English Club Chatter

The thing about Star Trek, and comic books, and Lord of the Rings is that, though they might not be considered literature in the highest sense, they are a part of the American shared experience. Personally, I'm a Steve Spielberg movie junky, like Raiders and Jaws, and I've read most of Stephen King's stuff. They appeal to this distinct emotion that loves fun action, being scared, and campy lines. (I realize that Tolkien is not American, but with the movie trilogy it's entered the ranks of Star Trek and Star Wars.) It's why we dress up like ghouls, and Indiana Jones, and Darth Vader for halloween instead of Kilgore Trout or Emma Woodhouse. These things are in our vernacular; who doesn't get the joke when someone says, deadpan, "We're gonna need a bigger boat."
The Da Vinci Code, though not "high" literature, or really historical, is nonetheless an exciting thriller in the vein of the paperback novels we read and reread over summer vacations as a kid. It's fun, and what's wrong with having fun?

I do not see any shame in reading outside the confines of Academia. Many times it is this type read that sparks some idea about some other text that I have read. I personally, really enjoy the rhetorical scince and science fiction novels. In fact, not just the novels. Every time I get the chance to take in a Carl Sagan, Cosmos, program I do so. I must admit, I do enjoy it. It may not be the most literary correct endeavor, but I have had some interest in Sagan since high school.

Why should we even consider these external pursuits with descriptive words like shameful? Are we attempting to redefine what is essentially a literary work? Is there something that defines this "literary correct"? As we consider some of the things we have all read, I think that we allow ourselves to overlook some key things in our history or in literary history. we should consider that some of the most famous authors that all fo us have studied wrote for magazines, periodicals and publications of this nature that probably could fit this list of "shame".

Thanks

Hello all--many of you don't know me but I look forward to having some of you in my classes (for instance, 582, Studies in African American Literature: The Harlem Renaissance, Winter Quarter. Just a little plug for myself.). I, too, am interested in the language of secret shame and guilty pleasure. I prefer the term "guilty pleasure"--and if I were a more evolved ex-Catholic, I would drop the guilt part altogether--because it emphasizes why we all do this anyway: we love to read and talk about books. As far as I know, even the "worst" reading I do (_In Style_ magazine, paperback mystery novels, _Bridget Jones' Diary_) doesn't hurt me or anyone else, and in fact I enjoy it immensely. None of it diminishes the scholarly work I do or the more challenging texts I work with.

In my mind, the question of shame goes back to the idea of quality--what is good literature vs. what is bad--a concept that has been used by scholars to create a hierarchical literary canon. Some of the most divisive debates in literary studies have to do with scholars drawing lines between what is worthy of study and what is garbage. Some of the texts that have been dismissable until very recently include sentimental fiction by women, pretty much anything by people of color, and gay/lesbian writing. The fact that so many once-ignored authors have made their way into the literary canon is evidence that the standards of "quality" are not unimpeachable. So in the interest of making the canon more democratic, I resist the idea of "shame" when it comes to reading.

Now that I've made this plea for democracy and inclusion, I'm going to contradict myself. While I firmly believe that there is value in lots of diverse kinds of narrative, I also recognize that not all narratives are created equally. How do we make aesthetic judgements about texts (not all are as well written as others, after all) without going back to the old status quo? Ok, I need to go--I have a copy of People magazine waiting for me.

CAC

Ok first, since I was mentioned by name I feel compelled to clarify something. I in no way meant people shouldn’t read and enjoy the Da Vinci Code, it was a good movie too. I was just responding to the notion that it was true (Trish, you didn’t imply that you believed it, I have just been badgered to death ((by another English major)) about the validity of the book—maybe I came a crossed to vehemently). Anyway, the idea of secret shame and how it influences our work. I will confess that I too have a “secret” shame. I am an adult cartoon addict. From AquaTeen to Zorro, and no I don’t fantasize about the Powerpuff girls—not a lot anyway. My secret goal in life is to revive the old Cartoon Classics, where the great works are turned into cartoons and therefore become even greater! Yes, greater, because now they will reach people who otherwise would never be exposed to anything more profound than Madonna and her three week study of the Kabala (arrrghhh!) So I suppose these indulgences humanize the work by bringing it closer to the average person.

THis is great, a group of us coming home from As You Like It, were discussing a topic of this sort.

We were stuck on Harry Potter, however. That is one of my "guilty" pleasures, ((as well as westerns and a book called This Bridge Called My Back--(all these books are dog eared)).

I know westerns are corny, and Zane Grey pretty much has the same plot line everytime...But I love it. Riders of The Purple Sage is a masterpiece to me, as well as Harry Potter and The Order of the Pheonix. It is allmost as if, if we enjoy reading it then it cannot be quality.

Now, saying everything written is quality, just because someone wrote it, is a stretch. But we should allow ourselves to enjoy books like this, it broadens our horizons. Besides I am sure you could find a bit of John Milton's influences in Harry Potter....

Well, I'm not sure about Harry Potter and Milton (though I'm open to suggestion). If you want a really Milton-inspired "children's" fantasy series, I'd recommend Philip Pullman's _His Dark Materials_. Amazing stuff.

I'm intrigued by the problem Cynthia offered us, which is sort of where I began. Our hackles are raised by lists of the "100 Best Books," because the 101st (etc.) is always a book we're devoted to, and we are also naturally troubled that there are so few women and minority writers included, but can we avoid such lists, even in our own heads? Life is short, so don't we want to read the great, life-changing books before it's too late? But what if the classics (or some of them) don't change our lives? And what if comics or pulp fiction do? And what about the pleasure problem again? Are all things that give us pleasure good? Or should we discipline and train ourselves to take pleasure in what we ought to (but how do we do that, and what standard do we apply?)? So many questions!!

J., I know what you meant... and I know what you mean by people believing far-fetched premises or fiction and not bothering to really find out the truth. (ahem...remind you of any political situations?)
But I digress. I am going to go out on a limb here and say that maybe what makes Harry Potter, or action movies, or Cartoon Network "guilty pleasures" is not so much about their artistic merits but about what enjoying them says about us. All of those things are pretty popular, so maybe we, as opened minded, educated people are afraid of seeming conformist. (Although it should be said that by only reading certain types of literature we are conforming to the literary standards of the institution we belong to.)
Also, we have by now developed a set of values that might be hard to reconcile with our choice of entertainment. For example, I am pretty anti-consumerism and not fashion oriented, but I still pick up a Cosmo at the doctor's office every now and then, and I feel "guilty." Maybe we're (unconsciously) afraid of the hypocrisy that is inherent with being English majors and enjoying something not considered "literary."

I guess I'm a member of the English Club even though I'm too lazy to go to the meetings. My email inbox is usually a cozy void, a status symbol of my hermiting. But here we are, with links out the wazoo to a wacky blog, how trendy the English Club has become. Anyway....

I guess I'd like to add that I'm on the other end of the spectrum. I embrace the shameful, guilty pleasures of Star Trek/wars, of comics and dorky tv, or in my case video games. English is attractive to me, but not because of stuffy old poets. I have no shame defying them with my mutant power of lameness. Those authors are brilliant in their own way, literature is powerful, but to not infuse it with today's world is silly. I don't want to be a modern author who mimics ye old style. Resistance is futile.

Man I giggled as I wrote that, I suck.

I have to agree with you, Matt, because I, too, "embrace the shameful, guilty pleasures," but they aren't all that shameful to me anymore. I read romances and suspense and mysteries and I love Zane Grey (I'm arguing with you tomorrow Jesi). I'm obsessed with Wicked (the book and the musical) and La Femme Nikita (the TV show, not the movie). I'm often wrong about these things, but I wonder how much of what we are reading in our classes today was considered "literature" when it was written? Maybe Nora Roberts is pop-culture at its finest, or maybe our great-grandchildren will be reading her novels in college. I have overcome the "shame" of reading these novels because of Jennifer Crusie Smith's article "The Romantic Suspense Mystery," which outlines the evolution of those novels. I think we should all embrace what we enjoy, not only because it might very well be "worth while" later, but because it is important to have pastimes that keep us happy and take our minds off our everyday lives.

now come, bring it on here Erin! haha what indeed will you argue with me about...I said I love Zane Grey....but you must admit he has a nancy drew novel way of writting...this then this then this then happy ending...

(I love westerns....)

I guess I should have read some Zane Grey.

As one who has been the recipient of some of Cynthia Callahan's "guilty pleasure" hand-me-down mystery books (I'm half-way through Evanovich's _Ten on Top_, Cynthia), I'd like to respond to her comments, I think she's correct in linking the concept of shame to the good literature/bad literature dichotomy and the creation of a literary canon.

One of the truly exciting things about literary criticism in the past few decades is that it has overturned many of the exclusionary aspects of analysis and chipped away at the underpinings of that hierarchical canon. Not so many years ago, African-American literature, gay and lesbian writings, and women's writings were dismissed as inferior and unworthy of academic study. My field, 18th-century women's lit. and particularly the poetry of Anne Finch, offers a good illustration. The most widely used English literature anthology, the Norton, included in both its first and second editions (published 1962 and 1968), not a single woman author in its volume covering literature from 650 A.D. to the start of the 19th century. Almost 1200 years of literature, and NOT A SINGLE WOMAN! The 3rd edition (1974) devoted 2 pages out of 2,521 pages to its first and only female author to be included--Anne Finch. The 7th edition (2000),now includes 21 women authors. Clearly the efforts of feminist critics to recover the "lost" literature by women has had an effect.

It seems to me that the responsibility of those of us who call ourselves lovers of literature and literary scholars is to continuously re-evaluate what is "literature" and to push for becoming ever more inclusive. But, as Hannibal reminds us, this must be done without abandoning all values and standards of the past. And maintaining this balance is often devilishly difficult to do.

In the spirit of sharing, I'll chime in simply that I went through a period of about two years in which I was an absolutely devoted fan of the t.v. show, _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_, and I'm proud to admit it! Its first few seasons were wonderful. I'll add another aspect of this subject that blends into the type of literature more commonly taught in universities: fandom. Let's face it, some of the fun is in sharing our personal fascinations with others. That's true whether it's Faulkner or Buffy. =)

Yes, I agree with the Buffy praise, Now has anybody read any of the books? Do they hold up without the personality of the cast? I also have a question for Dr McGovern,I think it's great that previously Unacknowledged Authors are being paid their rightful dues. I guess my question would be, just how many women writers were there to discover in this part of history that didn't really favor women doing such things? And how in today's context can you determine good from bad? By that I mean, they were allready breaking convention, how much more daring could they be without incuring the wrath of society. An otherwise talented writer could very well have been forced into a style of conformity. And one more question, how do you validate that the writings are authentic? I could see some unscrupulous person (I am not thinking of anyone I know, just to be clear) faking a "find" and making a career out of nothing. Just curious.

If I'm on the mailing list, does it mean I'm in the club?
Assuming so, here goes...
I'm obsessed with Tori Amos. I have all her albums, singles, many bootlegs, been to 36 shows...listen to her everyday, without exception.
When I find a book I love, I read it over and over and over. I've read the virgin suicides over 30 times. on the road, the dharma bums and big sur by kerouac too many times to even know at this point. ariel by sylvia plath, everything by anais nin, etc.
I fall asleep almost every night with either the blair witch project or the south park movie in my dvd player. Not very glamorous, but the screaming and obscenities take the edge off my insomnia.

I feel better now.

I'll proudly admit to my fandom. I've happily read everything I could by Douglas Adams and Terry Prathett, and earned quite the salary lounging around the Sci-Fi section during my bookstore stint. It's important to recognize that many contemporary authors are completely capable of moving between traditional literature and graphic novels, or even, dare I say, comic books. I hold up one of my personal obsessions, Neil Gaiman as an example. His work on the Sandman graphic novel series earned widespread acclaim, and likely assisted in weaning many "comic book" only individuals onto slightly denser fare. Of recent years, books like Sandman, Preacher, and the reemergence of The Watchmen indicate that not only are "comic books" still alive and kicking, but that the "secret shame" of comic books now holds in it's grip an older audience capable of consuming more intellegent ideas. It's our continued indulgence in these secret shames that forces their evolution into something faster, better and stronger.

Oh, and as for the shame issue, as most of you have so eloquently put it, screw that! If I like it, I'm going to listen to it, watch it, READ IT. More than once. I refuse to be confined by that train of thought; no one should be able to choose what I digest, in any way shape or form. If I respect you as a teacher or as a person, I just may take your advice and try out something new, but I will not feel ashamed for my personal choices, however non-academic. Pleasure always has a place in our lives; it's up to us as individuals whether or not literary or entertainment pleasures be tinged with guilt or shame. And why can't academic pursuits be both? In my experience, reading anything is is almost always better than reading nothing.

Alright, NOW I feel better.

OK, so let me add another wrinkle to this thread (can a thread wrinkle? maybe if the thread is woven into a cloth -- but I digress). I've noticed that what started out as confessions of secret shames has morphed into expressions of pride in reading against the canon (or however you want to express the literary mainstream, whether determined by the academy or by some other authority). This seems intriguing. Are we really ashamed or are we actually proud? Maybe there's a difference between genuine shames (something we know is bad -- the literary equivalent of eating an entire tub of ice cream or binge drinking) and reading/viewing works that may not be mainstream but that we feel have a defendable excellence. For instance, I too was a Buffy fan (before it went bad). My wife even gave me a "Watcher's Guide" for my birthday one year. But I don't really feel ashamed about this, because I think the writing on the show was superb. At its best, it was quite brilliant satire (and there were some great characters -- Buffy was kind of limp, but Spike was mesmerizing). Is this true of all of our "secret shames"? And let me pose again a question I asked earlier: is pleasure really a perfect guide to our reading/viewing? Are all pleasures equal, or should we try to develop our pleasure responses? When I was younger, I loved a series of books about Freddy the Detective. I have warm memories of his adventures, but when I reread them recently they seemed a little flat. So presumably my tastes, what gives me pleasure, has developed over the years. Is this bad? And -- here's a twist -- maybe the real "secret shame" is to take pleasure in classic or canonical works! If everyone enjoys Harry Potter, how shameful is it to confess that we do too. On the other hand, if I tell most people I really love Shakespeare, that often kills the conversation. But I do! And I love Austen and Dickens and Donne and (to show that I read authors still living, or only recently dead) W.G. Sebald and Ian McEwan. Can I love the "classics," old or new, without being conservative or authoritarian?

Maybe loving both Buffy and Shakespeare just speaks to the fact that someone is well-rounded. We are people who can identify with other Buffy or comic-book fans, but we can also sit around and discuss the finer points of classical literature. I think it lends more depth to one's character than it undermines it.
Now, I also have to admit that in addition to my action-movie addiction, I read, during my pre-teen and teen years, EVERY single Sweet Valley High book, sometimes one per day (and there are thousands of them.) I still get a little nostalgic when I walk past the juvenile section at my local library.

Trish, I think you've hit the nail exactly on the head. Any argument that says I am well rounded and have a deep character must be right!

Yours roundly and in depth,

HH

Maybe liking Buffy just means you're wierd, wierdos. :-) Sorry, I've spent way too much of my life on the internet, a little message board flaming is almost second nature. Anyway, I believe that our "secret shames" are appealing to us because they are somewhat counter-culture to the mainstream. Or at the very least, they are marketed to our culture despite being popular(like Buffy). I mean lets face it, how many of us were reading literature every night while being the prom king/queen and the head of the football team? Not many I'm sure, we are outside the societal norm. Whatever that means for us we have found our place and our loves, and perhaps there is some connection between that alienation and the things we view as "defendable excellence". I'd need more exposure to a few of the things mentioned, but I'm guessing there's a common intrinsic nerd quality to them, at least in the things I enjoy.

On the other subject, I believe pleasure should be the only measure of a good work of art. What other quality is so entwined with humanity? Structure for example, does not equal quality. Moreover I guess, a well formatted work may make some people giddy inside (oh baby look at that semicolon). For me, it's not what I find enjoyable when combing through a work. It's what you like. It's random and varied and enjoyable. Find what you enjoy at the moment and run with it, what other way is there to enjoy art or life for that matter.

Well, I have to disagree, as I've never much cared for Buffy (except the campy movie with Kirsty Swanson). However, in the defense of those who support Buffy, and all her slaying antics, I've never knowingly watched the first few seasons, so perhaps I'll use this as an oppurtunity to discover something new.
Then again, I've never considered myself well-rounded. As mentioned earlier, I'm often quite proud of my "counter-canon" literary interests, and even more so whenever the alternate literary interets mirror, mimic or blatantly rip off topics and ideas often covered by more canonical literature.

A quick response to Jim Bennett's excellent question about how we determine good literature from bad literature. My advice: don't get too hung up determining good from bad. As Duke Ellington once said when facing a similar question about music--"If it sounds good, it IS good." As we develop our tastes and become more "well-rounded" readers (in the sense that Trish suggests), perhaps we can apply a similar standard to evaluating literature: "If the work is a good read, it IS good."

I am nervous about questioning my boss, but since I just got tenure, she can't fire me (I think!). Actually, I don't really disagree that pleasure is important in our reading experience and is part of how we determine what is valuable to us (and what is not -- I've often not finished books that I've found boring). It's also probably true that we don't need to worry about picking and choosing and applying standards, although those of us who make up course curricula do have to decide what to include and exclude (and I suppose, to put it bluntly, we only have so much reading time before our eyes give out and we pass on to that great library in the sky). Still, I think there are different kinds of reading pleasure. I enjoy a good detective novel, but Mickey Spillane (I the Jury, My Gun is Quick), while a wonderful stylist, is not much of a thinker. On the other hand, John Donne, George Eliot, Derek Walcott, and Arthur Miller are. Some reads give me a tingle or some good fun, but there are others that hit my emotional-intellectual g-spot. So to speak. Maybe we don't need to obsess about which books we take to a desert island, but isn't it interesting to think about what makes a great book great? What is it? Great characters we can identify with? Intricate plots? Mesmerizing language? Deep, complex ideas? Monica, what is it about Kerouac that keeps bringing you back for more? Corwin, what's the secret to the success of The Sandman? Jesi, what draws you out onto the range with Zane Grey? An what keeps all you Harry Potterites going?

HH

I can answer that in one word: Cowboys.

Im enthralled with the west...and Jesse James (thats a famous cowboy for all you city folk) is a total dreamboat....

You know, I just love the book Watership Down. And this summer, my wife read three Harry Potter books out loud to me and our cats as we sat on our back porch drinking coffee. Some nights, it carried over into exciting chapters by the campfire. As I can't think of any other books that would have been as enjoyable in this format, I bask in my shame. Quite frankly, there should be no shame attached to a series of books that has done so much to encourage young people to read. Let's face it, at this level, because of the shifting canon, it is helpful to have at least some knowledge of what it is that students have read, if for no other reason than that some of our most well intentioned referential moments, ones that we have taken for granted in the past, are too often met with a sea of blank stares. After all, there is the idea of a canon, but there is also a real canon, which consists of those things Trish identified as the shared American experience. I have seen Hanibal make Star Trek relevant, which works because of its identifiable position in our culture over a sustained period of time. I'm glad to see all you intellectuals out there like to embrace the pleasure of a good yarn now and then.

Of course, I have heard one professor in the English Department claim that what Tom Robbins writes is not literature. So shame on me for Robbins being my favorite author.

Oh, and Hannibal (spelled it correctly this time),it's amazing how your admitting a love for Shakespeare can kill a conversation. I know, I've taken your Shakespeare classes.

I don't know what keeps us Potterites going; I keep waiting for it to fail me somehow, but it hasn't. And I think for kids, it must be a marvelous thing, particularly in the way the books become more complex as the heroes age and are able to begin to think on an abstract level. Even though Harry can be a bit of a prat, Rowlings works hard to have his emotions and reactions ring sincere as he attempts to reckon with his unique situation. It's classic good vs evil stuff, but the slow, simmering development of the characters is a main part of what keeps me interested. Another aspect has to be that I am consistantly pleased with the author's performance, and, having someone read it out loud, allows me more freedom to consider such things and still get through the texts expeditiously.

Ok, so I should ask a question. Um. Is it more important to teach high school students classic literature when it is clear that a good percentage of them seem incapable of truly appreciating, let alone comprehending them, or should we encourage them to read whatever it is they will read simply for the sake of their reading at all? What do we sacrifice in either scenario?
I always enjoyed reading until I was faced with having to study things like Great Expectations in ninth grade. What a snoozer. The experience didn't so much open me up to the wonder of literature, but rather made feel kinda stupid and not want to go to English class. Of course, now I get it, and appreciate the heck out of Pip's tale.

Well rounded with character...the perfect definition of an egg. Fresh, hard-boiled, but still simply an egg. There has to be more than just being well-rounded. How can we accurtaely define well-rounded? Well-rounded in what discipline. What is character?

Seems to me what's going on in this thread is an evaluation argument. Like any evaluation argument, the terms of value (like "good," "best," "excellent," "literature") need to be defined. i.e. What are the criteria for judging "excellence" or "best"-ness in literature?

The criterion that's come up repeatedly in this thread is "pleasure." A few people have even argued that "pleasure" is the only criterion that matters. Even if we accept that as the single criterion (which seems oversimplistic), it should be recognized that the criteria for pleasure shift significantly between genres. I sincerely doubt that what gives us pleasure about Buffy is the same as what gives pleasure about Seamus Heaney's work. The point is, one is a TV show, and the other is a body of poetry. Obviously (a) we have different expectations of those genres, (b) the works do not set out to achieve the same goals, and therefore can't be compared in every respect. (Apples and oranges.) That they both give pleasure seems to be the confusing factor here, because that one criterion for judging applies to both genres.

But that hardly means there aren't additional criteria for judging the success of a work in fulfilling the objectives or expectations of its genre. For example, you might expect Buffy to be suspenseful, but you might not expect that of a Heaney poem. Case in point: I started Harry Potter at the urging of Hannibal, and after a few chapters tossed it across the room in disgust . . . what a derivative rip-off! My expectation, given the mega-publicity, was that Rowling would work within the expectations of the fantasy genre, but not re-hash ideas from Dahl, Tolkien, Lewis, et al. She failed my criterion of originality. (By the way, "originality," seems to be one of the prime criteria by which all art is currently judged (though this was not always the case in the past).

The simple egg was chaste
Until by its lover was embraced
Then they moved to a belly well-rounded
When out of her body born
Undeveloped in its new form
It struggled to become well-grounded
And from this new foundation
It sought comprehensive education
That favored the things well-founded
Until the question was begged
Are you simply an egg
You must be to be so well-rounded

P.S. Northrop Frye admonished us that the literary critic's job is not so much to judge the quality of a work but to understand it. That makes sense to me. And the latter is a lot harder.

And yet, was is so original about Dahl, Tolkien, etc? And, did you manage to toss Shakespeare in disgust for his rehashing of old ideas? Your response seems an oversimplification. How many new ideas and themes are there to sustain literature oh these many centuries? I like West Side Story in and of itself, without concerning myself with it being at least a thrice-told tale.

I did not mean to suggest that originality is one of MY prevailing criteria for judging art, since it isn't. I DO think it is a prevailing cultural value/ criterion in contemporary American society. I mentioned the originality criterion re. Rowling as an example of a criterion other than "pleasure"--and cuz she bugs me.

I was just messing with you a little bit, but it was the only criterion you mentioned. I believe this blog started as a question of what secret shames we have in our reading. Harry Potter recently became one of mine. It's not up there with the Gilmore Girls (a highly original television program) which is my ultimate guilty pleasure in the so-called arts.

But hey, I'm snobby enough never to have read Stephen King, nor to have watched more than an accidental minute of any reality tv show. And, for that matter, I have never seen Titanic.

There shouldn't be a cut off point and there needn't be a consensus as to what is good, bad, better, worst, etc. As Hannibal suggests, what was great to him at one point is not so much great anymore. That doesn't mean that it isn't great to someone still. Or as Cori suggests, a book may fulfill the objectives of a certain genre, though the genre may be considered a lesser art form by some. I have certain reads that I consider great because they put me to sleep, and I like to sleep now and then. I think the top 100 lists are good reads as well, and they do stimulate an emtional-intellectual reaction. Though not as orgasmic to me as apparently some books are to others in this blog.

Finally, I do feel some shame because my Emma Woodhouse costume smells of moth balls.

I think the true shame about people that read King or Potter is when they ONLY read King or Potter. It's the balance thing again. Even the most studious academic tires of Shakespeare now and again; we need variety.
I just don't think enough people read what we think of as 'high' literature outside the confines of academia. And that stinks for me, because I wanted desperately to dress up as Ernest Hemingway for Halloween, but nobody would've gotten it.

Maybe you still can. I could get my Hunter Thompson costume out, we could get someone to drive us, and we could both ride shotgun.

hahahahahahahha!

Actually, I wanted to say "I wanted desperately to dress up as Ernest Hemingway, but it's too much to have to carry around a drink AND a shotgun," but I thought it might be tasteless.

Thank you, I'm glad someone could stoop that low. You really made my day.

Trish, without an emoticon, I couldn't tell whether that laughter was in earnest.

It's earnest, I promise... I'm still laughing.

(Earnest, Ernest... was that pun intended?)

oh yeah, i forgot you don't really know me. All my puns are intentional. Even the ones that aren't.

*laughter*

Earnest, ernest...

*sound of drum and cymbols clash*

I like this particular thread because it seems so utile. Each of us has been able to make something of it, and when we show what we have produced from it, we add to this patchwork quilt of literariness. There are reasons why certain works have become must-studies just as there are reasons we have best sellers that more-or-less reflect the throw away, here today..., fifteen minutes of fame culture.
Some of you more intelligent readers and thinkers are drawn to the university environment because that is where you need to be and want to be and should be. This is where you get to discover and add the essential patches for your quilt--the one that keeps you warm and cozy in your own room. The quilt that, over time will become worn and tattered in places only you could have caused it to become so. And you share your patches with others by discussing and debating with like-minded enthusiasts and idealists, and, in turn, you incorporate theirs into yours. And, over time, you add or subtract or add new threads to old patches or rearrange where the patches come together. Hopefully this never ends. (not this post)
My point being that some people will create their own unique quilts in which to surround themselves in whatever it is that is truly something to love and cherish. They will be happiest when someone wants to talk about a certain patch or when they discover the same patch on someone else's quilt, whether closer to the heart or the head. Ultimately, these are not the people who buy a new throw every year or insist on displaying their designer decor to everyone. We may temporarily borrow these trappings from time to time, but we will always be comforted in the fact that we have something more valuable to return to.
I say we, but do I honestly feel that I am representative of this romantic patchwork metaphor--I'm a frayed knot.

Long live the pun!

I want to second Cori's invocation of Northrop Frye in this discussion: pleasure is a fine thing (that's a tautology, more or less), but understanding a literary work seems equally if not more important--unless it's the end of a long day and I just need to zone out in front of the t.v. Let me explain why Cori's comment seems so vital to me. One of the magical things about literature is the way in which it can challenge us, expand our horizons, introduce us to completely different experiences and viewpoints. I've learned more about people and life from literature than from any other discipline of knowledge. If we take a simple notion of pleasure as our highest measure of literature, then we risk valorizing works that merely confirm our own limited experiences and prejudices. Again, I'm not saying pleasure is bad, but rather that, for the mind that seeks to expand beyond itself, we must value the effort to understand a work that might at first seem offputting for any number of reasons. Students like to think of their professors as somehow "finished" with our education; but here's a secret: we are only in this business because we can't get enough of being students, ourselves. I sometimes laugh at myself standing up in front of my classes, explaining enormously complex works by Faulkner or Wallace Stevens with confidence and some measure of ease. It took literally years of painstaking work for that sense of such writers to develop. In other words, all my life, I have been drawn to the literature I *don't* at first understand, but that consistently rewards re-reading and re-consideration. So I stand in front of a classroom sometimes looking like I'm all about knowledge and surety, when I'm really all about mystery and exploration. As Alexander Pope noted, "Darkness strikes the sense no less than light."

Jim, I like the quilt metaphor (especially for its patchiness), but I think there's a literary law that for every metaphor there is an equal and opposite metaphor. I certainly have books that keep me warm and cozy on a cold wet night, but there are also books that are like a cold shower at 5 in the morning, or like being dropped in the middle of the woods with only a match and a pocket knife, or like finding yourself in a city in China with no map and no knowledge of the language (I'm not sure if any of these metaphors work, but you get the idea). Isn't it also important and valuable for our reading to challenge us, to shock us even, to take us out of ourselves and into brave new worlds (whether Shakespearean or Huxleyan)? I think this is why some people in our society (perhaps even some of us!) are so nervous about what goes on at a place like OSU -- we're in the business of raising difficult questions, challenging received wisdom and the status quo, transforming ourselves and others. That's scary, but also thrilling! And, shifting perspective, think how many now classic works of literature (or film, or art, or music) were originally found offensive, incomprehensible, or boring. Lady Chatterly's Lover and Ulysses were confiscated as pornography. Moby Dick was a complete failure for Herman Melville. Emily Dickinson never published anything during her lifetime (nor did Gerard Manley Hopkins). People walked out of the first performance of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring (as they did of Dry Lips Oughta Move to Kapuskasing, a play by Tomson Highway I saw in Toronto). Even the Harry Potter books has been attacked in some parts of the US for promoting witchcraft!

HH

I think my metaphor includes all those things you talk about. That is why you are here; to study, to be shocked, to be challenged, to grow, to expand, to strive for a better understanding of whatever it is that invites itself to better understanding. Those are the patches.The comfort was not to suggest that we hunker down with a comfy book and a glass of cognac in our studies. The comfort comes from knowing that we have a place to do all of these things. The wornness is to suggest the wornness of pages in a book, as well as any other well-worn thing that got that way out of passion and hard work. It is here that we can explore and share these passions, these patches, if you will. It is people like you, Hannibal Hamlin, who allow the world to appreciate or rediscover that which might have at first seemed too much to want to handle. Yet, you don't find it particularly useful to force your finds on the world, but to find those among your fellows who consciensciously think about your finds and to invite those who want to , to come and share knowledge with you. I applaud you for that.
You can go and enjoy that which the mass culture offers, guilt free, and return to something that is not shared by many in the masses. You can learn more from an experience than many, because you have studied the human condition in the finest format imaginable. That is your quilt, young man, and it's really quite smart. And trust me, you have helped provide me with many of my favorite patches.

As far as the evaluative criterion of pleasure goes, I'm not sure where that became important in this discussion. I get the idea that the "guilt" portion of pleasure seemed to besomehow vaguely used as a gauge in measuring the relative goodness and badness of literature in some of the comments in here.
I doubt any of us read Harry Potter to help us better understand the human condition or to expand our minds beyond where they were going into the endeavor.
I can't see where anyone suggested using the simple notion of pleasure as the highest measure of literature, nor can I imagine anyone in here would ever believe it to be.
We are to learn and to better understand that ofwhich we long to have a better understanding.

Don't forget that the lines between 'good' and 'bad' literature are blurred according to context. If I have Hamlet in one hand and Harry Potter in the other, then (perhaps begrudgingly) I would pick Shakespeare. But if it's a choice between Potter and People magazine, then presumably Potter is the better choice. Those of us in an academic setting can justify a 'guilty pleasure,' because we study plenty of 'good' literature at school. And for lit professors, I would think reading Harry Potter would be sort of like a vacation (As Cynthia Callahan stated, it doesn't 'diminish' the scholarly work you do). As for people not literarily inclined, I think it's better that they read Harry Potter than watch another episode of Survivor or, god forbid, Jerry Springer. In this day and age, many people derive their entertainment solely from television, and programs like those in particular. So, anything that instills the desire to read in anyone is ok by me. There are plenty of worse things we could be doing.
Also, stuff like Stephen King and the Sweet Valley High series were basically a gateway drug for me; now I can't get enough of stuff that's further up in the canonical hierarchy. Let us all get our first taste from something 'bad'.
And, Dr. Hamlin, I appreciate your 'cold shower at 5am' image; I've felt that way before. If I manage to get through my college career without having to read Joyce's Ulysses, I will be happy.

I hear you Trish (and by the way, Jim, thanks for the accolades -- I'm not worthy, I'm not worthy!), and I agree. I think that's what Barb was probably getting at. I remember a professor of mine once saying that the beauty of the world of literature was that you could usually take a "both/and" rather than "either/or" approach. As you say, just because you enjoy Macbeth on Tuesday doesn't mean you can't enjoy The Virgin Suicides on Thursday, and Harry Potter on Saturday (or People on Sunday). So long as you know the differences between these things, and can appreciate them for what they are and what they provide you with, you're fine. What Cori was arguing (apart from her beef about Harry, which I understand, though I've enjoyed the books) was that we need to appreciate the differences between these works in critical terms. This doesn't mean according to the university code or the term of literary criticism or theory, but by means of our own critical judgment as readers. As Norman says, what really transforms us is our wrestling with books that wrestle back ("I will not let thee go, except though bless me"), and learning how these great books work only makes the experience richer. And by the way, Trish, if you or anyone else wants to be bold and have a Ulysses book group, I'm in (and I'll buy the keg -- or coffee or whatever)! Ulysses is not an easy read, but it was one of the great experiences of my undergraduate days.

HH

I venture out from behind the pages of my book and glow of my computer for a few days and look what you heathens have done to MY thread. Anyway, I shall attempt to briefly summarize what I find enjoyable about a work of fiction. For me, it centers around the morals of the characters, their virtues. A twisting plot or interesting setting is fun, but I have to first care about the person twisting the plot. Harry Potter is a somewhat addicting read I guess, but Harry Potter is a very lame character for me. He doesn't pass as valiant, just bumbling and lucky. A work like Tolkien inspires me because the characters strive against adversity. They know of a gloomy outcome and they fight anyway, and for some reason that mindset really hits home to me. It's not a religious moral base that I look for either, It's human morals and the not so basic desire to care for others, and sacrifice to help them. Sadly it is a quality mostly found in fiction alone, but it's something to aspire to.

On a different note, I'm seeing a lot of you higher ups argue that pleasure or enjoyment of a work is not quite as important as understanding the critical meaning of it. I guess my viewpoint needs a little adjustment. As I read that, it sounds like you Professors, (Profs if I'm hip and cool), anyway you Professors boil your reading down to a job, and force yourself to take something from each work. That sounds a little different than reading Ulysses and genuinely being stimulated by a thought from it. Expanding your horizon and taking something from it is still pleasurable, but cranking out a work by a stuffy old author that you don't enjoy in the hope of forced expansion of self, that's a little tedious, no?

Even thought I'm really in your camp on this one too, I must ask, "Should literature become work?" Is its intent to waggle it's finger and define our lives or to simply bring enjoyment to us? If Harry Potter is only a simple bedtime romp, why should Shakespeare be any different?

Ok, I guess I should have kept up with this thread. I have to disagree with the learned scholars who have chimed in, but only on one point, i.e. the Idea of equating great literature (or almost any worthwhile thing for that matter) to pleasure. This is, I think, a poor measure for any real measure of value to a piece. While I would say something I enjoyed was “good” it doesn’t make it acceptable (ok that’s the only word I could think of.) If that is a measure we use how would you explain the popularity of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman? Do we really enjoy Willy Loman? Still high school and college age people are forced into bad fitting costumes and thrust in front of smart-mouthed siblings almost on a continual basis. If someone else said basically the same thing I do admit to scanning the last thirty or so post.

I appreciate all the hard work everyone has done to help make some of these daunting works more accessible to me. I still cannot begin to understand works of great depth and meaning without someone pointing me in certain directions. Even then, it is just a beginning. Sometimes I feel like a two-year old just repeatedly asking "why". But when something mind-blowing that is happening in a piece of literature is revealed to me, I'm forever altered by that. Othello expanded my mind and my expectations. Dry Lips floored me. I can't get past the beginning of understanding the bulk of what is going on in these works, but I want to try. Ulysses is something I can't even begin to wrap my brain around. In fact, I seem to be repelled as if Ulysses and I are two magnets. Yet, I have forayed into it on several occasions, because I want to find that thing that helps me into it.
Harry Potter really is a good kid's story, and I look at primarily through that lens. That way I have been able to find merit in it, and have enjoyed it. When looking at it with any other criterion, it will certainly fail me, and so I don't.
So, professors, keep helping us. I doubt many of your students believe you are finished products, no more than they think they will ever be. But without your level of completeness, many of us cannot hope to reach a much deeper level of understanding. It is no doubt a job, as Matt suggests, but I'm willing to bet you thank your lucky stars you have a job you truly enjoy. I never thought I would enjoy reading Shakespeare, but that was because I had no idea, and I mean NO idea that his works or anyone else's could be so awe inspiring. I just didn't know there was so much going on in these books. Thank you.

Getting back to the "pleasure" principle, clearly another problem in evaluation is what gives different people pleasure. Some people do not find "thinking" and "pleasure" to be mutually exclusive. Perhaps, in fact, they are inextricable for some. They could even be combined with that snuggly cognac and quilt Jim refers to.

And now you'll REALLY resent me because I'm going to suggest that there may actually be some danger in reading without thinking (i.e. exclusively for some kind of zoned-out pleasure), which I of course do myself voraciously via cookbooks and gardening magazines. In Andrew Bacevich's recent book The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced By War, he comments on the huge popularity and even influence of Tom Clancy novels. Yet "to read Red Storm Rising is to enter a world of 'virtuous men and perfect weapons,' as one reviewer noted. 'All the Americans are paragons of courage, endurance and devotion to service and country. Their officers are uniformly competent and occasionally inspired. Men of all ranks are faithful husbands and devoted fathers.'" This lack of complexity in characterization wouldn't pass most people's aesthetic criteria for judgment. (Personally, I can't take pleasure in such simple-minded stereotyping, though my husband seems to!!) But we have other responsiblities as supposedly "thinking" people besides pleasure, don't we? I posit that whether slurping up popular culture or less-popular culture unmindfully, with only pleasure on our minds, we become rather sinister people, a danger to ourselves and others around the world: the ones who should be doing the thinking, but choose not to. Hence the guilt with which this thread began?

It is frightening to think that, on a whole, our society allows others to do the thinking for us without questioning what we should be questioning. What's more frightening is who we seem to allow to do the thinking. Politics has seemed to become a bit too much an extension of pop-culture. It's way too American Idol. Slogans and sound bites, rather than deep discussion of issues, have taken on too much importance. We need only to look at history to see where slogans have carried so much weight, and the danger in them, is that to buy into the slogan, is to give carte blanche for everything that is behind the slogan. It is important that someone reads beyond the statements and at the implications, yet even those who do and bring them to our attention, are forced to or want to do it in a mass media, pop-culture format. Book deal.
If we see it on TV it must be legitimate, and if lots of people buy into it, it must be true. I'd like to think it is ridiculous, but I'm with Cori, it's dangerous.

I'm curious. Can anyone give me an example of a text, the significance and/or critical meaning of which increased (perhaps not the word I want) at some time well beyond the time of its initial surfacing? I'm not sure I know how to expalin what I'm asking, but I'm thinking of some sort of 'resurrected' work that seemed more relevant and of more import to later readers perhaps owing to events of a period or because readers' expectations had changed or maybe simply because someone was able to overcome any limiting 'traditional' interpretations and to shape an interpretation in a new way.
I ask this because several people have made reference to works that might not have been received well in the time they were written, but have since been accepted as pieces worthy of considerable critical interest and study.
So, I'm not sure if I am asking for that in particular, as in a work discovered at a later time, or whether I'm asking about something that might have had acclaim during its time, but became more appreciated in another time.
If someone figures out what I'm asking and can help me, please do.

Ok, how about James M Cain’s: The Postman Always Rings Twice. It was ground-breaking, paving a road for the likes of. Almost all of his major works have been put on the silver screen. Still, at first several Hollywood studios refused to make the films. The public called him “vile” and “pornographic” many actors turned down roles in his stories because of their “repugnance” at the “lack of morality” that is inherent in all Cain's characters. From those early days his stock has increased and now he is considered the father of the noir novels.
And about mindless followers and politics, reap what we sow. We have been dumbing down society to the point that our resident Shakespeare professor advocates Buffy the vampire slayer! (Just kidding HH)

Another extraordinary writer (in addition to Dickinson and Hopkins, mentioned above) who was largely unknown and unappreciated by the literary greats of his time, and who now stands as one of the giants of his era, is William Blake. Talk about strange and difficult to figure out--the guy can seem perfectly certifiable. But, as later generations realized, his had a brilliant mind and created arrestingingly insightful and beautiful art.

So, with Blake, what was it that allowed later generations to grasp and/or appreciate his works?
Was there a particular critical theory or new tradition of criticism that opened these texts up, or was it, perhaps, changes in the environment of society? Does this sort of natural aesthetic distance tend to lead to an expansion of a work's literary meaning, when it can be looked at by fresh, new minds or through different lenses?
Some critical lenses seem to be in opposition to others, but collectively, don't they all help to more-or-less bring out a work's definition more completely or, dare I say it, in a more well-rounded fashion?

"Freedom is the right of all sentient beings."
"Peace through tyranny."

These two quotes define the hero and villain of my secret shame: Transformers. While true that the cartoon is childish refuse, the comic books take full advantage of these two dynamics. Both characters strive for peace and an end to their four million year old war, they just have two very different political views on how to achieve this goal.
In a lot of the action oriented fiction I enjoy (regardless of the medium) it is this type of blurring that I really go for. Obviously no one wants oppression, but when the motives are altruistic it puts a different spin on things. And guess what? None of that reading of my comics is really all that academic. I guess I agree with Matt about looking at morality, I just like the morality that is harder to agree or disagree with. When an antagonist or protagonist in a story makes a decision that harms others for what he believes to be the greater good, it brings a lot more life to the characters for me. Batman, Darth Vader, Roland Deschain (of Gilead), Robin Hood, Tyler Durden.....all make decisions that harm others in their pursuit of a better world (or universe).
Why do I like most of the non academic fiction I do? Itallows me to see myself and the world around me in new and different ways constantly.

Other guilty pleasures of mine:
Most of adult swim on cartoon network, video games, The Dark Tower series by Stephen King, any book by Chuck Pahlaniuk, literature and film by or about Hunter S. Thompson, most anything written by Kevin Smith, Newgrounds.com, and other very varied various stuff

holy god, there are 60 comments to this thread. it seems this blog was a swell idea.