Good Stuff

[Dawnstorm]

"they're based on certain values that we all fundamentally share" -- Ooo, now you've done it. Eddie's going to be on you like white on rice.

I would, normally. But I'm in a similar situation to this:

I've been so darn busy at work I never have time to get started any more!!!

Rant mode is not, currently, a priority.

My father told me about an experiment where art critics were asked to critique abstract paintings. They did so, in their usualy terms. They had not been told that the paintings were actually made by apes. My father wanted to prove to me that abstract art is not art.

Someone else (an abstract painter perhaps) might have said it sheds unfavourable light on critics.

Me, I thought it showed that apes can be "artists", too.

(If you're curious, you can take that quiz: Artist or Ape?.)

The difference, to me, appears to be mostly geometric. Heh.

 

[Fung Koo]

The discourse on literary issues, as I argued earlier, doesn’t require a literary/commercial divide to occur, and in fact, usually doesn’t.

Any literary theory worth its salt (i.e. everything other than the 20's/30's "new critical" that tries to examine literature in a vacuum [as an extension of the Decadents ideology], which is the framework we use to teach critical language-arts skills, because it works to focus on grammatical formalism in language, and provides the basic skills to be able to perform within all the other forms of theory) examines cultural context and positions a text within its context to validate the argument being made. Academic criticism is rooted in social functionalism, history, culture, the publishing industry, etc, AND the written word itself.

And academics, again, don’t that often discourse on the literary/commercial divide, but instead on the offerings of various works.

Oh man... so first let's define "offerings" and how those might be determined. (context, mayhap?) And, there's a plethora of theoretical texts examining the commercial/literary, low-brow/high-brow, sacred/secular, etc. A plethora!!! Like... too numerous to count!!!

Are we talking about actual criticism, or are we talking pseudo-critical advertising? (i.e. author/book reviews)

By far, the majority of actual criticism examines the piece within (or at least with an awareness of) its context. The terms "literary" and "commercial" may not always be used, but are always somehow there. Book review "criticism" is primarily an exercise in taste. It, too, is "commercial." It is not usually academic or "literary" in any way. It's fundamentally advertising, the same way a music video is a commercial for a product.

...not from what authors actually wrote.

It doesn't really matter what the author tries to write -- commercial, literary or otherwise -- when we talk categories. It likewise doesn't really matter how the text is packaged and sold. A "commercial market" categorized book can be a total flop commercially and be heralded as literature, or vice versa. Academic criticism is simply the exploration of that text within and without its context, or juxtaposed against dissimilar contexts to speak to the evaluation of the primary context. Intentions aren't an argument against the academic critical assessment, or hindsight categorizations thereof.

But people take it as a philosophical viewpoint, the same way they do the idea that because Bantam Spectra’s books are sold in one part of the bookstore, they must somehow be fundamentally different from titles from Bantam Books, rather than it’s just a marketing organizational system. This sort of thing offers up certain ways that books can be sold (literary as big business,) but also cuts off other avenues (fiction that is not sold as literary has fewer promotional and sales venues than fiction that is sold as literary.)

This gets my goat... "just" a marketing organizational system. There is no "just" about it! You can't minimize the the fundamental organization of the market itself. It didn't just pop into existence out of nowhere. It has a tradition, and cultural contexts of its own. It has reasons and purposes. It isn't as simple as "Academia over here... Publishing industry over there..."

...but the idea that these represent all of academia and education is one of those let’s reduce the spectrum to a dot things that I try to argue against.

Yet you seem to be reducing the commercial/literary spectrum to a dot, and it's not.

From where I'm sitting, the major problem with this argument is that book reviewers are being conflated with academics. Which itself is a commercial/literary divide. I get the sense what we're really upset with here is the popular critical -- which is advertising. These people are not "critics" -- they're fans. And usually elitist ones, at that.

 

[owl]

[edit] woah... how did I end up in this thread. Pardon me!

 

[KatG]

I didn't say they didn't talk about it, but that it wasn't the main basis for how academics study literature. Nor did I say that they ignore cultural context and study literature in a vacuum -- far from it.

But you have to understand, people don't make the distinction between reviewers (who you see as advertising and elitist,) and academia. As far as they are concerned, it is academia that has laid down a literary/commercial division mandate that we are all supposed to follow. Further, they see academics as united together, one front, one opinion, at least in terms of SFF. And this is the problem -- that academics are seen not as a voice of cultural insight, but as gatekeepers to the country club, and all supposed to be guarding the same gate in perfect agreement as well. And that commercial is seen as the opposite of literary, which is an utter error, in my view.

As for what you are saying about cultural impetus effecting the marketplace, and thus, category markets, I do understand what you mean. For instance, horror -- horror has always been popular, but by specific author, not enough by type. In the last ten years, however, that has changed culturally, along with an interest in dark fantasy, leading booksellers to now set up a horror section, at least in the U.S. -- to have a small category market that can sustain itself on regular buys. That is essentially culturally based.

But it isn't literary/commercial based. The horror in general fiction is sold as commercial (paperback) fiction with some authors being considered also literary. Moving the horror titles from the general fiction shelves to the new horror section, the horror titles remain sold as commercial (paperback) fiction with the same authors being considered also literary. They've moved shelves (organization,) but the works have changed in substance or labelling not at all.

Likewise, Bantam can take an author who has been published by Bantam Spectra, their SFF imprint, chiefly marketed by Spectra and sold in the SFF section of the bookstores, and publish the author's new title in Bantam Books, instead of Spectra, market it to the category fans and elsewhere, and sell it in general fiction section of the bookstores. The author has not changed styles or subject matter, is not more accessible to a general fiction market than before, has not developed a literary reputation, etc., but gets moved for any number of organizational reasons, ranging from the author selling really well (the most common reason) and so easy for fans to locate/remember without being in the SFF section, to Bantam Spectra having a lot of books in one month coming out and Bantam Books having a spare slot to take the extra.

Even though the publishing imprint and which shelves a book gets put on and the hardcover or paperback format it gets published have nothing to do with a work's assessed level of literary-ness, people are quite convinced that it does, because they're taught it -- by friends, parents, advertisers, etc. And yes, this is what humans do. But it's also what humans do to point out things that they find false.

Do you feel that all academics regard SFF or all category SFF as commercial trash, and if so, how do you explain this academic journal to which I linked?

 

[BrianC]

So what does it mean that I read stuff that interests me, and I don't read stuff that bores me?

 

[KatG]

Not sure I understand the question, BC.

 

[A. Lynn]

I feel so... ignorant



I'm sorry guys, I do suppose that I'm a bit of a newb or a blonde, but either way can somebody please let me know about this whole "commercial vs literary" and this war on academia? A small summary, if anybody would be so kind? Thank you so much.

 

[KatG]

Hmm, that's sort of complicated, and I'm sure some will disagree with me. Basically, some fiction gets called literary, meaning it is felt to have exceptional artistry and can be considered literature or worthy of being assessed as literature. There are concrete narrative reasons for this term, market reasons and then just a whole lot of opinion reasons that a book may be termed literary. It can be called literary by its publisher, by other authors, by critics, by readers, by academics and educators, etc.

Commercial is a term that developed, mostly from the market, for paperback fiction. This was related to how books used to be sold, in the two-tier system, as I went over earlier in this thread. It means, ostensibly, a work of fiction that has mass appeal, has a simplistic and accessible style and structure, and should sell well. The category markets, which developed to sell types of fiction to a dedicated fan base, because of these dedicated fan bases, because they were mostly in paperback editions, and because they usually use violent action in their stories, have traditionally been considered commercial. Therefore, all category SFF is considered by many to be automatically commercial.

Commercial has frequently been placed in opposition to literary fiction, as a Satan to God so to speak, even though numerous works termed literary have mass appeal and sell well, and numerous works termed commercial don't sell well at all, and many works deemed commercial are later championed as literary by various factions. If a work that is supposed to be literary does sell well -- say, Oprah picks it -- it can sometimes come under suspicion from certain quarters to not really being literary but in fact, commercial. If a book is termed literary, it often turns potential readers away from trying it, as literary books are supposed to be boring, hard to follow and not having wide appeal. If a book is termed commercial, it also often turns potential readers away because it's thought to be, well, not very good. These are only one set of definitions for literary and commercial, which is rather the problem, but are the most commonly used.

Academics are often seen, erroneously, as the gatekeepers of what is literary and what is not, since they study works on a literary and cultural basis. They are often lumped together as a group, presumed to have one mind and one goal. As such, there's a lot of resentment towards them as a group for supposedly ostracizing any category SFF titles from their realm and for preventing any of them to be viewed as literary fiction.

This does not reflect reality or history, given that academics and their students have been some of SFF's strongest advocates for it offering works of literature. Academia also contains some of SFF's strongest critics against it being capable of offering works of literature.

The editorial in the academic literary magazine was pointing out that the elements which some academics or other critics use to condemn all SF as not-literary, are the same elements found in fiction that they do study as literary. Which is not a new observation, but does serve as an example that academia is not united in its opinion about SFF fiction.

Why is this of perhaps interest to SFF writers? Well, largely it isn't. But there are a lot of writers who believe certain segments are gunning for them, and they have a lot of anger about it. So since I ran across this one, I thought to point it out. It's just one woman's opinion; it does not change the world. But it's nice.

 

[Fung Koo]

Oh joy... the first day of English Lit 1000, all over again!!!

Kat has made a few good points, but here's a bit more to peel the onion back a little further about how:

some fiction gets called literary, meaning it is felt to have exceptional artistry and can be considered literature or worthy of being assessed as literature.

All fiction is "commercial literature," but not all commercial literature is Literary (notice the capital L, Literature).

Here's an analogy:

Draw a stick figure. Draw a smiley face on that stick figure. You now have a basic form of a human being. It can easily stand in as symbolic for all human figures. Pretty much everyone understands it.

Now, say you draw two stick figures, exactly alike. Each is supposed to represent two distinct figures. How do you differentiate between the two? There are two options: 1) Add a curly hair to the top of the head of one, and leave the other as is; or 2) Add a curly hair to the head of one, and add ears to the other. (Basically, either you specialize one and leave the other general, or you specialize both.)

Now, let's say you have a page full of stick figures, all exactly alike (basic stick figure forms). Lets say you want a lot of them to represent a crowd of people -- it doesn't matter that they all look distinct. But then you want 3 to represent specific, distinguishable people. Again, you'd probably modify the form of the stick figure by adding details to the ones you want to highlight.

As an analogy for commercial literature and Literary Literature, imagine "commercial" meaning the basic stick figure shape -- indistinct, all basically alike, conforming to the normal minimum of identifiable characteristics. In other words, pretty much everyone knows what a basic stick figure is.

Literary works are, by comparison, the specified stick figures. They can either be in a highly specialized group that shares certain likenesses (say, 10 of the crowd of stick people have curly hairs on their heads) or singular (one of the 10 has the curly hair and eyebrows). The "Literary" stick figures fundamentally look like the basic "commercial literature" stick figures, but have extra qualities. (Or seem to be incredibly perfect.)

When it comes to calling something "Literature," the trouble can be in arguing that the distinguishing features actually exist. (This is the basic problem with all systems of categorization, even in science.) Since reading is a personal, subjective experience, we all bring different perspectives to the text -- we may not all see the features, and indeed might even see conflicting features.

So it's not as cut and dry as the analogy would suggest, but that's the idea. Academics in search of "Literature" look for the specific, distinguishing features on the stick figures, and then argue with each other about whether or not they are really there. And, in those circumstances where the Academics agree they are there, they argue about how important they are to the development of lower-case literature (in other words -- do these unique stick figures have an effect that modifies the creation of, or how we understand the shape of, the basic stick figure?).

To go a little further still:

Capital L "Literature" is fundamentally composed of works that are considered self-reflective of the media itself. That is, a primary concern of "Literature" is the text itself. For "commercial" literature, the text is only the vehicle for the delivery of a story.

In other words, "Literature" is self-obsessed (if we can personify the text!).

Let's go with a really simple narrative for an example:

John walked to the store. At the store he met Sally. John and Sally then fell in love. After a brief falling out, they live happily ever after.

You could tell this exact story a bazillion different ways. This is "commercial" literature -- the same story told over and over again because it's easy and recognizable to everyone. The details in between change -- like the names of the characters and the setting of the story -- but, when you grind it down to basics, the plot and overall form remains very similar from book to book to book.

The academic search for "Literature" (Capital L) primarily examines the works that stray from the "normal" formula. "Literature" is mostly composed of works that start from the basic story, but then do things that are somewhat atypical. It might invert the form to see if it makes the story better (From TV, "How I Met Your Mother" is an example of a simple inversion to the basic formula -- it allows a different mode of story telling, and therefore is potentially the TV equivalent of "Literature"), or it might focus entirely on some small aspect of the story (long rambling internal monologues, or a boy's obsession with his mother a la DH Lawrence).

Alternatively, a work of "Literature" might tell the exact same story as a commercial literature work, and with the same basic form, but does it in such a way that is somehow remarkable. Why, if the formula is so basic, are some stories generally regarded as better than others? What is it about them?

The vast majority of all fiction is lower-case L literature, SFF included. Commercial literature -- regardless of genre -- is full of stories that follow the same basic sets of rules. The important part is the story itself. "Literary" Literature, by comparison, is full of stories that are either seen to perfect the rules, or those that modify or break the rules, in order to tell the story in a particularly powerful or altogether different way.

In other words: "Literary Literature" is the exception and the height of form, "commercial literature" is the rule and the basic of form.

Think:
pret a port v. haute couture
Ford Taurus v. Ford Cobra
Chair v. Throne

 

[Fung Koo]

But you have to understand, people don't make the distinction between reviewers (who you see as advertising and elitist,) and academia.

Ok, so follow-up question: Should they see the distinction?

If your assertion is that there is no need for the division (indeed, the false divide) between commercial literature and Capital L Literature, is the division between academic criticism and popular criticism likewise false?

Further, they see academics as united together, one front, one opinion, at least in terms of SFF.

And for good reason -- highly formulaic literature, regardless of genre, gets the brunt of Academia's ire. Modern SFF finds its roots in juvenile mass-market paperback formulaic writing. That SFF has ascended out of this history is to its credit -- but is also its cross to bear.

And that commercial is seen as the opposite of literary, which is an utter error, in my view.

I agree, commercial is not the opposite of literary. But they are not the exact same thing.

Moving the horror titles from the general fiction shelves to the new horror section, the horror titles remain sold as commercial (paperback) fiction with the same authors being considered also literary. They've moved shelves (organization,) but the works have changed in substance or labelling not at all.

Likewise, Bantam can take an author who has been published by Bantam Spectra, their SFF imprint, chiefly marketed by Spectra and sold in the SFF section of the bookstores, and publish the author's new title in Bantam Books, instead of Spectra, market it to the category fans and elsewhere, and sell it in general fiction section of the bookstores. The author has not changed styles or subject matter, is not more accessible to a general fiction market than before, has not developed a literary reputation, etc., but gets moved for any number of organizational reasons, ranging from the author selling really well (the most common reason) and so easy for fans to locate/remember without being in the SFF section, to Bantam Spectra having a lot of books in one month coming out and Bantam Books having a spare slot to take the extra.

Ok. So what you're saying is that the publishing industry has no qualifications with which to identify some works as "Literary" and others as "Commercial" -- you're saying that the publishing categories are false. This is certainly true. It's publishers trying to act like academics, when they are not. It's just a pretension.

But that doesn't make the literary/commercial divide irrelevant or false in its entirety.

Even though the publishing imprint and which shelves a book gets put on and the hardcover or paperback format it gets published have nothing to do with a work's assessed level of literary-ness, people are quite convinced that it does, because they're taught it -- by friends, parents, advertisers, etc.

So are you saying that blame is being erroneously assigned to academia, when in fact the most deserving party is the publisher and those who believe them?

Do you feel that all academics regard SFF or all category SFF as commercial trash, and if so, how do you explain this academic journal to which I linked?

As I said above, SFF's cross to bear is its root in the juvenile mass-market paperback formula writing-team houses. For a lot of SFF, its reputation is well deserved. But, I'd point out that there is at least one or two (but usually 10 or so) major works of SFF on the reading list for every single historical period of literature. The academic beef is not with the ideas of SFF, but with the traditions in the SFF publishing industry.

The other problem is that the definition of what makes Good-SFF good is somewhat different from what makes Capital L Literature good when compared to their respective baselines. Not every academic is well read in SFF -- indeed, most are not -- and so there is an ignorance about what qualities of SFF make certain SFF stories better than others. The focus of the academic is different for most other forms of fiction. And there is very little agreement on the aspect of SFF that makes SFF good and bad -- this is the debate we usually get into about the definitions of SF and F.

SFF is a grotesque form -- and grotesques are notoriously difficult to judge because they repel aesthetic considerations. The qualities one must assess lay outside the usual suspects, and it takes a special taste to really "get" the grotesque, chimeric nature of SFF.

As for the article, these aren't hard to find. Jump on Jstor and there's a bazillion defenses of SFF to be found. Most are written by relatively junior folk who are simply promoting their favourite SFF -- few actually contribute to our understanding of what SFF is, or how it works, or why its there. These articles are kinda like Canadians bitching about Americans -- the Americans are vaguely aware that we're here, and we're screaming our lungs out trying to be heard. They don't even need to ignore us -- we're a flea trying to get the attention of an elephant.

In other words, it's a one sided battle. Other than SFFs history in pulp, most academics simply don't care about SFF one way or the other, commercial or otherwise.

 

[KatG]

We're having one of those conversations that we have in Gary Wassner's forum.

You and I, Fung, have a basic ideological difference of opinion about the nature of fiction, plot and literary attributes, as well as the nature of pulp, I suspect. Which I suppose reflects academia itself, or at least the battles that range about fiction in general.

I also disagree with you about SFF in academia, mostly because I've talked to academics who aren't junior people and who have been studying it a good part of their careers. What they say is going on doesn't match what you say is going on, though I'm not under the illusion that category SFF has become the center of literature studies.

I guess it's not something to worry about, LOL.

 

[Fung Koo]

So, out of curiosity, what are the venerable academics saying is going on?

In a nutshell, of course...

 

[Randy M.]

[...]There was a version of the "literary" vs. "commercial" market category distinction prior to the existence of the modern publishing industry. It was based on the religious model of inclusion and exclusion of the scared and secular. [..]

If that was intended, I'm stealing it.

If that was a typo, I'm still stealing it, and it may be my favorite typo ever.


This is an interesting discussion, by the way. I wish I had more time to read and contribute to it. Two things occurred to me that I thought I'd mention:

1) From what I've read, academia as delineator of what is and isn't literary only gained real influence over the mass of readers in the '50s and '60s, say about the time that most of our recognized literary writers were starting to come out of the universities. Before that there were literary critics who were more or less ... er ...secular (not affiliated with colleges and universities) who had quite a bit of influence over popular tastes in literature; those critics included H. L. Menken, Edmund Wilson, Clifton Fadiman, Irving Howe, Robert Penn Warren, and Malcolm Crowley, among many others. I think the closest I've seen to them now would be John Leonard and Michael Dirda who, for all their eloquence and wide range of literary likings, cast pale shadows of influence beside those of their predecessors.

2) One of those 'secular' critics, Edmund Wilson, produced a book in the 1940s titled Classics and Commercials, a collection of essays he'd written over the previous years, including those in which he bashed horror stories in general (or at least those collected in Great Tales of Terror and Supernatural and another collection), H. P. Lovecraft (still a sore spot for some Lovecraftians), and the mystery genre ("Who Cares Who Killed Roger Ackroyd?" -- still a sore spot for many mystery readers). What you don't hear genre fans mention as often is that in some of those essays Wilson had favorable comments on Raymond Chandler and H. G. Wells, and acknowledged one of the great literary commercial successes of the late 19th century and early 20th century, the Sherlock Holmes stories, as minor masterpieces.

In short, the division between literary and commercial seems to be older than what I've read here so far suggests, though the division in popular discourse may have originated with lay-critics. Also, the argument about relative merit in commercial fiction is, apparently, just as old.

Randy M.

 

[KatG]

So, out of curiosity, what are the venerable academics saying is going on?

In a nutshell, of course...

That they've been studying these authors for decades. That they are now dealing with new writers like J.K. Rowling (though two I talked to don't think she's all that, of course.) That they have a lot of courses in their universities studying SFF works. That the students and the rash of new professors in the 1970's created changes in how SFF was viewed, because they saw it as literature. That writers like Ursula LeGuin and Octavia Butler who were seen as feminist writers were studied in women's studies, which boosted the view of SFF works in general. That the generation in college now grew up with SFF and takes it seriously as literature. That SFF is sometimes seen as a more vibrant source of literary development than straight contemporary fiction, which many academics see as currently stagnating (a view the last part of which I don't necessarily agree with.) And of course, there are a decent number of SFF writers who are or have been professors themselves.

I don't believe that people in publishing are not capable of assessing/understanding literary attributes. I do believe that people often misinterpret what is happening in book publishing or how books are sold as meaning something about the qualitative nature of titles. And I know there is a great deal of prejudice toward different publishing imprints and publishing formats that has very little to do with the literary nature of a work. And I don't think much of the stick figure analogy.

Randy, the things you bring up are interesting. The separation of the two types of publishing went on for a hundred years or so in the modern age (and of course the scared and the secular was much longer,) but the post-war period was when the two began to be merged, when publishing was still a gentlemen's business but was rapidly changing, and the book category markets were firmly developed. That we had lay critics laying a foundation of literary versus commercial beforehand -- and also laying down the idea that genre stories could be literary -- sort of mirrors the early development of SFF, which was not purely pulp and was not separated from a literary aspect as pulp, marketed through those channels. And then SFF was brought into more regular channels, as the publishing businesses merged, which may have contributed to an outsider mentality. Actually, that makes enormous sense -- thanks for the info.

 

[Ranke Lidyek]

For all this, one could argue that the majority of pre-industrial literature was birthed by the fantasy genre (ok, not genre, but the majority of classic works are fantasies: the Odyssey, Dante's Inferno, Milton and so forth ), so I find it odd that academics and taste-makers excluded fantasy in this century. Certainly, the pre-industrial classics have more in common with the fantasy genre than the milk-toast, Starbucks, NY-centric "literature" of the moment...

But fantasy isn't the only overlooked genre. The mystery genre is rarely considered--and there's some damned fine writing there as well. It all seems, on the face, rather random.

Perhaps a more apt assessment might be made by considering the overall mental, societal, and psychological makeup of those who seem make such determinations. If so, then I reference us back to my earlier post and to Fung Koo, who, I feel, was accurate in his portrayal. Furthermore, I feel that the hermetic existence of such people favors increasingly isolated, unrealistic, closeted, self-congratulatory writing. These people have never known true hardship or rites of passage, so fantasy writing, which often deals with man without the societal chaff, concentrating on a look at our nature stripped of conditioning--is ignored or looked down upon by the cultural elite. They aren't comfortable with certain truths.

Again, this is the dichotomy of the "commoner" versus the new nobility. They need to believe that they are a better class of human being and one way is to separate themselves in terms of "art", which has always been humanity's watermark. If something is exclusive, then only "they", the elite few, really understand it and the rest is just pablum for the unwashed masses.

Which means that the literary and commercial are artificial distinctions--though I'd argue that commercial fiction is more quantifiable....

I hope I'm making some sort of sense here. My brain's fuzzy tonight...

 

[Fung Koo]

...academia as delineator of what is and isn't literary only gained real influence over the mass of readers in the '50s and '60s, say about the time that most of our recognized literary writers were starting to come out of the universities....

And, that's when the TV entered the market...

There's an evolutionary history here that I don't think can be glossed. I've said it elsewhere, but we need to remember a few things when we talk about Academic and literature -- most importantly, "commoner language" (ie - secular) literature wasn't introduced into universities for viable study until the middle/late 1800's.

And we also have to remember that when English-language "literature" was first introduced as viable for academic study barely 150 years ago, the novel was considered the absolute lowest of the low. All novels were considered commercial, unartistic, populist crap. While Tennyson was Poet Laureate, the novel nearly wound up as illegal because he hated them so much!

So the novel, as a form in its entirety, comes out of a culture of derision, and a high-brow opinion that it was low-brow, commercial, morally-questionable, sensationalist titillation.

There's a powerful and often used argument that the novel only took its first step out of the ghetto when the cinema took the lowest wrung on the ladder (and cinema only climbed out of the ghetto when TV took the lowest wrung).

Poetry has always been considered (amongst those in the know) as the highest form of the written word. (It's why we have the King James version of the bible. Poetry is pretty much considered holy.) That's why "Literary" novels -- that play with the elements of form -- are considered Literary. Because they're poetic.

Below Poetry you get Theatre. The Novel is the layman's theatre -- but with the added burden of an author's self indulgence (and SFF is considered to be the ultimate in self indulgence). Then film, then TV.

That's the rank and file of entertainment media arts.

But I digress...

The point is, if you consider the timeline and the introductions of technology, its pretty easy to see why Academia was never considered to be the Makers of Greatness -- novels weren't worth greatness until after the cinema became an institution in the 30s and 40s. Novels -- especially SF -- seem to reach a peak in the 50s and 60s when TV comes in.

You referenced HG Wells -- his most popular work was radio theatre.

This timeline accords quite well with the publication dates of the books you've mentioned. 1850ish we get English-language poetry in university. 1900ish we get the early film industry, and novels gain acceptance. By 1950ish the TV is introduced and the novel has a home. 50 years is equivalent to 2 standard generations.

Which segues nicely into Kat's post...

...That the students and the rash of new professors in the 1970's created changes in how SFF was viewed, because they saw it as literature.

Generational shifting, certainly, and the development of technologies along the way that came with certain cultural biases, allowing the novel to find acceptance.

I don't believe that people in publishing are not capable of assessing/understanding literary attributes.

I don't mean they're incapable -- it's just foolish to forecast. "Literature" is an exercise in hindsight.

And I don't think much of the stick figure analogy.

Boo on you!

But fantasy isn't the only overlooked genre. The mystery genre is rarely considered--and there's some damned fine writing there as well. It all seems, on the face, rather random.

If by mystery genre you're going back to DeQuincey, Poe, and Doyle, you'll find that these are most definitely part of the root structure of the SF genre. The whole scientific induction/deduction issue was the cornerstone of mid/late 19th century detective literature. It was published primarily in the short story or serial formats. This lit branches out into what we call mystery, law fiction, thrillers, crime drama, etc. And eventually, it found its home in serial TV dramas.

These people have never known true hardship or rites of passage

C'mon now, the eggheads have as much variability in their backgrounds as everyone else. Academia's reputation as a place composed of upper-class pampered weiners who endure no hardship is as false a prejudice as all those we're discussing here. Hermetically sealed, yes. Closeted, yes. Blinded by their own studies, yes. But ignorant of hardship? No more than average...

Again, this is the dichotomy of the "commoner" versus the new nobility.

Bang on. And coming back to my point about the evolution of the media, this is tied directly to literacy. The unwashed, illiterate masses and Nobility as Philosopher Kings. The concept of universal literacy is hugely important to this discussion. If poetry is the apex of literature, and TV/Film the basement, and the commoner was usually the illiterate fool in the basement.... It's no wonder the novel could gain acceptance with the introduction of visual media arts.

Now that we have a reasonably universally literate society, we've all become bourgeois. Marx had it backwards -- it was the bourgeois revolution, not the proles. So now we bicker and argue over our personal tastes in our pampered little lives.

 

[KatG]

Mystery gets some of the same flack too, but less so, because it moved into hardcover sooner and because it had a broader market besides its base fans. The category market for mystery developed a hardcover-paperback system, one which SFF started borrowing more extensively in the late 1980's. Still, Kate Atkinson, who is an amazing writer in my view, was told that she missed out on the Booker Prize because her work was seen as "too genre," i.e. suspense. Whether that's really true or not, these issues do come up in the press and among readers, with people very much split on whether genre fiction can be literary or can only be literary if it turns itself into something else.

But again, the tar and feather composite of all academics as elitists who are trying to impose a social system on the world just doesn't hold up in my experience. Very often, it's been the universities that call out for social changes, and again, a decent sized contingent of academics have been large advocates for genre fiction, including importantly SFF. And again, academics while having their purvey in the academic and educational communities, are not really the ones telling the general populace what is not literary. There is no central authority in charge of all this, and everyone argues with everybody else.

The dichotomy of noble and commoner we get isn't so much from what themes various authors may be using. Rather, it is on one hand the interpretation of format and publisher, which are often assumed to connote a particular literary value on a work -- an outmoded way of looking at the market that does come, I think, largely from how the publishing market developed over the last century -- and which has been both a selling tool and a cross to bear and overcome for publishing. And on the other hand, a sincere belief that violent action and a narrative that has a high-action plot are not literary in development, that this has mass appeal, but not literary complexity. I suppose it could be equated to Fung's stick figure model. In this view, you can then build literary complexity onto the violent action -- transcending the problem of the choice of what is seen as a limited narrative pattern.

Michael Chabon has talked a lot about this in interviews where he's been trying to get people used to the idea that genre fiction provides literary opportunities -- that over time, plot has become the dirty word in reference to textual worth. But not for everyone. There are many people -- academics, publishers, critics, readers, etc. -- who violently disagree with such a view or ignore it as a reference point altogether.

I say all the time that opinions of written art are subjective, by which it is often assumed I mean that everyone's opinion should be equal, is all the same, so no one's opinion is worth anything, blah, blah, blah. But I mean that opinions are subjective, which means that they can never be equal. We do not value opinions on the same rubric. But we can build bridges between people with the same opinions or partially the same opinions or not at all the same but I can see where you're coming from opinions.

What we can't do is build universal bridges, which are an attempt to create equality -- we all start from the same place and are in agreement -- and authority -- this is the way things are. Literary/commercial as a divide is an attempt to create one of these universal bridges, as in "we all know that," and "everyone has this experience." But the definitions of literary and commercial are fluid -- what may seem like an universal bridge and a neat division is actual a bunch of different, constantly shifting bridges. Fung and I, for instance, agree about certain points and not others. As he points out, academics disagree about what features, narrative patterns, count and which do not. I am of the opinion that an author choosing one narrative pattern over another doesn't have much to do with the literary power of the work.

It's no good trying to make a universal bridge out of all publishing people or all academics either, because their opinions and views are much more varied and fluid than that. Which is again why I referenced the article. Because writers worry about everything, and learning that different groups are composed of different views generally helps them worry less. Some of them anyway.

*Oops, missed Fung's latest post -- we're posting at the same time.

 

[KatG]

Agree in general with your tech timeline, Fung, though I think the novel started to get a higher status a few decades before cinema, in the later 1800's. But it does seem to be the progression. Take music -- opera was low-brow until there was musical theater, etc. And it is certainly a progression that a writer considered low-brow by many, in part because of immense popularity, over time is often then considered to be of more literary worth, etc., perhaps in comparison to writers who come after. Also agree with the connection between suspense fiction and the development of SF. There's a reason that most SFF is suspense in nature.

That's why "Literary" novels -- that play with the elements of form -- are considered Literary. Because they're poetic.

Essentially agree. This is not the only way to be literary, or to use language to create literary effect, but it is what is meant when we call an author a stylist or language stylist -- they're poetic.

I don't mean they're incapable -- it's just foolish to forecast. "Literature" is an exercise in hindsight.

Agreed in principle, but publishers and other people can express their assessment of the literary impact of a work. And that impact remains whether a majority agree with it over time or not.

 

[Fung Koo]

It's tricky calling a lot of novels from the late 19th century "novels" -- many are novellas or collected serials. Serialized, episodic lit gained acceptance well before the novel-proper as we know it, which probably owes something to evolution of radio. Radio plays were hugely important in the acceptance/evolution of serial-to-novel.

HG Wells, Margaret Atwood, Douglas Adams, for example, really gained their notoriety through radio plays.

 

[Dawnstorm]

Well, didn't early novelists function pretty much like court jesters? They could say what they want because nobody took them seriously, but everyone did listen. We had novels masquerading as history and history masquerading as novel.

Interestingly, I can't think of many novelists that were also poets. Not until Thomas Hardy (who became a poet only in the 20th Century, I think), but correct me if I'm wrong. They get more frequent in the 20th Century. (Well, there are always the romantics: Shelley's Frankenstein was pretty much inspired in a poetry circle...)

With SFF we have a harsher definition problem; as soon as we have the genre, we have precursors and role models and no clear borders. Was there a status difference in the 30ies between Edgar Rice Burroughs and H.G. Wells? Not in Amazing...