In defence of polemic

Ever since Martin Amis declared that “the Muslim community will have to suffer until it gets its house in order”, two opposing literary brigades have been having it in public. They have produced a substantial collection of polemic; it should be included in English degree courses.

Marxist don Terry Eagleton called his Manchester University colleague a fascist, a trait Eagelton reckoned Amis inherited from Kingsley Amis. Amis responded by arguing that he had be “conversationally expressing an urge, an urge that soon wore off.” That explanation was not good enough for Ronan Bennett, who condemned Amis’ “odious outburst of racial sentiment”. In turn, Christopher Hitchens ripped Bennett’s ‘clumsy tirade’ apart. And now Ian McEwan has deployed for battle. Interviewed in the Saturday Telegraph, he said:

‘Chunks of left-of-centre opinion have tried to close down the debate (about Islamism) by saying that if you were to criticise Islam as a thought system you are a de facto racist. That is a poisonous argument.

They do it on the basis that they see an ally in their particular forms of anti-Americanism.’

Gauging the response to home grown Islamism is an important issue, often rendered taboo by political correctness. But it is not a strictly political question. It is cultural, and it is refreshing to see a small part of the literary world tackle it.