Early in 1967 Highsmith's agent told her why her books did not sell in paperback in America. It was, said Patricia Schartle Myrer, because they were 'too subtle', combined with the fact that none of h...
In many ways, likability is a very elaborate lie, a performance, a code of conduct dictating the proper way to be. Characters who don't follow this code become unlikable. Critics who criticize a chara...
Often in literary criticism, writers are told that a character isn't likable, as if a character's likability is directly proportional to the quality of a novel's writing.