Bitchin' Blog Posts
Headbanger’s Ball
by SB Sarah | by SB Sarah | September 19, 2008 | Friday at 4:22 pm | 90 CommentsWhat’s this? You need an excuse to bank your head in that nice head-shaped divot on your desk? We here at SB HQ are happy to assist, as is Zumie, who sent me these excerpts from her creative writing textbook, The College Handbook of Creative Writing by Robert DeMaria.
Excerpt the first, from page 16:
“Male-female relationships have become very complex since the so-called sexual revolution of the 1960s. Nowhere has the loss of tradition and structure in society caused more confusion than in the relationships between men and women. Romeo and Juliet may have had their problems, but they knew exactly where they stood and what was expected of them. Today’s proliferation of paperback romances may be an escapist reaction to the confusion, or even a simplistic way of dealing with the varieties of interpersonal problems. There are also, of course, many worthwhile literary works on the subject, most of them by women who have been writing with greater freedom in an atmosphere of liberation—writers such as Alice Walker and Cynthia Ozick.
But wait, there’s more! Excerpt the second, from page 20:
The broad literary spectrum ranges from the silliest kind of romance or comic book adventure to the works of such major literary figures as Herman Melville and Jane Austen. Some critics try to draw the line and create criteria for what they call true literature, as opposed to mere entertainment or downright junk. Drawing a precise line is always a bit arbitrary, and not really necessary. What we have is a continuum from the very trivial to the very important. Since the range is very wide, some of the material between these extremes can prove quite interesting without actually being worldshaking. What good fiction, poetry, or drama does for us is leave us with the feeling that our experience has been expanded vicariously and that perhaps we know something afterward that we did not know before. In other words, good literature has an impact that, in some way, changes the reader. Trivial literary entertainments such as thrills and romances and television dramas, however, cannot be dismissed with contempt. They have a role to play in the lives of many people, and many of the writers involved find such work a pleasant and profitable form of employment, though significance in such works is clearly minimal. Their aim is to thrill, chill, and titillate. Frank Lloyd Wright once described television as “chewing gum for the eyes.” It’s an excellent description of that medium and might also apply to most of our light literature. Chewing gum gives you a lot of action but no nourishment. Great literature, on the other hand, is full of emotional, spiritual, and intellectual nourishment.
I love the dancing tango of “Have I insulted you? Have I? No, how about now? How about now?” that DeMaria is playing here with that added dollop of piquant elitism. It’s not necessary to draw a line between the erudite and the junk (but romances are junk) and even romance has a role to play in the lives of their readers (ignominious fools though they are). Jesus fucknuts, what kind of self-absorbed superiority fix is this guy on in the quest to teach creative writing? Thrill, chill, and titillate in the absence of emotional, spiritual, and intellectual nourishment? MY ASS, SIR.
I bet he giggled when he typed “titillate,” too.
What an outrageous pity that this boneheaded statement is being used to instruct a venue of creative encouragement. Discouragement is more like it. Pass me a romance. Preferably a hardback. So I can aim it at his groin.
Filed: Ranty McRant
Tagged: writing, television, poetry, literature
Elizabeth Wadsworth said on 09.19.08 at 04:51 PM • [link]
Well, this part actually makes sense to me:
The rest is self-important crapola that sounds like it was recycled from somebody’s college dissertation.
Spamword: want34. I want 34 new books to read when I go on vacation next week.
Kalen Hughes said on 09.19.08 at 04:54 PM • [link]
Speaking as someone with an MFA (and as someone who attended one of the top creative writing programs in the country): WHO THE FUCK NEEDS A CREATIVE WRITING HANDBOOK? I’ve never heard of such a thing. Neither Hollins (Pound for pound the most productive creative writing program in the United States—The New York Times) or San Francisco State (the best poetry program on the West Coast) uses any such useless collection of drivel to “enlighten” their students.
And I love the fact that his moron has entirely glossed over the fact that Austen, in her own day, was writing popular fiction (the dreaded “novelâ€, which was dismissed with nearly the same slanders he now uses against the entire romance genre).
I say unto Mr. DeMaria: Crack a fucking book and do some research before parading your ignorance for all the world to see.
snarkhunter said on 09.19.08 at 04:57 PM • [link]
Le sigh.
I also love the implication that male-female relationships were not at all complex prior to the sexual revolution.
(Captcha: man21. Nope. Still looking for the first one.)
Kalen Hughes said on 09.19.08 at 05:10 PM • [link]
Couldn’t help myself . . . went and looked up this guy’s publishing record and what do I find: All his novels are with “Vineyard Press”.
Never heard of ‘em.
Look them up, and what do I find: On the homepage is a statement from someone named “Michael DeMaria”.
Interesting, no?
spinsterwitch said on 09.19.08 at 05:11 PM • [link]
WTF! As Kalen so aptly pointed out, Austen (and the Bronte’s…even Byron and some of the touted male authors) were considered to be overly emotional and not serious by many in their day.
As for taking something away from these books, I really think that my voracious reading had something to do with my ability to write and certainly it all sparked an interest in history.
Zumie said on 09.19.08 at 05:18 PM • [link]
I actually have since found more stuff that’s even more condescending, amazingly. Here’s an especially ripe one: (from page 52)
“Some characters are superficial or two-dimension; other characters are three-dimensional and more fully created. They are as complex and convincing as real people. Flat characters have very little depth and are often stereotypes—the tall, dark, handsome lover in a romance, for instance, and his beautiful, virtuous, and devoted sweetheart. Entertainment literature does not require characters with depth. It needs only stock characters to amuse us or help us wile away our leisure time. It is devoted largely to love, sex, and violence. It needs heroes and villains, and, especially, husbands and wives and lovers with all the romantic agony humanly possible.”
When was the last time this dude cracked open a romance book, is what I want to know.
Jessica said on 09.19.08 at 05:31 PM • [link]
This is a bit of a mystery to me. There’s a literature professor at Vassar named Robert DeMaria Jr, who’s a specialist on Samuel Johnson (which might explain a lot, actually) but then there’s this Robert DeMaria on Amazon, etc., who has published a bunch of fiction on, As Kalen Hughes pointed out, Vineland Press.
They are two different people (right?), but which is our culprit?
Silver James said on 09.19.08 at 05:43 PM • [link]
*passes around the chewing gum* I’ve read some pretty emotional, spiritual and intellectual romances in my life. So there, Mr. DeMaria. *pbtthhh*
Noelle said on 09.19.08 at 05:46 PM • [link]
And did you see what the asking price is 73.75!!
I was going to say poor ignorant man bless his heart. But now I think he’s just evil.
Spam: going87 -yep by next semester it will be going for 87.75
While in ‘10 my “trash” will be going for only 12.50!
Kelly C said on 09.19.08 at 05:48 PM • [link]
It may make sense, but it also implies/infers (whatever) that you can’t/don’t/won’t learn anything from any “trivial pursuits”. (ie, romances, TV, etc. ) @@
SpamWord: white98 - - - yes, I was white in ‘98. ;-)
dillene said on 09.19.08 at 05:55 PM • [link]
Well, I’m glad that there are worthwhile literary works on the subject. I hate it when literature isn’t worthwhile.
Jesus, what a poltroon.
Kalen Hughes said on 09.19.08 at 05:56 PM • [link]
Same person as far as I can tell. Unless the guy writing the creative writing tome has never actually published a work of fiction . . .
Carrie Lofty said on 09.19.08 at 06:09 PM • [link]
They have a role to play in the lives of many people, and many of the writers involved find such work a pleasant and profitable form of employment, though significance in such works is clearly minimal.
Pleasant and profitable and minimally significant. I’m so proud.
Jessa Slade said on 09.19.08 at 06:14 PM • [link]
Ah yes. I remember my creative writing classes in college. First semester, all 12 people in my class killed off our main characters because we wanted our stories to be “taken seriously.” And of course nothing is as serious as death.
As for Creativity Handbooks? Run away, run away.
Cat K. said on 09.19.08 at 06:35 PM • [link]
But! But! But! Isn’t it also true that when a book that is romantic in nature makes the Literature cut, it is then removed from the “romance novel” pile? Is this not what he might be talking about? I mean, not all stories of love/ romance/ affection/ HEA are necessarily going to be romance novels, but it seems to me that once a book is deemed to have light(er) reading and sufficient romantic content, it then gets defined as a “romance novel” by everyone (from B&N;, to Amazon, to my public librarian). No?
MC Halliday said on 09.19.08 at 06:58 PM • [link]
What Kalen found, prompted me to do further research and I found out Vineyard Press Inc is listed as an ‘author funded’ publisher. (MacRae’s Industrial Guide)
And on Amazon, from Vineyard Press, are several fiction books by a Robert Demaria (the cap M is shown as lower case).
Cat K, if I might answer your question, the romance genre is simply defined by HEA. It can be dark (noir) but must have a happy ending. Even if it has romantic elements, it isn’t a true romance.
Paige said on 09.19.08 at 07:00 PM • [link]
What really got my goat about this whole article was the complete regard for television dramas as unimportant.
The West Wing introduced political discourse (in a way M*A*S*H never could because M*A*S*H wasn’t allowed to discuss Vietnam) into fictional primetime and PEOPLE WATCHED. House discusses dysfunctional friendships, drug abuse, and medical issues—and it teaches us about them in a starkly different way than any other show has: the main character is a drug abuser, and an asshole, but the two aren’t interconnected…I thought the stereotype was that drugs ruin your life? Gossip Girl, even, is a treatise on the importance of material goods, the transformation of friendships into frenemyships among young women, and the blindness and apathy of the Y2K generation.
The majority of people in our world won’t read great literature or watch McNeil Lehrer News Hour or even know what Noam Chomsky has to say about anything. However, people will watch tv and read romance novels and generally partake in popular culture. This popular culture, this trivial, insignificant drivel, is a window on the mass world. It is a harder job, in my opinion to be a television or romance writer than to write the next great American novel—for it is your job to open that window on culture, to capture a moment in time, and to reveal truths about the world while masking it in pure entertainment value. Some people might look deeper into romance novels and television dramas for those nuggets of truth and discover and appreciate things about themselves and the world they never noticed before. Others will just sit back and enjoy the ride. And maybe they’ll look at the world differently and maybe they won’t, but there’s nothing wrong with reading a book or watching a show just to read a book or watch a show.
Barb Ferrer said on 09.19.08 at 07:01 PM • [link]
Dear Professor DeMaria,
You sir, would clearly not know creative worth in literature if it came up and bit you in your smug, elitist, over-entitled, bony white ass.
No Love,
Someone who delights in writing material people actually want to read.
AgTigress said on 09.19.08 at 07:04 PM • [link]
Well, who’d have thought it!
I don’t really believe in the concept of teaching ‘creative writing’. We all need to learn the mechanics of writing - to use vocabulary and syntax clearly in a way that conveys our meaning to the reader - and we can all benefit from analysing the strengths and weaknesses of published work, noting the pitfalls to avoid (like inane remarks about flat characters having little depth) and the successes that we should like to emulate. However, polishing and improving the medium by which we convey our ideas, the actual words that we choose and set down, has little to do with creativity, and is a required skill for both fiction and non-fiction writers.
The actual creativity, the ability to invent and envisage fictional people and situations, is innate in most people, but is very highly developed in some and quite limited in others (just like musical or artistic talent). It cannot be taught. It can be fostered and improved, especially through practice and informed, objective criticism, but it cannot be synthesised. And if one accepts that the ability to tell stories that others will enjoy is an inborn gift, then all that ‘creative writing’ is really teaching is ‘writing’; that is, how to convey one’s thoughts in a way that others will understand clearly.
Hortense Powdermaker said on 09.19.08 at 07:20 PM • [link]
The broad literary spectrum ranges from the silliest kind of romance or comic book adventure to the works of such major literary figures as…Jane Austen
It’s curious that so many “great literature” pimps always acknowledge Austen as deserving a place in their pantheon. What is it that makes her important to them?
There was a lot of nasty shit going on back in Austen’s day. The Anglican church routinely branded slaves on their plantations; poor people were executed for poaching; children could be sentenced to death for a number of crimes, including “strong evidence of malice in a child aged 7–14 years of age.”
There were a lot of controversial human rights issues during the Regency period. Austen didn’t write about any of them.
All she did was create some wonderful characters in *shudder* romances that have the plot essentials of beginning, middle, and end. What is it we know after reading her that we didn’t know before? That women can be silly, that clergymen can be pompous, that first impressions can be mistaken? These are “worldshaking” revelations that “change us” for the better?
No, she’s great because - as is true of all romance - she wrote about the very human condition of falling in love.
Lorelie said on 09.19.08 at 07:43 PM • [link]
Personally, I wouldn’t want to learn a single thing from the writer who could not see the contradiction inherent in his word choices.
Laura Vivanco said on 09.19.08 at 08:03 PM • [link]
Obviously I disagree with DeMaria’s opinions about the romance genre.
What really got my goat about this whole article was the complete regard for television dramas as unimportant.
I imagine the editors of Slayage: The Online International Journal of Buffy Studies would be rather annoyed too.
Suze said on 09.19.08 at 08:23 PM • [link]
Golly, look at all those lowbrow losers reading entertainment literature! How inferior of them! Intelligent people (like me) read only important works of earth-shattering significance, and spend our leisure time improving our minds. In fact, we have no “leisure” time, because everything we do is important and necessary, and without us and our intelligence, the world will surely plummet into ignorance and darkness.
For the record, I require my entertainment literature to entertain me. This requirement, in turn, necessitates that the characters I’m reading about have depth, matter to me, and teach me something about the world or myself that I didn’t know, or notice, before.
So there. Pthbthbth!
Joanne said on 09.19.08 at 08:54 PM • [link]
That would be casting pearls before swine Sarah, save that view for those that would appreciate it.
And of course, like so many of you, Frank Lloyd Wright is my go-to icon for tv viewing recommendations.
Yes!! Exactly! And the Handbook of Creative Writing ain’t it.
Or maybe it’s been too long of a week and I just think this is one more person who puts romance in quotes so they can feel better about what they’ve just written.
Alex said on 09.19.08 at 08:55 PM • [link]
I have a spare hardback copy of a Salvatore book I’d like to shove in his ass.
Sideways.
I may not be much of a romance reader, but I do read a lot of stuff classified as ‘entertainment’ reading. Hell, I have a whole shelf devoted to Terry Pratchett, an enormously funny comedic writer who can make a joke and a sharp point with just a few words. But because he’s 1) Fantasy 2) Funny, he’s not taken as ‘real literature’.
Although Good Omens has made it onto the local high school reading list.
Wendy said on 09.19.08 at 09:01 PM • [link]
*incoherent noise*
I never cease to boggle at this sort of thing. We had a textbook in my 12th grade english class that tried to pull the same stuff on us. We all (teacher included) wanted to pull a Dead Poets Society on it.
And, I’m with absolutley everyone who has already expressed their amusement/outrage/confusion over the concept of a creative writing handbook. Really?? Whatever happened to reading texts and talking about process?
I’ve been reading a lot of “serious” lit and history lately, and I’ve gotta say, it’s just not doing half as well with my brain as all the fluffy “inconsequential” stuff I usually turn to.
SonomaLass said on 09.19.08 at 09:09 PM • [link]
Hortense Powdermaker, hear hear!! All Austen wrote was considered silly romantic stuff for women in her day, and yet she routinely makes today’s lists of significant literary figures. Certainly it wasn’t because she couldn’t have written about other things. Is anything more important to human beings than our relationships with each other?
I hate it when people say “romance” and mean only the very worst of the categories—as if any genre would measure up well if judged by its dregs. (No, nothing against category romance myself, just a personal feeling that the monthly market for so many new titles means that some of the Sheik’s Unwilling Virgins aren’t quite as well-written as others.) And I really hate it when writers are pompous, judgmental ass-hats about the work of other writers. (Yes, Mr/Professor DeMaria, I’m lookin’ at you!)
Silver James said on 09.19.08 at 09:26 PM • [link]
Joanne, my father had the misfortune of studying under Wright for a semester. He called Wright an “asshole” when he left the program. While I admire the man’s design skills and architecture, he absolutely sucked hind tit as a human being.
Alex, that so totally ROCKS! I bought
Good Omens
when it was first released and have read it many times. STILL a favorite for “a dark and stormy night…”
an said on 09.19.08 at 09:55 PM • [link]
I actually own the textbook too. It’s that bad all the way through.
Zumie, you have my sympathies.
Wryhag said on 09.19.08 at 10:41 PM • [link]
Oh, those insidious “paperback romances”! Are hardcovers better? Are e-books worse? I wonder how Alice Walker and Cynthia Ozick feel about teh paperback romances. I wonder if this creative writing tome will lead to fewer paperback-romance writers? I wonder if Herman Melville spinneth in his grave! (Here’s a touch of irony: I was going to write my doctoral thesis on Melville. Man had a great and wicked sense of humor.)
Although these passages obviously raised more questions than they answered for me, I finally realized how out of touch with reality Mr. Mister was when he wrote the following:
Bolding mine.
Katie Dickson said on 09.19.08 at 10:56 PM • [link]
For someone who writes and teaches writing for a living… dammit, that author used the word “very” so many times my eyeballs almost fell out of my head. If I wrote that like in any of my lit courses at Boston University, I’d get a C. (Which would be turned into an F once they depreciated my grade.)
Can something even be “very trivial”??!! Discuss.
P.S. I am reminded of the WEST WING episode wherein Rob Lowe’s writer Sam (and the President, too) lambast a poor slob who wrote an introduction that went something like, “on this very unique and extremely historic occasion….” Giggle.
Sarah L. said on 09.19.08 at 11:16 PM • [link]
As someone who made it about a year through an English M.A. program before leaving on mental health grounds, I can tell you that, from what I’ve seen, this is SOP for academia, because ANY genre fiction is somehow less deserving of consideration, discussion, or study. Oh, there’s a professor here and there with a “pet” genre, but he/she will dress it up in literary criticism to “prove” that it’s actually very postmodern, don’t you know, and those poor slobs who read it for *gasp* entertainment are just too lowbrow to appreciate the true subtleties which are obvious to the truly educated, tenured members of the English department.
Bitter? Me? Nah.
Christine M said on 09.19.08 at 11:26 PM • [link]
.
I am also annoyed with the presumption that no effort goes into to the creation of “light literature” and TV. I think it’s safe to say that most writers of teleplays and genre fiction put a great deal of time and emotion into their work. Its not about just happily pumping out crap for cash.
JenTurner said on 09.19.08 at 11:36 PM • [link]
First of all, unless it’s a science textbook (and backed up by some serious findings)...I don’t want to open a book that is used for teaching and find it filled with nothing but opinions.
As the mother of a 9 year old girl, it freaks me out that someday my daughter’s education might include being forced to read crap like this.
That’s about all I can say on this topic without bursting into four letter words. :)
rebyj said on 09.19.08 at 11:51 PM • [link]
The deeper the man sword the better….
hehe sorry…go back to tearing this guy a new asshole with no lube!!
rebyj said on 09.19.08 at 11:52 PM • [link]
btw , obvious FYI .......the coding of the underlining of the clickable options below has made us all underlined….
kopperhead said on 09.19.08 at 11:58 PM • [link]
Oh my. I was wondering how long it would take for this guy to use “literary” and “Austen” in the same sentence. I’ve read my share of “literature”, but what are my go-to choices? Almost anything not “literature”. (Note creative use of quotations.)
Poison Ivy said on 09.20.08 at 12:02 AM • [link]
Since everybody is doing a great job at sticking up for romances, and TV has been defended already, let me point out that comic books as a genre are not as silly and trivial as this man claims, either.
That said, it is true that some people put as little as possible into their writing. For whatever reason, they phone it in. But this is true across the spectrum. And it’s also one reason that some stories resonate with an audience and become beloved keepers, and others don’t.
Paige said on 09.20.08 at 12:47 AM • [link]
trying to get rid of the underlining
Also, I wonder if this guy is bitter because no one has published his “high brow” literature.
Jo Bourne said on 09.20.08 at 12:56 AM • [link]
He seems ... sophomoric.
(i.e. conceited and overconfident of knowledge but poorly informed and immature. )
And he shows an inexplicable ignorance of genre writing.
But what strikes me immediately is the just toad-ugly prose.
Why would anyone buy a book on writing from someone who writes clunky prose?
Angela C said on 09.20.08 at 01:37 AM • [link]
That’s really what it sounds like to me. He’s reassuring himself that even though his books won’t sell, it’s not because they’re less than worthwhile; he just doesn’t pander to the trivial entertainment lobes of people who’re just looking for their next shallow fix. “Yes, okay, take your cheap thrills… now, if I’ve embarassed you enough about your pulp fiction, might I interest you in something much more important?”
Joanna S. said on 09.20.08 at 02:14 AM • [link]
I think it was snarkhunter who mentioned this earlier, but I’m actually more disturbed by his blanket assumption that the 1960s created problems between male/female sexual relationships and that’s what has caused the upswing in genre fiction (both writing and reading). It’s as if our constant thinking about and with our groinal regions after women have come marching out of kitchens all over the globe is the root of what he considers bad fictions. Because, of course, no one was thinking about sex before this, nor did they realize that seduction as well as the act itself is fraught with myriad problems.
As both a medievalist and a feminist, I’d like to tell DeMaria that he is flat. Out. Wrong. After all, if female desire weren’t considered so gosh darn tricky, many of his literary “greats” would have had nothing to write about. Then, in turn, he would have nothing with which to pontificate upon like the writing dilettante he reveals himself to be.
Marta Acosta said on 09.20.08 at 02:54 AM • [link]
Okay, look at this guy’s bibliography. He’s just churning out stuff. He’s probably taking on jobs to get a check here and a check there and you can tell his heart isn’t in his writing because it’s so rote.
However, a comment above said:
Okay, you’re kidding, right? Because I’ve seen “Three’s Company” and I’ve read The Sound and the Fury and there’s a difference. Great literature is revelatory. It is art.
My general attitude is: reading is good. I don’t care if it’s Cat Fancier magazine, comic books, Stephen King novels, , or Calvin and Hobbes. (And Calvin and Hobbes would definitely fall into the Art category.)
There’s no reason to trash entire genres and categories. Except for Sandra Lee’s Semi-Homemade cookbooks. Those are the work of the devil fer sure.
Teddypig said on 09.20.08 at 04:32 AM • [link]
Anthony Bourdain on Sandra Lee…
“Pure evil. This frightening Hell Spawn of Kathie Lee and Betty Crocker seems on a mission to kill her fans, one meal at a time. She Must Be Stopped. Her death-dealing can-opening ways will cut a swath of destruction through the world if not contained. I would likely be arrested if I suggested on television that any children watching should promptly go to a wooded area with a gun and harm themselves. What’s the difference between that and Sandra suggesting we fill our mouths with Ritz Crackers, jam a can of Cheez Wiz in after and press hard? None that I can see. This is simply irresponsible programming. Its only possible use might be as a psychological warfare strategy against the resurgent Taliban—or dangerous insurgent groups. A large-racked blonde repeatedly urging Afghans and angry Iraqis to stuff themseles with fatty, processed American foods might be just the weapon we need to win the war on terror.”
voodoo chile said on 09.20.08 at 05:20 AM • [link]
Men and Women have always had complex dealings with one another. That’s what makes it interesting. I hate it when someone tries to reduce the beauty of relationships into some intellectual exercise. Sigh.
Jennifer Armintrout said on 09.20.08 at 07:18 AM • [link]
As a Melville fan, I must protest… Typee and Omoo were, at heart, “comic book adventure,” and “mere entertainment,” and when it was first published, Moby-Dick was “downright junk.”
Ehren said on 09.20.08 at 08:18 AM • [link]
and so continues my loathing for self important professors and teachers.
I am so glad that while my creative writing teacher in highschool was weird and clearly friends with the same woman who claimed I attacked her, when all I had done was throw a binder away from me and five feet to the right from her, that she had a healthy love of all things literature from the classics to the modern to comic books. And if it was humorous or bizarre and clever in anyway, you get extra points. Even in the tardy excuse book.
oh that was a fun time, reading off all those tardy excuses from only one boy in the entire class.
Miranda said on 09.20.08 at 01:52 PM • [link]
I think people decide on a lot of motives of ‘literary’ writers when those writers weren’t trying to be all that literary at all. We read The Scarlet Letter in high school, and there was a HUGE discussion of the significance of Hester naming her daughter Pearl. Blah, blah, meaning, blah beyond price, blah. Later, we were going over some of Hawthorne’s own notes, and one said “Pearl, the English of Margaret. A pretty name for a girl in a story.” The end. He thought it was pretty. He wasn’t trying to tell us anything.
Scarlet Letter is good if you don’t have teachers maundering on about symbolism they’ve invented, but the other ‘literature’ I’ve read and enjoyed (Austin, Bronte, Dickens, Eliot [Middlemarch]) all had plots, and a lot of them had romantic plots. Hemingway almost did me in. I was rooting for the fish to eat the old man in “Old Man and the Sea” and a friend said she resented being stuck for half a semester dealing with fishing. I didn’t like Faulkner either. I don’t generally find books or media to be life-changing.
My password is schools41. One of the good things about being over 41 is no one can make you go to school :)
Ashwinder said on 09.20.08 at 03:59 PM • [link]
I used to get the impression all the time in my high school English classes that over half the crap we used to discuss as being symbolic or meaningful or what have you wasn’t actually consciously written into the story. It was all crap made up by English teachers and literary critics and that if the authors heard about some of it they’d be all O RLY.
Anon76 said on 09.20.08 at 05:42 PM • [link]
Me LUBS me some Anthony Bourdain!
Such a caustic sucker.
Anon76 said on 09.20.08 at 05:48 PM • [link]
Oh, I so hear you on that, Ashwinder. All the savvy kids in our high school knew that you need only jot down the teacher’s impressions of the work to pass the quiz later presented. It didn’t matter what WE read into the work, but what the TEACHER did. LOL
Bonnie Dee said on 09.20.08 at 06:46 PM • [link]
I have a big problem with this part:
Yes, there’s reality show crap on TV, but there are also very worthwhile dramas that are full course meals not chewing gum. Mad Men anyone?
Flo said on 09.20.08 at 07:02 PM • [link]
Why doesn’t he even get into the fact that we all are different and what is emotionally and spiritually and intellectually fulfilling for one person may not be for another? That’s like one of the MAIN points of literature. That we all take away something different and that it’s a GOOD thing. That it makes literature a living breathing art.
UGH! *pulls hair*
megalith said on 09.20.08 at 07:22 PM • [link]
When I was in college, this phenomenon was known among my friends and I who were English majors as “English major bullshit.” As in, “Man, I was really shoveling some English major bullshit in that essay exam today! How ‘bout you?” or “Sure, I’ll help you with your paper, you poor Chem E! It just needs some more English major bullshit.”
Chrissy said on 09.20.08 at 07:39 PM • [link]
We used to call it “toady prose.” I think it was Dr. Leslie English who invented it.
As for “toady fiction” I always thought people who were quick to spit on romance and deny reading any kind of popular fiction sort of… well, the equivalent of snots who claim they “never watch television.”
K. Whatever. I’d tell you what an asshat you are but Fringe is on.
Marta Acosta said on 09.20.08 at 09:18 PM • [link]
First, heh, heh, heh, TeddyPig said “whiz.”
Second, have you ever seen Sandra Lee’s horrific tablescapes? They make me want to stab a bitch.
Third, yes, there are bad lit teachers. There are some terrible math teachers, too, but I never hear anyone saying, “Math is crap.”
There are also wonderful teachers who can guide and instruct you in a way that stays with you forever.
Fourth, there’s a disturbing pattern of anti-intellectualism here every time some academic idiot insults the romance genre. Basically it’s: “Romance is stupid.” “No, everything you like is stupid! Literature is stoopid.”
The proper response should be: “You’re ugly and your mama dresses you funny,” and then walk away.
It takes nothing away from romance to give proper cred and respect to the great works.
SonomaLass said on 09.20.08 at 09:37 PM • [link]
Hear, hear, Marta!
And as for “snots who claim they ‘never watch television,’” I have to point out that there are some people who just don’t (I’m partnered with one). I don’t think he’s a snot, though; he just isn’t interested. He doesn’t read romance novels, either, but I figure he’s entitled to his choices, same as me.
Some info on DeMaria that might interest people: the scholar at Vassar is Robert DeMaria, Junior. The author of the Handbook and the Vineyard Press fiction is Robert DeMaria, Senior. Dr. DeMaria the scholar has never published fiction or “how-to” handbooks, just “scholarly monographs and editions.” He also informs me that his father will be 80 years old next week.
AgTigress said on 09.20.08 at 09:54 PM • [link]
On the general issue of critics finding symbolism and underlying themes in works of art of which the artist him/herself may not even have been aware (e.g. the Margarita= Pearl example); the fact that the writer/painter/sculptor was not conscious of a symbolic meaning does not mean that it is not there. One of the characteristics of creative work is that it comes from the heart as well as the head, and the author may not always be conscious of all the reasons why he/she has chosen a particular detail. Choices are often made simply because they seem ‘right’ to the writer or painter. He will not necessarily know the reason for the ‘rightness’, but one will exist: there will be a personal history behind that instinctive choice, and informed external analysis may sometimes be able to identify and interpret it.
In any case, if someone who reads or sees the work perceives that symbol, it is there, even if the creator did not know it. A creative work has a dual existence, its existence for the creator and for the receiver. The reader/viewer/listener is necessary to complete the existence of a work of art. While it is seen only by the person who made it, it is incomplete.
Critical analysis may seem pointless, but it hones the mind and the critical faculties when it is done properly, and that, in itself, pays homage to the work of art. If a student merely parrots what she has been told by a teacher, of course it is a waste of everyone’s time, but if she uses her own critical faculties to analyse a work, whether it is a Great Novel or one of the less successful category romances, whether the reader enjoys it or detests it, it is good mental training, and it forms part of the wider influence of that work. The fact that I heartily loathe Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings is no less a valid point of view than that of the myriads who adore it. I can explain exactly why I hate it. Both positive and negative viewpoints testify to the power of Tolkien’s vision.
I emphatically echo Marta’s remark about anti-intellectualism. There are many, many different ways of enjoying fiction and all other creative endeavours, from symphonies and great paintings to crochet. Some modes are primarily intellectual, others are primarily instinctive and emotional, and most are a complex amalgam. They are all of interest, and they can all be analysed with advantage. It is wrong to dismiss the emotional pleasure of enjoying ‘light’ or popular novels, art, music or drama. It is also wrong to dismiss the intellectual pleasure to be derived from tackling more challenging works. For a full life, we all need both the light and the serious, the dainty sweetmeats as well as the nourishing, filling meals.
I agree with those who have sneered at the quotations from this daft publication on ‘creative writing’: first (as I said) because I do not believe creativity can be taught, only practised and developed, but above all because, as someone remarked above, the author cannot write well himself. Taking writing advice from this man would be like taking advice on composing music from somebody who is tone-deaf.
Alexandra said on 09.20.08 at 09:59 PM • [link]
This attitude is why I am not exactly fond of the creative writing emphasis of my English major. I lucked out this semester, but I won’t be continuing because I’ve heard that the rest of the teachers only teach “literary” writing. As it is, some people get very “Why don’t you try something new, like writing literature?” and I reply “Why don’t you try something new, like writing fantasy?” (my chosen genre).
As it is, I’m pretty screwed in the eyes of these professors: I write romantic YA fantasy. Three strikes, and I’m out.
Wryhag said on 09.20.08 at 10:09 PM • [link]
Absolutely true. I’ve as much had my fill of anti-intellectualism all my adult life as I’ve had of anit-populism.
Can’t we all just get along and respect each other’s tastes? (If you took that sentence literally, you neglected to look at my screen name.)
Laura Vivanco said on 09.20.08 at 10:11 PM • [link]
I used to get the impression all the time in my high school English classes that over half the crap we used to discuss as being symbolic or meaningful or what have you wasn’t actually consciously written into the story. It was all crap made up by English teachers and literary critics and that if the authors heard about some of it they’d be all O RLY.
One of the most exciting things about doing academic work on romance novels is that I’ve been able to get in touch with some of the authors I’ve written about to find out what they thought of my literary criticism of their work. I know I don’t always get things right, but some of the authors have stated that they definitely did intend there to be some of the themes/images I identified.
At other times, rather than being “actually consciously written into the story,” the author may say that my interpretation is one which may have been present in the back of her mind and possibly came out during the process of writing without the author giving conscious thought to it. Maybe the authors who’ve said that were being kind to me, but I do think it’s quite possible for themes/images to emerge during the process of writing without the author giving conscious thought to them. Jenny Crusie’s written quite a lot about the “Girls in the Basement” and making collages, and it’s clear that for some authors a lot does emerge from the subconscious. Some may spend more time than others looking at those elements and doing their own literary criticism during the writing process (or its visual equivalent if they’ve made a collage). Anyway, I think the fact that parts of the creative process are subconscious means that a literary critic is not necessarily wrong if the author didn’t consciously write something into the story.
People often associate certain meanings or emotions with colours, for example, and romance heroes often have names that recall powerful predators or (fallen) angels. People also have certain basic storylines that they know well and which permeate our culture, such as Cinderella and Eve in the Garden of Eden and so if someone is poor and meets and marries a rich man, it’s not unlikely that somewhere in there there will be a faint echo of Cinderella, or if a hero or heroine in a romance offers the other food then there may well be a hint of seduction/temptation. Because certain associations are so common, they may not be examined consciously by an author each and every time they make an appearance in a novel. In addition, because readers share the same background knowledge, they may absorb and understand these additional meanings and emotions subconsciously too. If you’re reading a romance and the heroine suddenly appears dressed in newly-purchased bright red lacy lingerie, for example, you’d probably automatically think something different than if she was wearing plain white cotton underwear. You might not stop to analyse each item of clothing, but I suspect that at some level you’d have worked out what they might mean.
Anyway, to get back to this:
we were going over some of Hawthorne’s own notes, and one said “Pearl, the English of Margaret. A pretty name for a girl in a story.†The end. He thought it was pretty. He wasn’t trying to tell us anything.
it’s possible that, on a subconscious level, the reason Hawthorne thought that “Pearl” was a pretty name was because of its associations. Or he may have thought about them consciously but not bothered to write a long essay about them in his notes, because he took them for granted.
I do think that literary critics should be careful to back up their suggestions with plenty of textual evidence and always remain open to the possibility of alternative explanations.
Marta Acosta said on 09.20.08 at 11:03 PM • [link]
AgTigress, really nicely put.
I think great fiction touches not only our minds, but our hearts and our souls.
Many of the great works we enjoy (or not) today were popular works in their time, and some of the books now shelved as genre fiction will survive to be seen as classics.
Elizabeth Wadsworth said on 09.20.08 at 11:15 PM • [link]
On the other hand, I consider The Cake Mix Doctor to be art of a high nature.
Marta Acosta said on 09.21.08 at 12:09 AM • [link]
I just looked up The Cake Mix Doctor. I feel like such a simpleton, because I merely dump a bag of chocolate chips in cake mix batter and ignore all the other creative and artistic possibilities. (I do sometimes put fun colored sprinkles on my cupcakes.)
Also, if Sandra Lee is the devil’s minion, I’m pretty sure Paula Dean is a messenger from heaven.
Joanne Renaud said on 09.21.08 at 12:48 AM • [link]
This is Robert DeMaria? THE Robert DeMaria?
I actually have read a few novels by Robert DeMaria, and my God, his books are bad. He wrote “The Empress” and “Clodia,” two especially pretentious examples of the toga porn genre. Both books take place in ancient Rome, and feature some overwhelmingly beautiful yet depraved and incestuous woman who dominates all the weak-minded men around her. I own both of them for the covers, but the stories themselves are laughable, not to mention repulsively misogynistic.
It’s hard to know which deathless piece of Mr. DeMaria’s prose I should quote first. How about this lovely sex scene from page 199 of the Jove/Harcourt paperback edition of “The Empress,” where Agrippina seduces her son Nero:
But he was not asleep, only dreamy with wine and the magic of the moment. His mouth sucked at her breast through the thinness of her gown. Her nipples were erect. With a delicate motion of her fingers she pulled away the blue material and lifted her heavy breast toward him. He took it in his mouth, his lips and tongue suddenly alive his body stirring with animal urgency. Against her thigh she felt his excitement and soothed him with her song and the reassuring caresses of her hand. She touched his legs, his hips, and under his tunic, the firmness of his young manhood. How well she knew that desire in men would not be denied. And how she little she cared about the barriers of blood. “We are all merely men and women,” she had once said. And the prohibition against this sort of passion only heightened it and made it more delicious. Besides, what harm could it possibly do, especially if no one ever knew. The gods themselves, if there were such things as gods, were easy victims of the same delights. These arguments and more she gave herself and urged her son to find satisfaction where so many lovers before had found theirs. She reassured him now with whispers. She kissed his hair. She drew him into her now fully reclining body and freed him from the brief undergarment that contained him. She herself wore none. He moaned with desire and confusion and buried himself in his mother’s arms. She embraced him, possessed him, devoured him. And at the peak of their peculiar pleasure she felt sure he would never belong to another woman.
Oh, my dear lord. And this guy hates romance novels. I’ve enjoyed thousands of romance novels a thousand times more than I enjoyed this crap.
Miranda said on 09.21.08 at 01:07 AM • [link]
Learning to think critically and analyze material is important, of course, but one person’s great work is another person’s “I would rather gouge out my eyes than read another page of this book”. I have had the eye-gouging response across the literary spectrum from classical literature to the lightest of lightn’fluffy. If I have that response, then I’m not going to respect the work, no matter who wrote it.
AgTigress said on 09.21.08 at 01:11 AM • [link]
Though the evidence for Roman undergarments is rather scant, it seems highly unlikely that a male of the highest social class, in Rome, and in the 1st century AD, would have worn any kind of loincloth or subligaculum under his clothing. A little archaeological research would have been in order.
Oh, and the prose is fairly excruciating, too - though, to be fair, it is almost impossible to quote a sex scene ‘cold’ and out of context without it sounding frightful.
Are we quite sure that this is the same ‘creative writing’ Robert DeMaria? If so, he should be ashamed of himself.
AgTigress said on 09.21.08 at 01:28 AM • [link]
Oh, I think we are all familiar with that feeling! Personal taste is part of the reader’s side of the author/reader relationship that completes the creation. It is still interesting to analyse why one detests a book so much, though. Working it out can tell one a lot about oneself as well as about the writer.
Joanne Renaud said on 09.21.08 at 01:34 AM • [link]
AG Tigress, through the course of “The Empress,” Mr. DeMaria makes a bunch of mistakes that are much worse than putting a loincloth on Nero. For example, Nero belongs to a gang of young punks called… get this… “The Mohocks.” The Roman Mohocks, to be exact. Because, you know, folks in first century Italy knew all about the Mohowks and the Iroquois League, and the the early 18th century British hooligans who named themselves after them.
I quoted the sex scene because it was the most outré, but here’s another example of his writing:
Rome. The center of the world. Wolf-mother to millions. Blazing with wealth. Stinking with poverty. Temples and palaces. Arenas and theaters. Marketplaces with open shops. Tenements for the poor. What a clanging and shouting and grinding of cartwheels. What commerce and traffic from dawn to dusk. Rome. The throbbing heart of the Mediterranean, linked by arteries to all the outposts from Britain to Asia. Administrative capital. Seat of the emperor. Residence of the aristocracy. Its monstrous appetites were fed from far and near. Metals, grain, wine, fish, marble, timber, wool, wild animals, slaves, and horses. Goods poured into the city from Spain, Gaul, Greece, Asia and Africa. Wherever a Roman soldier set his foot, traders and merchants followed. And what an influx of races. What a babble of languages and a riot of costumes. The most thrilling and dangerous city in the world. There was nothing in Rome that could not be bought, from a slave to a senator; from a whore to a pearl. Gleaming white in the stifling day. Dark and damp in the cobbled night. A city of walls within walls, searching for society, retreating into privacy.
I’m pretty sure that this DeMaria is the same guy who wrote the creative writing guide, since the Vineyard Press is dedicated to showcasing his work.
AgTigress said on 09.21.08 at 01:49 AM • [link]
Oh, good lord, that passage is really dire. I think it is easier to make an objective judgement on that kind of passage than on a sex-scene.
The entire paragraph appears to consist of a long, staccato series of notes, rather than coherent thought. It is lazy, ugly writing, and the perpetrator is not a person who has any right whatever to sit in judgement on the work of others.
Alex said on 09.21.08 at 03:23 AM • [link]
So, uh, any chance we can somehow contact this asshat and take our grievances up with him in a form he might understand—the scathing dressing-down.
If I could make some notes, I’m sure I could pour some acid on his opinion of himself…
Alex said on 09.21.08 at 03:39 AM • [link]
On a literary front, the “Rome” passage uses an effective technique—the little staccato descriptors and bits of imagery/sensory detail. He carries it much too far, though, and he just generally lacks grace.
Spamword: Spirit33. This guy just hasn’t got it…
Zumie said on 09.21.08 at 03:53 AM • [link]
I’m so, so scarred by those excerpts. EEEAAGH. Thank god we’re barely touching the book in class. *handles it with gloves to be sure* I’ll try bringing this up with my teacher and see what she says. She’s pretty reasonable.
SonomaLass said on 09.21.08 at 04:00 AM • [link]
As I said above, this “asshat” is an elderly man, who wrote most of this stuff many years ago. The newest edition of the Creative Writing Handbook (the third) is more than ten years old. Empress of Rome was published in (I think) 1978. While I don’t agree with his assessment of the romance genre (or appreciate his efforts to contribute to it), I can’t see much point in trying to contact him or dress him down.
Katherine C. said on 09.21.08 at 08:27 AM • [link]
“Blah, blah, meaning, blah beyond price, blah. Later, we were going over some of Hawthorne’s own notes, and one said “Pearl, the English of Margaret. A pretty name for a girl in a story.†The end. He thought it was pretty. He wasn’t trying to tell us anything. “
“I used to get the impression all the time in my high school English classes that over half the crap we used to discuss as being symbolic or meaningful or what have you wasn’t actually consciously written into the story. It was all crap made up by English teachers and literary critics and that if the authors heard about some of it they’d be all O RLY. “
AMEN!!!! What they said. Any time a teacher/professor started a sentence with “What the author was trying to say here is ...” I would automatically tune out—you know this how? Was always one of my biggest pet peeves.
As to DeMoron, I don’t know that I can say it any better than anyone else has already, but if this lackwit would pull his head out of his ass long enough to read some of this “inferior” mindless drivel he’d actually learn how to write something worth reading himself ... Just saying.
Paulina said on 09.21.08 at 08:45 AM • [link]
There is an article at io9.com concerning the same issues, only with science fiction books, but it really applies to all “genre” fiction. It also makes a good point about “literary fiction” being just another genre. Personally, I read fiction for escapism and entertainment; I’d rather see it well written, with interesting plot and characters, without making an impact on me beyond “hey, that was good!” than force myself to read something that’s dull and boring, only for the sake of reading something that
Katherine C. said on 09.21.08 at 09:18 AM • [link]
Jesus, Mary and Joseph too! No wonder he’s trying to get us to stop reading anything else, he’s hoping we won’t notice how bad he is—the second excerpt reads like a string of cheesy movie trailer teasers, all he’s missing is “In a world where” ... and also, EWW!! I’m certainly not in a hurry to read “The Empress” anytime soon. And hey, I learned how to quote ...
AgTigress said on 09.21.08 at 12:40 PM • [link]
I have often come across this kind of writing, but I have never understood its alleged effectivenes. To me, it is just extremely annoying; irritating to the point of unreadability. Sentences, or even verbless fragments, of three or four words can occasionally work well as a focus of strong emphasis after a much longer sentence (as in ‘blah, blah, blah, long speculative sentence’; ‘He was wrong’), but that should be used only as a very occasional technique or it completely loses its impact.
As used in the quoted passage, all it amounts to is really a long sentence divided up by full stops (periods) rather than the commas, semicolons or colons that would be more appropriate, and suffering from a marked dearth of verbs. It is, at best, a naive and hackneyed way of trying to convey atmosphere, owing far too much to the excesses of advertising. The ‘punch’ of a short, sharp phrase depends on contrast: if the whole text is a list of short, sharp phrases, it becomes samey and boring.
Paulina: literary fiction being ‘just another genre’. The very concept of ‘literary fiction’ seems to me a prime example of bad classification, because it is based on a value-judgement rather than on a formal, factual characteristic, and value-judgements are unstable and changeable. We can all divide novels into ‘good’ and ‘bad’ (and all gradations in between), but everybody’s list would be different, and every list would include both ‘literary’ and ‘genre’ novels in all categories.
Classes like ‘romance’, ‘fantasy’, ‘science fiction’, ‘humour’ and the like are broadly based on the content and intention of the story, and even though the complexity of made-up tales means that there are a great many hybrids and blurred dividing lines, they are generally useful concepts. ‘Literary’ really should be dropped as a concept because it is taxonomically invalid: it cuts right across the other classifications, because it is based, not on content, but perceived merit according to a currently fashionable (and mutable) definition. The books that win literary prizes could all be classified according to type of content, just as popular fiction can (‘poetic’, ‘dystopian’, ‘obscure’, ‘derivative’ , ‘stream of consciousness’ - as well as ‘romance’, ‘whodunnit’, ‘historical’ and all the others currently classed under popular fiction), and this would be a far more useful approach.
Joanne Renaud said on 09.21.08 at 12:51 PM • [link]
Thank you, AG. When I first ran across the “Rome” passage in the book, my first reaction was, WTF? Where all all the verbs? It combines the worst excesses of bad advertising copy and a movie trailer voiceover.
You still haven’t told me what you think of “The Roman Mohocks,” though. :)
AgTigress said on 09.21.08 at 01:01 PM • [link]
Not much!
Going back to the identity of this author, the novelist cannot, I think, be the same man as the Vassar literature professor, who is a Robert DeMaria Jr. The latter took his first degree in 1970, which would suggest that he was born around 1948; the novelist (the Vineyard Press chap) published his first novel in 1961, which would surely make him at least 10 years older, and he is still writing novels: either the academic published his first novel at the age of about 13, or he went to college as a mature student, and would now be well beyond usual retirement age: the photo on his website (the academic DeMaria) suggests a man of around 60 at most. The academic DeMaria’s bibliography, listed on his website, is extensive, but it does not include this ‘creative writing’ textbook (let alone any novels!) This is somewhat surprising if he is the author of it.
There are other men of the same name on Google. More research is indicated before blame can be firmly assigned.
:-)
Joanne Renaud said on 09.21.08 at 01:35 PM • [link]
AG, the author of the Creative Writing Handbook is also the author of “The Empress” and “Clodia.” Here’s the entry for “International Who’s Who of Authors and Writers 2004”:
http://books.google.com/books?id=phhhHT64kIMC&pg=PA138&lpg=PA138&dq;=“college+handbook+of+creative+writing”+demaria&source=web&ots=e_qrGXLxuy&sig=YOncCqrxWDmp1aJCqW11ibE5Z5A&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=4&ct=result
I hope this clears up any confusion! The writing styles in the textbook and the Roman historical novels seemed way too similar for it to be a coincidence.
expected96: Yup, it was just as I expected all along.
AgTigress said on 09.21.08 at 03:34 PM • [link]
Thanks a lot for sorting that out, Joanne. I should think that Professor Dr. Robert DeMaria of Vassar, expert on 18thC English fiction, Visiting Lecturer at Oxford, etc. etc., may be pretty damn pissed off that he is continually being confused with this other Robert DeMaria! Unless Creative Writing/Turgid Novels DeMaria is Vassar DeMaria’s dad, in which case, I suppose, he would make allowances.
I even wonder whether the use of the ‘creative writing’ textbook in colleges is sometimes based on a misidentification of the author, on the assumption that it is written by a professor of literature at a high-ranking college! Though Turgid Robert DeMaria seems to have been a college teacher himself. He is now 80 years old. Hmm.
snarkhunter said on 09.21.08 at 06:01 PM • [link]
Re: DeMaria’s identity—SonomaLass, above, cleared that up. The Vassar Lit professor is the son of the elderly novelist/creative writing textbook author.
And while we’re on pet peeves:
Well, I can tell you how we know. Many of us (I teach college, not high school, but I imagine this is also true of some high school lit teachers) spend years studying these texts and their contexts. We read the authors’ letters and commentaries. We are familiar with the tradition in which the author is writing, the approach the author is taking, etc.
Believe it or not, literary study is not all bullshit. It can be subjective, but that subjectivity is grounded in a wealth of knowledge of literary and cultural history and an understanding of how such texts function.
So, yeah, sometimes it’s bullshit. You can write a pretty good bullshit paper on a book, if you feel like it. (Think of Dave Barry’s awesome essay about how to be an English major—it’s something about how the whale in Moby Dick represents the Republic of Ireland [a ridiculous assumption, by the way, since the RoI didn’t exist].) But that doesn’t meant that all literary criticism is bullshit. Done well, it can offer insight into not only the work itself, but also the culture in which the book exists or is read now, and into how we perceive such books today.
Chrissy said on 09.21.08 at 08:19 PM • [link]
Complete sentences. Rock. So hard.
Not to mention… why is it the twerpage insists on peeing all over poor Bill Shakespeare? Romeo and Juliet were not healthy relationship role models. It’s like all the buttheads trying to sound clever and wise by quoting Polonius.
Umm. Comprehension good. Pedantry bad. grunt grunt
sandra said on 09.21.08 at 08:28 PM • [link]
So, good literature gives us “the feeling that our experience has been expanded vicariously and that perhaps we know something afterword that we did not know before”. By this narrow criterian, the only ‘good literature’ I have read was Robert Graves’ The White Goddess, back when I was 12 or 13. I understood about one word in ten, but afterwards, I felt as if my brain had been expanded. Looking back on it from the perspective of someone considerably older than 12, it was probably all crapola. Spamword is seem51, as in ‘Things seem different to a woman of 51 than they do to a pubescent girl’.
Lee Rowan said on 09.22.08 at 05:28 AM • [link]
Mr DeMaria, Senior, is just mad as hell that his hot-blooded Roman epic isn’t selling as well as the romantic drivel written by women, who upset his little applecart by getting uppity when the Pill was invented. 1960 was when it all went downhill—women’s lib, peaceniks, civil rights… He can’t even find a publisher, and these girls are writing about sex and being paid for it! How dare they!
Le yawn.
“attack14” ... no. I refuse to have a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent.
La Reine Noire said on 09.22.08 at 07:48 PM • [link]
This is why I decided not to specialise in Creative Writing. We thankfully never had to use that textbook, but the content more or less corresponds to my professor’s constant rants about ‘genre fiction’, which he despised.
I will read absolutely anything if it catches my interest, whether it’s Twilight or Wuthering Heights. This has been known to garner me strange looks in the library, and my masters’ thesis on Alexandre Dumas sent one of my examiners into a rage because Dumas is considered popular fiction and not literature within the French canon. I someday hope to augment my doctoral dissertation (on representations of fifteenth-century queens consort in late medieval/early modern literature) by writing about historical fiction depictions from the eighteenth century onward. In short, the DeMaria Seniors of the world are among my least favourite people.
Marta Acosta said on 09.23.08 at 01:25 AM • [link]
I studied creative writing in college, and we never used any texts. I loved my professors. I had a deliciously snarky ex-Jesuit who tried to make everyone drop the class, a marvelous Southern novelist who always wore tweed, a high-strung short story writer… None of them ever dissed genre fiction.
I loved sitting around and talking about fiction and writing.
My favorite high school teacher was in a crackpot cult (well, the FBI hadn’t raided them yet), used to tell us about her escapades with lovers in Paris, thought she was reincarnated from a Valkyrie, and said I had a nice bright aura. She was fantastic and let us write whatever the hell we wanted.
They were all passionately in love with books.
Maybe you can’t teach creativity, but you can nurture and inspire the creative spirit.
Cheers to all the brilliant and wonderful teachers out there!
Deb Kinnard said on 09.23.08 at 03:58 AM • [link]
This rubbish sounds very familiar. I had the misfortune to have been a high school senior in 1969 (the summer of love). At mom’s insistence (“You’re always scribbling in those spiral notebooks anyway, why not get credit for it?”) I took Creative Writing that year. I wanted to write of teenage love/angst/joy. My teacher wanted teenage peace/love/dope. He gave me a C+ for the year and warned me not to consider writing seriously because “you will never amount to anything.”
Five books later, I would love to find the pretentious drip and shove one up his nose.
Here’s to art! That is, romantic fiction.
HilciaJ said on 09.23.08 at 07:33 PM • [link]
I’m going out for some chewing gum. Anyone one else want some?
Care to comment?
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