There’s no exact cutoff. I am being respectful of other candidates people raise. Mockingbird unquestionably had social impact at the time and is treated as important today. I think it has a good chance of being read 100 years from now. With other stuff, it’s a matter of arguing how much impact it had when published, how important it is treated today, and what chance there is of being read in the future. I certainly wouldn’t say zero for some of the candidates raised post-1960.
Right, but Harry Potter isn’t considered art. It probably will be forgotten 100 years from now as well.
Not because it’s crap but because the market demands “water cooler media” and new stuff, and every few years we will have another Twilight or Divergent or Potter or some other YA trend. That’s not going to stop, whether it’s in novel or fully immersive hologram form, as you say. Potter will be buried under a mountain of other stuff by then.
Nope, it’s a little different. A very high-quality novel could have a subtle plot and be subtle* in other ways with characters and whatnot, but if people don’t read it for this reason and it lacks impact among a large number of people, it won’t be included in the canon of the future. Ergo, it won’t be treated as great art, regardless of its quality.
I am a huge Shakespeare fan, but he is given a free pass on a lot of stuff that wouldn’t be forgiven today. Not that playwrights (outside of musicals) become famous any more, but a “true artist” would be expected to come up with his or her own stories and characters.
*Again, my meaning of “subtle” here doesn’t mean “quiet” and “peaceful” but avoiding the most obvious tropes, templates, and cliches.
So? The future cultural impact is a different matter than the artistry itself. It doesn’t matter to ~my~ experience of a work whether people in 100 years agree that it’s great (though I may like them to).
Sam Sheppard, August Wilson, Neil Simon (Charlie Kauffman if you agree that screenwriting should count) … Nope not famous.
What is Shakespeare given a free pass on? I am curious
I forgot to add Edward Albee, Neil LeBute and David Mammet to the list of very very famous playwrights who don’t write musicals. I’m not sure what your point is with that one but if you are going to say stuff in a thread where people already are inclined to disagree with you, get your check able facts right.
That’s cool. But I am specifically talking about works that are great enough to be included in a canon and do in fact end up getting included in a canon.
These guys are all old except Neil LaBute and got their fame in a totally different era.
Sam Shepard (you misspelled his name; your facts weren’t right! j/k): Born 1943. Which of his plays are actually famous among the masses? I also don’t think he’s all that famous, though he was mentioned as a notable drunk on Screen Junkies Movie Fights two weeks ago.
August Wilson: 1945-2005. I wouldn’t say he’s famous among the masses.
Neil Simon: Born 1927! I’m not claiming straight plays became culturally irrelevant a long time ago, mind you. More like in the 1970s. Simon is definitely famous, but his reputation was built 60+ years ago.
Edward Albee: Born 1928! Another genuinely famous playwright who earned his renown in the 50s and 60s.
Neil LeBute: Born 1963. Thing is, he’s not famous as a playwright but for his work in film. Kaufman (you misspelled another name! facts! j/k!) doesn’t count for the same reason. Films are still a prestige entertainment/art form… for now…
David Mamet: Born 1947. Borderline case. He is debatably famous as a playwright, but something like Glengarry Glen Ross (1984) is more famous for the movie and “coffee is for closers!” He also has really made his mark in film.
I mean, at the end of the day, do you believe that people are still becoming famous as writers of straight plays and that straight plays continue to have a significant cultural impact? I bet you really don’t. Because they’re not.
When I say “so?” it’s not rhetorical. Why should people care about your increasingly narrow and idiosyncratic concept of “Great Art,” which excludes so much art that people find great? What is the actual point of this whole argument?
For “free pass,” mean not only flaws and limitations but also things that wouldn’t be allowed today. Basically, everything flawed, limited, or obsolete about him is glossed over or ignored, and he is worshiped for everything good. And it’s not as though scholars have missed these things, but in the popular imagination he is treated as perfected genius. A few things:
• The unoriginality of most of his content.
• His potential collaborators never get any credit (e.g., The Two Gentlemen of Verona).
• His English is treated as a kind of “classic English” by default, even though a lot of his slang and terminology would have seemed obsolete to playgoers just a decade or two after his death. IOW, it probably sounds better to our ears because of the way we relate to Shakespeare than it did to people in the 17th century.
• Similarly, the blank verse play soon became obsolete. It would have seemed very quaint and old-fashioned to people soon after Shakespeare’s death, but to us it’s this grand old English. He benefits from a recontextualization that happened in the 19th century. It’s as if at that point he made the flip from “too old-fashioned” to “awesomely old-fashioned”!
• Ira glass got excoriated in 2014 for calling Shakespeare “unrelatable,” but he wasn’t totally wrong. Again, anything that seems unlike our current era (and unrelatable for that reason) is automatically considered to be of Shakespeare’s time and “awesomely old-fashioned.” King Lear is pretty gross and depressing, with a dude’s eyes getting squished out by another dude using his bare hands. If this were in anything created today with someone shouting, “Out damnéd jelly!” it would be flagged as disgusting and ridiculous, but because it’s Shakespeare, it’s… cool? We just automatically view anything in his plays through a different lens. And this is regardless of whether those same things would have seemed ridiculous or gross to his contemporaries.
• Similarly, women dressing as men and not being noticed and any other such convenient tropes are just seen as fine for the time, even though no one could get away with that today.
• The five act play structure doesn’t work very well and was abandoned a long time ago. If there’s one criticism that is likely to be recognized by non-academics, it’s that Shakespeare’s plays are too long and tend to bog down in parts. Further, since the climax typically occurs in Act III (the classic “cataclysm”), the endings tend to be anticlimactic, since the eventual resolution comes too far after the cataclysm.
• A range of emotion is imputed to Shakespeare that isn’t there. Our culture has a tendency to dumb great artists down and make them “safe.” Thus, Haydn isn’t seen as the badass composer of his Sturm und Drang period but instead the lovable old composer of the Surprise Symphony (which actually is badass in its own right, but never mind…). This cliche arose of Shakespeare being some sort of patron saint of romantic sentiment with Romeo and Juliet and the sonnets selectively quoted… yet he is more or less the opposite of that in tone 99.9% of the time. Shakespeare is massively intelligent and massively cynical about everything. His plays are cerebral and chock full of irony and sly humor. That’s why I like them (plus his insane ability with the English language). But his emotional range is actually quite limited, and he’s less versatile in tone than people give him credit for.
Those are some thoughts on that. I think Shakespeare and Mozart both tend to get dumbed down in the same way, with their worshipers actually missing the ways in which they were truly great. That is, they are overrated and underappreciated at the same time.
The point is that, in the future, the canon of novels will be closed and nothing will be able to become famous over the long term. If you don’t care if that’s the case, then fine, you don’t care.
:dubious:
Sorry for the misspellings. I was going off the top of my head and trusting auto correct.
Believe what you want. The canon for theatre moves more slowly than film. It takes years for plays to penetrate because they are disseminateed one performance at a time. If you think Mammet made his mark in film you are uninformed same with LeBute. The fact that you think this shows the cultural impact their plays had. Neither would have ever come close to Hollywood without their work in theater being relevant. Very little of their work was filmed.
Edward Albee didn’t earn his renown in the 50s at all (you want to count zoo story, go ahead but I would say Virginia Wolf is what made his name) and has had plays produced that were new as recently as 2007. Hit plays. Relevant plays.
I don’t even know what to say about the Sam Shepard and August Wilson comments. They are the two most important playwrights in the English language in the last 40 years. I suppose fame is relative. Are you only counting it as famous if people who know nothing about the art form know these people? Because then I suppose only Shakespeare and maybe Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller are really famous. Maybe not even Williams. But, to bring it back to novels, if you use that same criteria then only Steven King and possibly Dickens and Mark Twain are really famous novelists.
So, first… Why is fame relevant to your argument at all, because I’m not tracking that, but it seems to be important to you that novelists become famous to people who don’t read books.
Second you ignored the question about what would Shakespeare not be allowed to get away with? Adaptation of known material was, at the time considered not only acceptable but expected. Do you have a problem with West Side Story being an adaptation of Romeo and Juliette? How about Oh Brother Where Art Thou? being an adaptation of The Odyssey? There are lots of stories that are inspired by or adapted from older source material. If I am following your argument these aren’t art? And how does this relate to novels again?
Edit:I see you actually posted about that later bit while I was writing. I’ll read it and get back to you.
Wow, so again I’m going to suggest a spin off thread, or maybe a title change for this one. There is a lot to unpack but it has nothing to do with novels.
As I said, j/k!
Again, I am not making any comment on the quality of their work, and I’m far from an expert in the theater. But would you agree or disagree about the change in cultural relevance of straight plays before, say, 1970 and after? Would you say that things have stayed the same? Simon was a household name; LaBute isn’t.
Yes, the goat one and whatnot. That did get press. Thing is, he was a grand old man of the theater putting out new material. Is there anyone in theater today in their 30s or 40s becoming famous for straight plays the way Neil Simon did in his 40s for The Odd Couple? It’s just a different world.
You are making an important point: the canon can shrink immensely over time:
• There are no American playwrights of the 19th century considered important today. Barely any are even remembered. In fact, only three playwrights of the time are considered great in any language: Ibsen, Wilde, and Shaw.
• There are only two American poets of the 19th century considered important: Dickinson and Whitman. Poe is a runner-up (as a poet). But there were lots of “men of letters” writing poems who were seen as their contemporaries as major poets: Lowell, Aldrich, Holmes (who at least is recognized for “The Chambered Nautilus”), Whittier, etc. Longfellow was a massive hit writer and seen as a great poet for the ages; he’s basically considered sentimental garbage today (a bit unfair in my view, but I mostly agree his stuff isn’t good).
The list of 20th century novelists we revere today will probably be far shorter in 2116. In some cases, this is fair. I have never come across even a mention of a 19th century playwright that is forgotten but should be revived. In some cases, it’s unfair: I think there are a good number of 19th century poems that are forgotten because their writers lost “brand.” I think the sci-fi writer Robert Sheckley is unjustifiably forgotten (by curators of the genre for sure, but I also think his stories have a lot of entertainment value that readers could still enjoy).
Because people don’t read writers that were only ever popular among academics and hobbyists. The canon will be closed across various art forms, and I don’t think that’s really good for culture.
Nope, if anything, I think writers should probably adapt more. Right now, we have an extreme cult of originality that ties into legal framework behind IP. Nevertheless, if a writer adopted material at the rate Shakespeare did, s/he wouldn’t be considered super original, and that would probably be a fair assessment (even if originality itself is overrated).
People will inevitably take it in the wrong way, thinking that I’m trashing Shakespeare or something, and it will be another ragefest.
Who says? Of course it’s art. It may not be great art for all the ages, but it is definitely art.
[QUOTE=Aeschines]
That is why no one reads literary fiction: it’s boring. It doesn’t have the BIG stories full of Voldemorts and vampires and teens dying of cancer but finding true love.[…] The art form was new in 1719 (Robinson Crusoe), and the body of extant novels was still small at the beginning of the 19th century. You could write about anything and not be redundant with the past. [thread pg 1]
[…snip-cut from a separate post…]
You’re correct! I’m not talking about the academic perspective, however. I’m talking about average people. [thread pg 3]
[…snip-cut from a separate post…]
A very high-quality novel could have a subtle plot and be subtle* in other ways with characters and whatnot, but if people don’t read it for this reason and it lacks impact among a large number of people, it won’t be included in the canon of the future. Ergo, it won’t be treated as great art, regardless of its quality. [thread pg 3]
[…snip-cut from a separate post…]
The point is that, in the future, the canon of novels will be closed and nothing will be able to become famous over the long term. [thread pg 3]
[…snip-cut from a separate post…]
Because people don’t read writers that were only ever popular among academics and hobbyists. The canon will be closed across various art forms, and I don’t think that’s really good for culture. [thread pg 3]
[/QUOTE]
Wait, your ideas intrigue me, but I fear that I am confused. First, what do you mean by “literary fiction?” If you agree with wikipedia
[QUOTE=]
Literary fiction comprises fictional works that hold literary merit; that is, they involve social commentary, or political criticism, or focus on the human condition. Literary fiction is deliberately written in dialogue with existing works, created with the above aims in mind and is focused more on themes than on plot, and it is common for literary fiction to be taught and discussed in schools and universities.
Literary fiction is usually contrasted with popular, commercial, or genre fiction. Some have described the difference between them in terms of analyzing reality (literary) rather than escaping reality (popular).
[/QUOTE]
Then I do not see how you can say that people find literary fictions like Animal Farm or Les Miserables or writers like Kurt Vonnegut or George Orwell as boring. I say that because those examples are all about social/political commentaries and musings upon the human condition. I personally, find it harder to think of any book that does not try to touch upon one/all of those subjects.
Are you saying that literary novels make us think and reflect upon the world while genre novels are mindless indulgences? The difference between War and Peace and the endless shelves of generic romance novels or Twilight fan-fiction? Is this similar to how a complete meal and junk-food are akin? That I can agree with, but then do you also agree that all people crave different things at different times; and that people get their ideas from different sources at different rates? Even if “the masses” consume their junk-food genres en mass, they still crave (read) healthy literary novels as well; just as you, a very well read person, can still enjoy the junk-food experience of re-reading the Star Wars books.
You who devoured the Star Wars book series (genre novellas) while a kid still learned a few nuggets of wisdom (or at least new and interesting things to the-kid-you) from them didn’t you? If you read The Phantom Tollbooth right now, you would know everything it is trying to say, and thus you could mindlessly enjoy it as genre junk-food. But to a kid, that book is the height of literary thought, up there with Dr.Seuss’ stories.
From this I say that the literary/genre dichotomy is constantly in flux and relative to every person (community) and their stage of development (interaction with outside communities). And from that can I have you agree with me that there is no “canonical” “canon?” There is the canon of the East, West, every nation, and every school, and every home, and every person, etc… all influencing each other or going unnoticed by another entirely. We each have our favorites, and we recommend those to our friends. We are taught in school the “academic canon” (lord knows I would never have read Shakespeare otherwise) which changes slowly every year, and when we join other groups (be it for work or play) they all intermingle and share their thought on what is the “must read canon” of that particular group. The internet and e-groups like this message board only hasten and broaden our appreciation (canonization of ‘must read’ books within that community) of these previously unknown gems.
From that I say the novel (the variety of newly available accepted and appreciated novels vs the “variety” of our past closed communities) is going to thrive in this age of globalization and mass sharing. When was the last time you as a Westerner ever read or appreciated the great Asian authors? Now we are actually translating them, and putting them up for sale on e-books for the whole world to judge (against all other books we can read) so that we can make a new globalized “must-read Canon.” That canon does not really change up any of the other sub-canons however; the increase in variety of books in our language will show us previously hidden shining jewels, though. It is like expanding the number of Michelin Star restaurants from just in the USA to the whole world. It just makes eating/reading everything that you should, an ever increasing and daunting task for completionists. Or expanding your palate from your Mom’s American cooking to Indian or Ethiopian food by finally having a restaurant of that type open up near you.
There, I think I got my ideas across. That improvements in translation technology, the internet and everyone’s increasing connectivity, and everyone joining e-groups with others from around the world will only increase everyone’s sharing ability and widen our personal (sub-group) artistic/literary canon. We do not need to only trust monks to copy and re-copy stories onto paper, or to worry that our knowledge will be lost forever because one Alexandrian Library was burned down. Everything is much more secure and sharable than ever before. We will not need to find a Rosetta Stone in order to read Egyptian stories anymore, everything is being expertly translated into every other language. The high-quality novel that was not appreciated in its time, will be preserved and indexed forever such that those coming later will be able to easily find it and realize that it should be in their own “canon.”
Thanks for your in-depth post!
I am not trying to be all that profound with my definition or distinction here. Really, it’s not that hard because there is a certain class of author or would-be author who is ostensibly trying to write a novel of literary merit. They talk about New York faction versus MFA faction with these folks. The “explain reality” as opposed to “escape from reality” is pretty good, but then something like Divergent is also a commentary on our society, so it doesn’t totally work.
I think it’s telling that people in this thread have rather consistently brought up old writers as though they are recent. There’s a lot to unpack in just this sentence you wrote. Les Miserables is a 19th century novel written before the distinction between the “popular” and the “literary” really existed. Orwell died in 1950, a long time ago. Vonnegut is a very interesting case. He was never really taken seriously by academics in his time and was seen as a more popular writer. None of what you cited is really relevant to my point, which is about how the novel is entering new cultural territory.
They do?
Not sure where you got that. I’ve never read a Star Wars novel. I was talking about the movies.
I am actually not criticizing or making a value judgment about genre fiction. I even said that one of my favorite writers is Robert Sheckley, a sci-fi writer. My point is that the literary/genre dichotomy that has arisen puts the novel in a trick bag.
That’s a hard thought to parse. Regardless of its truth value, I don’t think it’s relevant to my point.
I basically agree with this! It’s not as though Jesus Our Lord Jesus Christ waves his magic wand as says, “Here are your canonical novels for posterity.” Further, as you aptly observe, whatever canon can be said to exist comprises a wide variety of influences and influencers. Good point! Yet, this insubstantiality of the canon does not lead me somewhere more optimistic than my original point but rather somewhere more pessimistic. And you are about to get very optimistic, and it is my dour duty to shoot this good mood down. Sorry:
Well, if you read the Will Self article I linked to in the OP, he says it’s not thriving, and I don’t think it’s thriving either. But it depends on what you consider “thriving.” What’s nice in 2016 is that you can self-publish your novel and, if it’s competently written, at least get some people to read it. That’s nothing to sniff at. I self-pubbed a non-fiction book with a friend, and… some people have read it! What’s not so nice in 2016 is that, if you have the dream of becoming a “famous author” of “serious works,” that’s really damn hard and is arguably a role that is passing out of existence. And even becoming a famous author of unserious works is extremely difficult.
Wee-ell, I am fluent in Japanese and a professional translator. I have read a number of novels in Japanese, including some works by “great authors” like Natsume Souseki and Mori Ougai.
Oh? I was unaware of this trend! And I will actually call bullshit on this, as I don’t think Japan for example really has an organized canon in the same way the English-speaking world does. The vast, vast majority of Japanese people could give two shits about their literature. And though you say, “now we are translating them,” that stuff has already been translated, and no one in the West is reading Makura no Soushi or Tsurezuregusa or any of that outside of university. Here’s the thing about Japan: it’s a culture that throws away the recent past much more easily than we do. There is much less curating and canonization going on there in the first place. Just as a quick example, back in the 80s and 90s when the switch was made from vinyl to CD, all of those old classic British and American albums were released on CD, right? Only a tiny fraction of Japanese albums were re-released on CD. Like probably well under 5%, maybe under 1% of stuff released before the advent of CD was re-released.
Even if what you say is true on the surface, which I doubt (people you know are reading Koren and Indian novels, for example?), it would just exacerbate the Long Tail and further dilute the degree to which any one work would garner attention.
Wait, what?! The state of AI translation remains garbage.
Even if this were true, it doesn’t change the observed fact that the US isn’t minting new famous authors of “serious fiction.”
I think this is true to a certain extent. Contra to what I said above, although you never meet them in person, there is always some “otaku” preserving something somewhere in Japan. For example, I am a big fan of the British singer Brian Protheroe. I had all his stuff on vinyl, but I also have it on CD because someone in Japan released a box set in 1997 that I happened to see in a record store to my great delight.
Most popular novels of the last half-century in Japan have simply been thrown into the landfill, not translated, no longer thought about at all (except by some otaku somewhere, perhaps…). Translating a book is a BFD, not that many people are qualified, and the total number of qualified people could, even if they wanted to, only translated a fraction of the books that have been published.
This is just very naive optimism. But I like what you wrote all the same. The kind of world you describe is pretty awesome. I just wish it were real!
::grabs popcorn::
You two were made for each other. Carry on.
::slurps Big Gulp::
Yes, imagine that, two people discussing an issue! Some others in this thread should try it sometime. 