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Apr. 7th, 2003 07:44 am
(no subject)
The only thing I dread about higher education is the lengths academics will go to to hide the joy of the written word behind all manner of big words, reducing everything to a nebulous statement of political origin. As time goes on, this seems to get worse and worse.
Now, granted, every story is enhanced by an understanding of the time and culture that produced it. Dickens isn't nearly as interesting if you don't know what his era was like, or why his novels are written in small, easily-digestible chunks. Mishima is understood best when you know what post-war Japan was like, and his upbringing, and his political/social views. Alice Walker (one of my favorite American writers) is enjoyed more when one knows the history and the feeling behind her work. These are the things English teachers live to impart to their students.
But a lot of professors take this to an extreme. They go so far that they lose the most basic point of fiction: to bring us pleasure.
There is joy in the written word, the way they flow together, the way generally silly symbols of even sillier sounds fit together to take us to other times and places, into the minds of people we'll never meet. A well-structured and well-written sentence can be a thing of beauty in itself:
There are, of course, many more.
Now, I'm not saying that a story shouldn't be examined; that would be silly. They should be. No story is ever exactly what it appears at first glance. Only by examining the story can we realise that, for example, the antagonist in Joyce Carol Oates' "Where are you going, Where have you been?" is more than a gawky teenager, or that Ian McDonald's Scissors Cut Paper Wrap Stone is about deeper issues than it first appears.
But we must always be careful that we don't obscure the writer's intent to write a decent story behind critical analyses and words like "colonisation" and "textualization". We must not hide the joy of the story behind our assumptions about his politics, or his intent.
At the end of the day, the writer writes stories. And enjoying the stories -- enjoying the gift these men and women have given us -- is more important, and more lasting, than any analysis.
Now, granted, every story is enhanced by an understanding of the time and culture that produced it. Dickens isn't nearly as interesting if you don't know what his era was like, or why his novels are written in small, easily-digestible chunks. Mishima is understood best when you know what post-war Japan was like, and his upbringing, and his political/social views. Alice Walker (one of my favorite American writers) is enjoyed more when one knows the history and the feeling behind her work. These are the things English teachers live to impart to their students.
But a lot of professors take this to an extreme. They go so far that they lose the most basic point of fiction: to bring us pleasure.
There is joy in the written word, the way they flow together, the way generally silly symbols of even sillier sounds fit together to take us to other times and places, into the minds of people we'll never meet. A well-structured and well-written sentence can be a thing of beauty in itself:
And then religion reared it's head; poor little talkative Christianity, and she realised that all its great words, fromLet there be light to It is finished, only amounted to "boum." - E.M. Forster, A Passage to India
I foresee that man will resign himself each day to new abominations, and soon that only bandits and soldiers will be left.-- "The Garden of Forking Paths", Jorge Luis Borges
His was a battle field without glory, a battlefield where none could display deeds of valor: it was the front line of the spirit.--Yukio Mishima "Patriotism"
There are, of course, many more.
Now, I'm not saying that a story shouldn't be examined; that would be silly. They should be. No story is ever exactly what it appears at first glance. Only by examining the story can we realise that, for example, the antagonist in Joyce Carol Oates' "Where are you going, Where have you been?" is more than a gawky teenager, or that Ian McDonald's Scissors Cut Paper Wrap Stone is about deeper issues than it first appears.
But we must always be careful that we don't obscure the writer's intent to write a decent story behind critical analyses and words like "colonisation" and "textualization". We must not hide the joy of the story behind our assumptions about his politics, or his intent.
At the end of the day, the writer writes stories. And enjoying the stories -- enjoying the gift these men and women have given us -- is more important, and more lasting, than any analysis.