moreau%babel.DEC@decwrl.ARPA (08/19/85)
From: moreau%babel.DEC@decwrl.ARPA (Ken Moreau, ZKO2-3/N30 3N11, DTN 381-2102) Bill Ingogly writes: >Fact: Gerald Jonas writes a column in the NYTBR every other week. He >hardly trashes every SF book he reviews. Another fact: I believe > [some text omitted] > I see some of the hostility toward >'critics' in this newsgroup arising from the perception of SF as a >popular genre, and a certain resentment that the 'eggheads' are seen >as either (1) choosing to ignore SF or (2) choosing to say bad >things about SF as a matter of course. Sorry, I never said that NYTBR trashes only SF, I said they trash anything which I seem to like. I also never said that 'eggheads' are ignoring or saying bad things about SF. My points about critics were (and are) completely general, not limited to SF, literature, Broadway, or any other field. The feeling seems to be common to critics in every field. I agree that some critics (at least of NYTBR and a few other places) do not apply different standards to SF, but I disagree with their standards when they review anything. > You're welcome to your >opinions, but don't assume you've found some great 'truth' or that >anyone who doesn't agree with you doesn't belong in this newsgroup >(there have been replies to some of my postings, for example, that >questioned my 'right' to post in this newsgroup because of my >'incorrect thinking'). But my whole point is that there is no such thing as "great 'truth'". I don't assume I found it, I deny that it even exists! I welcome other opinions because I enjoy these discussions. As someone or other said a while ago, (possibly paraphrased) "I completely disagree with everything you said, but I will defend to the death your right to say it". Brad Templeton writes: >I suspect that the use of "art" as a pejorative stems from the fact >that quite often material is passed off as art when it is quite >simply *BAD*. > >What Spider Robinson (an author whom I dislike, btw) may be trying >to say is that truly superb art involves excellent communication >skills as well. You may have something valid to say about emotions >or the human condition, and you may be able to convey it to a few >who think as you do, but an artist of great skill conveys it to all. Thank you for saying what I meant, better than I said it. Critics (and most self-proclaimed artists who do not have the skills to back up their pretensions) seem to feel that "It is great art because I *SAY* it is great art, and if you don't understand it and agree with me, you are an uncultured barbarian" (see Mr. Tuckers comments, below). Davis Tucker writes: >In most places in the world, to say that something is "great art" is >a compliment. To you and Spider Robinson (author of such art as >"Harry Callahan's Crossroad Five-Guys-In-A-Bar-Trade-Stupid-Puns- >And-Act-Superior-And- Incredibly-Sophomoric"), it is an insult. *WRONG, WRONG, WRONG, WRONG, WRONG*. I said that art and a good read are orthoganal, and that I preferred one of them over the other. I *NEVER* said that one is superior to the other, because (see above) I deny that the concept of "great truth", or "absolute standards" by which to measure superior, even exists. I also never said that I do not like great art, but (as Brad Templeton points out) most of the stuff touted as *ART* is not art, it is bad. I like and appreciate art. But I won't depend on some pompous critic (or even you, Mr. Tucker) to tell me that some piece of sh** is art simply because I don't immediately like or understand it. If it is art (and to me that is a very select, very praiseworthy term), then it will be immediately obvious to everyone. If it is not, then it fails the test, and no critic can sneer at my taste enough to make me admit it is art. > But to champion a "good read" >over "great art" is very, very egocentric. It also belies an >inferiority complex about one's ability to appreciate art and uphold >one's personal standards as opposed to lying down and accepting the >tyranny of entertainment. Many definitions of great art encompass >being a "good read", but this quality is but a portion of what it >takes to write a great novel. It seems to me that if I am "accepting the tyranny of entertainment", you are accepting the tyranny of critics. And I agree that being a good read is but a portion of what it takes be a great novel. But most of what critics have touted to be *GREAT NOVELS* have not had that portion, have not been a good read in addition to whatever else you may require to judge something great. I seems to me that you are attacking the very action you are trying to defend. I am confident in my "ability to appreciate art and uphold one's personal standards". But when I defend that standard, you accuse me of being egocentric. >Spider Robinson... (the sound of spitting in derision and disgust) > [some text omitted] >purposefully ignorant attitude. These hedonistic tendencies will >leave you with little fulfillment, less enlightenment, and no >understanding of the world outside D&D games and national news >programs. > [some text omitted] > ... A backward, Luddite, barbarian attitude ... > [some text omitted] > Spider Robinson's championing of ease of reading over depth of feeling is simple laziness. > [some text omitted] > ... semi-mindless entertainment ... > [some text omitted] > ... the lazy or the proudly ignorant. ... > [some text omitted] >"I am ignorant, I am proud of it, and I shall remain blissfully so". Isn't it nice that we are keeping this discussion on an high-level and serious track, without resorting to insult and personal attacks? Ken Moreau
kwc@cvl.UUCP (Kenneth W. Crist Jr.) (08/20/85)
I do not see why people get so upset when critics say what is good and what is bad, what should be read and what should not. The only critic I have ever found who knows what I like and don't like is me. I have not read any of those "WHAT'S WRONG WITH SCIENCE FICTION" since Part II (I wasn't on the net for part one) and if you disagree with what the writer writes, don't read it. As for whether a story is ART or a GOOD READ, WHO CARES? If you like it, good, you have just enjoyed a fine story. If you don't, you don't. I wish people would stop taking what "critics" think so seriously. Kenneth Crist Computer Vision Lab University of Maryland
reiher@LOCUS.UCLA.EDU (08/22/85)
From: Peter Reiher <reiher@LOCUS.UCLA.EDU> Ken Moreau writes: >But I won't depend on some pompous critic >(or even you, Mr. Tucker) to tell me that some piece of sh** is art >simply because I don't immediately like or understand it. If it is >art (and to me that is a very select, very praiseworthy term), then >it will be immediately obvious to everyone. If it is not, then it >fails the test, and no critic can sneer at my taste enough to make >me admit it is art. I hope that you don't mean that, once you've decided that it doesn't meet your qualifications for art, then you cannot be persuaded. If you do, then you are being rather narrowminded. Good critics persuade, they do not browbeat. I disagree that great art is immediately obvious to everyone. You yourself said earlier that you don't believe that there are absolutes in art, so how can you be sure that anyone else will agree with you when you say something is great art? If it's only great art if everyone agrees, then I imagine that nothing is great art. What I find most disturbing is your contention that, if one doesn't immediately recognize the value of a work, or if a book isn't a good read, then it is not a great work of art. The reason I find it disturbing is because I know, from my own experience, that this isn't true (for me, at least). Therefore, I suspect that you are denying yourself some of the deeper pleasures of reading in favor of shallower and more transitory pleasures. (I could, of course, be wrong. Perhaps you have read books like "The Sound and the Fury" and "Ulysses" and been immediately blown away by what good reads they were. I had to work at understanding and appreciating them, but I don't regret a moment of that labor.) If, of course, you really don't care about such books, if you only are interested in reading works which appeal to you from the moment you pick them up, that's your prerogative. My objection is that, despite your claims that you don't believe in absolute standards, you impugn those who disagree with you, by suggesting that they are pretentious, that they have less understanding of art than you, that they don't really like what they say they like, etc. If you are secure in your beliefs, than perhaps a less emphatic and sneering tone would be better. And Power.wbst@Xerox.ARPA writes: >Finally, as you can see by my definition, it doesn't include >reviewers, archivists, or SF-librarians. A close examination of his entire posting suggests to me that Mr. Powers' definition of Critic (his idea of a insulting term) is any person making comments on a work of art whose comments he consistently dislikes. I, for one, do not agree with his article, nor with his veiled suggestion that Critics have caused writers in the mainstream of fiction to lose their inventiveness. True, there is little enough originality on he bestseller list, but if one looks, one can find interesting, stimulating, original writing outside science fiction. For those who haven't tried looking, I suggest doing so, and will be happy to provide a list of authors to start with. Peter Reiher reiher@LOCUS.UCLA.EDU {...ihnp4,ucbvax,sdcrdcf}!ucla-cs!reiher
brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) (08/26/85)
> From: Peter Reiher <reiher@LOCUS.UCLA.EDU> > > > Ken Moreau writes: > > >But I won't depend on some pompous critic > >(or even you, Mr. Tucker) to tell me that some piece of sh** is art > >simply because I don't immediately like or understand it. If it is > >art (and to me that is a very select, very praiseworthy term), then > >it will be immediately obvious to everyone. If it is not, then it > >fails the test, and no critic can sneer at my taste enough to make > >me admit it is art. > > What I find most disturbing is your contention that, if one doesn't immediately > recognize the value of a work, or if a book isn't a good read, then it is > not a great work of art. .................................................. Waaaaaiiiit a minute. I saw you palm that card. Imediatly recognizing the value of a book is not the same thing as said book being a good read. It is my considered (and I do mean considered) opinion (and I do mean opinion) that to be great art a book must be, first of all, a good read. If something is sufficiantly inaccessible that it cannot be read for fun, it fails as art because it will only speak to that small segment of the population that is already prepared to listen; its exploration of (if I may) the human condition is wasted on those who could otherwise get the most out of it. Something that is ONLY a good read is something that I can respect (there's so much that isn't even that), but, for me, great literature must be a good read and more. One test of literature that I'm particularly fond of is: how long is the author remembered? This isn't one hundred percent; not matter how hard I try I cannot convince myself that Cooper was writing great literature. BUT--what writer who is remembered and, more, STILL READ after a hundred years failed to write stories or books that were fun to read? I have no patience for intellectual arrogence, which leads us to: > .... Perhaps you have read books like "The Sound and the Fury" and "Ulysses" > and been immediately blown away by what good reads they were. ............. > > And Power.wbst@Xerox.ARPA writes: > > > Peter Reiher > reiher@LOCUS.UCLA.EDU > {...ihnp4,ucbvax,sdcrdcf}!ucla-cs!reiher I will confess, hanging my head and whimpering, that I have not read THE SOUND AND THE FURY. I have read ULYSSES. It fails as great literature. It speaks only to the inellectual elite. This isn't bad; the intellectual elite could use some speaking to, but great literature must be inclusive, not exclusive. I wish I were good enough that I could have written ULYSSES. But I say that the same way one says, "I wish could afford an elephant." I don't want the elephant, I just wish I could afford one. Nevertheless, I agree with a great deal of what you said. Good writing can be found anywhere, from children's books to the "literary" genre. Perhaps there is outstanding writing in romances, or westerns, or even pornography. But the point about critics is this: I believe that good writing must be accessable. But "accessable" varies from person to person. I also believe that it is reasonable to discuss writing in terms of certain standards that transcend "I liked this" or "I didn't like this." THAT is the role of a critic. A good critic. The role of the bad critic is ego fullfillment. I think Gene Wolfe is accessible. I know others who don't. I think Wolfe's BOOK OF THE NEW SUN may prove to be great literature. Others don't. The subject happens to interest me. A good critic, whether or not I agree with him, will help me organize the issues in such a way that will help me decide, and, MUCH more important, get more out of the book. And I want to get more out of the book. It was so much fun to read. . . . -- SKZB
judith@proper.UUCP (Judith Abrahms) (09/03/85)
In article <> brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) writes: >It is my considered (and I do mean considered) opinion (and I do mean >opinion) that to be great art a book must be, first of all, a good >read. If something is sufficiantly inaccessible that it cannot be >read for fun, it fails as art because it will only speak to that >small segment of the population that is already prepared to listen; >its exploration of (if I may) the human condition is wasted on those >who could otherwise get the most out of it.... Do you mean that if a large no. of people can't understand it, it can't be great art? And if you have to work to understand it, ditto? You might argue (as many did when Joyce, Eliot, and Pound first published) that it's perverse and snobbish to pour a great talent into the production of work that's more or less opaque to the average *contemporary* reader. Such work may show a certain lack of social or political concern on the part of the artist, but I don't see why that makes it bad art. Anyway, what about older books? Most of the works of literature -- not all, but most -- from which I've learned most about the human condition and so forth were books I had to read quite a few times before I felt comfortable enough with them that I could say I was having fun. How much fun is Hamlet the first time around? And after you've gone through it many times, and it's begun to occupy a special place in your thinking about the world (if it does), is "fun" really the right word for what you finally get out of it? A great many books that have changed my way of looking at things were lots of fun from the moment I picked them up, but plenty of them repaid a bit of study. Sometimes it was even worth reading the works the author read in order to get a better sense of his/her way of seeing things. >One test of literature that I'm particularly fond of is: how >long is the author remembered? By whom? Homer's work is a hell of a lot of fun once you get into it. So are the Canterbury Tales; so's a lot of Shakespeare, for that matter. How much of this stuff would have survived at all if it hadn't been preserved and taught in the schools? > ... what writer who is remembered >and, more, STILL READ after a hundred years failed to write >stories or books that were fun to read? All these people wrote works that were fun to read, but they didn't STAY fun to read when their languages ceased to be current. At this point, if it's more than a hundred years old, either you do a little studying or you miss a lot. And the further back you go, the less accessible the writing gets, until (as in the case of Shakespeare) you're missing allusions to matters that were as common then as the six o'clock news is now -- like the way cloth is woven, the way a sailing ship works, who all the Greek gods were, and so on. Or (as in the case of Chaucer) all of the above, plus the fact that you're virtually looking at a foreign language. Or (as in the case of Homer), the fact that you ARE looking at a foreign language. > ... I have read >ULYSSES. It fails as great literature. It speaks only >to the inellectual elite. This isn't bad; the intellectual >elite could use some speaking to, but great literature >must be inclusive, not exclusive. > >I wish I were good enough that I could have written ULYSSES. >But I say that the same way one says, "I wish I could afford >an elephant." I don't want the elephant, I just wish I >could afford one. Joyce trained to write ULYSSES by reading a lot of difficult books and studying a few languages. He moved to Europe from Ireland chiefly because the culture he was born into was too provincial to allow him access to the flow of invention and inspiration that was sweeping the Continent at the time. I mention this because many of my favorite science fiction writers have studied relatively inaccessible works (references to Joyce, to Pablo Neruda, to Jung, to dozens of "mainstream" writers, abound in the work of Zelazny, for instance) and the richness and depth of their style, and of their ideas, seem to me to have benefited from the scope of their investigations. >But the point about critics is this: I believe that >good writing must be accessable. But "accessable" >varies from person to person. And varies over time. What was inaccessible to me in sixth grade is easy going now. I once wanted to be able to write ULYSSES too, but at this point -- as you suggested -- I just wish I had a fraction of the capital with which Joyce bought his elephant. I believe the way to save that up is to read books by writers with interesting styles and interesting ideas. Some of them are hard going and others are great fun, but that's no measure of what I get out of them in the long run. I suppose I'm saying that in order to have good writers, you have to have good writers -- not hard writers or easy ones, just good ones. I think if you insist that a work be easy reading and fun (RIGHT AWAY!), you may not be giving it a chance. One of the reasons I enjoy reading the newsgroups is that, just as in more formal publications, people write well here. I just can't believe such good writing has developed without at least some study of our language and literature. I think I know what the work of people who read only "fun stuff" looks like: as an editor, I'm often called on to reorganize their writing for publication. To my knowledge [!!!] I've never seen clear, fluent, interesting writing from someone whose first criterion for choosing a book was that it be accessible. If that's what I'm looking at now, well, it's never too late to learn. Judith Abrahms {ucbvax,ihnp4}!dual!proper!judith ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Poetry is certainly something more than just good sense, but it must be good sense... just as a palace is more than a house, but it must be a house. -- Coleridge ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) (09/10/85)
> Do you mean that if a large no. of people can't understand it, it can't be > great art? And if you have to work to understand it, ditto? No and yes. > You might argue > (as many did when Joyce, Eliot, and Pound first published) that it's perverse > and snobbish to pour a great talent into the production of work that's more or > less opaque to the average *contemporary* reader. Such work may show a > certain lack of social or political concern on the part of the artist, but I > don't see why that makes it bad art. There is a clear and present danger that we will soon find ourselves attempting to define "art." I would enjoy the effort, but I enjoy futile persuits. However, a work that is opaque to the average contemporary reader is never, in my opinion, great art. It is fine if the reader has to work at it; it is flawed if the reader has insufficant reason to want to. > Anyway, what about older books? I don't understand. What about them? > > ........... How much fun is Hamlet the first time around? Quite a bit, in my opinion. Shakespear can be enjoyed on any number of levels. One can also learn vast amounts from him. But can always be enjoyed, even the first time one sees one of his plays, or even reads one (if you happen to be someone who can read a play). > > >One test of literature that I'm particularly fond of is: how > >long is the author remembered? > > By whom? Homer's work is a hell of a lot of fun once you get into it. So are > the Canterbury Tales; so's a lot of Shakespeare, for that matter. How much of > this stuff would have survived at all if it hadn't been preserved and taught in > the schools? We have no disagreement here. All of the things you have just mentioned are things that I consider to be great art. Fun, aren't they? > > > ... what writer who is remembered > >and, more, STILL READ after a hundred years failed to write > >stories or books that were fun to read? > > All these people wrote works that were fun to read, but they didn't STAY fun to > read when their languages ceased to be current. Here we just disagree. I can't think of anything else to say. > > >But the point about critics is this: I believe that > >good writing must be accessable. But "accessable" > >varies from person to person. > > > I suppose I'm saying that in order to have good writers, you have to have good > writers -- not hard writers or easy ones, just good ones. I think if you > insist that a work be easy reading and fun (RIGHT AWAY!), you may not be giving > it a chance. I don't "insist" on that, and I do, in fact, read authors who force me to work and are not enjoyable. These people are craftsman in their own way. But I do not call them artists. What they produce just isn't good enough. And this distinction--what is and is not art--actually matters to me, for what reasons I'm not sure. I am sure of opinions on what makes for great art-- just as I am sure that these opinions will change, perhaps into their opposite, as I continue to read and think about what I've read. > > One of the reasons I enjoy reading the newsgroups is that, just as in more > formal publications, people write well here. I just can't believe such good > writing has developed without at least some study of our language and > literature. I think I know what the work of people who read only "fun stuff" > looks like: as an editor, I'm often called on to reorganize their writing for > publication. To my knowledge [!!!] I've never seen clear, fluent, > interesting writing from someone whose first criterion for choosing a book was > that it be accessible. If that's what I'm looking at now, well, it's never > too late to learn. > If there is an implication here that I write well, thank you. You, too. The points you raise are well taken. But I continue to disagree. I'm glad I read Moby Dick. There was a lot to it. But it failed as art. Huckleberry Finn did not. There was as much going on underneath, but Twain didn't leave the roof off his house. It had a top level--fun--that was there too. Melville should have had an editor with a big blue pen. It wasn't fun. I don't think it will last. I could (always always always) be wrong. -- SKZB > Judith Abrahms > {ucbvax,ihnp4}!dual!proper!judith > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Poetry is certainly something more than just good sense, but it must be good > sense... just as a palace is more than a house, but it must be a house. > -- Coleridge > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ *** REPLACE THIS LINE WITH YOUR MESSAGE ***
nrh@lzwi.UUCP (N.R.HASLOCK) (09/11/85)
In article <247@hyper.UUCP>, brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) writes: > > Do you mean that if a large no. of people can't understand it, it can't be > > great art? And if you have to work to understand it, ditto? > > No and yes. > My contribution to this discussion is a simple ( very difficult ) question. What is art? What is the artistic content of the medium that we(?) are discussing? A work of literature has both structure and style. The structure is the story being told, with all its subplots, twists, turns and final resolution. The style is the way in which the reader is exposed to the structure, or the the way the author hides the structure from the reader. Note: These are my definitions for the purposes of my comments. Feel free to use them if they make sense to you. > > You might argue (as many did when Joyce, Eliot, and Pound first > > published) that it's perverse and snobbish to pour a great > > talent into the production of work that's more or > > less opaque to the average *contemporary* reader. > > There is a clear and present danger that we will soon find > ourselves attempting to define "art." I would enjoy the effort, > but I enjoy futile persuits. However, a work that is opaque to > the average contemporary reader is never, in my opinion, great art. > It is fine if the reader has to work at it; it is flawed if > the reader has insufficant reason to want to. > > > Anyway, what about older books? > > I don't understand. What about them? > What is opaque? Obviously it must be the style, otherwise we would be seeing comments about books with no story. The question is, how much story is left if we take away the style and would it be worth reading? ( I cannot comment here, not having taken the time to read the works in question ). Given that a lots of the 'Classics' have been abridged and otherwise munged into child readable form while most of the specified authors have not, I would suspect that there is not enough story to make it worth the effort. For me, great art should have both style and structure and the two should complement each other. Experiments with style may be fun for the author and interesting for the literate but without a complementing structure, the result is unlikely to be great art. > > > > >One test of literature that I'm particularly fond of is: how > > >long is the author remembered? > > > > By whom?. .... How much of this > > stuff would have survived at all if it hadn't been preserved and taught in > > the schools? > > We have no disagreement here. All of the things you have > just mentioned are things that I consider to be great art. > > Fun, aren't they? > But does this not give us a training in what is supposed to be great art? Do not all of these things have a worthwhile story as well as a unique style? Have not all of these stories been rewritten for children on the basis of the story alone, resulting in non art. > > > ... what writer who is remembered > > >and, more, STILL READ after a hundred years failed to write > > >stories or books that were fun to read? > > > > All these people wrote works that were fun to read, but they didn't STAY > > fun to read when their languages ceased to be current. > > Here we just disagree. I can't think of anything else to say. > I disagree too, look at some translations where the translator has succeeded in applying a currently acceptable style to the work. For example Magnus Magnusson's translations of the Icelandic sagas. > > I suppose I'm saying that in order to have good writers, you have to > > have good writers -- not hard writers or easy ones, just good ones. > > I think if you insist that a work be easy reading and fun (RIGHT AWAY!), > > you may not be giving it a chance. > > I don't "insist" on that, and I do, in fact, read authors who > force me to work and are not enjoyable. These people are craftsman > in their own way. But I do not call them artists. What they > produce just isn't good enough. And this distinction--what is > and is not art--actually matters to me, for what reasons I'm > not sure. I am sure of opinions on what makes for great art-- > just as I am sure that these opinions will change, perhaps into > their opposite, as I continue to read and think about what I've read. > No one if forced to read a book, ( after leaving school ) and writing books that are difficult to read merely reduces the readership. If the book is an experiment with a new style, then there is no problem. Just remember that style can be display as easily in a short book as in a long book. If the purpose of the book is to familiarise the readership with the style so that the author can later write his masterpiece in his new and difficult style, then the book should be only long enough to do that. Producing a long book in a difficult style that is unfamiliar to the authors readership is pointless unless the book is also fun. It will never be recognised as great unless someone, probably someone else, works exceptionally hard to make that particular style popular. > > > > One of the reasons I enjoy reading the newsgroups is that, just as in more > > formal publications, people write well here. I just can't believe > > such good writing has developed without at least some study of our > > language and literature. I think I know what the work of people who > > read only "fun stuff" looks like: as an editor, I'm often called on > > to reorganize their writing for publication. To my knowledge [!!!] > > I've never seen clear, fluent, interesting writing from someone > > whose first criterion for choosing a book was that it be accessible. > > If that's what I'm looking at now, well, it's never too late to learn. > > Surely, 'clear, fluent, interesting writing' is 'accessible' because it is clear, fluent and interesting. Maybe I missed something? > > I'm glad I read Moby Dick. There was a lot to it. > But it failed as art. Huckleberry Finn did not. There was > as much going on underneath, but Twain didn't leave the roof off > his house. It had a top level--fun--that was there too. Melville > should have had an editor with a big blue pen. It wasn't fun. > I don't think it will last. I could (always always always) be wrong. > > -- SKZB > > Judith Abrahms There is simply too much written material for me to be able to read it all in the space of this lifetime. If a book is seriously flawed, I will need a very compelling reason to read it. Simplistic style and simplistic plotting may still contain neat concepts that make the 90 minute invested worthwhile. If may favourite reviewers cannot find anything good to say about a difficult book then I will probably not bother to open the cover and I will find something else to call art. -- -- {ihnp4|vax135|allegra}!lznv!nrh Nigel The Mad Englishman or The Madly Maundering Mumbler in the Wildernesses Everything you have read here is a figment of your imagination. Noone else in the universe currently subscribes to these opinions. "Its the rope, you know. You can't get it, you know."
wfi@rti-sel.UUCP (William Ingogly) (09/11/85)
In article <247@hyper.UUCP> brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) writes: >> Do you mean that if a large no. of people can't understand it, it can't be >> great art? And if you have to work to understand it, ditto? > >No and yes. So a book can be 'great art' if many people can't understand it, but can't be great art if it requires work? Consider the subclass of books that you'd call 'great art.' By your answers to above questions, some of those 'great books' are beyond the abilities of many people to understand them. But these impenetrable books have to be accessible to fit your criterion for 'great art.' How can they be impenetrable and accessible at the same time? Is this like a Zen koan? ;-) >... However, a work that is opaque to >the average contemporary reader is never, in my opinion, great art. >It is fine if the reader has to work at it; it is flawed if >the reader has insufficant reason to want to. Semantics: the relationships between signs and symbols and the concepts, feelings, etc. associated with them in the minds of their interpreters. What you're doing here is stating a personal definition of art (and what's more GREAT art). Stating an idiosyncratic definition doesn't redefine a term for society at large. Furthermore, a term like 'great art' can have an interpretation agreed upon by a subgroup in society that differs from the interpretation that's considered commonly accepted. Which definition is 'correct,' and does correctness have any meaning in this context? The answer is not as immediately obvious as you seem to want us to believe. Consider, for example, the loaded term 'secular humanist.' If a group of people decide to create a new symbol like this and use it regularly to describe reality their very use of the symbol tends to lend it a certain credibility. Perhaps the media-concocted term 'yuppie' is a perfect example. Many people's belief in this creature is supported by the fact that media people seem to believe it exists (or created it to sell newspapers and magazines). As human beings, we use symbols to partition the world and make sense of it. But it's easy to confuse the symbol with reality: creating a symbol like 'yuppie' doesn't automatically imply that a creature that fits the definition of yuppie is real. And my use of the symbol is no guarantee that everyone else uses it in the same way. The confusion of the symbol with the symbolized is one reason why people come to believe in a term like 'yuppie' without bothering to question whether it describes something that really exists as a discrete and unambiguous category of objects. We change our own perception of reality to an extent through our creation and manipulation of symbols: a study of an American Indian society that recognizes a different set of primary colors than the Anglo's Roy G. Biv found that its members were very good at recognizing fine shades of blue-green (one of their primary colors) but not as good at recognizing fine shades of blue or green (our primary colors). The situation was reversed for members of Anglo-American society (note: for anyone who's interested I think this was a study by Benjamin Whorf; someone will correct me if I'm wrong). The argument over 'great art' is an argument about the meaning of a symbol. Our understanding of the word 'art' is conditioned by cultural forces as well as personal. Made objects in other societies may look aesthetically pleasing, and stories told in other societies may be fun to listen to. But the fundamental relationship between human being and made object/story may be profoundly different than what we're used to. A story may be given ritual embellishments that are pleasing but are intended to please the gods rather than the listeners, for example. And a battle-axe may be given intricate carvings to increase its ritual power or simply because the society believes that's the way a battle axe SHOULD look. There ain't no such animal as 'art' in the sense of an object or category that has reality as a primary attribute. 'Art' describes a relationship that exists between a member of a culture and the objects of its own creation. Anyone who's interested in this might want to check out "The Savage Mind" by Claude Levi-Strauss. What Steve Brust is doing here, it seems to me, is coming up with his own personal symbol for the reader/book relationship and asking us to accept it as superior to other symbols for that relationship that many other members of society use. The only reason a phrase like 'great book' exists is that one or more persons decided to invent it to describe a class of objects. Its use says nothing about the existence or nonexistence of that class of objects, just as saying 'shiftless welfare moochers' does not automatically cause an underclass to spring into existence. Mr. Brust has one definition of 'great art' which he defines for us here at some length. The term means something different, however, to many of the rest of us who happen to share this culture with him. A consensus on its meaning (if there is one) would define certain attributes that indicate a great book. Lasting power is one that's often mentioned, but more fundamental is perhaps the illumination of those characteristics that define us as human beings: the meaning of life, love, and hate in human relationships; the growth and decay of societies and cities; and so on. It's our recognition of our own passions, strengths and weaknesses in Shakespeare that many people believe is responsible for his continued success as a writer over the centuries, not that he's 'fun to read.' >I don't "insist" on that, and I do, in fact, read authors who >force me to work and are not enjoyable. These people are craftsman >in their own way. But I do not call them artists. What they >produce just isn't good enough. Now you're redefining 'craftsman' and 'quality' for the rest of us. I think you believe a little too strongly in the power of your personal definitions, Steve. Your refusal to call them artists has little to do with the conventionally accepted definition of art, and you're going to have to go a lot farther to prove to us that it's worthwhile scrapping a definition most people agree on for your own idiosyncrasy. The bottom line would seem to be that you equate working for something with drudgery and art with fun. I'm sure you've known people who enjoy work and feel that art is drudgery. Your attitudes may be related to the division in our society between labor and leisure. Since you see reading and art (perhaps) as leisure time activities, any suggestion that work might be involved in reading a particular 'work of art' causes you to eliminate it from the category of possible 'great books.' But the division between labor and leisure in our society has to do with our economic system; it doesn't mean that abstract entities called 'labor' and 'leisure' really exist (for those who are interested in this topic, there was a philosopher who wrote a book about this; it has 'Leisure' in its title, and may have been written by Karl Popper. I'm sure your local library has it). One man's labor is another's leisure; the personal computer is a perfect example. I happen to enjoy the work I put into reading a 'difficult' book; it's part of the 'fun' of reading it for me. >... The points you raise are well taken. But I continue to >disagree. I'm glad I read Moby Dick. There was a lot to it. >But it failed as art. Huckleberry Finn did not. There was >as much going on underneath, but Twain didn't leave the roof off >his house. It had a top level--fun--that was there too. Melville >should have had an editor with a big blue pen. It wasn't fun. >I don't think it will last. I could (always always always) be wrong. I know several people beside myself who ENJOY Melville and think he's fun (two of them are old Navy men and sailing buffs). It's full of the sea, wisdom, and a hell of a sense of humor. The scene where Queequeg (sp?) crawls into bed with Ishmael for the first time is amusing to me as is the initial scene where Ishmael talks about getting the 'hypos' and hitting out for the open sea. I IDENTIFY with Ishmael, laugh with him as I recognize a common and primordial human experience, and as a result I have (believe it or not) FUN when I read the book. What you're talking about is your own personal preferences and prejudices, not about qualities people can use to reach a consensus on to define what's 'great art' and what's not. As to Moby Dick's 'lasting:' it was written (I think) in 1835 or thereabouts. How many novels continue to have admirers and readers who enjoy them after 150 years? -- Cheers, Bill Ingogly
brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) (09/12/85)
> > For me, great art should have both style and structure and the two > should complement each other. Experiments with style may be fun for > the author and interesting for the literate but without a > complementing structure, the result is unlikely to be great art. This is, I think, the essence. Given a story to tell, or a theme to explore, a writer may choose from an infinite number of structures that will handle it. Only one, in any given case, is the best. While form and content (terms I'm more comfortable with) may be discussed separately, content determines form. It is the interaction (and, frequently, the conflict) between them that allows knowledge to develop. And as for what is art, try this for part of the definition: the process of exposing the underlying contradictions that are hidden in mundane life through crafting a work that is esthetically (sp?) pleasing. -- SKZB
chen@mitre-gateway.arpa (09/12/85)
From: Ray Chen (MS W420) <chen@mitre-gateway.arpa> From: proper!judith@topaz.rutgers.edu (Judith Abrahms) Subject: Re: critics Date: 3 Sep 85 12:57:57 GMT brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) writes: >>It is my considered (and I do mean considered) opinion (and I do >>mean opinion) that to be great art a book must be, first of all, a >>good read. If something is sufficiantly inaccessible that it >>cannot be read for fun, it fails as art because it will only speak >>to that small segment of the population that is already prepared to >>listen; its exploration of (if I may) the human condition is wasted >>on those who could otherwise get the most out of it.... and proper!judith@topaz.rutgers.edu (Judith Abrahms) responds: >Do you mean that if a large no. of people can't understand it, it >can't be great art? And if you have to work to understand it, >ditto? Judith and others, An old English teacher of mine once gave me a prerequisite for classic literature. Basically, a classic piece of literature should be able to be read at many different levels. It should be like an onion with many different layers (but no bad spots). You should be able to read it for fun and enjoy it one time and be able to read it for something deeper some other time and enjoy it as well. When reading a classic piece of literature, you should get out of it what you put into it. There should be deep and profound ideas, conflicts, etc. in the novel for those who are willing and able to look for them. Yet, there should also be something for those who only want solid entertainment. Shakespeare, for example, in his time was a very popular playwright, and not because his plays were thought to be that good or profound. (In fact, a lot of people looked down him and his work.) He was well liked because his plays were FUN. There were sexual innuendos, puns galore, and slapstick humor throughout all his plays. They just don't appear that obvious to us now, because we don't know Elizabethan slang. Homer's epic poems, too were passed down orally long before they were ever written down. Somehow, I doubt that generations of Greek tribesmen memorized them because they were "Art". They memorized them because they appealed to people at many different levels. I don't think that being a good read automatically makes a book a literature. There are a lot of books out there that are fun, but don't have the content to be considered literature or art. However, I do think that literature should be a good read. Ray Chen chen@mitre-gw
judith@proper.UUCP (Judith Abrahms) (09/16/85)
In article <> chen@mitre-gateway.arpa writes: > [quotes me here:] >>Do you mean that if a large no. of people can't understand it, it >>can't be great art? And if you have to work to understand it, >>ditto? > >Judith and others, > >Basically, a classic piece of literature should be able to be >read at many different levels. It should be like an onion with >many different layers (but no bad spots). You should be >able to read it for fun and enjoy it one time and be able >to read it for something deeper some other time and enjoy it as well. >When reading a classic piece of literature, you should get out >of it what you put into it. There should be deep and profound >ideas, conflicts, etc. in the novel for those who are willing >and able to look for them. Yet, there should also be >something for those who only want solid entertainment. > >Shakespeare, for example, in his time was a very popular playwright... >...He was well liked because his plays were FUN. There were sexual innuendos, >puns galore, and slapstick humor throughout all his plays. They >just don't appear that obvious to us now, because we don't know >Elizabethan slang. But we still read the plays of Shakespeare, despite the fact that most of his puns, sexual innuendoes, and slapstick humor are lost on us unless we study his writing. (Of course, a lot of this does come across in stage productions by directors who know the work well and can give visual cues as to what the increasingly difficult language means.) But we don't READ Shak. because he's the same spinner of rollicking hilarious yarns TO US that he was to his less educated contemporaries. That was exactly the point I made when I said that the classics may have been great fun when they were contemporary, but that as their language and their references become increasingly obscure to us, we read them with more difficulty and for different reasons. For that matter, we still read the sonnets of Shakespeare, and I don't believe they're susceptible of being read on your "onion" model; they don't work as easy doggerel and also as compact, dazzlingly inventive, intricate constructions of nested metaphors that economically illuminate the depths of human emotion. My point, which I tried to make in my earlier post, is that neither you nor I nor Steve Brust IN FACT is committed to reading only works that give immediate pleasure and are capable of appealing to a wide variety of people on a great no. of levels. We all love Shakespeare, and we love him more when we know what he's referring to in those metaphors that are no longer current. I used him as an example because he's the classic case of the difficult work that's worth studying, the work whose obscurities -- once investigated -- are transformed into sources of new light on the deepest places of the human heart. And the more general point I tried to illustrate with this example is that if so many of us find Shakespeare worth working through, even though his writing has become difficult to understand, it's certainly possible that more recent writers, who simply don't bother to write at a level accessible to any high school graduate, are also worth the effort. As William Ingogly recently pointed out, there are definitions of "fun" that denote other activities than the mindless enjoyment of a work that makes no demands on the reader. The work of deciphering an elegant little program, which does in three lines what I'd only been able to do in six, is incredible fun, for a variety of obvious reasons: I learn something about programming, I feel the presence of the other programmer & rejoice that I have found someone I can learn from, and thereby improve my own creations; and I simply feel joy at watching the great trapeze act that is an agile mind moving in perfect grace among its creations. I get exactly the same feeling when, after ten or so readings of William Gaddis' _JR_, which is almost all dialogue, I begin to be able to tell who's talking and where the plot's going at almost all points in the book, and begin to be sure that everything's perfectly connected and there are no loose ends in over 700 pages. After about 5 readings, I began to see that almost all of this book was overpoweringly funny, too... but that's not the level I began at. I got into it because I was tantalized by the idea that an author could entirely abandon the whole stream-of-consciousness tradition and show nothing but dialogue, and yet make that dialogue so consistent that with a bit of attention I became able to tell at almost all points who was speaking, and about what. THEN the fun began. You just never know until you get in a little way. And I don't feel it's a writer's obligation to put a sugar coating of easy, fun, helluva-good-read stuff on the outside of the work to draw the reader into the recesses of his/ her view of the depths of human reality. Nor do I believe a reader should expect him/her to do so. It makes more sense to me to develop my abilities to watch the sheer mastery of language and idea that our most brilliant writers invariably display, and, if I see that going on in a book, to go on and investigate the possibility that it also has a plot, ideas, humor, characters I can identify with, and so forth. Why should a novel or a play be required to provide instant gratification in some way, then to draw the reader into more profound levels of discourse? This has never been required of poetry, or at least not since poetry moved away from the song form in the Middle Ages. And it's still not required of those "classics" which almost all of us read, and read in translation. If we're willing to go after the fun that's still in the Odyssey, by reading translations of it, and we don't condemn it for being difficult in its "raw" form, i.e., in Greek, on what grounds are we to condemn a recent work that's difficult the first time around? If we read an annotated version of Shakespeare in order to appreciate the humor of the plays, does that make him less of a "great" writer? If we're to go on seriously with this discussion, we might consider working out -- by consensus -- a set of working definitions of the terms we're bandying about. It makes little sense to me to speak of "accessible" literature, "art" literature, "fun," and "good reads," when these words obviously refer to different works depending on who's using them. There exist more exact terms, used routinely in the work of criticism of all kinds. For example, the term "entertainment" normally means anything -- a book, a piece of music, a TV show -- that gives immediate pleasure, essentially to everyone, and makes no demands on a typical mind that has developed in our culture without making any special effort to train itself to process recreational input. The word "art" is usually used to denote work that assumes rather more education on the part of the consumer, and more willingness to assume an active role in pulling meaning or pleasure or anything else out of it. It we use these terms, we may then say very simply that entertainment is by definition fun. We may also say that some art is, or includes, or may be taken to be, entertainment, and that some art isn't, doesn't, and isn't. We can allow Steve Brust to reserve the use of the term "great literature," in his private lexicon, for description of art that doubles as entertainment and hence gives pleasure to more people than art that doesn't. But all this juggling of subjective judgments -- "Well, *I* had fun with Hamlet" ... "I found Ulysses hilarious!" ... "Melville is great fun!" ... "This work FAILS as literature, because it wasn't fun [for me]." ... is getting us nowhere. Judith Abrahms {ucbvax,ihnp4}!dual!proper!judith
pete@stc.UUCP (Peter Kendell) (09/16/85)
Summary: Expires: Sender: Followup-To: Distribution: Keywords: Xpath: stc stc-b stc-a In article <3633@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU> chen@mitre-gateway.arpa writes: >Shakespeare, for example, in his time was a very popular playwright, >and not because his plays were thought to be that good or profound. >(In fact, a lot of people looked down him and his work.) He was >well liked because his plays were FUN. There were sexual innuendos, >puns galore, and slapstick humor throughout all his plays. They >just don't appear that obvious to us now, because we don't know >Elizabethan slang. E.g. "country matters" in Hamlet. Having seen several Shakespeare performances by the Royal Shakespeare Company in London and Stratford, and also by the National Theatre in London over the last year, all I can say is that Shakespeare transcends all the arguments about 'Art' V. 'Entertainment'. Seeing a London audience literally creasing itself laughing at "Love's Labours Lost" last month sent shivers up and down my spine (I was laughing too!!). I mean, these were 400 (or so) year old lines that not only meant something but were also funny. Now, *that* is an achievement. "Richard III" last year in Stratford was possibly the most extraordinary play I have ever seen. Etc, etc. Now here's my 2p's worth in the Great Debate: Surely, a great and lasting work is one that works on many different levels. The upper level may be a simple story, song or farce; easily assimilated. But when you've finished it you think - "Wait. I think there was more to that than first appears." So you read, listen or look again. And you find more. And you find that every time you go back to it you find something new, or a different way of looking at it. Or you find that your way of looking at the world has changed. This can't happen if the work is not accessible at the upper level. In fact, many may not want to go any further or even suspect that there is further to go, and yet it will still have been satisfying for them. Some may take a short-cut through the upper levels and go straight to the deeper meaning. If there is nothing below the upper, visible, level, then what you have may be entertainment, but it's not art. Naming some examples of what I mean is self-defeating; everyone has had this sort of experience. A typical example is an exciting adventure story that turns out to be an allegory *AS WELL*. An allegory by itself is unutterably tedious. Quality and craftsmanship ARE absolutes - a well-made table is one that is good for putting things on, is visually satisfying, and carries on being both these things. A badly-made table looks trashy and falls apart in use. Similar criteria apply to any man-made thing, be it a table, your rewrite of 'ls' or a SF (or other) novel. Now go and take a 5 minute break, -- Peter Kendell <pete@stc.UUCP> ...mcvax!ukc!stc!pete 'Give it all you can, It's much better than, The prefabricated concrete coal bunker!' Who ? When? Answers on a postcard or stuck-down envelope.
jimb@ISM780B.UUCP (09/16/85)
>> For me, great art should have both style and structure and the two >> should complement each other. Experiments with style may be fun for >> the author and interesting for the literate but without a >> complementing structure, the result is unlikely to be great art. >This is, I think, the essence. Given a story to tell, >or a theme to explore, a writer may choose from an infinite >number of structures that will handle it. Only one, in any >given case, is the best. While form and content (terms I'm >more comfortable with) may be discussed separately, content >determines form. It is the interaction (and, frequently, >the conflict) between them that allows knowledge to develop. > >And as for what is art, try this for part of the >definition: the process of exposing the underlying contradictions >that are hidden in mundane life through crafting a work >that is esthetically (sp?) pleasing. > -- SKZB A mild demure on one point. The statement "only one (structure), in any event is the best" assumes that the "best" is definable, recognizable, and agreed upon. Each structure will yield a unique combination of effects; which combination of effects is the best depends on auctorial intent, which is something that even the author may not be consciously aware of, and the aggregate perceptions of the readership, which is culturally determined and will vary with time and society. That many classics are widely agreed to be be great works is only indicative that the authors struck pretty close to dealing with raw universal truths that seem [so far] to transcend time and culture. -- can I borrow a cute tag line from anyone -- Jim Brunet decvax!cca!ima!jimb ucbvax!ucla-cs!ism780!jimb ihnp4!vortex!ism780!jimb
franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) (09/17/85)
[Not food] Perhaps we should admit that 90% of all criticism is crap. Frank Adams ihpn4!philabs!pwa-b!mmintl!franka Multimate International 52 Oakland Ave North E. Hartford, CT 06108
brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) (09/23/85)
> ....................................... But we don't READ Shak. because he's > the same spinner of rollicking hilarious yarns TO US that he was to his less > educated contemporaries. That was exactly the point I made when I said that > the classics may have been great fun when they were contemporary, but that as > their language and their references become increasingly obscure to us, we read > them with more difficulty and for different reasons. For that matter, we still > read the sonnets of Shakespeare, and I don't believe they're susceptible of > being read on your "onion" model; they don't work as easy doggerel and also as > compact, dazzlingly inventive, intricate constructions of nested metaphors that > economically illuminate the depths of human emotion. > This is important enough to the point of the discussion that I think it worth hitting on. My point is exactly that--Shakespear IS fun, the very first time. If fifteen-year-old Stevie hadn't seen a production of Midsummer Night's Dream that left him in stitches, then a production of Macbeth that left him depressed but triumphant, he would never have taken the time to look for the rest of what is there. I won't comment on the sonnets; I know even less about peotry than I do about fiction. I should admit here, though, that whoever it was who claimed to have really enjoyed ULYSSES on the first reading very neatly cut the rug out from under most of my arguments. Good going, whoever that was. I been nailed. > > Why should a novel or a play be required to provide instant gratification in > some way, then to draw the reader into more profound levels of discourse? > This has never been required of poetry, or at least not since poetry moved > away from the song form in the Middle Ages. And it's still not required of > those "classics" which almost all of us read, and read in translation. It is exactly what IS required, or at least present, in those few of the classics that "almost all of us read." As I say, I know little of poetry, but are you quite sure of what you say here? > > .......................... We can allow Steve Brust to reserve the use of the > term "great literature," in his private lexicon, for description of art that > doubles as entertainment and hence gives pleasure to more people than art that > doesn't. > Well, this point (first brought up, I believe, by Mr. Ingogly) is certainly hitting me where I live. I hate it when people promiscuously redefine words to make their own points, so I don't enjoy being accused of doing it. Especially when, looking back over my own contributions, it seems I really have. I will now procede to back down and, I hope, build up to my point again. Writer's who give me the impression of conciously and deliberatly writing over the heads of much of their audience annoy me. In attempting to find the reason for this annoyance, and so determine if it is my problem, their problem, both, or neither, I have come to certain conclusions. This question actually matters to me on a very practical level. I need to know, for myself, "what makes good writing." The conclusions I have come to are, brifly summarized, good (fiction) writing is that which exposes and lays bare areas of life that are normally hidden, and does it in using language that can be understood. You mention the classics: can you name one art form (painting, music, etc) in which those works which are now regarded as the classics were not, at the time, entertainment for the masses? Doesn't this indicate something? > But all this juggling of subjective judgments -- "Well, *I* had fun with > Hamlet" ... "I found Ulysses hilarious!" ... "Melville is great fun!" ... > "This work FAILS as literature, because it wasn't fun [for me]." ... is getting > us nowhere. > > Judith Abrahms > {ucbvax,ihnp4}!dual!proper!judith Oh, I don't know. I'm enjoying it. I'm also learning something. -- SKZB
wfi@rti-sel.UUCP (William Ingogly) (10/04/85)
In article <250@hyper.UUCP> version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site rti-sel.UUCP version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site hyper.UUCP rti-sel!mcnc!philabs!cmcl2!harvard!seismo!hao!hplabs!tektronix!uw-beaver!cornell!vax135!houxm!ihnp4!stolaf!umn-cs!hyper!brust brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) writes: >> Why should a novel or a play be required to provide instant gratification in >> some way, then to draw the reader into more profound levels of discourse? >> This has never been required of poetry, ... > >It is exactly what IS required, or at least present, in >those few of the classics that "almost all of us read." >As I say, I know little of poetry, but are you quite sure >of what you say here? Before the 20th century, poetry used almost exclusively auditory mechanisms to convey its meaning. Thus, virtually all poetry was pleasing to the ear. This includes poetry written in the language of the common man (e.g., Burns, Whitman, etc.). It's possible to read all of this stuff and enjoy the surface music, I think, without really getting into what it MEANS or how the music supports the meaning. This is similar to the surface enjoyment one gets from listening to Mozart (say) without knowing anything about music. But getting into music OR poetry at this surface level does not give one an appreciation for what the artist is really doing. Consider the Shakespearian sonnet (quoted from memory, so please forgive me, W. S., if I've mangled your poetry): That time of year thou may'st in me behold When yellow leaves, or none, do hang upon The bough and shake against the cold... Read it aloud; it sounds good, doesn't it? But a surface appreciation of the music gives you nothing of the poem's meaning: it might as well be in Swahili. The poignancy of the poem's central metaphor, of the poet's life considered as though it were the season of winter with the associations with endings of things and death, and the resonance between the fall of leaves and the fall of hair or loss of function, and of the palsy of the aged contrasted against the palsy of the last few leaves of the year shaking in the icy wind, comes from a careful consideration of associations in the reader's mind as he reads this sonnet. Finally, the reader comes to appreciate the way the music of the poem supports the message W. S. is trying to get across. Many (I hope most) of us are trained in school to appreciate at least some poetry on these levels. It's WORK to read a poem this way; it's also the way the poem was intended to be read. And a large part of the enjoyment of a poem is seeing the different levels hang together as an organic unit. Is 20th century poetry any different? A lot of it contains considerable music, even contemporary stuff; try reading John Ashbery's "A Wave" out loud, for example (there are also 20th century movements whose practitioners produce poems that contain little or no music: the concretists, for example -- check out Gene Wolfe's poem "Meteor" published (I think) in some anthology or other). Getting at the meaning can be tougher. Many contemporary poets are interested in the way language acts as a barrier between reality and our understanding of reality, for example; in his modern classic, "Crow," Ted Hughes uses the fall from grace in the Garden of Eden as a metaphor for humanity's fall from primal innocence due to the acquisition of language. Should these poets avoid dealing with these issues because they're difficult? Should they water down the very stuff of poetry itself so their audiences don't have to work quite so hard to understand them? I personally find understanding 20th century poetry a lot of work, but the rewards are also considerable. >The conclusions I have come to are, brifly summarized, >good (fiction) writing is that which exposes and lays >bare areas of life that are normally hidden, and does >it in using language that can be understood. Agreed. But except for highly personal symbols, ALL language can be understood; it's just a matter of the amount of work you have to put into the understanding of the language. >You mention >the classics: can you name one art form (painting, music, >etc) in which those works which are now regarded as the >classics were not, at the time, entertainment for the >masses? Doesn't this indicate something? Until fairly recently, virtually all Western art was funded by and produced by an educated and well-heeled elite. This tradition goes all the way back to the 11th and 12th century trobadours, who adopted an anti-Church stance for the benefit of the well-educated members of the court, NOT for the benefit of the peasantry. The only art works produced specifically for the understanding of all society in those days were the great cathedrals of Europe. Popular art, oral stories, and music had little to do with the entertainments of the well-to-do educated elite that ran society. As near as I can remember, drama in Shakespeare's time descended from certain crude popular entertainments at sacred and profane festivals; the morality plays, for example. They weren't considered 'art' by the educated class. My recollection may be faulty in these matters, but I think Shakespeare's generation of playwrights may have been the first to produce entertainments that functioned on more than a crude and superficial level as 'literature.' And Shakespeare was certainly the best of his contemporaries. Drama may have been different than the other arts in this regard because of its origins as an entertainment by and for the uneducated peasantry. Except for drama, most of the arts remained in the domain of the educated until the European Romantic movement in the early 19th century; Romantic poets and theoreticians like Wordsworth, Shelley, Burns, Keats, etc. glorified the simple life of the common man and used ordinary language in their poetry rather than the highly stylized language prevalent in classical poetry. The Romantic movement had a profound effect on our perception of the proper stuff of literature and poetry, and in that sense was subversive. Walt Whitman's heroic stance was a legacy in part of the Romantic tradition. If you look at who was reading what poetry (and literature) well into this century, however, I think you'll find a clear split between the literature of the educated elite and the literature of the masses. Most kids were taught accessible poets like Longfellow and Poe, for example, and most working class kids quit going to school after a few years. Volumes of 'popular poetry' abounded; we used to have one in my parent's house. The only people reading the 'literary' contemporaries like Eliot and Frost by and large were the people who finished high school and went on to college: i.e., the upper middle and upper classes. How are things different today? For one thing, the proliferation of the paperback has made all kinds of literature more accessible to anyone who's interested in it. Also, there's been a general spreading of education to the general public since World War II due to the GI Bill and the increased availability of higher education to bright working class kids. The presentation of opera and dramatic productions of quality on television since the 1950s has made great art available to anyone who has access to television. I grew up in a working class family. It's unlikely a working-class kid like myself would have had an opportunity to develop a taste for drama except for the fine productions that were put on in the 1950s. There's been a general democratization of the availability of the arts in the last 35 years, which is a good thing. So I think the perception that the 'classics' were intended at the time of their production as entertainment for the masses is based on a faulty understanding of the history of the arts in Western society over the last few hundred years. -- Cheers, Bill Ingogly
brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) (10/14/85)
> > But getting into music OR poetry at this surface level does not give > one an appreciation for what the artist is really doing. Consider the > Shakespearian sonnet (quoted from memory, so please forgive me, W. S., > if I've mangled your poetry): > > That time of year thou may'st in me behold > When yellow leaves, or none, do hang upon > The bough and shake against the cold... > > Read it aloud; it sounds good, doesn't it? But a surface appreciation > of the music gives you nothing of the poem's meaning: it might as well > be in Swahili. > We seem to be pretty much in agreement here. My point is and was that literature ought to do both (tastes great! Less filling!). As far as I can tell you agree. Correct? > > >The conclusions I have come to are, brifly summarized, > >good (fiction) writing is that which exposes and lays > >bare areas of life that are normally hidden, and does > >it in using language that can be understood. > > Agreed. But except for highly personal symbols, ALL language can be > understood; it's just a matter of the amount of work you have to put > into the understanding of the language. I'll go along with that. The only thing left out is: to what extent is it the artist's responsibility to make you WANT to put in a lot of work, and how can an artist best go about it. We seem to disagree here, and I believe we have both stated our positions fairly well. > > >You mention > >the classics: can you name one art form (painting, music, > >etc) in which those works which are now regarded as the > >classics were not, at the time, entertainment for the > >masses? Doesn't this indicate something? > > Until fairly recently, virtually all Western art was funded by and > produced by an educated and well-heeled elite. This tradition goes > all the way back to the 11th and 12th century trobadours, who adopted an > anti-Church stance for the benefit of the well-educated members of the > court, NOT for the benefit of the peasantry. The only art works > produced specifically for the understanding of all society in those > days were the great cathedrals of Europe. Popular art, oral stories, and > music had little to do with the entertainments of the well-to-do > educated elite that ran society. > I'm not quite certain if we are agreeing or disagreeing here. My impressions agree with yours. It seems to me that most of the classics of that era (as we consider them today) were produced for the great cathedrals of Europe, or were part of the oral tradition. (Homer, Beowulf, etc.). > > So I think the perception that the 'classics' were intended at the time > of their production as entertainment for the masses is based on a > faulty understanding of the history of the arts in Western society > over the last few hundred years. > > -- Cheers, Bill Ingogly I follow you all the way up to your conclusion. What am I missing? Good, interesting stuff, though. --SKZB .