How to send a book out in the world

The stipulations attached to the Windham-Campbell Prize — festival appearances, interviews, videos — were not extraordinary. From annotating their own work to parsing their creative process into anecdotes to existing both as creator and influencer, the contemporary writer is expected to be visible in every register. But not so Helen DeWitt, author of works such as The Last Samurai (2000) and Some Trick (2018). The American writer refused to accept the prestigious $175,000 literature prize because of her disinclination to partake in the elaborate promotional commitments.

DeWitt’s action appears to be in keeping with the tenor of her work. The gap she writes into is the one that exists between what literature ought to be and what the market champions. DeWitt belongs to a distinguished lineage — the writer who refuses to become a personality. Elena Ferrante’s insistence on anonymity, Thomas Pynchon’s elusiveness, Cormac McCarthy’s aversion to literary celebrity articulate a belief that the writer’s presence, once amplified, begins to distort the contract between reader and text.

The culture of perpetual disclosure insists on flattening the writer into a brand. The introvert author offers a necessary counterpoint. DeWitt’s refusal, like Ferrante’s silence, is a reminder that in a noisy world, the most imaginative stance may well be to let the book stand on its own.