Comments on: Pretty Girls Can’t Write Serious Non-Fiction

By: Amanda Foreman

Amanda Foreman — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 21:58:31 +0000

To be honest, if I had known that the “Tatler photograph” – which I did a year after the book came out, and was part of a series called ‘forty under-forties: their bare essentials’ – was going to become such a scandal, I would have made an effort on the day and washed my hair. Oh well, one lives and learns. Truly, youth is wasted on the young.

By: The Pretty Writer

The Pretty Writer — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 12:42:20 +0000

‘Pretty girl can’t write serious non-fiction’

– said the ugly girl.

By: Kym

Kym — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 04:38:05 +0000

It is definetely Sour Grapes.
Well, said, well written, Kassia Krozser 🙂

By: Evangeline

Evangeline — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 01:26:59 +0000

Ha! I would feel this argument had some form of validity if it were for the fact that the authors listed at the end have impressive CVs. If they weren’t attractive and educated at the best colleges in the UK, they wouldn’t receive half the attention they do. The same thing happens on this side of the pond: the credentials (and a little attractiveness) is used to get a foot in the door and used by publishers as a selling point.

Methinks it’s sour grapes on Hughes part– if these women were writing shoddy, ill-researched biographies with turgid prose, she would have a point, but their books are lively, accurate and easy to read while still retaining a bit of scholarship.