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writers on writing
Anamaria has pointed out a review at the Washington Post, on Brett Lott's Before We Get Started. This review is by Jonathan Yardley, who is a biographer, columnist and book reviewer of significant stature. Generally the book reviews at the Washington Post are far more interesting to me than the NYT, so I have read quite a few of Yardley's reviews over the years. I suppose I like him, in part, because he's less condescending about genre fiction than most mainstream reviewers. In April of last year he wrote a column with the irresistible title "Dumas, the Papa of Popular Fiction" which caught my attention, especially given the opening sentences:
The recent revival of interest in "popular" fiction -- fiction written primarily to entertain, with few if any literary pretensions -- is welcome and long overdue. The vast majority of the books that get onto the fiction bestseller lists are junk, pure and simple, but many readers and even a few critics have come to understand that there's occasionally genuine merit in so-called genre fiction -- mysteries, thrillers, science fiction, multigenerational sagas -- and that this work rarely gets the serious, respectful consideration it deserves.
I've been wondering ever since I read this if "multigenerational sagas" is some kind of code for that-which-must-not-be-acknowledged: romance fiction. But I'm going to put that aside for the moment. Just so you get the picture: Yardley is a reviewer I generally like and respect, although I don't always agree with him. And now there's his review of Brett Lott's book on writing. Or actually, it's a review of Brett Lott's whole career and personality, in addition to one of Before We Get Started.
This review has me in knots. On the one hand I agree completely with Yardley on some basics about how-to-write books (as I've posted here, not so long ago). He says in this review:
Yes, people who aspire to be writers are like people who aspire to anything else: They need help. Over the years some exceptionally good books have been written about the art and craft of fiction -- I think in particular of Flannery O'Connor's Mystery and Manners and Eudora Welty's One Writer's Beginnings-- but they deal with large issues rather than niggling details. They don't say, implicitly or explicitly: Do as I advise and you can be just like me. They understand that serious writing done in the hopes of making literature is a mysterious process the precise nature of which is hidden within the individual writer's heart and mind, and that this process cannot be transferred -- least of all in a classroom or a writers' colony -- from one person to another.
I have posted before about this general topic of literary pretensions, for which I have little or no tolerance, so I do agree with Yardley on that front. Except this particular review is so ... extreme, I'm not sure what to do with it. For example:
Though his prose is ordinary at best and gag-inducing at worst, and though his fiction rarely rises above sentimental tear-jerking, Lott has persuaded himself that he is "a literary writer," "a literary author," and has taken on all the airs to which he apparently believes this distinction entitles him. He travels every stop on the circuit, teaching at one "low-residency M.F.A. program" after another, and now he has the gall to offer himself as a literary exemplar whose "writer's life" provides a beacon that can guide to the literary promised land all those who dutifully follow it.
Ouch. Ouch ouch ouch. This feels like overkill to me. Now, Brett Lott is a grownup and he'll deal with this; my concern is far more selfish. I've got a bad taste in my mouth about Jonathan Yardley, and the only solution is to read the darn book and see for myself. If the tone had been more measured, I could have simply decided not to bother with Lott's book; as it is, I almost feel obliged to read it. Which is not, I think, what Yardley had in mind.
February 2, 2005 11:56 AM
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Comments
I've had that very experience, where a bad review almost makes me want to read/see/hear the thing just to find out what the reviewer's talking about. Like Gigli. I kept thinking, "Oh come on. It' can't be as bad as all that."
I never gave in though. I hate that Affleck guy gives me hives.
Posted by: Joshua at February 2, 2005 02:44 PM
Could this be a case of a reviewer trying to increase their readership? Be extreme and see who you net for readers? Isn't it a niche market, readers of reviews? I was asking some people at the office, whether or not they would do something based on, or in defiant of, a reviewer's comments. Some don't ever read reviews of movies or books. (Who am I kidding, read reviews of books!?!) But others do, for the entertainment and to see if the reviewer "matches" their opinion. It's a form of entertainment for some people. For you?
Posted by: Pam at February 4, 2005 03:52 AM
>It's a form of entertainment for some people. For you?
That's an excellent question. I'm going to think about it.
Posted by: sara at February 4, 2005 06:43 AM
I've been known to read reviews after I see/read whatever it is. It's interesting to see what someone else picked up (or didn't) and seeing how they view the world. But it's the same thing when I ask someone I know what they thought; I don't place any more weight on a reviewer's opinions. Unless it's a review in People magazine, then I read/watch the ones they hated, because those are the ones I usually like.
Posted by: Christina at February 4, 2005 11:53 AM