Lessons from Three Weak Literary Works

According to the Iran Book News Agency (IBNA), quoting the Financial Times, literary critic Simon Kuper has introduced three books as examples of bad works, demonstrating that the weakness of books usually stems from a lack of authorial self-awareness, weak narrative, and exaggerated simplification. These three works include the memoirs of footballer Ashley Cole, the novel by British politician Nadine Dorries, and the controversial book “Eurabia” by Bat Ye’or.

Kuper, who has been studying and critiquing literary works for years, has identified three books as his worst works: “My Defence” by Ashley Cole, “The Plot” by Nadine Dorries, and “Eurabia” by Bat Ye’or.

Cole’s book, published in 2006, is an example of celebrity memoirs that only reflect the author’s selfish voice and lack believable characters, narrative, or story development. The book’s story revolves around Cole’s love for his old club, Arsenal, and his reluctant departure from it.

Nadine Dorries’s book, similar to Cole’s, lacks self-awareness and engages in conspiracy-mongering; Dorries claims that other members of the British Conservative Party tried to remove her beloved Prime Minister, Boris Johnson. The book’s narrative includes numerous interviews with anonymous sources, all of whom sound alike and similar to the author’s voice.

The third book, despite being weak in terms of scientific rigor and documentation, has had a strange impact on public opinion. Ye’or alleges a decades-long conspiracy to bring Europe under Arab control. This work was even cited by Anders Breivik, the Norwegian killer. Kuper says the power of simplification and the dissemination of extremist political ideas is a characteristic of influential, yet bad, books.

He concludes that the weakness of these books results from authorial egocentrism, a lack of engaging narrative, and a tendency towards excessive simplification, but some of them, like Eurabia, have achieved a disturbing impact on audiences through extreme simplification.