What We Talk About When We Talk About Lit

I'm sometimes frightened by how much of my life seems to have been determined by certain events in my childhood. Writing is no exception -- the majority of the essays and reviews I have written could all be said to originate from one moment when I, a precocious and (I'm sure) annoying twelve-year-old, asked a college professor who was a friend of my mother's if science fiction could be literature. He said no, because it's formula fiction, and cited work by Robert Heinlein and Larry Niven as examples. I was crushed.

I liked reading well enough before I discovered science fiction, but it wasn't until I started reading Isaac Asimov and Ray Bradbury that books became a central part of my daily life. I quickly moved from the SF classics to more modern work, mostly stories published in magazines, and I thought I was a brilliant intellectual. I was certain that college professors would be so stunned by my encyclopedic knowledge of the history of Galaxy magazine that I would get to skip high school and move directly to adulthood, which is what I wanted more than anything.

I don't know where I picked up on the word "literature" or why I thought it was important for science fiction to be given that label. But I do remember how crushed I was that someone I deeply respected so obviously considered what I spent most of my time reading to be trash. I sent him copies of stories I loved and essays that seemed intelligent to me, all trying to prove him wrong. I got a copy of Louis Perrine's classic (and stuffy) anthology Literature: Structure, Sound, and Sense and read as much as I could stand, trying to learn the difference between Great Literature and everything else. Science fiction more and more began to seem like a kind of disease, a social liability, the sort of thing you shouldn't talk about in public. By the time I got to college, I had nearly abandoned it completely.

For quite a while I thought I would become a serious playwright or a brilliant avant-garde poet or a deeply serious writer of deeply serious short stories. Instead, I became a high school English teacher, and eventually worked my way back toward the world of science fiction and fantasy, because I still loved enough of it to find it appealing, and certain new writers were doing things that felt like the kinds of writing I'd long, and mostly unconsciously, hoped somebody would do -- a kind of writing that mixed the best of both the highest of Perrine-sanctioned Literature with the most pulpy, fun, exciting, and imaginative elements of popular literatures.

I understand what that professor was trying to tell me when he said that SF is formula fiction -- he didn't want a voracious reader like me to waste time and energy on work that was, from his point of view, a kind of candy. Soon after telling me that SF was not Literature, he told me to read Kafka, and eventually I did, and am grateful, because there are few writers I find as provocatively imaginative.

Life is short and there are an awful lot of books out there, so I don't blame anyone for severely narrowing their definition of reading or of literature. If you think the only books really worth spending time with are the most classic of classics, then you will certainly be a fine reader and have plenty to think about, but your perception of the possibilities of literature and life will be flawed. In high school, I read a biography of Eugene O'Neill, and while I don't remember too much from it, I have never forgotten one moment where the biographer said that O'Neill's father James maintained that a person could learn everything necessary to know from Shakespeare, and that O'Neill went out of his way to reject this idea, while holding on to a veneration for Shakespeare. He acknowledged the greatness of Shakespeare, but unlike his father, didn't think it was the only kind of greatness possible.

Certain friends who got to know me during the time when I was trying so hard to become a Serious Writer are surprised by the fact that I am now as likely to write about science fiction as I am of anything else. At least one person now won't read anything I write, fiction or nonfiction, for fear that it has somehow been "tainted" by SF. (Meanwhile, in the SF world I'm sometimes seen as pretentious or elitist for writing about SF as if it were just another type of writing.)

I like a lot of the stories, poems, and plays that Perrine collected in his Literature anthology, but I don't care for his definitions or analyses, because they don't mention the thing I value most in creative writing: imagination. The greatest books, regardless of how they are packaged or labeled, are great because the writer's imagination finds expression in structures of language appropriate to it. That's what Shakespeare and Kafka have in common with each other, and what they both have in common with, yes, some writers labelled as science fiction and fantasy writers, some writers labelled as mystery and crime writers, some writers labelled as this, that, and another thing. Amazing work is being written by writers whose books appear in the Children's and Young Adult section of the bookstore (and no, I don't mean Harry Potter, as much fun as those books can be). Etc. On the other hand, stupid, formulaic, plodding, incompetent work is done by people who have been pegged as writers of Serious Literature. Why judge mainstream fiction by its best examples and other types of fiction by their worst?

Some SF fans spend a lot of time complaining about mainstream literature, judging it in exactly the way they complain people who don't read SF judge it. Clannish factionalism is silly, and there's no need to celebrate one type of literature by demeaning another. Holding writing to high standards is important, but that's an entirely different endeavor from making categorical judgements about vast sections of the literary landscape.

Here at the LBC, we're about celebrating books and writers we love, and the diversity of opinions and approaches represented by the members is one of the most exciting parts of this experiment, I think, because it shows an optimism about the possibility of surprise -- the surprise of finding exciting, vibrant, and undeniably brilliant writing in places where it might not have gotten the sort of notice it deserves.

Comments

[derik]

The first books I really enjoyed reading where what you could call"genre" or "formulaic" fantasy (Robert Jordan comes to mind). I gave them up when I started reading "real" literature, and it's only in the past couple years that I've been able to go back and find quality science fiction to read.

[filchyboy]

However good his intentions the remarks were those of a fool. I remember a gifted instructor of mine who once informed me with all honesty that art could never be produced on a computer: a typewriter is the only tool for literature. Of course he didn't realize the stupidty of his remarks nor did his former who remarked on the impossibility of art being produced on a typewriter as a pencil was the only avenue to art...the quill was the only avenue to art etc.

[Ralfy Acuna]

I went the other way. I started with textbooks that emphasized formalism for required literature classes, then majored in business in college. After a year, I studied literature for a master's degree, where I was thoroughly indoctrinated in all sorts of "isms," with an emphasis on Foucault, Derrida, and Deleuze and Guattari.

After a few years, I bought a used copy of the fifth edition of Perrine's anthology. Compared to the jargon-filled theory that I went through, Perrine's writing is not at all stuffy, and his view of literature very sensible. After going through several theoretical movements surveyed in collections like those by Adams, Richter, and the Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, I found in Perrine what for me is the best way of evaluating art.

For example, the argument given above--that the best art mixes "stuffy" high art and formulaic literature, or that the finest works use language that is appropriate to their content--are probably not new. New Critics gave similar points, as they saw works in isolation from others, as organic wholes that used language effectively. Perrine himself gives the same advice in Chapter 9 of his book: "First, every story is to be initially judged by how fully it achieves its central purpose." Perrine refers to "elements" in literary works, including the way language is used.

As for the need to be "surprised," Perrine has something to say about that, too, at least for "escape literature": "Each story must have a slightly new setting or twist or 'gimmick,' though the fundamental features of the characters and situations remain the same." Harold Bloom and structuralists may also question the need to be "surprised," as it is possible that all stories re-use plots and other devices.

Ultimately, works that make us happy, that make us surprised, and that use language effectively may apply to many literary works, including "non-Serious literature." Any discussion on this topic becomes moot because anyone can celebrate any literary work as long as it achieves its central purpose. For example, if a work is meant to entertain, and it does so even if it is badly written, then it is a great work of art. This is Perrine's point in Chapter 9.

The catch lies in Perrine's second point: "A story, if successful, may be judged by the significance of its purpose." In short, no matter how imaginative or well-written a work is, if future generations do not find its purpose significant, then it is soon forgotten.

Perrine does not explain in detail what "significance" means, but I think this must be answered using philosophy and the "human condition": as Mr. Cheney points out, life is short and there are too many works to read. Ultimately, no matter how much we practice self-esteem and celebrate exciting and surprising writing, that will not matter because our personal experiences will not follow suit. There are possibilities that we will one day lose our jobs or businesses, become terminally ill, lose our loved ones because of betrayal, and experience many events that will involve incredible joy and tragedy. Not all of them will be surprising and exciting at the same time, as there are some surprises that we will likely not enjoy.

Notice that the Perrine's "serious literature" have central purposes that are signicant because they address those experiences. Thus, Kafka (like Shakespeare) is great not only because he is imaginative, as there are other writers who are also imaginative but whose works are meant primarily to entertain. Kafka is great because his works force readers to ask difficult questions about their own beliefs, things they take for granted, assumptions or fantasies that they have about their work or their life, etc. And that, for Perrine, is what "Great Literature" means.

Why, then, do we escape to science fiction and formulaic fare? Probably because we want to forget that human condition that was described above. We'd very much prefer to sit down and talk about literature in a celebratory manner. For us, great literature is like great food: it makes us happy, it allows us to relish great writing, and it gives us the opportunity to find something vibrant and exciting in what we read. And there are many such literary works to choose from, just as there are many Hollywood movies and pop songs from which we react the same way.

On the other hand, much of "great literature," especially those that most people no longer read, see life as one of tragedy and sometimes despair or even absurdity. From Kafka's *Metamorphosis* to *Beowulf* to Shakespeare's *Hamlet*, the works that have survived and still remain in some literature classes see human experience in a much more somber light. They force us to see ourselves and others in a critical light.

This is probably why we see Perrine and his "serious literature" as "stuffy." It does not compare to our exciting and surprising fantasies.

Although I'd rather use a word other than "stuffy." How about "honest"?

[booksquare]

Genre fiction plays into archetypes -- the major themes that, while not always realistic, seem to define the human experience on a grand scale. Literary fiction, to me, plays into the archetypes on a more human scale. Science fiction is largely the fight between good versus evil (something I appreciated once I got past the "science fiction is for boys" stage of my life). I think this is why genre fiction resonates with such a broad spectrum of the reading public. We like idealism.

I don't see a contradiction between reading science fiction, fantasy, romance, mystery, and/or literary fiction. They speak to different aspects of being. Escape is as much a part of surviving as facing day-to-day reality.

[Abigail]

"Science fiction is largely the fight between good versus evil"

I've heard this claimed about fantasy, but not SF. I think it's equally untrue in both cases. I'm also not so sure I'd agree that literary fiction doesn't deal with the human experience on a grand scale, or that SF doesn't deal with smaller stories. With a little more time on my hands, I could probably come up with half a dozen examples to dispute each of those claims.

Something that's always troubled me is the term 'escapism'. It's a pet peeve of mine. All reading is an escape. Anna Karenina is no less imaginary than Frodo Baggins or Philip Marlowe. I can see claiming that genre fiction is easier to read than literary fiction (although I wouldn't necessarily agree with that either) but I really wish someone would take the 'escapism' label out back and put it out of my misery.