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Was I the only reader who was appalled that the writer of this article felt "relief" (mentioned twice!) at Alain Robbe-Grillet's death because of the latter's philosophy of the novel, and influence on some novelists?
I love novels. I read incessantly. But there's something horribly disproportionate about being so dismissive about another person's death when the disagreement is primarily an artistic one. It's not as though Robbe-Grillet's attitudes, which he was entirely entitled to, caused people to die in Africa or suffer on the streets of Chicago. And the only power he had was that given to him freely by other writers.
"Now we can go on"? You could have gone on any time you wanted. Write the novel you want to write; hope that it finds its rightful audience. I'm sorry if Robbe-Grillet's influence made it a little harder for "good" novels to get the best reviews and publishing deals (if indeed it did), but it's always been a chancy business.
