Okay, this book does not contain sumptuous aesthetic accounts of cool tropical breezes winding through palm fronds or descriptions of sipping Aperol spritz with a lover on a Positano patio. But art and artists are its subject matter. Dederer’s non-fiction prose is also a joy to read. The book is an inquiry into the question of “what we should do with the art of monstrous men.” It addresses the tension between loving a work of art and hating the deeds of its creator. The #metoo movement spurred the latest cultural reckoning of how to respond to public figures who do bad things. However, artists are a particularly complicated case because we love their paintings, songs, films. Dederer makes the point that the art we love often becomes part of our identity and so a simple “cancelation” of the artist is unsatisfactory. It doesn’t feel entirely right to “cancel” Miles Davis or Picasso, to disappear their work.

Monsters winds ever closer to the core of the question with short, engrossing chapters. Dederer’s writing is insightful, intelligent, and probing. It is also heartfelt, casual, and contemporary in the way that she addresses the reader and winds her own stories through the text. Themes range from obsessive fans, to the difference between male and female artistic monsters (unsurprising spoiler: men abuse women and children, while women abandon their children to have the space to work), to capitalism’s hold on identity creation, to love.

A complete answer to the question is never given. However, if like me, you love to think about complex topics that don’t have easy answers, you might find that the Dederer provides a roadmap to thinking through your own answer to the question. Morality and art are central to human meaning. Your relationship to each might surprise you in the light of one or the other.

A few favorite quotes: 

“My major artistic concern for the past twenty years has been childcare, it has preoccupated me more than any other subject; even now that my children are mostly grown I’m still not sure I managed it well, I lie awake worrying about it, and meanwhile old Pablo [Picasso] was putting out cigarettes on his girlfriend’s face.”

“The artist must be monster enough not just to start the work, but to complete it. And to commit all the little savageries that lie in between.”

“Emotion, subjectivity, forgiveness, empathy, institutional change, making room for silenced voices, acknowledgement that the work is altered–all these things matter. So does one more thing: beauty.”