Mortification: Writers' Stories of Their Public Shame (Hardcover)

Thus concludes writer John Banville's contribution to MORTIFCATION, in which he tells of a last-minute book signing engagement in Miami, during which he was approached by a potential customer, who is quoted above. This single incident perhaps best reflects the insecurities of the seventy writer-contributors to this volume, which is mostly about their humiliations suffered at various book signings, book fairs, and readings.

MORTIFICATION is essentially a collection of very personal very short stories. Like any anthology, it's difficult to generally rate because the individual chapters vary so widely in content, style, and appeal. Here, they range from 1 star to perhaps 4.5, with the majority at or above 3.

My least favorite came from John Burnside, who categorized mortification into Mild and Persistent forms, and a Virulent Strain. His definitions for the three were perhaps based on personal experience, but they didn't have that ring, so he may have missed the point of the book.

Personally, I most enjoyed those stories of humiliation submitted by David Harsent and Andrew Motion. The former, a poet, relates attending a bookshop reading with three other writers of the genre. Harsent attends so drunk that he falls asleep on stage, then loudly projectile vomits in the shop loo within the audience's hearing. Motion's gaffe occurred while a lecturer of English at the University of Hull. Andrew organizes a university poetry reading, and takes upon himself the task of picking up at the train station one of the invited writers, whom he hopes to recognize based solely on a photograph. In short, he picks up the wrong woman, who compounds the debacle by playing along with the error in order to get a free lunch.

Editor Robin Robertson saves for last the profound mortification - profound certainly on anyone's list - of Niall Griffiths, who relates waking up with a raging erection brought on by partaking too freely in powdered stimulants the night before. The humiliation lies not in the tumescent condition itself, but what happens when Griffiths relieves the situation to a woman's magazine article entitled "You Too Can Have A Bum Like Kylie's", complete with photos. The "Kylie" is presumably the gorgeous Australian actress/singer Kylie Minogue. In any case, Niall definitely states that he was scarred for life.

The lesson learned in MORTIFICATION is that writers have feelings like the rest of us mortals. Perhaps I should leave off writing book reviews for fear of offending vulnerable sensitivities. .......... Nah!

(Warning: might put you off ever becoming a published writer. If not, you've picked the right dream.)