Extremely well said. If voices like yours went mainstream, we would (in 5-10 years maybe) have such a better literature on the shelves and a richer culture overall.
Dude, thanks for writing this. I was on board with the piece until he got to actually talking about the literature...and then I was like, isn't "resigned to preventable atrocities" pretty much the fundamental basis of life as an ordinary American these days? Obviously that's not a good thing, but it's true, and you can't just go around flogging your characters to constantly engage in class struggle if you want to make art that feels true right? Thanks for expanding on this idea more articulately than I could.
Also this whole problem seems to stem from the careerist bent of many contemporary literary fiction writers. Like, does anyone write fiction for a reason besides making it in the big time anymore? Can we write for other reasons than to be pulped through the publishing mill?
Thanks for the feedback. I've been thinking about the underlying dynamics of these kinds of battles, which I never quite understood until I placed them into a religious framing - at which point the psychology of it clicked.
I think the reason these pieces get made is pretty simple: clout and attention (for writers, attention is the raw material that gets converted into money some point later on). Denunciation is consistently a pathway to increasing your personal status, which has always been the case.
Extremely well said. If voices like yours went mainstream, we would (in 5-10 years maybe) have such a better literature on the shelves and a richer culture overall.
Thanks!
Dude, thanks for writing this. I was on board with the piece until he got to actually talking about the literature...and then I was like, isn't "resigned to preventable atrocities" pretty much the fundamental basis of life as an ordinary American these days? Obviously that's not a good thing, but it's true, and you can't just go around flogging your characters to constantly engage in class struggle if you want to make art that feels true right? Thanks for expanding on this idea more articulately than I could.
Also this whole problem seems to stem from the careerist bent of many contemporary literary fiction writers. Like, does anyone write fiction for a reason besides making it in the big time anymore? Can we write for other reasons than to be pulped through the publishing mill?
Thanks for the feedback. I've been thinking about the underlying dynamics of these kinds of battles, which I never quite understood until I placed them into a religious framing - at which point the psychology of it clicked.
I think the reason these pieces get made is pretty simple: clout and attention (for writers, attention is the raw material that gets converted into money some point later on). Denunciation is consistently a pathway to increasing your personal status, which has always been the case.