Matt Yglesias says uninformed criticism of Pinter’s Nobel is a sign of the right’s flirtation with Philistinism. He writes:

Surely there’s nothing more annoying on this earth than complaining about the politics views of prize-winning artists. If you have some critique of Harold Pinter’s plays to offer, then by all means offer it. If you think Pablo Neruda is a bad poet, then make your case. But if you think Neruda shouldn’t win prizes for his poetry because he was a Communist, then you’ve sunk into a real cesspool of philistinism. Shakespeare was a monarchist — get him out of the schools! That’s just dumb.

Ross Douthat thinks Yglesias has a point. I’d give him half a point.

I will confess here and now I know very little of Pinter’s work. I’ve caught bits and piece over the years, read the occasional criticism (and many since the Nobel announcment) but I think it’s fair to say I’m perhaps a few inches shy of real ignorance about Pinter’s literary contributions.

But does that really mean I can’t complain about his Nobel? Leaving aside the obvious point that I’ve learned to trust the judgment of the various people complaining about it (Roger Kimball, Terry Teachout, our own Andrew Stuttaford, et al), can’t I object to the fact that literature Nobels consistently stink and make an informed assumption that they’re being consistent with past performance? Hitchens

makes that point quite well this morning in the WSJ, btw.

But here’s the real reason I think it’s ok to complain about Pinter’s Nobel without being fully fluent in his oeuvre. I heard him on the BBC the other day. He was whining that the ever increasing political oppression — that is, in and by Britain and America — had made it impossible for him to write regular poetry. Oh how he wished he could write about the sea or old friends more but, alas, he cannot because the ever-tightening fist of big brother makes that impossible. A person who thinks that America and Britain have been the increasing sources of oppression during Pinter’s lifetime is a person who has trouble seeing reality, moral and political.

I am not a particularly literary guy. I don’t get weepy about the “craft.” But I seem to recall reading somewhere that real literature isn’t supposed to be polemical or political at the expense of deeper truths. It isn’t supposed to serve as propaganda, at least not if it detracts from artistry. Human condition, truth, untrammeled honesty: these seem to be the qualities I hear associated with great literature. When I hear a fossilized anti-American asshat (yes, I’m trying to revive the word) prattle on about how he wishes he could write about trees but the American gestapo makes that impossible, I know I am hearing from someone I don’t need to waste my time on. Perhaps the “early Pinter” is the cat’s pajamas, but as far as I’m concerned this guy’s a political hack with literary pretentions and I’ve read nothing that tells me I should waste my energy trying to disabuse myself of that assumption. If that makes me a Philistine, I can deal with that.