There are many ways that bad writing makes its way into print. I’ve detailed too many of them over the years, but, what the hell — let’s have another go at it.

First, the reading public is stupid… really stupid. But, a good or great artist should always write up, respect the potential reader, even if just one in a million. To write down to a reader is to beg a bad piece of writing out of its element.

Second, the publishing industry is lazy… very lazy, and obsessed with profit over art, ever since the big publishing companies were taken over by conglomerates that know nothing of good writing. While no one begrudges publishers from making money, the things they bank on as being bestsellers rarely pan out, and thus the big companies get on a merry-go-round of increasingly bizarre publishing choices which lead to hacks like a James Frey (no, he’s too bad to be a hack), or frauds like the ever-increasing number of claimed plagiarists, getting published.

Even worse, though, is the fact that the small independents are no better, pumping out the bilge in less volume, unit-wise, but more in terms of titles, especially in poetry. This is because, big or little, publishing suffers from the old tried but true methods of cronyism and sexual favors as means of getting one’s crap in print, and this is the real reason published writing is so horrible and manifest, even to its promoters, who will only sotto voce admit that they see no future for great writing.

Yet, I’ve forgotten at least one other major reason publishing these days sucks — celebrity writers. And I don’t mean memoirs like that of a vapid bimbo like Paris Hilton, but supposed real literary fiction, by noted authors such as failed actor Ethan Hawke, or even successful film director Ethan Coen, of the famed Coen Brothers filmmaking duo.

A while back I stumbled across his 1998 debut book of short stories, published by William Morrow, called Gates Of Eden. It’s bad — really, really, really bad. To the degree that Dave Eggers is bad because he thinks that if he holds his cock in profile to the setting sun he’ll be a hipster, so is Coen bad because his idea of great literature starts with Elmore Leonard and ends with William Burroughs.

Yet, that didn’t stop such high profile venues as Playboy and Vanity Fair from publishing such garbage. Simply put, short stories are a far different art form from playwriting, or screenwriting, where more than half the heavy lifting of the storytelling will fall on the shoulders of the cinematography and other filmic devices — most especially a good actor, who can often hide mediocre writing and dialogue with charisma and the smooth or distinct delivery of even banal lines.

What may seem funny or deep, depending on the mood and soundtrack, can be simply dull and flat as hell when in naked black print on a white page. Coen apparently never learned this key lesson, for this small book of fourteen tales is utterly larded with bizarre film noirish stereotypes and caricatures.