I doubt many authors
intend* to build a brand. At once an individual and a business,
they're too
busy trying to make money and write mind-changing books to worry about
branding. Nonetheless, their success creates a brand. A way people know and
experience them. What unique, compelling, and meaningful beliefs their awareness
and reputation lend to their mere bylines.
In this month's Real
Simple (yes, I read that - it's extraordinarily relaxing to look at and a nice
reminder of all the things I don't have to care about ... like, I'm sure you can
make a meatloaf with saltines and ketchup, but who would want to?), Rick Moody
has a piece about fatherhood. A lovely, mushy, get-to-know-the-new-me,
how-i-fell-in-love-with-kids-and-got-married autobiography.
He has slewn his
brand.
This writer of dark
and desperate lives lived in banal cul de sacs and ordinary times. This clever
cynic who gave voice to characters exhausted by everything they were supposed to
be, but had no interest in being. A curmudgeon toward cuteness - letting no
puppy or baby escape with withering glance.
He was a
20-something writer. An unsustainable brand. At some point, that either becomes
sad or has to evolve. But, then, like a child actor, where can he go from
here?
Then,
too, I saw an interview in last Sunday's New York Times with
73-year-old neoconservative Harvey Mansfield about his new feminist-bashing book
Manliness. Now, to be fair, I bear little if any relation to this man's
ta
rget audience, but, still,
considering that he has quite a laudable gig as a professor at Harvard, I hadn't
expected him to be so cavalier with his brand.
An excerpt
from the interview:
Q: So
your generally left-leaning colleagues are willing to talk to
you?
A: People
listen to me, but they don't pay attention to what I say. I should punch them
out, but I don't.
Read the
interview
*with the obvious
exception of Ann Coulter.
