My Dinner With Camille.

So, remember that old post of mine about Camille Paglia: "Try to survive a tornado with a post-structuralist"?

And then remember that great BlogAd for Paglia's book "Break, Blow, Burn"? You can see the ad on the BlogAds page showing the best BlogAds (scroll down to the third ad). See how it links to my post and uses my name? The ad ran in the premium slot on my blog for quite a while.

Anyway, Paglia is returning to Madison to give a big lecture tomorrow. At the request of the promoters of the lecture, I did a post on this blog to encourage people to come to it, and I linked back to the old "tornado" post, saying her recent appearance in Madison had been amusing. A couple days later, I received a phone call inviting me to the pre-speech dinner with Paglia. I accepted the invitation.

But what's this? Suddenly, I'm uninvited! Camille Paglia has actually read "Try to survive a tornado with a post-structuralist," and -- I'm told -- she's angry and hurt by what I said about her. The very material that was used to promote the book has become a reason to demand that my invitation to the dinner be withdrawn. Okaaaaayyyy....

For 15 years, I've thought of Camille Paglia as an unusually tough and feisty woman. Wasn't she the one who sneered at women who acted like fragile victims?

Ah, well, it's true: despite my light touch and detailed coverage, the post was rather damning. Go back and read it, and you'll see. Funny, though, then, that you used the post to advertise the book.

And I don't blame her for not wanting to be stressed out at a dinner before a big speech. I didn't know I was capable of stressing out such a big rockstar diva. But apparently, I am. With the very post that her people saw fit to promote her with. That's too funny!

UPDATE: Look how the BlogAds blog praised Camille Paglia's ad precisely because of the way it included me:

There's some post-modern intertextual polymorphic joy (not forgetting that Paglia hates post-modernism) in the fact that Paglia's publisher bought an ad on Anne Althouse's blog quoting an Althouse post that quoted Paglia saying: "Once you’re 'swept up in the blogosphere,' you become self-referential."

Hey, you can have fun with advertising! Let's get out of the stiff and starched print-it-once-a-month-and-pray-that-someone-reads-it mentality. This Paglia ad is a wonderful respite from book blogads with blurry images sporting mumbling unreadable text, the bain of my existence.

(It's Ann, without the e!)

So, you can have fun with advertising, but it's back to the stiff and starched when it's time to make out the dinner list...