So what exactly is 'great writing'?

[Mugwump]

We are all book lovers – yes. Nothing stirs our imagination like a well-written novel which takes hold from the very beginning and refuses to relinquish its grasp until the final page is turned.

But what precisely do we mean when we say 'well-written'? Critics fall over themselves to espouse the virtues of a particular author, but try to pin them down on what 'well-written' actually means and many assume the defensive, offering vaporous answers that amount to little more than nonsense.

Below I include two similar passages from award-winning novels that are concerned with bullying and violence. Which do you think is the better written, and why?

Note that I have removed the names of the participants in an attempt to minimise the effects of prejudice.

The people behind ______ grabbed at him, to hold him.

______ did not feel like laughing, but he laughed. “You mean it takes this many of you to fight a ______?”

“We're people, not ______s, turd face. You're about as strong as a fart!”

But they let go of him. And as soon as they did, _____ kicked out high and hard, catching ______ square in the breastbone. He dropped. It took ______ by surprise – he hadn't thought to put ______ on the ground with one kick. It didn't occur to him that ______ did not want to fight like this seriously, that he wasn't prepared for a truly desperate blow.

For a moment, the others backed away and ______ lay motionless. They were all wondering if he was dead. ______, however, was trying to figure out a way to forestall vengeance. To keep them from taking him in a pack tomorrow. I have to win this now, and for all time, or I'll fight it every day and it will get worse and worse.

______ knew the unspoken rules of manly warfare. It was forbidden to strike the opponent who lay helpless on the ground; only an animal would do that.

So ______ walked to _____'s supine body and kicked him again, viciously, in the ribs. ______ groaned and rolled away from him. _____ walked around and kicked him again, in the crotch. _____ could not make a sound; he only doubled up and tears streamed out of his eyes.

Then _____ looked at the others coldly. “You might be having some idea of ganging up on me. You could probably beat me up pretty bad. But just remember what I do to people who try to hurt me. From then on you'd be wondering when I'd get you, and how bad it would be”. He kicked ______'s face. Blood from his nose spattered the ground nearby. “It wouldn't be this bad,” ______ said. “It would be worse.”

He turned and walked away. Nobody followed him.

New prisoners are largely of two kinds – there are those who for shame, fear or shock wait in fascinated horror to be initiated into the lore of prison life, and there are those who trade their wretched novelty in order to endear themselves to the community. ______ did neither of these things. He seemed pleased to despise them all, and they hated him because, like the world outside, he did not need them. After about ten days they had had enough. The great had no homage, the small had had no comfort, so they crowded him in the dinner queue.

Crowding is a prison ritual akin to to the eighteenth-century practice of jostling. It has the virtue of an apparent accident, in which the prisoner's mess tin is upturned, and its contents split on his uniform. ______ was barged from one side, while from the other an obliging hand descended on his forearm, and the thing was done. _____ said nothing, looked thoughtfully at the two men on either side of him, and accepted in silence the filthy rebuke of a warder who knew quite well what had happened.

Four days later, while working with a hoe on the prison flower-bed, he seemed to stumble. He was holding the hoe with both hands across his body, the end of the handle protruding about six inches from his right fist. As he strove to recover his balance the prisoner to his right doubled up with a grunt of agony, his arms across his stomach. There was no more crowding after that.

 

[Expendable]

Sneaky. I tried not to let it influence me though.

Both showed the scene and it was hard to pick which but Author #1 was a bit more immediate, a little more real.

-Ex.

 

[Eldanuumea]

This was a very clever idea for a thread, Mugwump, and it gives me an idea for a classroom activity.

I chose piece #2, because I tend to prefer what I would call "thoughtful" writing, that draws out ideas and descriptions and looks for meaning.
My daughter would have chosen piece #2, because she likes lots and lots of dialogue.

I thought the pieces were equally well-written, but simply served different purposes and were aimed at different audiences.

 

[Rocket Sheep]

Neither is "Great".

The first one has the most promise. It has nice action but it has possible pov issues and too many adverbs.

The second has a distant recollection feel to it which some people find dreamy (and I personally dislike) but it is too formal, it feels like haughty old rich guy on a hilltop casting down his knowledge to the lowly workers children (er... if you know what I mean...).

I wouldn't have given either an award for prose. What award did they win?

 

[ShellyS]

This is the sort of discussion I try to avoid because I find it very subjective. What I consider great, or even good writing, when it comes to fiction, someone else might not. So I usually keep the labeling to factors of readability. Are there errors? Is the prose flat? Did I like it? And I try to remember that the labeling is mine and applies to what I like and don't like.

I don't like a lot of literature people have labeled great? Does that mean they are or aren't "great"? I leave it to folks to decide for themselves, which is why I think people should be exposed to the broadest range of reading material available.

 

[Mugwump]

Okay, passage one is taken from Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game, which in addition to being one of the biggest selling SF novels in history also won both the Hugo and Nebula awards in the mid eighties. Given that there have been very few dual-award winning SF novels over the years it's reasonably safe to argue that OSC probably did something right when he put this story together. The book has spawned half-a-dozen sequels which have met with mixed receptions.

For those who aren't familiar with Ender's Game let me say first that it, like Harry Potter, is one of those rare and remarkable books which can be appreciated by both adults and children. Unlike Potter however, EG has a nasty streak that gets even nastier as the pages are turned. It is, quite possibly, one of the most disturbing pieces of SF ever put into print.

The second passage is taken from John le Carre's The Spy Who Came In From The Cold, a tale which many regard as being the legendary spy writer's finest achievement. I don't agree with this opinion (the shortness of the chapters and the book itself means that his remarkable talent for construct mesmerizing sequences of dialogue is somewhat shackled) but that's for another debate.

I think it's interesting to note the differing attitudes toward violence and how it is portrayed by both authors. From the very beginning it's obvious that Card doesn't believe in leaving anything to the imagination. Claret is sprayed, ribs are smashed and testicles crushed in what seems like a sadistic orgy of blood-spattered gore which, I suspect, Card not only agrees with but longs to jump into.

John le Carre, in complete contrast, chooses to shun the visceral almost entirely. His two acts of violence are incredibly subtle, cloudy (dreamlike?) affairs. What exactly happens to Alec Leamas in the dinner queue? Is he stabbed? Punched? Hit with a blunt instrument? I'd argue the first but it could be anything. The point is that le Carre correctly understands that leaving the 'how' to the reader's imagination can be far more effective when describing scenes of violence.

Unlike Card, who pretty much takes you by the hand and leads you through the slugfest, le Carre forces you to do some of the work yourself. He's given you the bare basics, now go out and construct the rest of scene in your own mind.

In my opinion this appreciation of subtlety is what sets the latter passage above the former and highlights le Carre's superiority to Card as a writer.

Average authors, fear losing the reader’s attention and walk with him through every detail of a scene, Great authors bugger off and leave you with a trail of tasty breadcrumbs to follow.

 

[Dawnstorm]

I went with 2, because I felt 1 read to slowly (too much word-ballast) for an action scene, but not clinical enough for a detatched-violence scene (á la Ballard).

However, I feel that text 1 relies more on context than text 2; it's more important to know the characters, for starters. Also, 1 suffers more from name deletion. So a stand alone comparison may not be fair.

 

[Eldanuumea]

It amuses me that I have read and enjoyed both of those books, the LeCarre one decades ago but the Card one within the past two years. Didn't recognize the context of either one.

 

[KatG]

Well-written means "I like this writing." The reasons a critic may have for regarding the writing as strong vary considerably. A critic may like the characterizations, whereas another critic might dislike the same characterizations. Frequently, well-written is an accolade used for writers who are very focused on language -- imagery, description, point-of-view, but more often than not, it means that whatever aspects of fiction a reviewer particularly prefers were present in the writing being reviewed.

In the case of the poll, you not only have two excerpts that are written in different styles, genres and about different issues of bullying, but they are different types of narrative text. Card's excerpt is an action scene, which is rather funny, given that Card's work, "Ender's Game" in particular, is often exposition heavy and easy on the action. Le Carre's excerpt is not a scene. It is a block of exposition delivered by omniscient narration in which are imbedded scene snippets to establish the character's situation. (That's why it seems "thoughtful" -- it's the musings of the omniscient narrator to the reader.) Hence, Card's scene, being a visual image, is very detailed, while Le Carre's block of exposition, being primarily used to deliver information about prisons and the character, and containing a time jump besides, is not. If you really wanted to compare the text of these two authors, you'd be better off either picking two blocks of exposition or two full-fledged scenes. But since the purpose of doing the excerpts seems to mainly have been to laud Le Carre's style in one instance and trash Card's style in one instance, maybe not. It appears rather like voting policies in Florida -- you're trying to stack the deck, Muggie.

Card is quite effective at characterization. One of the reasons "Ender's Game" is his most acclaimed work is because it is essentially a character study in which we are deeply immersed in the struggles of a young man who has to solve very complicated stand-off situations. Le Carre is known for taking the usual hard action realm of intelligence thriller and instead investing in the philosophy, poetry and symbolism of it -- moral questions over guns essentially. So that does give a basis for comparison, I suppose, that they posit moral and emotional dilemmas, but they seem to me to be going in two different directions -- Card is doing a coming of age story against a sf background, and Le Carre is doing the dark angst of espionage, not to mention that their styles and choice of language are not at all the same.

Wouldn't it make more sense to compare Card to someone like Kim Stanley Robinson, and Le Carre to Robert Ludlum?

 

[Mugwump]

Well-written means "I like this writing." The reasons a critic may have for regarding the writing as strong vary considerably. A critic may like the characterizations, whereas another critic might dislike the same characterizations. Frequently, well-written is an accolade used for writers who are very focused on language -- imagery, description, point-of-view, but more often than not, it means that whatever aspects of fiction a reviewer particularly prefers were present in the writing being reviewed.

In the case of the poll, you not only have two excerpts that are written in different styles, genres and about different issues of bullying, but they are different types of narrative text. Card's excerpt is an action scene, which is rather funny, given that Card's work, "Ender's Game" in particular, is often exposition heavy and easy on the action. Le Carre's excerpt is not a scene. It is a block of exposition delivered by omniscient narration in which are imbedded scene snippets to establish the character's situation. (That's why it seems "thoughtful" -- it's the musings of the omniscient narrator to the reader.) Hence, Card's scene, being a visual image, is very detailed, while Le Carre's block of exposition, being primarily used to deliver information about prisons and the character, and containing a time jump besides, is not. If you really wanted to compare the text of these two authors, you'd be better off either picking two blocks of exposition or two full-fledged scenes. But since the purpose of doing the excerpts seems to mainly have been to laud Le Carre's style in one instance and trash Card's style in one instance, maybe not. It appears rather like voting policies in Florida -- you're trying to stack the deck, Muggie.

Card is quite effective at characterization. One of the reasons "Ender's Game" is his most acclaimed work is because it is essentially a character study in which we are deeply immersed in the struggles of a young man who has to solve very complicated stand-off situations. Le Carre is known for taking the usual hard action realm of intelligence thriller and instead investing in the philosophy, poetry and symbolism of it -- moral questions over guns essentially. So that does give a basis for comparison, I suppose, that they posit moral and emotional dilemmas, but they seem to me to be going in two different directions -- Card is doing a coming of age story against a sf background, and Le Carre is doing the dark angst of espionage, not to mention that their styles and choice of language are not at all the same.

Wouldn't it make more sense to compare Card to someone like Kim Stanley Robinson, and Le Carre to Robert Ludlum?

Possibly. After reading that piece of le Carre prose I remember thinking how remarkably efficient it is at achieving its purpose. I decided that once I reached the end of the novel I would compare it with similar-ish passages in other books. Ender's Game was simply the first book I laid hand on after re-reading TSWCIFTC. Not very scientific but then I am a terribly lazy researcher outside the university. <grin>

In truth I like Card's style. I just happen to think that le Carre is the superior craftsman. From what I've read about Card, I have a sneaking suspicion he might agree himself.

I did briefly consider comparing le Carre with Raymond Chandler but my collection appears to have slipped into the Bermuda Triangle that is the attic.

 

[Rocket Sheep]

This just shows how unimportant perfect prose is in telling a story. I loved Ender's Game but I remember being immediately disturbed by a child whose interior dialogue was so much more advanced than his exterior dialogue... I put it partly down to his giftedness and partly down to OSC not quite nailing it, but it didn't really spoil the story.

JLC's prose, I'm afraid, is just too stuffy for me to enjoy for a whole book. That is a personal thing. There would be scenes whose descriptions I would admire, turns of phrase that I would reread just to enjoy them but there are too many formal highbrow nonsense words and stuffing about clouding the story for me. Those words don't speak to me, they speak to college professors of a century ago that need to be impressed. The Spy, however is also a great story.

I don't think that evaluating snippets of prose is a great way to choose great stories.

 

[Mugwump]

JLC's prose, I'm afraid, is just too stuffy for me to enjoy for a whole book. That is a personal thing. There would be scenes whose descriptions I would admire, turns of phrase that I would reread just to enjoy them but there are too many formal highbrow nonsense words and stuffing about clouding the story for me. Those words don't speak to me, they speak to college professors of a century ago that need to be impressed.

That's interesting. I find le Carre to be a quite beautiful stylist and a superb storyteller. I agree that he's not entirely contemporary but then neither is he some relic of a bygone age, to be stuck in a dusty museum with the ilk of Conrad (now that is highbrow), Fitzgerald or even Joyce.

I don't think that evaluating snippets of prose is a great way to choose great stories.

I agree. But it does help to stimulate lively and often interesting discussion.

 

[KatG]

It's succinct and efficient because it's a block of exposition.

A scene is made of scenic description (sensory information) and exposition (non-sensory info and description, character inner thought and analysis, etc.) The amount of exposition in a scene varies considerably, depending on what the author is trying to do with the scene, the author's style and so on. A block of exposition is usually composed from exposition, but it can also include scenic description told to the audience and scene snippets or fragments -- bits of actual scene with action or dialogue that are not full scenes.

In the case of the Card excerpt, Card has various plot conflicts simmering which in this scene come to a boil and explode in an important plot event, so he's used a full detailed scene here. This excerpted part of the scene has minimal exposition, but that doesn't mean that Card doesn't use larger amounts of exposition in other scenes.

For Le Carre, he doesn't want to waste a large chunk of narrative space on a series of scenes showing the main character's (let's call him Bob) first few weeks in prison. That's not an essential part of the plot. But he does need to show that Bob carves a place for himself and is not an ordinary prisoner. So he uses exposition.

First, he uses the omniscient narrator (Le Carre himself) to tell us info about prisons:

"New prisoners are largely of two kinds – there are those who for shame, fear or shock wait in fascinated horror to be initiated into the lore of prison life, and there are those who trade their wretched novelty in order to endear themselves to the community."

Then, he has the omni nar tell us info about Bob:

"Bob did neither of these things. He seemed pleased to despise them all, and they hated him because, like the world outside, he did not need them."

Then he gets a little lyrical, still expository telling (note the time jump):

"After about ten days they had had enough. The great had no homage, the small had had no comfort, so they crowded him in the dinner queue."

Then he tells us what happened using exposition and a bit of scenic description to give us a visual image we can make use of, but not a detailed full scene because he doesn't want to waste the time on it. He essentially summarizes an account of what happened for us:

"Crowding is a prison ritual akin to to the eighteenth-century practice of jostling. It has the virtue of an apparent accident, in which the prisoner's mess tin is upturned, and its contents split on his uniform. Bob was barged from one side, while from the other an obliging hand descended on his forearm, and the thing was done. Bob said nothing, looked thoughtfully at the two men on either side of him, and accepted in silence the filthy rebuke of a warder who knew quite well what had happened."

Another time jump, which exposition is quite useful for:

"Four days later,"

And then again a bit of scene fragment, but still a summarized account told to the audience rather than a full, detailed scene:

"while working with a hoe on the prison flower-bed, he seemed to stumble. He was holding the hoe with both hands across his body, the end of the handle protruding about six inches from his right fist. As he strove to recover his balance the prisoner to his right doubled up with a grunt of agony, his arms across his stomach."

And finally, with a few words, Le Carre sums up weeks of events that he doesn't have to show and we can surmise:

"There was no more crowding after that."

Having established that his hero is tough, sharp, skilled and not an ordinary prisoner, Le Carre can then move on to those plot events he needs to concentrate on.

Both writers were dealing with their main characters facing down aggressors and showing that they were not to be challenged. So that is a basis for comparison in terms of character development. But Card had a key event of considerable importance to the main plotline, so he used a scene. Le Carre had some details of character and situation he need to impart as background, so he used a block of exposition. Card also uses blocks of exposition, sometimes with scenic description and fragments, depending on what he's dealing with. The writers in these excerpts are using different narrative tools and techniques for different purposes, so it's not really a straight comparison of their writing, is what I'm saying.

 

[Mugwump]

That's a fine assessment Kat.

 

[ironchef texmex]

Oh, man, I've missed you guys. A few quick points.


Le Carre and Card have promise? Hah! They'll be so happy to hear that.


Le Carre has less exposition? Of course he does. Go back to the books from the 70's and before and compare them to the more recent stuff. Not many 200 pagers getting printed these days. Not so many 600 pagers back in olden times. The reason? Before word processors, cranking out novels was a collosal pain in the 'ol keister. So why does Le Carre make his points so quickly. Don't be surprises if a simple desire to avoid Carpal Tunel played a role.


And what is great writing? It's writing that has the energy to move you from one cognitive/emotional state to another. In other words the written words, when seen in unison, create a motive force that acts on the prefrontal........ Okay, I'll stop now. Nah, I don't know what it is either.

 

[SubZero61992]

They both suck to me.

 

[FicusFan]

I just wandered in, because the poll attracted me.

I would have to say that the presentation here favors #2. There are fewer dashes and it looks neater to read and to think about. #1 has so many dashes where the names were removed that it hurts just to look at it. I couldn't keep track of it after a couple of lines and gave up. If you remove names to keep pre-conceptions from tipping the voting, you might want to use X and Y and Z or whatever instead of those empty spaces, at least for a passage that has a lot of names.

Just my 2 cents.

 

[Drakonslair]

I voted for Author #1 partly I suppose because as soon as I started reading it I recognised where it was from and I love Card. I think I just prefer his style of writing.

 

[KatG]

I'm hoping that's a happy "fine" and not a sarcastic one, Mugwump.

Going on that assumption, take a look at what Card is doing. The main point of the scene is to have it be an incident of savagery, which it is, and that may be one reason people don't like this excerpt as much. Le Carre's tough guy, in comparison, is doing what tough guys do -- he's attacked but it's ritual punishment and following the rules of such rituals, he accepts it. However, to show that he's not to be so accosted again, he attacks himself later on, with swift casualness, one of his attackers to send his message. All very honorable and warrior-like.

But the whole structure of "Ender's Game" is that Ender is strategically isolated and taught to command dispassionately, without desire for those under him to like him or concern for their wellbeing, in order to survive. This scene shows that process occurring -- Ender is attacked, again a ritual punishment not intended to cause serious harm, but Ender misinterprets the situation, misjudges his skills and causes serious harm to one of the attackers. He makes a mistake, one that he knows will put him in danger of serious harm. So he breaks the rules of honorable tough men and commits an immoral act of violence -- continuing to harm a person who's already down and injured. He has to do so in order to survive, but it changes him and how he will be viewed, and not exactly in a heroic, isn't he cool sort of way.

In writing the scene, Card uses minimal exposition because he wants it to seem sudden, too fast to think clearly about, and visceral. He gives us enough exposition to see Ender's thinking, so we can understand his actions even if we don't agree with them. But mostly, he wants to present an indelible visual image -- Ender kicking the boy to the ground, Ender kicking the boy when he's down on the ground, Ender threatening the other kids.

I can't find my copy of the book, so I filled in the blanks as best I could:

The people behind Ender grabbed at him, to hold him.

Ender did not feel like laughing, but he laughed. "You mean it takes this many of you to fight a bugger?"

We have minimal exposition -- Ender doesn't want to laugh, which lets us know that his inner turmoil doesn't match his external bravado.

“We're people, not buggers, turd face. You're about as strong as a fart!"

But they let go of him. And as soon as they did, Ender kicked out high and hard, catching "Bob" square in the breastbone. He dropped.

Not only no exposition, but minimal scenic description here too. "They let go of him," "he dropped" -- all meant to happen very fast. Sometimes if you have too little detail, an action scene can happen too fast and not hit readers emotionally, but if you frame it right, sudden, undetailed action can be effective and in any case, Ender kicking the boy is not as critical as what he does next.

It took Ender by surprise – he hadn't thought to put Bob on the ground with one kick. It didn't occur to him that Bob did not want to fight like this seriously, that he wasn't prepared for a truly desperate blow.

Exposition here, to show us Ender made a big mistake, one he didn't intend and one which he's sorry about.

For a moment, the others backed away and Bob lay motionless. They were all wondering if he was dead.

Card does a little omniscient narrator here -- "they were all wondering." Card's omni nar is less present than Le Carre's and mostly used for bits outside Ender's pov, but still around. Note minimal detail here again -- just stark action, you fill in the little bits.

Ender, however, was trying to figure out a way to forestall vengeance. To keep them from taking him in a pack tomorrow. I have to win this now, and for all time, or I'll fight it every day and it will get worse and worse.

Ender knew the unspoken rules of manly warfare. It was forbidden to strike the opponent who lay helpless on the ground; only an animal would do that.

Exposition here, to show Ender's thinking and his making his fateful decision.

So Ender walked to Bob's supine body and kicked him again, viciously, in the ribs. Bob groaned and rolled away from him. Ender walked around and kicked him again, in the crotch. Bob could not make a sound; he only doubled up and tears streamed out of his eyes.

Then Ender looked at the others coldly. "You might be having some idea of ganging up on me. You could probably beat me up pretty bad. But just remember what I do to people who try to hurt me. From then on you'd be wondering when I'd get you, and how bad it would be." He kicked Bob's face. Blood from his nose spattered the ground nearby. "It wouldn't be this bad," Ender said. "It would be worse."

He turned and walked away. Nobody followed him.

Much more scenic detail here, because Card wants you to really see and hear it happening. It's the climatic moment of the scene, the purpose of the scene. Ender protects himself from attack but does not make himself a creature of respect, like LeCarre's prisoner. He makes himself a pariah. At that particular moment, you don't really need Ender's thoughts to get the emotional impact of the incident, so no exposition is a decent way to go.

It all comes down to what they are trying to do with a piece of text, whether a scene or expository block. Those are the choices we make as well.

 

[Rocket Sheep]

Oh, man, I've missed you guys.

Le Carre and Card have promise? Hah! They'll be so happy to hear that.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Next time I'm going to wander in late and laugh at everyone too!

And they do have promise! The fact that they've already fulfilled it, proves we were right!

Mugwump was very mean to lead us down garden paths of prose in the interests of lively discussion...
... I'd be mad if I weren't so impressed by the deviousness of it all.