, and more fun than you would believe, given the pressing seriousness of the subject matter." --Nick Hornby, best-selling author of High Fidelity In this unflinching, deeply personal book that expands on her instantly viral Paris Review essay, "What Do We Do with the Art of Monstrous Men?" Claire Dederer asks: Can we love the work of Hemingway, Polanski, Naipaul, Miles Davis, or Picasso? Should we love it? Does genius deserve special dispensation? Is male monstrosity the same as female monstrosity? Does art have a mandate to depict the darker elements of the psyche? And what happens if the artist stares too long into the abyss?
She explores the audience's relationship with artists from Woody Allen to Michael Jackson, asking: How do we balance our undeniable sense of moral outrage with our equally undeniable love of the work? In a more troubling vein, she wonders if an artist needs to be a monster in order to create something great. And if an artist is also a mother, does one identity inexorably, and fatally, interrupt the other? Highly topical, morally wise, honest to the core, Monsters is certain to incite a conversation about whether and how we can separate artists from their art.
