Panegyric …

…Julian Barnes: in praise of James Fenton | Books | The Guardian. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

The 1970s have a rather low reputation at the moment, but one thing to be said for them was that if you were setting up then as a writer, you did feel and believe that you could say anything you liked about anyone and anything, that offence could and indeed often should be given. Nowadays we are more cautious, and more self-censoring. Would any editor today print without a qualm an article such as the one James wrote in the Statesman under the heading “Mrs Thatcher’s Bum”? Probably not. Similarly, a poetry editor might anxiously consult multi-faith correctness before politely declining James and John Fuller’s joint anti-Catholic poem whose exultant refrain runs, “God we hate Catholics and their Catholic God.” 

I guess one needs to know the context.