Thursday, June 24, 2004
(4:20 AM) | Adam R:
The Value of Literary Criticism?
In the words of a Chaza choir member, "I generally try to stay away from shit and garbage." That's why I read so many classics--with Conrad, Dostoyevsky (or even Beckett!) you know all along that you're not going to take a lot of crap. When you veer a little from the path, say to free, advance copies of Wild Animus or anything by Bret Easton Ellis, you're going to run into a few snags, a few books with torn pages and busted bindings.The thing is, those latter books, the crappy ones that are nearly good, are the ones that I can sink my critical teeth into. The parts that you laugh at because they're so bad, that's where I can find a compelling essay. At the same time, I enjoy reading the worst of Michael Crichton novels (say Timeline) with nary an intelligent thought creeping through my head.
I often think fondly of the spring afternoon when I told a literature professor she was wasting my time trying to find something intelligent to say about Moby Dick. I told her to lower the Bakhtin, I said that the only way to meaningfully explain what's happening with the whiteness of the whale or old Queequeg is to go back and rewrite the whole damn book starting with "Call me Ishmael." When you mess around with all the intellectual hullabaloo, I said, "You're out to sea."
Zing! And here's the thing:
The thing is, I still agree with myself. Certainly it's my artist's temperament, but I have a hard time seeing the value in vivisecting Ulysses (aside from the Guiness you'd drink while doing it) to try and make a relevant point. Why hijack great literature for our paltry ends? Herr Kotsko's reading of "The Penal Colony" was a good read, an impressive understanding to boot, but what good does that do anyone? A fat lot of good, that's what good. It does anyone. A fat lot of it. Good, I mean.
I'm reading The Brothers K now. Constantly it astounds me; sections of it, particularly the sections written by young Irwin which read like Lester Bangs, are brilliantly executed. One part made me pause to write this post, but when thinking about what to say I remembered my position on literary theory. I've sort of declared a moratorium on murdering texts, so while I could write that the things Kincade is saying to his father work because of the reflections he's had earlier about Aesop being a moron, I feel much more strongly that you should read it for yourself. I could try to say something, but without rewriting the entire thing, I'd be saying nothing. It's like what Frost wanted to say to his neighbor when they were building that wall. He decided not to say anything because it wasn't "elves exactly, and it'd be better if [the neighbor] said it for himself."
That last sentence itself illustrates the ugly un-artfulness of misusing literature. Literature abuse.
Literary criticism stretches the distance between life and art to a near breaking point. Scratch that--it completely severs any connection between our life and the beauty we can find in it. It contrives terms and categories that are natural to our instincts but not to our existence. For instance, when we apply the force of love between Romeo and Juliet to our own lives, when we derive our definition from their relationship, we've made love into something concrete, definable, and weird. Now we feel funny about having a crush, and we hope no one makes fun of our emotions or plagues our houses behind our backs.
It's great when a smooth-talking catcher from the Durham Bulls says he believes "that the works of Susan Sontag are self-indulgent, over-rated crap," but it's even better when, moments later, he affirms the value of gentle kisses. Susan Sontag is cool inasmuch as knowing how to pronounce her name can muster you up some feminist pootie-tang, but baby, gentle kisses will work every time.
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PS I'm fully aware of the paradox inherent in this post.
