dot_cattiness: Why yes, I do think that fiction needs t

Faith, Hope and Tax Deductible (

hangedwoman) wrote in

dot_cattiness,
@ 2003-09-17 10:24:00

Why yes, I do think that fiction needs to be more than entertaining to have literary value.

I guess that does make me a bigot, in that I'm prejudiced against the stupid.

(Post a new comment)

	xiphias 2003-09-17 12:51 pm UTC (link)
	Because, of course, "fun" and enjoyment are themselves valueless. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	hangedwoman 2003-09-17 01:21 pm UTC (link)
	Of course not, but "entertainment value" is not the same thing as "literary value". It's like saying Jackie Collins is in the same category as John Steinback. Hell, most of the time I'm glad of some proof that people are reading, but don't tell me you're challenging yourselves by reading fluff. (Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

	xiphias 2003-09-17 02:35 pm UTC (link)
	So what is "literary value"? (I'm asking this as someone who's studied both critical theory and literature. . . one of the things I've learned from this is that you're drawing a distinction here that does not really hold up well under scrutiny.) (Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-17 02:49 pm UTC

	reddragdiva 2003-09-17 12:55 pm UTC (link)
	You bigot! I'll bet you don't even like fanfiction either. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	hangedwoman 2003-09-17 01:22 pm UTC (link)
	blush I used to read quite a bit of Due South FF. Never really got into slash, though, so ultimately that was doomed. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	humanx 2003-09-17 01:22 pm UTC (link)
	Why yes, I do think that 'fiction' vs 'literature' is a false dichotomy. I guess that does make me a bigot, in that I'm prejudiced against the snobby. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	hangedwoman 2003-09-17 01:54 pm UTC (link)
	So there's no difference between Anne Rice and Virginia Woolf? (Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

	reddragdiva 2003-09-17 02:20 pm UTC (link)
	None whatsoever. Hit 'Random Journal' and read the teenage 'Merkin proto-goth angst poetry if you don't believe me. (Reply to this) (Parent)

humanx
2003-09-17 03:03 pm UTC (link)

Certainly there's a difference. It is one far too complex to solve with simplistic and badly defined catagorizations.

'Literature' is not a synonym for 'good writing', and good writing is not something precluded by entertainment value. It's also never something without entertainment value.

Furthermore, I cannot imagine a single example of fiction which is nothing but entertainment. The trashiest Clive Cussler spy novel - he's a much better example than Anne Rice to use in future arguments, by the way, for reasons I'll explain below - still instructs the reader on a number of topics. It still interacts with the life of the reader, and has social, political, and personal ramifications, even if just to confirm what the reader already believes.

If the prose is awful, there is still story, character, and atmosphere. The true value of a text just can't be judged on how pleasingly the words in it are arranged.

Anne Rice's prose is stilted at best and cringingly purple at usual worst. She may not be a very good writer. That is something which can be reasonably defined, unlike 'literature', which if anything at all is not a measurement of quality, but a genre primarily defined as 'not genre'. Anne Rice is a crossover between the genres of literature and horror, hence her ability to succeed popularly. She has more in common with other writers of non-genre fiction than writers of horror.

There seems to be a lot of that demon spectre Class involved in most designations of literature which confuse it with value, at that. There are many kinds of readers, and many kinds of writers to speak to them. Your writer of 'literature' may be incapable of speaking to many of them, but I see no reason why that should be a badge of pride.

And finally, dividing fiction up into 'pleasurable' and 'intellectual' seems to betray a distaste for intellectual endevors as pleasure, and a disdain for the plethora of intellectual opportunities offered by pleasure.

It generally seems to me that what is declared literature and what is condemned as mere entertainment-fiction has much more to do with the readers than the authors involved.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-17 03:27 pm UTC

(no subject) -

humanx, 2003-09-17 03:55 pm UTC

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-17 07:09 pm UTC

	ororo 2003-09-17 01:25 pm UTC (link)
	Some things, Dickens and Shakespeare spring to mind, that we consider literature today were considered pulp/trash/for the masses when they were published. Interesting how definitions change over time, isn't it? (Reply to this) (Thread)

	reddragdiva 2003-09-17 02:19 pm UTC (link)
	That would be because they proved to have a shelf life longer than several minutes. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	(Anonymous) 2003-10-01 08:09 pm UTC (link)
	I would be interested to know where and when Shakespeare was considered pulp or trash (Reply to this) (Parent)

red_frog
2003-09-17 01:36 pm UTC (link)

My impression from the NYT story I read was that the award (I assume you're talking about King here) was not exactly for literary value as for achievement--the guy did a lot to encourage reading and writing and his stories are the basis for a couple of damn good movies. (And some lousy movies, but that happens.)

I agree that King's writing does not strike me as Literature. He also desperately needs an editor, since he can be very long-winded on his own--his later books suffer from his ability to terrorize his editors. But what defines Literature to you? Dracula is a dull book, frankly, but it inspired a very vital genre. Is it Literature? "One Hundred Years of Solitude" is a tough slog, and Austen's books are fun frolicksome romance novels with a lot of satirical jokes. Are they Literature?

(Reply to this) (Thread)

hangedwoman
2003-09-17 01:49 pm UTC (link)

More accurately, I'm talking about one particular rabid King fan who suggested that people spam and generally harrass Harold Bloom for his response to the award.

I agreed that Bloom's comment was a little over the line, but I also said that King himself probably would not necessarily think he was deserving of the award. All this guy could see was that I didn't agree with him, and the shit started flyin'.

OK, once more for everybody: to me, great literature is that which is challenging and/or an example of mastery of the craft on a technical level that approaches virtuosity. Most popular fiction, especially in this day and age manages to achieve popularity by appealing to the lowest common denominator.

Entertainment by itself is not bad. Entertainment without other qualities can not be considered great literature.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

xiphias
2003-09-17 03:06 pm UTC (link)

Okay. First, I want to challenge your "especially in this day and age" comment.

How much popular trash fiction from other centuries do you read? I read some -- I like it. There is, of course, TONS of Victorian trash available. "East Lynne" comes to mind as a piece of Victorian trash that my wife likes, but I've just not been able to get into it. Me, I tend to read pulps -- Edgar Rice Burroughs, H.P. Lovecraft, stuff like that. Doc Smith.

Okay, so, I'm getting the "other centuries" thing in only under a technicality for some of those, in that it's the 21st century now, and some of those are (early) 20th century. But you get the point.

Sturgeon's Law: 80% of everything is crud.

What you've got is a selection falacy. What is easily avalable from earlier times is the material that enough people found valuable enough to preserve. If fewer people found it valuable, it will be harder to find. So, right there, your "especially in this day and age" claim begins to fall apart: you don't know what percentage of popular fiction was crap in earlier centuries, because you don't see most of the crap fiction.

I go looking for it, so I've read a bit more of it.

So, now we get to your definition of "great literature."

By your standard, almost no Shakespeare is great literature. I mean, do you count As You Like It as great literature? It's one of my favorite plays -- but, c'mon, it was such trash that Shakespeare may not even have bothered to give it a title! (There's a theory that it's called "As You Like It", because that's what was written in the title spot to express the concept, "Call it whatever you want.")

How about Victor Hugo's Les Miserable? Do you consider that great literature? Again, I really like it, and in that case, there's an author who was TRYING to instill his work with Purpose and Message and Noble Intent.

Which is why there's a THREE FUCKING CHAPTER DIGRESSION ABOUT SEWER MANAGEMENT IN PARIS!

I think there are a lot of people who would knock a book out of consideration for greatness just for sticking in a polemic about how you could use human waste as fertilizer.

This is probably getting up to the length limit of LJ responses. . .

(Reply to this) (Parent)

xiphias
2003-09-17 03:13 pm UTC (link)

continuing on . . . .

Basically, I'd like to hear some examples of what you consider great. Shakespeare? Umberto Eco? Melvile?

Does Bartleby the Scrivner count as a great work? How about Waiting for Godot?

What if you consider both of those works to be black humor pieces? Because, if you think of it that way, they're both pretty damn funny. Do they become better works? Worse works?

Is there ANYTHING by Charles Dickens that counts as "great"? (I personally can't stand Dickens.) How about Arthur Conan Doyle? How about Lewis Caroll? I like both of them. Do they count as "great literature"?

Is "Ivanhoe" great literature? How about "Treasure Island", or "Kidnapped"? How about the Jeeves and Wooster stories?

That's probably enough questions for now. . .

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-17 04:08 pm UTC

(no subject) -

xiphias, 2003-09-17 04:30 pm UTC

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-17 04:42 pm UTC

(no subject) -

xiphias, 2003-09-17 04:45 pm UTC

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-17 04:57 pm UTC

(no subject) -

cheshyre, 2003-09-17 08:22 pm UTC

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-18 07:58 am UTC

(no subject) -

cheshyre, 2003-09-18 11:59 am UTC

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-18 12:44 pm UTC

(no subject) -

cheshyre, 2003-09-18 12:54 pm UTC

(no subject) -

xiphias, 2003-09-17 08:51 pm UTC

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-18 08:05 am UTC

(no subject) -

xiphias, 2003-09-18 08:07 am UTC

Oh, like I'm going to ignore that one -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-18 08:24 am UTC

(no subject) -

cheshyre, 2003-09-18 08:26 am UTC

(no subject) -

red_frog, 2003-09-18 09:54 am UTC

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-18 11:20 am UTC

(no subject) -

beckyzoole, 2003-09-18 10:51 am UTC

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-18 11:28 am UTC

(no subject) -

beckyzoole, 2003-09-18 04:54 pm UTC

(no subject) -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-19 10:28 am UTC

(no subject) -

beckyzoole, 2003-09-18 10:46 am UTC

red_frog
2003-09-17 03:24 pm UTC (link)

Most popular fiction, especially in this day and age manages to achieve popularity by appealing to the lowest common denominator

Like, say, "Pamela" or "Madame Bovary". Or any of the endless run of salacious 19th century vampire novels. C'mon--"Frankenstein" was written on a lark, as anyone who graduated from 7th grade English knows. It's amusing. It's not Great Literature. But it's obviously influential.

King's stuff, like that of most authors, is uneven--you acknowledge that. The difference is that the chaff from other authors has had a chance to fall out of play so most people really don't know about it unless they look. King's stuff is recent so the weeding-out has not yet begun. Read period literature--not just the stuff that's well-known--and you start getting real appreciation for how much crap is out there.

But spamming Bloom for his views would be stupid. The guy's a complete publicity nut--there's even reference to that in the NYT article--and he'd probably enjoy knowing that he had the attention.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

lysana
2003-09-17 04:00 pm UTC (link)

You never said "great literature" until this comment. You said that fiction has to be more than entertaining to have literary value. Fiction == literature. All fiction thus has literary value by default. What value it has is at least partially subjective. Even books that hang around for 50-100 years on Best Of lists can and will be judged drek by some minds. Are they right or wrong? It's a matter of taste, not objective measurement.

And all periods of time when the written word was used for entertainment contained a large quantity of "pander to the LCD" material within it. We just don't see the vast majority of the potboiler fiction that was churned out during, say, Dickens' time because it didn't resonate enough to stick around.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

Believe it or not, English *is* my first language -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-17 04:15 pm UTC

Re: Believe it or not, English *is* my first language -

lysana, 2003-09-17 05:16 pm UTC

Please, I'm repeating myself repeating myself too much -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-17 07:23 pm UTC

Re: Please, I'm repeating myself repeating myself too much -

blackfyr, 2003-09-17 09:36 pm UTC

Re: Please, I'm repeating myself repeating myself too much -

cheshyre, 2003-09-17 10:07 pm UTC

Re: Please, I'm repeating myself repeating myself too much -

hangedwoman, 2003-09-18 08:01 am UTC

Re: Please, I'm repeating myself repeating myself too much -

blackfyr, 2003-09-18 09:29 am UTC

Re: Please, I'm repeating myself repeating myself too much -

xiphias, 2003-09-24 08:46 pm UTC

	supergee 2003-09-24 03:56 pm UTC (link)
	Pop fiction today does not appeal to a common denominator. As Dean Koontz predicted years ago in one of his cynical writers' guides, best-selling fiction is category fiction (sometimes creating its own category). There is relatively little common between Nora Roberts and Tom Clancy, but they both sell millions. (Reply to this) (Parent)

hangedwoman
2003-09-17 02:04 pm UTC (link)

I didn't mean to ignore what you were saying about the NYT story - it just wasn't the focus of this argument. Your absolutely right that King has done a lot to promote reading and writing, and even more importantly (to me), he has donated beaucoup bucks for libraries. And that was in part what the award was about.

And honestly, I think a few pieces of his writing do actually have literary value - just not the overall body of his work.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

	supergee 2003-09-24 04:02 pm UTC (link)
	Always nice to see someone with literary taste put in a bad word for 100 Years of Solitude. I gave up after I decided that the title described the experience of reading it. (Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

	temima 2003-09-26 07:05 pm UTC (link)
	I kinda liked it, but I think I was confused who was who, so I just remember six or so odd members of a family. (Reply to this) (Parent)

Thank you Miss Grundy

shelleybear
2003-09-24 11:20 am UTC (link)

When I was in college, I went to my first english comp class and was informed that the first book we would be reading would be "Portnoy's Complaint".
Bing honest and cheeky, I raised my hand and asked the prof why I had to read about someone with more troubles then I had.
She, being at least partially realistic and frequently sarcastic informed me after the class that she would offer me the chance to do three papers on books of my choosing. I would be graded solely on them.
I guess she thought she could scare me off.......
My papers were:
1)"Way Station" by Clifford D. Simak - Topic: The attainment of illusion over reality.
2)"The Sword in th Stone" by T.H. White - Topic: A running comparison and analysis of the original work, and the failed Disneyfication of it.
3)"Some of Your Blood" by Theodore Sturgeon - Topic: A psychological and physical justification for vampirisem and i's moral implications.
I received an A- in the course.
To this day, I am proud to say that I have not read the Roth book.
I found the work I did read both entertaining and insightful, but I fear you would not consider any of them to have literary value.
So it goes.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

Re: Thank you Miss Grundy

hangedwoman
2003-09-24 11:37 am UTC (link)

Did you miss the part where I asked for a cease fire? I meant it - I understand I am only knowledgeable enough to carry this debate to a point, and was willing to accede to the fact that the debate had passed that point.

I have not read the Simak. I have read the other two (and pieces of the Roth), and I can not see what I said that would lead you to assume that I failed to find literary value in them.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

	Re: Thank you Miss Grundy (Anonymous) 2003-09-24 12:28 pm UTC (link)
	So just because you're fed up means that nobody else can continue to discuss the issue? (Reply to this) (Parent)

Username:		Create an Account Forgot your login or password? Login w/ OpenID
Password:
	Remember Me
	English • Español • Deutsch • Русский…

About

Help

Get Involved

Legal

Store

LJ Labs