Book Report: A Million Penguins

One of the most persistent memes affecting the writing newsgroups in their heyday -- alt.writing, misc.writing and rec.arts.prose in my own experience -- was the recurrent invitation to take part in an exercise of communal composition, where people would join in to write a story either together or serially.

These days we know that such things are called wikis, and it was only a matter of time before the meme found its natural home in a wiki. That it should have happened under the auspices of Penguin Books is a surprise, and not a pleasant one.

Penguin explains the idea here, and you'd be pushed to find a more witless piece of wittering. After comparing the art of novel-writing to software development and scientific research, the piece goes on to remark how Holbein and Titian used apprentices (they actually say "students" as if the master's studio was some summer job) to help make their paintings. The utter stupidity of that analogy will be immediately plain.

And the drivel goes on:

• But what about the novel? Can a collective create a believable fictional voice? How does a plot find any sort of coherent trajectory when different people have a different idea about how a story should end – or even begin? And, perhaps most importantly, can writers really leave their egos at the door? Typically, a writer will acknowledge in print the efforts of their book’s editor, copy editor and agent, since they each will have read the work in draft form. But such acknowledgments regularly include a disclaimer along these lines : “Any errors that remain are, of course, my own”. So the majority of published writers depend on collaboration, but only up to a point. After all, there is usually a single name on the jacket of a novel.

Can writers leave their egos at the door? Excuse me? When did that become a requirement for any type of artistic endeavour, even a collaborative one? Film-making is as collaborative as it gets, but do you suppose Alfred Hitchcock ever left his ego at the door? Did Balanchine check his ego just because some lithe youngsters had to execute his choreography for him?

As for the acknowledgements, does the cretin writing this for Penguin have the faintest idea how books are made? How "typical" is it for a writer to acknowledge a copy editor? And when it's done, does that mean the writer is giving up any measure of creative ownership? What a nitwit idea.

But whatever idiocy the project lacks in theory, it more than makes up for in practice. The wiki -- A Million Penguins -- went live last Thursday, and already there's a great steaming heap of text on the site, beginning with a list of characters that would have had me heading for the door immediately (without stopping to retrieve the ego I'd checked previously) were it not for my responsibility to readers of TTOO.

Eventually we get to the prose itself. I'll quote a passage picked more or less at random, and then bring this sad chapter to a close. Penguin, whose innovations in the past have done more to bring good writing to a large public than any other company, should dump this trash and wash its hands very thoroughly. Leicester De Montfort University, which is also involved, should be looking forward to a purge, but it most likely won't happen.

Here's the extract (Wikipedia-style links stripped out). I've put it at the end so you can move on now if you want, and not miss anything important.

"Ever wondered how bird flu is spread to humans? It begins with a big bird being given a silly name and the virus spreads without any means of stopping it. Even just reading a word of the story about the bird can be fatal."
As he said this, Big Bababoobey Ooby flexed his pinky, gazing at the raggedy nail as though it were a distant mountain chain, clouds massing behind it. He held a straight flush and so did his poker face. Cigar smoke built its own dull mass in the club's close darkness and hung like an undissipated mushroom cloud over the pool table. Big Bababooey Benjy came here all the time, like the weather, only unchanging.
Just then someone broke into song and Big Babooey Benjy turned toward the sound.
It was Big Big Babooey Benjy himself that been singing and Big Babooey Benjy came here often. Truth be told, the Big Baboobey Barbecue Dinner that they served was the best in town. Everybody here knew Big Babooey Benjy as the bird that once lived with Bernard Matthews, though it was a reputation he had tried to live down by dressing as an albatross.
"Big Babooey Benjy," a voice said, "There's a call for you."