I feel more than a little sullied, having finished George and Martha by Karen Finley, and I’ve a feeling that this is one of the desired effects by the author as she pits George W. Bush and Martha Stewart as fictional acerbic lovers holed up in a motel attempting to pleasure themselves in oedipal hi-jinks.

It’s an intentionally provocative piece, and one that largely works. It made for particularly poignant reading this week, as Dubya made his video adress to the Republican not-so-faithful at the national convention. It’s always seemed easy to take potshots at George Junior – despite the fact that he has been, however briefly, the most powerful man in the world – and recognising that is part of the strength of the slim novel by Finley, a New York performance artist and lecturer at NY University. It presents the ridiculous and emasculated outgoing President in a savage, and unforgiving  light, but also allows him to snap back out of his corner at prim and proper Martha, the narrator of the piece.

It is all self consciously referential to Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf (The play gets a mention half-way through, just to make sure you haven’t missed the point), but there’s nothing particularly wrong with that. The switching of scenes from the University campus to the shared double bed of corporate and political America is an interesting and punchy move, and it’s worth remembering that the original protagonists of Albee’s play George and Martha took their names from America’s first Presidential couple the Washingtons.

Is it a masterpiece? No, I don’t think so. To me its strange and stressed sexuality smacks of sensationalism rather than satire, overshadowing much of the biting dialogue that really puts ‘the system’ in its place, but then again I can see the argument that sex and sexuality should be at the forefront of this satire on God-fearing, Apple Pie baking America.

A nice example of the cut and thrust:

“George, did you consider aromatherapy for the guards at Abu Ghraib?” I ask, slightly off the cuff.
“I don’t like your crowd Martha. Never have. If you get a slurp of spaghetti sauce on your napkin you feel like you started a war.”
I get back to punpacking my clothes. George is not going to upset my routine. “You did, George. You started a war.”
“But that is not the point, Martha. I don’t need to be reminded by your friends that I started a war. I know I started a war. I know I am responsible for killing innocent people.”
“George it always comes back to you. Do you care if I start screaming in the middle of the night?” I’m bringing up old wounds.
“I thought maybe you were playing with yourself in the bathroom.” George is sarcastic.