Does misogyny diminish a work of art?

This question started nagging at me recently again, after one of those instances of running into casual misogyny such as I've noted in the "Female condition..." thread. I decided that rather than give the creep (dead, I'm glad to say) more exposure by posting there, I'd ask this general question, more interesting than his example in itself.

I'm not trying to be mysterious so if anyone really wants to know, I'll give you the creep's name and quote the verses that made me muse so. He was a Canadian poet, a "great" Canadian poet (O, ow and ouch, Canada!) I had never read and still know very little about (don't intend to learn much more either).

I opened a book of his poems on the first page and hey presto!--got smacked by a misogynistic punch as with a dead fish. Figured, just my luck. Got distracted by something (I was helping a friend sort through his mother's fantastic poetry collection--she was an academic and apparently in contact with everyone who was anyone in Brit and Canadian letters for decades and the books are filled with autographs, letters, photos, memorabilia), but, curious now because I've heard this guy is "THE great Canadian poet", eventually picked up another--different--poetry book of his, and this time even chose to flip to the middle.

And guess what? Smack WHAMMO!--a whole poem pissing on Sartre and Beauvoir, but especially Beauvoir, who wasn't, couldn't, never would be as good as a man no matter how much she tried etc. etc.

Now I'm REALLY curious. So I pick up yet a third book of poems, and this time I look at the publication dates--the first two were from the 1950s, this one's from the 1990s. Spanning a career more or less, fine. And AGAIN I open at random, and look at JUST ONE POEM...!--THREE TIMES, I picked a random SINGLE POEM TO LOOK AT!--and the poem is a sort of a summary of his life, what he learned, like those lists Esquire used (maybe still does) to publish, "What hath Lyffe Taught Me, by a Magnificent Specimen of Wizened Masculinity", and sure enough, there's the dig at women, women in general, the whole "loathsome female sex" (the phrase is from the poem about Sartre and Beauvoir); he says, he learned that "women are the stronger sex" not impeded at all by "lack of vision and creativity".

After this, I googled him and discovered that it's no news to anyone that "the great Canadian poet" was a complete asshole.

This guy went to a poetry reading by Margaret Atwood and yelled at her that "women are only good for screwing!"

Back to the question. The three poems of his I've read are forgettable stuff. I admit freely I couldn't tell you where my disgust at the misogyny--so directly, centrally expressed!--interferes with "objectivity". I objectively see the guy was shitting on women every chance and breath he took--apparently he believed (from a quote in an essay I found online), poor thing, that love and hate go hand in hand, so that expressing hate so loudly and so crassly, somehow gave an idea of his "love"--and by "love", I do believe I--and he--mean "dick".

Somehow or other this creep wrangled four (I think) wives and I'd rather not think about all the other women, which was his habit to accost at any time any how--there are poems about this too (I only saw quotations of some verses, enough to give you an idea: "She moved away when I put my hand on her thigh, showing me that her devotion to poetry wasn't perfect."

I know women of my mother's generation who fell for such creeps; I think it WAS something in the Zeitgeist, the horrendous legacy of Freudianism warping men and women alike.

Oops, took a ramble there.

Anyway--I'm thinking this creep will sink to a historical footnote fast enough, whether anyone cares or not that the "oeuvre" apparently largely consists of piss and bile launched at the entire "loathsome female sex".

But, hey, here's an example of a critically acclaimed poet--therefore "artist"--whose misogyny was one of, if not THE primary engine of his output.

Can this work still be loved, admired and prized? Can it have worth although it relentlessly humiliates and wounds human beings who are female? To anyone, or only to those who feel the way he did?

How about if the same sentiments and opinions were expressed about Jews or blacks?

"The loathsome Jewish race". "Blacks are the stronger race, not at all impeded by their lack of vision and creativity."

Why do even people who would baulk at THIS version of the verses tolerate the same when the targets of the hatred are women?

To go with the simple question "Does misogyny diminish a work of art?," it probably depends on a lot of things. It's usually a case by case thing for me. If the book is old enough, I feel you have to make allowances for different time periods and ways of thought, even if they are incredibly racist, classist, etc. If it's a passing comment here or there, I can overlook it (generally), especially if the book is otherwise incredibly worthwhile. The poems you're talking about sound pretty awful all around re: misogyny, so I think that would make it harder for me personally to be OK with still calling those great works of art. Of course, I don't know the poet you're referring to or the specific poems so maybe in context I might have a different opinion ?

Well, I thought running into three misogynistic poems in three different collections at random FIRST choice is telling enough--don't know how much context would be necessary? Maybe I'll look at another seven poems, to make it a round number. :) Can't do it now, don't have any of his books myself, and so few people hold his books on LT it doesn't seem likely anyone else will have much at their fingertips--OR CARE! :)--but it's Irving Layton.

And now that I've said as much, this is a very informative and hair-raising read I came across when I googled him after the third poem:

IRVING'S WOMEN: A FEMINIST CRITIQUE OF THE LOVE POEMS OF IRVING LAYTON

But, again, I don't want to make this about him (may he rest in crap), but art by people like him.

If the work of "art" banks on bigotry, I don't understand how it can continue to be heralded as "great".  Wagner was antisemitic, but his compositions are timeless.  I learned in 2009 that Orson Scott Card is homophobic, which greatly saddened me, because I love Ender's Game, despite his lack of understanding of girls.  I hope he's watching Agent Carter; last week's episode could educate him.

I wonder what sort of allowances will be made for the bigotry of our age.

>4 justjukka:

Yes, clearly the question is complicated when it comes to non-verbal art. Personally I don't think there's much sense in discerning misogyny in pure music, dance or architecture, but maybe I'm just lacking imagination (and vision and creativity). ;)

Wagner's case is a bit special because in his ambition to create Gesamtkunstwerken he explicitly invoked organic ties between one's philosophy and artistic expression, between words, sights and music, so that he actually invites consideration of music and drama at the same time, as one informing the other. But even so, and accepting the occasional antisemitic symbolism in his operas, I just can't see that his B-flats on their own are more antisemitic than anyone else's. Don't hear it, as it were.

Books, texts remain the most troublesome, I think. And yes, I think the example above (Layton) falls into the category of, as you say, "banking on it", making the odious one's trademark, calling card, bread and butter.

I suppose that if the measure of art's "greatness" is in its universality -- in its ability to speak to something within us all as human beings -- then the more women are included in that category called "human" the less great (or perhaps the word would be "relevant") a truly misogynist piece of art would become.

Personally, I became so adept at setting aside my woman-ness when interacting with art that I found myself often dismissing my woman's perspective as irrelevant or invisible. It took me asking "what does this have to say to women?" in a conscious and relentless way to bring my own kind of human experience back into the picture: to see what I think is profound in Picasso without excusing or ignoring his typically nasty view of women. To appreciate the insight in Shakespeare despite the fact that women in his plays seem to exist to suffer. In fact, I think I've mentioned this before, but it took the feminist Mary Daly asking me "What does Shakespeare really have to say to women?" to wake me up to the fact that this was a completely legitimate question to ask -- of any piece of art.

>6 southernbooklady:

The only way I can parse the question "What does Shakespeare really have to say to women?" is to understand it as "What does any dead white male have to say to women". Otherwise, I'd have to wonder how much Shakespeare the "asker" has read and how on earth they read him etc. I can't escape personal bias here, I got hooked on Shakespeare very early and, while I'm sure one could identify any number of misogynistic notions and clichés in his work, as is usual, I can also think of dozens of remarkable, marvellous female characters of his. I really don't see that "making women suffer" could be called something like a recognisable trademark of his, something that instantly comes to mind when you say "Shakespeare". (I doubt it would occur to me after a week, tbh.) Everyone made women suffer. There was (is) a widespread belief that women were made for suffering. Besides, he was a dramatist and drama needs melodrama, extremes, heightened passions. His Dark Lady gets away with tongue, hands and sanity intact, his Venus totally overpowers Adonis and fucks his brains out, and if Lucrece is a sorry victim of rape, that's because that's what happened in the ancient story.

I also don't perceive him as someone who put great stock in keeping women down, who believed that women deserve to suffer, or who'd have enjoyed their suffering. I just don't get that from him. Yes, despite The taming of the shrew, or Titus Andronicus or Ophelia's fate etc.--despite all the misogyny one can certainly find, I just don't see it as an engine or motivator of his work, or perceive it as a consistent vicious ideology. He probably believed various shit about women common in his day as now, but the dross didn't prevent him from creating Helena, Portia, Juliet, Rosamundlind!, Miranda, Viola--characters he must have loved to make so appealing.

I can't think of Shakespeare as a misogynist, or of misogyny as just a question of not providing something "for women".

Confronted with, say, a poem that's filled with woman-hate specific and general (e.g. insults to the individual woman Simone de Beauvoir AND her entire "loathsome" sex), I think the first question isn't "what is here for women" but "how do we deal with what IS there". How do we process it? What do we think of it?

Also--why does the question have to be "what is there for women"? What is there for men in a thing like that?

This is all very interesting. For me, since I am no longer required to read books, I find that issues of misogyny/homophobia/racism/whatever, play out more when I'm discussing the book with others, rather than reading it myself, and that the difficult part comes from weighing the author's reputation against a feminist critique.

For instance, Hemingway's Farewell to Arms, which at age 18, before I had even read a feminist critique of anything, I found viscerally frightening to read as a woman. It was clear to me that the woman suffered much more than the hero in the book and the HEMINGWAY DIDN'T SEE IT. (Nor did my English teacher, but that's another matter.))

Hemingway's reputation rests on two things: his prose style and his portrayal of manly men. His prose style remains regardless of his misogyny, and if you're looking at English prose styles you need to read him (at least in bits and pieces). However, his portrayal of men at the expense of women is worthy of critique.

So with Layton I'd be inclined to ask why he was Canada's most famous poet. I suspect it's not for his misogyny. If whatever he did for Canadian verse was so important that it has to be paid attention to, then I would let him off with a warning to readers not to be taken in by his misogyny. However, if it the reason he is praised is related to his view of women, then I say sink him in the deepest hole you can find.

On Orson Scott Card:

I tend to agree about Ender's Game, though see John Kessel's essay Creating the Innocent Killer: Ender's Game, Intention, and Morality*. However, by the time you get to Xenocide it gets pretty clear that he doesn't see all sentient beings are worthy of respect, and in fact, probably sees gay people as a lower form of life (he's certainly said that the are mentally ill). So, that's when I stopped reading him and stopped recommending Ender's Game without a caveat.

*Having trouble with the link to the url. Here's what I have: "http://www4.ncsu.edu/~tenshi/Killer_ooo.htm" rel="nofollow" target="_top">http://www4.ncsu.edu/~tenshi/Killer_ooo.htm. I found it by Googling the title.

>8 aulsmith:

So with Layton I'd be inclined to ask why he was Canada's most famous poet. I suspect it's not for his misogyny. If whatever he did for Canadian verse was so important that it has to be paid attention to, then I would let him off with a warning to readers not to be taken in by his misogyny. However, if it the reason he is praised is related to his view of women, then I say sink him in the deepest hole you can find.

Heh, I'm still hoping I can avoid getting too close to discussing Layton as such, from what I gathered, he figured as the enfant terrible among the stodgy, provincial, prudish Anglo-Canadians of the mid-century thanks to a filthy tongue--brought to it the four-letter words and generally the notion of activities those describe best--and a--as far as I can make out--the annoying persona of a belligerent macho working class tough always on the lookout for a drink and a tumble. It was probably both necessary and just a matter of time when the four-letter words and beat attitudes would invade even Canadian poetry and shake up things in general; I'm not disdaining this. But the outsize woman-hatred that accompanied this change seems to call for some justification, recalculation of "achievement".

In this article: Why Irving Layton still matters Layton is described as an OT-style "prophet", TRUTHTELLER, of UNPOPULAR truths. I think it's easy to see why I'm bothered to see a strident misogynist seen, "sold", as such.

(Oh and wow--he was actually married FIVE times. FIVE lucky ladies got rogered in marital bed and free verse by the pioneer of "frank eroticism" in Canadian letters. I bet they were thanking god every day of their married lives.)

Denounced first by puritans for the frank eroticism of his verse, and later by women for its perceived misogyny, Layton was politically incorrect and often socially abrasive, according to Priest. “It was something in himself that he couldn’t stop,” Priest added, “and it was unique and necessary.”

Gotta love that "perceived misogyny". Dude, I looked at three random poems in three books and all reeked of hating on women. As for "unique and necessary"--"unique" in context maybe, locally only; "necessary"--was really everything necessary, was misogyny "necessary"?

Article also mentions he was left-wing, so I have to wonder again: how would he have reacted to see the shit he wrote about the loathsome female sex translated with race as a subject? WHY can't these people see discriminating against women is the same kind of offence? Why don't they FEEL it? Bet you my last loonie he felt humanly and poetically for every downtrodden cotton-picker in the Delta.

Anyway, aulsmith, you hit on a central problem here--and I think Hemingway's example is very apposite. That is, what when the misogyny is so in-built in the writer's style and themes, when it informs them, so that you can't separate the two?

It seems to me that many writers ARE praised more or less directly FOR their misogyny (not necessarily exclusively, of course). Of course few who praise them call it that; they'll talk of "masculinity", "strength", "toughness", "taking no prisoners", "macho style", "big balls", "testicular" this and that etc.--TRUTH TELLING! UNPOPULAR TRUTHS! etc

Argh, sorry, I know it's ridiculous I keep saying I don't want to talk too much about the guy and then I keep posting stuff, but, really, I think this comment contributes to understanding the more general problem:

Sullivan recalled Layton’s own explanation of the genesis of this brash, womanizing persona: “Starting out in the forties was just terrifying in this godforsaken country. If you were a poet, that meant you were a puff. You had to do something to prove you weren’t a puff.”

Thus homophobia and misogyny ever go hand in hand! Textbook example! But what drives me mad the most is that people will STILL express this crap as "loving women" (the quote from here). No, that sort fucking doesn't LOVE women--maybe they love to FUCK them, and he certainly loved to put them down. But don't call that "loving women".

Okay, maybe I'm finally getting to the point: what's with the fucking glamorizing of being a bastard? Why do we pay respect to this silly posturing by, of all things, writers, and to the kind of writers who must be the most wretchedly insecure category of any people anywhere any time in history? When did who decide that the hard-drinking, hard-swearing, hygiene and niceties-averse, ball-scratching and dick-loving rutting goat with the approach and sex technique of cartoon cavemen is some kind of cultural hero, mirror of integrity, beacon of sincerity, needs must be truthteller?

A load of bollocks indeed.

a lovable lech {sic!}

Ugh. Yeah, I am getting all a-shivery.

ZoomerMedia founder Moses Znaimer credited the late author with having “reacquainted Canadian poetry with its own genitals.”

Ugh. Yeah, thanks for your dick, dickhead.

“Irving, when he was good, he was very very good,” recalled Margaret Atwood, who introduced Layton’s work in the 1983 edition of the Oxford Book of Canadian Poetry and was among the superstars of Canadian letters to present at Layton’s celebration. “Let us say that.”

Lady, YOU'RE a trouper. I'd have pasted "Women are only good for screwing!" on the fucker's tombstone.

We have to have manly writing lest the queers and the women take over the entire enterprise. ;)

No, truly, this is the kind of thing I'd drop in the deep hole of oblivion. I thought he might have evoked the Canadian landscape or culture in a particularly useful way. Sounds like he was just their first "great male narcissist," a flavor I hope is rapidly dropping out of favor.

What depresses me more than any insults such creeps come up with is knowing that they get praised for something that is completely false. Some poor idiot who's dead afraid of being taken for a "puff" and so has to keep reminding himself and others THAT HE HAS A DICK BY GUM! THAT HE USES ON WOMEN OFTEN AND THEN SOME! by crudest possible means, a man who doesn't feel he's strong unless he's tearing women down (yeah, nobody did that before him, that was super-novel and creative!)--he's got to be among the weakest, most spineless, most worthless twits around.

Who was a real man? Who had BALLS the size of Versailles? That puff Quentin Crisp, walking the streets in a woman's blouse, a rouged face, and peacock feather in his hat, getting harassed, beat up, ridiculed, dehumanised and never ever stopping being himself, not a day in his whole life.


"great male narcissist,"

Funny how I can't remember ever hearing of a "great" female narcissist. It seems an epithet reserved for consecrating exclusively male shittiness.

I've been reading and revisiting several "classics" this year and this question has been on my mind a lot. Equally, as mentioned above, the question amended to include racism, anti-Semitism, homophobia, et. al. The list goes on and on about who we'll trod on just to proclaim from the mount that we're so much better.

I can't remember hearing of a "great female narcissist" either; though it certainly feels as if all women that achieve greatness are consistently rumored to be narcissists.

While I get the perspective and logic of being understanding of an era in regards to classic authors or in regards to the era they are portraying, it's a logic I can't jam into a specific shape for modern authors. I ended up going back to a review I'd written about a novella recently read for this very reason; it's a companion short story to a trilogy (I believe it will be a trilogy, the third book isn't out yet). The author has written three novellas so far, two of which follow a specific supporting character from his series around for a span of time. This one follows a male character through a day and, though his being one of the 'charming lech' legion has been alluded to in previous books briefly, the reader has never seen him interact with women and doesn't know very much about his personality minus a friendship with the main character. It's high fantasy, an alternate world, but it's set in what might be our medieval times with some magic floating about. The attitudes fit for that time period anyways.

I couldn't put my finger out what bothered me previously. The character has a few liaisons throughout his day and one wasn't sitting right, the only one where consent or the implication of it is missing. The character gets the location of where a woman will be taking a bath from a child after they have a debate on whether she actually is the prettiest girl in town and then he gets some flowers to toss in the river upstream from her so they'll float sweetly(?) by, perches himself up in a tree, and watches as the girl comes to the river to wash. He stages a clumsy fall from the tree after awhile and the girl scrambles out of the water to wrap something around herself, he smiles, they have sex. The vibe I got from the scene was akin to the excuse bookends used by every peeping pervert ever: I'll do something cheesy and romantic (what woman doesn't love a bunch of forest detritus tossed in their bath with them), then, of course, I'm going to ogle her even though I see that she's making sure no one's around because she obv wants privacy (she owes me, for the romance detritus and stuff), at which time she will swoon madly for my dashing smile and climb on top of me once I make my presence known. Or at least the bookends to their fantasy.

Sure, it's not a slur - it's a lapse more than anything. Especially since it's a short story and there are plenty of factors we're unaware of. It stuck for me though because it's not a story that hinges on his behavior in this one frame or a story that hinges on historically acceptable and gendered behavior/interaction. It's this small blip in a fantasy series written by a modern author that claims to be a feminist and to want to write his females with that in mind (I'm of the opinion that if you're a feminist author it's not just your female characters who should be written with some kind of apparently alien sensibility). But I'm aware I feel like I'm splitting hairs - I was aware of this when I was adding onto my review - trying to sum up what I was talking about with this one scene. There's other things that add to it; the main thing is that this particular character is being also spied on when he goes to take a bath (for medieval-centric storylines, these characters are up on their hygiene) and at first it's just as off putting. Yet the author makes sure to quickly let you know that he's perfectly aware of this prior to taking off his clothes and he loves it, thinks it's hilarious.

The author isn't talking about how he/his character hates women but, even in it's smallness, the lapse highlights this low-level mutter throughout his series where all of the women (three) that are independent or learned are these tough shells that turn into shrews or obstinate walls when crossed or disagreed with, that both women the main character is interested in (in 'love' with for one/as a 'protector' for another) are somehow victims in his perception. You're left with this pretty intense and well-fleshed world that holds a lot of interest for some readers but it's very apparent that it's not about feminism, the author doesn't really care to add anything to his books that add anything to the conversation. But does that take away from his skill in other areas...

I don't need moral characters or moral writing in order to enjoy a book (or any media); life couldn't be represented in that way. It's the implication that all this is totally okay rather than the action of the scene itself. Most of the people I've discussed books with go to the side of giving credit to the times of an author or their subject when it comes to any kind of slur or action, so does that mean that modern writers/artists have more responsibility because they have access to current conversations and beliefs or do they have less because, eventually, someone will say the same thing about them down the road and so much of modern entertainment is what shocks. It was just how things were. Even if you've branded yourself for equality in whatever facet as a public figure, it still is how things largely are.

It's a faltering example, comparing the words of a poet/author with the actions of an author's character. So I guess my premise is that this action exists in a world he's created from the ground up and therefore represents his voice to a degree (or could, in theory). I don't know if I believe that voice automatically mars skill but it's hard for me not to think that voice can mar modern skill to a degree. Maybe it would be easier to swallow past ignorance if there had been more progress; maybe it would be easier to excuse if it didn't feel like complicity with a lack of progress.

And I just realized how much I've rambled, sorry. I've just had this on the brain and it's jumbled up.

Hi!

What book is that? Commercial, genre writing is situated differently to the works of art I had in mind. The latter are held up as exemplifying universal values, constant through time and space. To my mind, it's more surprising, and more hurtful, that a "canon classic" may be considered such (i.e. "worthy", universally and permanently so) despite rabid misogyny than, say, a piece of 1950s noir or science fiction.

Traditionally at least, misogyny is omnipresent in genre writing, even in the one geared to women, romance. As for that geared to men and boys, misogyny was and is an important ingredient, part of the attraction.

It's a novella from The Kingkiller Chronicles, so modern fantasy. It was the most recent example that paralleled what I'd been thinking of with classic reads lately. I do agree that misogyny is omnipresent in modern genre writing. But that's a bit of a chicken and egg deal... classics influence modern writing just as they influence modern thought - the vicious cycle continues. So who bears more responsibility for the hurt prejudice causes, the classic whose era we should (in some opinions) credit or the modern genre work whose author is influenced by canon but who also has access to modern conversations and the autonomy to build a bridge between those conversations and their content.

I think I'm more offended by the latter, tbh. If I was drastically injured and I just happened to stumble back through time and get roped into a leeching instead of having the benefit of modern medical progression available, I wouldn't necessarily be offended at the antiquity of what was available to me. I would be offended if a modern doctor decided to circumnavigate progress and bring in his pet leeches to work however. That feels the most willful to me.

We've kind of come to a place as interpreters of art where the field is laid more open when impact is evaluated. Ease of access alone is rife with connotations in what has become universal and what will remain so. I'd love to think that a work's voice can be separate from era and author prejudice but when I place a modern work into that ideal, it's more gray area than anything else as I imagine the case was with each of our eventual classics in their initial publications.

It's a literary Schrödinger's, where modern works and canonical classics are two separate boxes. The misogyny is in there - maybe it's prowling around alive and well and feeding on modern tropes, maybe it's deadened and has ceased to do anything more than passively effect its surroundings; I'd think the impact that would matter would be the one on whoever pops open the boxes.

Speaking traditionally, with all genres (I see the point about romance but because misogyny is so prevalent in the genre it's really just more of the same; just another way to be conditioned to accept or the result of conditioned acceptance) being geared towards men, or to the benefit of men, with misogyny as a draw - the pervasive line is that misogyny is the universal value of canon. Still, we consider its merit unimpeachable. Which, to me, means that the omnipresence of the same prejudice is far from extinguishing. For me, it all seems intrinsically linked, as any area of progress is with its framework.

The difference I was taking in account is in our valuation of art vs. trash.

It seems safe to expect, going by your description, that those Kingkiller Chronicles won't be taught in school to our grandchildren's grandchildren as a great artistic achievement. The author probably won't become any country's poet laureate. His name won't be immortalised in textbooks, or lent to a prestigious literary prize etc. At least, here's hoping! :)

More likely than not, that work is a piece of disposable and justly forgettable escapism, here today, gone forever tomorrow. For that reason I personally find the misogyny in such works less obnoxious, on the whole, than that in works that get academically canonised and taught to generations.

To make a simple analogy, I'm less inclined to fuss about the lousiness of food in Burger King than I would be in a supposedly top class establishment.

That said, in no way do I mean to minimise the harm done by pervasive sexism etc. in genre--for one thing, genre books are far more popular and thus most effective vehicles for dissemination and propagation of ideas. (I've actually been doing a thread in the Science Fiction group for a couple years now, motivated by this notion... we read "old" sci-fi with a focus on character representation, which naturally brings up sexism, racism and so on all the time.)

Incidentally, are you new to LT? I don't know how much of Talk you've seen so far; if you're interested specifically in fantasy, there are some excellent threads on the topics you raise in the FantasyFans and The Green Dragon groups.

For example: Male authors, awesome/interesting female characters?, Good epic fantasy with heroines who matter?, Romance plots in fantasy novels that are actually GOOD?

I don't read fantasy but I lurk in these and other threads because the posters are tremendously insightful (and post the best links!) I can't say how much I've learned from @kceccato, @sandstone78, @pwaites, @Sakerfalcon and others.

I do think that the desire for inclusion and instaculture has morphed (widened, possibly) interpretation and consumption of art while laying it bare to more personal bias and analysis. Basically I just think there aren't many that go into class rooms or museums and see that as the only avenue for artistic consumption anymore or an avenue that is massively available/popular/important. So yeah, it's basically what you've said about genre books being effective vehicles but not sustainable classics. Except I'd say that, due to the shift of current culture, they've become much more sustainable than ever before. A Kingkiller Chronicles book automatically has a farther reach than an H.G. Wells book would have had. It's not that people aren't experiencing classic work, they are - but just not in the same way with the same kind of framing and discourse that established cannon. Plus, the consumers are different. It's not all about class and privilege these days, the result being that many 'classics' (especially in literature) have come under fire to the extent that their status in cannon is not only questioned but often dismissed.

I agree with your analogy but I think, from my perspective, no one is fooled by the lack of quality between Burger King and a high class restaurant. That's just logical. However, access to healthy, quality food and recipes/cooking shows/competitions have brought further shades of 'what is high class food/a high class restaurant' and 'what is innovative/impressive/worth my time' into the picture. So it's not the simple quality/class distinction it used to be.

J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings is largely considered a classic work. Not because it was the first of it's kind; Tolkien had plenty of inspirations and his trilogy follows the tone of those inspirations basically to the letter. It's a classic because of it's consumption by a massive market and the perception of various parts of that market. Even Tolkien thought a lot of his fans were crazy when he realized how many people were coming up with interpretations of characters that he hadn't meant there to be. Now, interpretation is more welcome and more accessible no matter class, education, etc. Tolkien's work is definitely escapism but there's been a marrying of genre work and cannon that almost eclipses that separation between what is classic and what is genre. I think more modern work even comes closer to that eclipsing.

Svetlana Alexievich's Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets was awarded the Nobel and she's been praised for inventing a new type of literary genre. I loved Secondhand Time and I love Alexievich's style - I don't think it would have won the Nobel years ago or that her specific style/subject would have won much attention, I don't think it would have become a classic. I do think that years from now it will be seen as an important and classic work though and potentially taught in schools for generations for many reasons. I'd say that a different reader, a different interpreter of any work of art, has evolved during the recent generations. Maybe not a better one but certainly one with a larger reach and a louder voice.

Yup, I'm pretty new to LT and squeaky new to the forums lol. Thanks for mentioning those; I'd seen The Green Dragon in passing but I haven't jumped in yet. I'm fairly new to reading fantasy so I tend to forum-lurk as well. Definitely will check it and the threads you've mentioned out!

>18 lamotamant: If you are new to talk, you won't know that by using square brackets you can (fairly) easily link to the books you mention.

Secondhand Time Good, that one worked right.

Kingkiller Chronicles That linked to the first one in the series.

Lord of the Rings links first to The Hobbit. You have to click on (others) to find the right work.

By using double brackets you can link to Author pages H G Wells.

Always check on the right that the touchstone is correct, as they can be wonky, but it is still a big help to those who don't know the works you are referring to.

18 MarthaJeanne: Ah cool, thank you very much for that. I knew I could italicize titles and such but I'm mostly used to the title/author link insert option from GoodReads so I was clueless how I'd go about it on here.

Hope you don't mind me asking: in order to do the bit where you link the post # and username that you want to respond to I've just been using the html for a link and pasting in the link of the post and "post #/username:"... is there a more standard/easier way to do that? I briefly looked at HelpThing:Html Tips but didn't see anything.

>20 lamotamant: Just do > followed by the number, it does it automatically.

>18 lamotamant: just as an FYI, the Nobel is awarded to a writer for their entire body of work, not for a specific book. Secondhand Time, Voices from Chernobyl, Zinky Boys collectively established Alexievich's literary reputation. But I agree that her award is unique -- I can't think of another recipient whose work was solely nonfiction, for example. It did make me wonder if the prize committee was coming around to the idea of nonfiction as "literature" in the broadest sense.

It's a classic because of it's consumption by a massive market and the perception of various parts of that market.

Which strongly implies that "classic" is not an absolute value, but dependent on the work's relevancy to any given group of readers.

Which strongly implies that "classic" is not an absolute value, but dependent on the work's relevancy to any given group of readers.

Yes, this. Genre classics are plentiful; lots of classics are artistically worthless.

As for the Nobel, the very second literature prize went to Theodor Mommsen, a historian.

And now that I think about it, Churchill won it as well.

And last year, Svetlana Alexievich, a journalist. The idea is that literature, and so "classics," is larger than novels, plays and poetry. Churchill's speeches, at least, will probably be studied in 1,000 years. And Momsen was a towering figure in "letters."

The Alexievich award boded well for more non-fiction Nobels. But instead we got a stranger expansion—Bob Dylan.

The answer is yes if the author steals his wife's ideas and presents them as his own:

https://theconversation.com/anna-funder-rescues-george-orwells-wife-eileen-from-...

Documentation of these behaviors and more:

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/678996/wifedom-by-anna-funder/