After signing a deal to publish Woody Allen’s memoirs, The Hachette Book Group has pulled out. That comes after Ronan Farrow whined about the deal and HBG employees walked out in protest. HBG spokeswoman Claire Cottrell stated that “The decision to cancel Mr. Allen’s book was a difficult one”, but of course Claire is lying. What was difficult, and what proved to be too difficult, was for HBG to stand up to a lynch mob. Meaning, we suppose, that we’ll have to stick to actresses for models of integrity, rather than self-righteous publishers.
UPDATE (22/03/20)
Lionel Shriver has written a very good article on the Hachette job.
I guess if their employees are walking out in protest, and they decide the bad press is worse that the book sales, then it makes sense.
It might make business sense, though that is far from obvious. What is obvious is that it is cowardly, and morally reprehensible.