Deep Significance

Grumpy Old Bookman sums up his impatience with Serious Fiction and those who promote it:

The attitude in question takes the form of an assumption that this stuff is far superior, in every way, to books which just tell a story. It is held to be self-evident that a novel which concerns itself with Big Issues is, by definition, more worthy of attention, shelf space, and sales than is a book which contents itself with telling a story.

Later in the same post, he elaborates:

Finally, I want to return to my point that the novel which eschews all attempt at Deeper Significance, and just tells a story, is at least as valuable (actually rather more so) than one which seeks to weave in some message or other. . .A story, in my opinion, doesn't have to mean anything. But it does have to have an effect; otherwise both writer and reader are lost. And the story also has to have a beginning, a middle, and an end.

I agree with GOB that novels treating "Big Issues" are usually not worth reading and that critics who laud works of fiction for raising such issues are usually less interested in fiction than in advocating their own favored "ideas." But the alternative for the writer who doesn't pretend to dispense great Wisdom is not necessarily to produce "books which just tell a story."

GOB appears to reduce novels to only their narrative details. A coherent plot--"a beginning, a middle, and an end"--is not just necessay so that all parties concerned don't get "lost," but seems to be entirely sufficient. Simply "telling a story" discharges the author's duties, exhausts the possibilities of fiction as a literary medium. But this view of what is involved in writing fiction doesn't actually cede much room for "writing" itself. It doesn't seem to make any difference to GOB that fiction is made of words and that words can be made to perform many interesting tasks in addition to, or rather than, telling stories. Story is all. But to demand that writers confine themselves to storytelling of a sort that might be done just as well and just as readily in another medium seems arbitrary and short-sighted indeed.

What of the stylistic pleasures a work of fiction might provide? The pleasure of witnessing language used in novel and challenging ways (or even just moderately interesting ways), of experiencing the transformative power of written language (the power to transform perception as well as our understanding of what language itself can express) when it is wielded by a particularly venturesome imagination? Or the potential capacity of form to sustain the reader's interest, either by altering narrative convention in some dramatically compelling way, or by substituting its own kind of dramatic effect for narrative convention altogether. The way "story" is disclosed to the reader--not to mention the way point of view affects our response to narrated events--is surely just as important as the story itself, since story is really just a secondary quality that we habitually abstract from the immediacy of the work as a dynamic organization of words. Would GOB really say that a writer's attention to the formal and stylistic possibilities of fiction count for nothing compared to his/her obligation to "tell a story"?

GOB maintains that he doesn't so much begrudge writers with literary ambitions as "resent" readers and critics who use "Serious Fiction" for their own purposes: "it's the attitude of those who sell, review, and -- above all -- use the damn things as teaching material." He wants fiction to be allowed its "emotional" impact and literary critics to otherwise leave well enough alone. This is an entirely defensible position, except that he clearly does take out his frustrations on the overly ambitious writer--in this case Dara Horn and her novel The World to Come. He goes out of his way to point out flaws in the novel that, in his opinion, serve to diminish its emotional impact (all the while insisting he did like the book, sort of) and interprets any deviation from traditional narrative form as an example of putting on airs. I maintain, on the other hand, that truly serious writers deviate from the tried and true in order to enhance the reading experience, not to subvert it. "Emotion" is a feature of this experience, but not the only one. It is futile to demand that readers refrain from reflection on the nature of the reading experience, especially when we believe that what we've read has been paricularly rewarding. It's something we do. At its best, this is called criticism, and it doesn't have to go on a quest for "Deeper Significance" in order to be useful.

Comments

[John Wright]

This brings to mind what I was just reading in Ruskin's Stones of Venice about the decoration of archtecture. There can never be too much, although there can be more than falls within the architects ability to manage. For my part, I don't think I will ever object to fluency of prose unless that prose sacrifices in the process its first purpose--namely, to convey clearly the impressions that form the story's aim. I do not want--I suspect no one really wants--eloquence that is excrescent, but rather that which is fused entirely to the purpose of the narrative.

The same is true in the matter of authorial opinions: to the extent that they are particular (of a certain proposal) rather than universal, the story falls out of balance. However estimable his assertions, they remain polemic, and the effect of polemic being as variable as particular opinions, must be perfectly indeterminate in their effect on the reader. This introduces gross uncertainty and is poor design.

But as for style, symbols, or any sort of adornment of fiction, a writer is less likely to err with too little adornment than too much, although less adornment will always be inferior to more, when correctly applied--a more trivial subject inferior to a more consequential--miscellaneous, eclectic imagery inferior to that which iscomplementary and cumulative.

Finally, you say that serious (I take this to mean "good") writers deviate from the tried and true order to enhance the reader's experience rather than subvert it. If the tried and true order is convention itself (whatever it may be at the time), then I agree. Although it may be simpler to say that everything a good writer does (to the extent that he is a good writer) is deliberate. He may write quickly in the moment, but the moment of writing is prepared by prior thought or tested by the same. A perfect work is tested and coordinated in all its parts. It conforms to convention to the extent that convention is expedient and deviation unnecessary. But nothing is accidental.

[Lisa]

What happened to looking at this from the reader's perspective? Readers are looking for something specific in the titles they select. Some desire the books with multiple layers. Books that make a statement about something. Other readers simply want to escape into a world created by the writer. Neither reader is wrong and neither reader is right, but as writers our job is to provide those materials that will meet the needs of the various audiences. Doesn't matter what one author thinks of another - just fuel for the fodder and has the makings of a debate. We seem to continuously forget why we are here - because there are people out there who want to (hopefully) read what we write.

I think authors make a huge mistake in assuming that there are two kinds of readers - genre readers and literary readers. I believe this to be false. Absolutely false. Most readers are attracted to a certain style and at different points in their lives they will crave a type of title/kind of author and gravitate to that genre. So to imply that a reader of mysteries would never pick up Salman Rushdie is a false assumption.

[John O.]

"although less adornment will always be inferior to more, when correctly applied--a more trivial subject inferior to a more consequential"

I'm not sure how to approach this comment, other than with a sense of amazement that someone could make such a sweeping remark in reference to a work of art. Whther or not adornment is "correctly applied" (which implies that there is some sort of rules by which adornment, and other artistic endeavors can be deemed correct or incorrect), who is to say that more is always better than less? In fact, I've heard it said by many, and tend to agree myself, that a small amount of flavor/adornment/description/etc, if used judiciously, can be just as effective as a greater amount. To automatically assume that more is better, and that "serious" is "good" is exactly the type of thinking that Grumpy Old Bookman seems to argue against. It's that kind of thinking that mistakes large, complicated, overflowing stories for great stories. It's not that such stories can't be great, it's just that more size, complication, or details are not inherently "good."

[John Wright]

"It's that kind of thinking that mistakes large, complicated, overflowing stories for great stories."

No. It's that kind of thinking that doesn't confuse "greater detail is better when correctly applied" with complication, largeness and overflow.