Anton is Right…hehehe!
by amberbenson on Feb.16, 2010, under Anton Strout and Amber Benson
About Chik-Fil-A and about how there can be this disconnect between mass market writing and “literary” writing. As far as I’m concerned, if the story entertains then it’s done it’s job. Sometimes, I read this so-called contemporary literature and am bored out of my mind. Just because your novel is 8 million pages doesn’t make it good – superfluous paragraphs of literary drivel are superfluous paragraphs of literary drivel even if they come with a Booker Prize.
With that said, I love well-written literature. Give me Dostoevsky, Austen, Hesse and I am a happy camper. You can also give me Neal Stephenson or Neil Gaimen and I am in heaven, too. If I am transported out of my humdrum life for a little while, if I am utterly engaged by what I’m reading, if I laugh and/or maybe cry then it’s a good book.
And I’ll be the first person in line for the sequel.
Related posts:
- Anton Strout- Proudly a Reluctant Adult Welcome to the Amber and Anton hour, err two week, at Babel Clash. *slips Babel Fish in ear* First and foremost, I’d like to thank Borders and Morgan for inviting us. Amber promised this would be as good a place as any to harass me, but she’s such a sweetie,...
- Are you a reluctant adult? We’re off and running with a brand new topic. Does reading science fiction and fantasy make you a “reluctant adult”? What about the authors working in these genres? Should these “reluctant adults” tackle “serious literature” instead? How’s that for a loaded question? ...
February 16th, 2010 on 6:22 pm
I will give anything a go and if it’s well written, it will become part of my prized collection of books and if not so well written (in my opinion), it goes to the charity shop for someone else to enjoy (or not).
Your books and Anton’s are part of my prized collection and I will always be first in line for sequels from either of you (or rather pre-ordered online as they hardly stock any of the good stuff in Jersey as god forbid we might actually have some taste in what we read and rebel or something!)
PS I am talking about Jersey, UK and not Jersey, US.
February 16th, 2010 on 6:28 pm
I agree!! Half of these works of “literary merit” are just page after page of fancy and confusing words positioned in an utterly dull way. I think if the story pulls you in, makes you feel like your a part of its make believe world, then it is well worth reading, because that’s the purpose of books right? To provide a temporary escape from reality
February 16th, 2010 on 7:01 pm
I think some writers also forget that 8 million pages is not a handy sized book for taking on holiday and reading on the beach!
Some prize winning books are actually so dull that even the charity shops won’t accept them anymore as no-one will buy them. If that happens, I just keep them in a box in the attic and wrap them up as a secret santa gift if I get someone I don’t like very much. Saves me sometimes as much as £10 which is hopefully more than I spent on the book in the first place. Winner all round I reckon!
February 16th, 2010 on 7:05 pm
Susan, I love that you hide those books in your attic and pass them out as Santa gifts to those people you don’t like. I’ll make sure I stay on your good side - I can’t imagine getting an 80 pound ‘boring’ book in the mail from Santa!
And Breahna: the thought of escaping into a good book is what keeps me going these days!
February 16th, 2010 on 7:36 pm
It’s okay Amber, you are on my nice people = nice presents list. Good job really as postage on an 80 pound book would be extortionate from the UK to the US.
There are many sayings here of the universe needing to stay in balance like what goes around comes around, etc. Therefore, someone taking the time to be mean to me all year should reap the benefit of that all time and effort put in by me saving up a large and boring book all year for them so that they can have it in their secret santa. Perfect karma and I especially love it when the book is a prize winning one as I can can say with all seriousness that I chose it because I thought it would be a good one for *insert name of mean person here* because it won a prize and looked the one that looked the best out of the ones I saw (in the box in the attic - but I leave that part out).
It’s nice to put so much time and effort into selecting the right gift for someone and keeping the universe in balance. I am feeling very spiritual now after all that
February 16th, 2010 on 8:12 pm
Big high fives to you guys!
The whole “serious literature”/”popular literature” binary is fraught with issues. The distinction calls to mind Adorno’s famous separation of popular music and what he calls “serious music” and seems to be, in the case of literature, just as annoyingly prevalent in our cultural consciousness as it was when he was writing back in (I think) the 1940s. As a literary theorist (heck, as a thinking human), it annoys me to no end that a) there’s some loosely-defined yet nonetheless extremely influential hegemonic body of powers-that-be proclaiming what is and isn’t “real” Literature; and b) that the literary canon and that which maintains it instills a really problematic sense of what is and isn’t “good” reading onto our cultural consciousness; and c) that, therefore, a lot of really amazing writing may not get the respect and attention it deserves, because it is seen as popular or escapist or too “genre” to be literary. As far as I’m concerned, literary merit should have less to do with whether some group of people you’ve never met tell you a book is worth reading and more to do with whether you actually derive pleasure from the act of reading it. That’s empowering stuff. If adulthood means buying into the ideology that “serious literature” is better/better written/more profound/more important than “popular literature”, I’m just going to go ahead and keep eating at Chick-Fil-A and wearing Aquaman underoos to bed.
(I shudder to think of academia’s part in the making of the oppressive literary canon, but in my own defense, I did speak at a Buffy the Vampire Slayer academic conference a few years back, heh.)
February 16th, 2010 on 8:36 pm
I’m a little weird about books– I like Poe, Lovecraft, and older Sci Fi that are now called classics, but I’m afraid I am not a fan of many books that are thought of as literary classics. I tried to read My Antonio by Willa Cather a couple years ago for an online book club. I started it– commented that her writing was very descriptive of Nebraska in those days etc. Then I was BORED, so BORED…it was Nebraska and it just crawled by with sad people… depressing and hopeless. Everyone else seemed to love it. I figured I was just a freak. BAHAHAHAHAHA