I realized that for me, over the past few years of thinking about Polanski, thinking about Woody Allen, thinking about all these complicated men I loved, the word had come to take on a new meaning. It meant something more nuanced, and something more elemental. It meant: someone whose behavior disrupts our ability to apprehend the work on its own terms. A monster, in my mind, was an artist who could not be separated from some dark aspect of his or her biography.
