Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma

Content Warning: This section of the guide contains discussions of rape, sexual assault, pedophilia, suicide and suicidal ideation, antisemitism and racism, anti-trans bias, genocide, domestic violence, and alcohol use disorder.

Claire Dederer (b. 1967) is the author of Monsters, and the book is written from her perspective, chronicling her own experiences loving the art of problematic artists. Dederer began her career as a film critic for the Seattle Weekly, and the book represents a reprisal of that critical role, this time in long form. Using the films of Roman Polanski and Woody Allen as her starting point, she meticulously analyzes artists and their art throughout the book through a personal lens, grappling with Objectivity Versus Subjectivity in Art Consumption.

Before Monsters, Dederer published two memoirs. The first, Poser: My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses (2010) placed her discovery of yoga in conversation with Dederer’s moral and political struggles. The second, Love and Trouble: A Midlife Reckoning (2017) chronicles the emotional and sexual turmoil that she experienced after turning 44. Dederer self-identifies as a memoirist, and speaks about what this role means to her throughout Monsters: “I am, I suppose, a memoirist, though it’s a very uncomfortable label.