(Thanks Bob H. for pointing the interview out). My favorite part of the interview was where Pearson described Camille Paglia calling her a bitch: The chemistry between us was intolerable, but I couldn’t end the meeting because I was on assignment, so she ended it by storming off, calling me “ a stupid b*tch” on her way across the Four Season’s creamy lobby carpet. Whereupon, a lady in a CARMEN MIRANDA HAT, which is to say a hat sporting fruit, who had been sitting across from us in the lobby, introduced herself as a family court judge (I am not making this up) and said that she “couldn’t help but overhear your conversation with Camille Paglia.”
“Do you know what just happened?” she asked me, amused.
“No,” I wailed, still feeling like I’d just been b*tch-slapped.
The secret issue that had set us asunder, said the fruit-headed judge, was the fact that I had been chewing gum. “Are you aware that you were chewing gum? As a judge, I can tell you that body language is absolutely paramount in these kinds of conflicts, and chewing gum signals defiance.” Hilarious. I happened to have been quitting smoking at the time, and used gum like a critical limb, and had forgotten about it entirely.
What do I think of Paglia as a social thinker? I can’t get past the fact that she’s an abusive maniac who can’t tolerate insolence, no matter how inadvertent.
Come to think of it, Ann Althouse also had a run-in with Paglia and was uninvited to a dinner for her because Professor Althouse dared to write a blog post that Paglia didn't like and she was angry and hurt. Sounds like the lady could use some anger management tips.
Anyway, the interview with Pearson is good, take a look.
The interview caused me to observe that, in general, the modern American woman wants all the advantages of Chivalry, but not of the disadvantages.
ReplyDeleteI have enjoyed the Paglia that I have read. In interviews she comes off as a flaming narcissist. But then she is a celebrity, and it goes with the territory. So I will still read her, but I would expect her to be dreadful in an interview unless she was sufficiently mollycoddled.
ReplyDeleteTrey
re: flaming narcissist
ReplyDeleteThat's right. Paglia had risen on her opposition to the excesses of feminism, but her work is otherwise unexceptional. She comes of like the pedantic humanities professor from central casting.
"“Do you know what just happened?” she asked me, amused.
ReplyDelete“No,” I wailed, still feeling like I’d just been b*tch-slapped."
Is this supposed to be an adult? Can you imagine a man writing this?
I kind of go with Christy's take, although Paglia has said a lot of things that needed to be said before anyone else did. But I can't imagine anyone being able to live with her.
ReplyDeleteMy take on the family court judge is that she's a visionary, an objective observer and someone who knows enough and cares enough to take the extra step in being truly helpful, who just happens to be a family court judge.
ReplyDeleteDon't you wish you could have folks like her around as a personal adviser when weird "things" just happen to us?
She (the family court judge) is the person who should have been the subject of a long and insightful interview. I'd love to know more about her, wouldn't you?
Good point, Paul. The judge sounds like quite a character. Of course, Paglia's a character, too, but she's so overexposed that you pretty much know what she's going to say about everything the interviewer asks her about. The judge was unexpected, and she dealth with the writer as a human being, not as a foil for her ego. Difference between an idea-person and a reality-person.
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