Manners are free; birthday dinners aren't.

There's a nice defense of Dario Fo by thelyamhound, who tackles liberalism in the same post:

As far as the politics go, the fact is that since the beginning of time, artists tended, overwhelmingly, to be "liberal" in comparison to the dominant social flavor of their respective eras. What exactly that meant must be taken in relation to the era in question, but the notion that there's suddenly some "liberal bias" to art is nonsense--not because there's not a bias, but because there's nothing new about it. If conservatives want more art, they should raise more artists ... but don't be surprised if the industry turns them (if nothing else, gays have always been disproportionately represented in creative fields, and while gays aren't reflexively liberal, they tend to be so on social matters, at the least).

Readers were keen to discuss the merits of Philip Roth and Toni Morrison along with the some less obvious names: According to B-Real, "We'll see Bob Dylan get the medal before they give it to some guy who sees fit to make biting commentary about the horrors of modern America from his monastic abode on a farm in Connecticut." (We think that would be Mr Roth.) Everyone had a dog in this fight, but Mikerol gets a mention for the most heroic nomination: In his view, Austrian writer Peter Handke "would deserve [the Nobel Prize] even if he raped his grandmother, just for the capacities for communication that he has enabled in the logos."

That might be the Fray sentence of the week, although there's competition: Let's hear it for WorkingAuthor, who has harsh words for Doris Lessing, and adds sternly, "I hope she reads this." Let's hope her day isn't ruined. MR … 3.30 p.m. GMT