What have you read lately?

[apl68]

Salem Possessed:  The Social Origins of Witchcraft, by Paul Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum.  It's an older book that takes as its thesis the idea that the Salem witchcraft panic of 1692 was an outgrowth of social factionalism in Salem Village.  The authors show great ingenuity in using a variety of records to reconstruct the social factions in Salem Village, and to show correlations between these and who got accused of witchcraft.  It's amazing what you can reconstruct from centuries ago if you scrounge hard enough for sources.  Everything that survives from an historical period is a potential historical source.  That said, there's an awful lot of conjecture here.  I'm not sure how convinced I am regarding what the authors assert about some of the historical actors' motivations.


I've also been reading a lot of F. Scott Fitzgerald's earlier novels and short stories.  The man could certainly write!  He's one of the more readable "classic" authors out there.  It's shocking, though, to see how frequently, and how consistently, his work includes denigrating portrayals of African Americans.  It's not just a matter of using derogatory terms and stereotypes that were more acceptable a hundred years ago than they are now.  Black characters in Fitzgerald are always portrayed as background figures who are casually dismissed in some way.  I haven't found a single instance in his writing of his taking a human interest in any character who isn't white. 

Not that he often views white characters with much admiration or compassion either.  His cynicism about human beings bodes well for his continuing to be viewed as a classic author.  His portrayals of people of color?  Likely to lead to growing calls in the years to come to have him kicked out of the literary canon.  Should that happen, I don't know that he'd be that big of a loss, really.  But then I'm not usually a fan of "literary" fiction in general.

[ergative]

One thing I always wonder about when people worry about the preservation of any sort of canon, is why we want to preserve it.

1. Is it genuinely so good that we are willing to overlook its flaws? (e.g., [some] Shakespeare, Austen)
2. Does it represent the first instance of something genuinely new and innovative, even if it has aged badly? (e.g., Chaucer)
3. Is it important for its social/political/historical impact, even if, as a work of literature, it's rather lousy? (e.g., The Jungle, Uncle Tom's Cabin)
4. Has it always been a member of the canon, and so should stay on it for the sake of tradition and cultural continuity?

Points 2 and 3 tend to be fairly stable. Chaucer is never not going to be the first major poet transferring the traditions of Boccaccio and French fabliaux into vernacular English. The Clean Food and Drug Act is never not going to be inspired (in part) by The Jungle. It's really point 1, and as a consequence, point 4, that are possible sources of debate. In my preferred genre, science fiction and fantasy, it is undeniably true that the sorts of books that are written now are just plain better in every way than books from the golden era. I don't mean in terms of representation--although that's improved too. I mean in terms of world-building complexity, character complexity, and the basic sentence level quality of the prose. The genre has matured from something written quickly to make a quick buck in pulp magazines into something that can be astonishing. Even the Wall Street Journal has finally admitted it (and in the process provoking outrage among the SFF authors and fans who think this article breathtakingly condescending and decades too late).

So it may well be worth considering whether things that were once great works, compared to the other stuff out there (point 1) and deserved a place in the canon as it was then, are in fact not really so great given how much other amazing stuff has been published since then.  And that's where the drama lies. I just reread Nickolas Nickelby not too long ago, and my goodness, it was a very, very poorly constructed novel. All over the place, all sorts of little episodes that don't relate to each other and don't move the plot forward, because they only existed as an excuse for Dickens to comment on how silly theatre people are, or to make fun of a widow who wants to have a harmless romance with the man next door. The good stuff is absolutely great, but I'm not sure it's good enough to count as canon anymore. The only reason to keep it there is point 4.

When I was at college, I worked in the special collections of the library, and a large part of my duties involved making photocopies of archived papers for various scholars who requested them. I once spent several days making copy after copy of documents and memos from a committee in which everyone was discussing what should be the core canon that formed the basis of--something, I don't remember what. A core undergraduate curriculum? A set of texts issued by the university press? Something official, at any rate. It was from the 1930s or so. I don't think that something as nebulous as 'the canon' should be decided by one committee of university dudes, but if it is, it should definitely be ruthlessly updated every five or ten years.

[Treehugger]

Since I'm no longer an academic and have loads of leisure time, but, other the other hand, cannot currently travel or get out much, I have decided to read all the winners of the Nobel prize in literature in their original language. Seeing as how the Nobel prize winners wrote in 28 different languages, this project should take me a while (at least several lifetimes). I have already read many of the winners in French and English (for my doctoral studies and for myself) and have been studying Spanish with some friends, so first up on the list was Garbriel Garcia Marquez's El Amor en Los Tiempos de Cólera, which I adored. I am currently re-reading it and writing a little essay about it en español, por supuesto while also starting on Mario Vargas Llosa's La Ciudad y los Perros.

[apl68]

Since I'm no longer an academic and have loads of leisure time, but, other the other hand, cannot currently travel or get out much, I have decided to read all the winners of the Nobel prize in literature in their original language. Seeing as how the Nobel prize winners wrote in 28 different languages, this project should take me a while (at least several lifetimes). I have already read many of the winners in French and English (for my doctoral studies and for myself) and have been studying Spanish with some friends, so first up on the list was Garbriel Garcia Marquez's El Amor en Los Tiempos de Cólera, which I adored. I am currently re-reading it and writing a little essay about it en español, por supuesto while also starting on Mario Vargas Llosa's La Ciudad y los Perros.

I guess after that you could brush up on your Scandinavian languages, since that's where a lot of Nobel laureates came from in the early decades.

I feel like I had enough of reading Latin American authors in the original Spanish in my college literature classes (Sorry Mom!).

[Treehugger]

Since I'm no longer an academic and have loads of leisure time, but, other the other hand, cannot currently travel or get out much, I have decided to read all the winners of the Nobel prize in literature in their original language. Seeing as how the Nobel prize winners wrote in 28 different languages, this project should take me a while (at least several lifetimes). I have already read many of the winners in French and English (for my doctoral studies and for myself) and have been studying Spanish with some friends, so first up on the list was Garbriel Garcia Marquez's El Amor en Los Tiempos de Cólera, which I adored. I am currently re-reading it and writing a little essay about it en español, por supuesto while also starting on Mario Vargas Llosa's La Ciudad y los Perros.

I guess after that you could brush up on your Scandinavian languages, since that's where a lot of Nobel laureates came from in the early decades.

I feel like I had enough of reading Latin American authors in the original Spanish in my college literature classes (Sorry Mom!).

Well, I did spend some time learning beginner's Swedish on Duolinguo a few years ago before we went to Sweden. I had some phrases all ready to whip out, but everyone's English was so good, I really didn't get a chance. The irony is that when we went to Norway (for one day) nobody spoke any English and I hadn't studied any Norwegian, so ooops.

Anyway, yes ... my plan is first authors who wrote in Spanish, then German (since I had 4 years in college), then Swedish, then back to Italian which I had also studied (two years). In the mean time, I could start learning a really challenging language like Japanese ....

[apl68]

Since I'm no longer an academic and have loads of leisure time, but, other the other hand, cannot currently travel or get out much, I have decided to read all the winners of the Nobel prize in literature in their original language. Seeing as how the Nobel prize winners wrote in 28 different languages, this project should take me a while (at least several lifetimes). I have already read many of the winners in French and English (for my doctoral studies and for myself) and have been studying Spanish with some friends, so first up on the list was Garbriel Garcia Marquez's El Amor en Los Tiempos de Cólera, which I adored. I am currently re-reading it and writing a little essay about it en español, por supuesto while also starting on Mario Vargas Llosa's La Ciudad y los Perros.

I guess after that you could brush up on your Scandinavian languages, since that's where a lot of Nobel laureates came from in the early decades.

I feel like I had enough of reading Latin American authors in the original Spanish in my college literature classes (Sorry Mom!).

Well, I did spend some time learning beginner's Swedish on Duolinguo a few years ago before we went to Sweden. I had some phrases all ready to whip out, but everyone's English was so good, I really didn't get a chance. The irony is that when we went to Norway (for one day) nobody spoke any English and I hadn't studied any Norwegian, so ooops.

Anyway, yes ... my plan is first authors who wrote in Spanish, then German (since I had 4 years in college), then Swedish, then back to Italian which I had also studied (two years). In the mean time, I could start learning a really challenging language like Japanese ....

Sounds like you're a seasoned enough linguist that you could pull it off!

My Japanese is mainly limited to trying to sing along with some of my favorite anime themes.  It's surprising how much you can learn about a language by paying close attention when watching subtitled videos.

[ciao_yall]

Since I'm no longer an academic and have loads of leisure time, but, other the other hand, cannot currently travel or get out much, I have decided to read all the winners of the Nobel prize in literature in their original language. Seeing as how the Nobel prize winners wrote in 28 different languages, this project should take me a while (at least several lifetimes). I have already read many of the winners in French and English (for my doctoral studies and for myself) and have been studying Spanish with some friends, so first up on the list was Garbriel Garcia Marquez's El Amor en Los Tiempos de Cólera, which I adored. I am currently re-reading it and writing a little essay about it en español, por supuesto while also starting on Mario Vargas Llosa's La Ciudad y los Perros.

I guess after that you could brush up on your Scandinavian languages, since that's where a lot of Nobel laureates came from in the early decades.

I feel like I had enough of reading Latin American authors in the original Spanish in my college literature classes (Sorry Mom!).

Well, I did spend some time learning beginner's Swedish on Duolinguo a few years ago before we went to Sweden. I had some phrases all ready to whip out, but everyone's English was so good, I really didn't get a chance. The irony is that when we went to Norway (for one day) nobody spoke any English and I hadn't studied any Norwegian, so ooops.

Anyway, yes ... my plan is first authors who wrote in Spanish, then German (since I had 4 years in college), then Swedish, then back to Italian which I had also studied (two years). In the mean time, I could start learning a really challenging language like Japanese ....

Japanese is easy to pronounce but the grammar is strange. Just say everything backwards, or like Yoda and it's fine.

[ciao_yall]

Since I'm no longer an academic and have loads of leisure time, but, other the other hand, cannot currently travel or get out much, I have decided to read all the winners of the Nobel prize in literature in their original language. Seeing as how the Nobel prize winners wrote in 28 different languages, this project should take me a while (at least several lifetimes). I have already read many of the winners in French and English (for my doctoral studies and for myself) and have been studying Spanish with some friends, so first up on the list was Garbriel Garcia Marquez's El Amor en Los Tiempos de Cólera, which I adored. I am currently re-reading it and writing a little essay about it en español, por supuesto while also starting on Mario Vargas Llosa's La Ciudad y los Perros.

I guess after that you could brush up on your Scandinavian languages, since that's where a lot of Nobel laureates came from in the early decades.

I feel like I had enough of reading Latin American authors in the original Spanish in my college literature classes (Sorry Mom!).

Well, I did spend some time learning beginner's Swedish on Duolinguo a few years ago before we went to Sweden. I had some phrases all ready to whip out, but everyone's English was so good, I really didn't get a chance. The irony is that when we went to Norway (for one day) nobody spoke any English and I hadn't studied any Norwegian, so ooops.

Anyway, yes ... my plan is first authors who wrote in Spanish, then German (since I had 4 years in college), then Swedish, then back to Italian which I had also studied (two years). In the mean time, I could start learning a really challenging language like Japanese ....

Sounds like you're a seasoned enough linguist that you could pull it off!

My Japanese is mainly limited to trying to sing along with some of my favorite anime themes.  It's surprising how much you can learn about a language by paying close attention when watching subtitled videos.

Or online Japanese lessons like this one?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKjaFG4YN6g

[ab_grp]

Reading major works in their original languages sounds like a great project to take on, especially with so much background in different languages!

We finished That Old Cape Magic last night.  It was very enjoyable throughout and had lots of the signature Russo elements.  He is so good at his descriptions sometimes.  We were happy to find that it was generally light reading, no major heavy downer plot points, although there were some that were certainly sad.  It was a fun summer read with some clever writing as we have come to expect from Russo.  There were a few things that didn't seem to get resolved, but they were more of a curiosity than a major story line, and the lack of closure may have been intentional.

Not sure what we will read next.  Maybe Echopraxia (Watts) or How Green was my Valley (Llewellyn).  We try to alternate sci fi in with other fiction, but spouse's birthday is coming up, and I'm planning to get him/us a bunch of the books listed on some of the favorites lists from Goodreads.  This past week was apparently sci fi/fantasy week there, and at least some will be new to him.

[apl68]

Since I'm no longer an academic and have loads of leisure time, but, other the other hand, cannot currently travel or get out much, I have decided to read all the winners of the Nobel prize in literature in their original language. Seeing as how the Nobel prize winners wrote in 28 different languages, this project should take me a while (at least several lifetimes). I have already read many of the winners in French and English (for my doctoral studies and for myself) and have been studying Spanish with some friends, so first up on the list was Garbriel Garcia Marquez's El Amor en Los Tiempos de Cólera, which I adored. I am currently re-reading it and writing a little essay about it en español, por supuesto while also starting on Mario Vargas Llosa's La Ciudad y los Perros.

I guess after that you could brush up on your Scandinavian languages, since that's where a lot of Nobel laureates came from in the early decades.

I feel like I had enough of reading Latin American authors in the original Spanish in my college literature classes (Sorry Mom!).

Well, I did spend some time learning beginner's Swedish on Duolinguo a few years ago before we went to Sweden. I had some phrases all ready to whip out, but everyone's English was so good, I really didn't get a chance. The irony is that when we went to Norway (for one day) nobody spoke any English and I hadn't studied any Norwegian, so ooops.

Anyway, yes ... my plan is first authors who wrote in Spanish, then German (since I had 4 years in college), then Swedish, then back to Italian which I had also studied (two years). In the mean time, I could start learning a really challenging language like Japanese ....

Japanese is easy to pronounce but the grammar is strange. Just say everything backwards, or like Yoda and it's fine.

Very easy to pronounce, if you're used to Spanish pronunciation.  And vice versa.  When my mother taught college Spanish, she found that Japanese exchange students were some of her best students.

[mamselle]

Salem Possessed:  The Social Origins of Witchcraft, by Paul Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum.  It's an older book that takes as its thesis the idea that the Salem witchcraft panic of 1692 was an outgrowth of social factionalism in Salem Village.  The authors show great ingenuity in using a variety of records to reconstruct the social factions in Salem Village, and to show correlations between these and who got accused of witchcraft.  It's amazing what you can reconstruct from centuries ago if you scrounge hard enough for sources.  Everything that survives from an historical period is a potential historical source.  That said, there's an awful lot of conjecture here.  I'm not sure how convinced I am regarding what the authors assert about some of the historical actors' motivations.


I've also been reading a lot of F. Scott Fitzgerald's earlier novels and short stories.  The man could certainly write!  He's one of the more readable "classic" authors out there.  It's shocking, though, to see how frequently, and how consistently, his work includes denigrating portrayals of African Americans.  It's not just a matter of using derogatory terms and stereotypes that were more acceptable a hundred years ago than they are now.  Black characters in Fitzgerald are always portrayed as background figures who are casually dismissed in some way.  I haven't found a single instance in his writing of his taking a human interest in any character who isn't white. 

Not that he often views white characters with much admiration or compassion either.  His cynicism about human beings bodes well for his continuing to be viewed as a classic author.  His portrayals of people of color?  Likely to lead to growing calls in the years to come to have him kicked out of the literary canon.  Should that happen, I don't know that he'd be that big of a loss, really.  But then I'm not usually a fan of "literary" fiction in general.

Boyer and Nissenbaum have been superceded. I can't describe the details without sidelining work I'm doing on a different 17th c. issue now, and I don't want to derail the thread, but PM me if you want all the juicy details later.

M.

[RatGuy]

One thing I always wonder about when people worry about the preservation of any sort of canon, is why we want to preserve it.

1. Is it genuinely so good that we are willing to overlook its flaws? (e.g., [some] Shakespeare, Austen)
2. Does it represent the first instance of something genuinely new and innovative, even if it has aged badly? (e.g., Chaucer)
3. Is it important for its social/political/historical impact, even if, as a work of literature, it's rather lousy? (e.g., The Jungle, Uncle Tom's Cabin)
4. Has it always been a member of the canon, and so should stay on it for the sake of tradition and cultural continuity?

Points 2 and 3 tend to be fairly stable. Chaucer is never not going to be the first major poet transferring the traditions of Boccaccio and French fabliaux into vernacular English. The Clean Food and Drug Act is never not going to be inspired (in part) by The Jungle. It's really point 1, and as a consequence, point 4, that are possible sources of debate. In my preferred genre, science fiction and fantasy, it is undeniably true that the sorts of books that are written now are just plain better in every way than books from the golden era. I don't mean in terms of representation--although that's improved too. I mean in terms of world-building complexity, character complexity, and the basic sentence level quality of the prose. The genre has matured from something written quickly to make a quick buck in pulp magazines into something that can be astonishing. Even the Wall Street Journal has finally admitted it (and in the process provoking outrage among the SFF authors and fans who think this article breathtakingly condescending and decades too late).

So it may well be worth considering whether things that were once great works, compared to the other stuff out there (point 1) and deserved a place in the canon as it was then, are in fact not really so great given how much other amazing stuff has been published since then.  And that's where the drama lies. I just reread Nickolas Nickelby not too long ago, and my goodness, it was a very, very poorly constructed novel. All over the place, all sorts of little episodes that don't relate to each other and don't move the plot forward, because they only existed as an excuse for Dickens to comment on how silly theatre people are, or to make fun of a widow who wants to have a harmless romance with the man next door. The good stuff is absolutely great, but I'm not sure it's good enough to count as canon anymore. The only reason to keep it there is point 4.

When I was at college, I worked in the special collections of the library, and a large part of my duties involved making photocopies of archived papers for various scholars who requested them. I once spent several days making copy after copy of documents and memos from a committee in which everyone was discussing what should be the core canon that formed the basis of--something, I don't remember what. A core undergraduate curriculum? A set of texts issued by the university press? Something official, at any rate. It was from the 1930s or so. I don't think that something as nebulous as 'the canon' should be decided by one committee of university dudes, but if it is, it should definitely be ruthlessly updated every five or ten years.

I do like Jane Tompkins's chapter "But Is It Any Good?" for a discussion of the sentimental (and UTC factors into this discussion) and the canon. I generally don't like Dickens for the same reasons that you list, but I think it's an unavoidable issue of the Victorian literary marketplace. I do like to ask my grad students to consider Hawthorne's position the canon -- having a BIL on the state board of education, who can make your novel required reading in school, probably helps your literary reputation.

Whenever I teach a class in post-war American literature, I like to discuss canon. The Norton includes one Dick story as a token SF story, but I try to bring in a few other genre writers. It's fun to teach something like "The Call of Cthulhu" in this context -- Lovecraft certainly has a strong influence on contemporary SF and horror, and he works well in discussing the genre conventions of the Modernists. Then I ask if his blatant racism should exclude him from the canon, and if not, how do we address it (especially given the influence of his mythos). I've also assigned Shirley Jackson who is having somewhat of a resurgence, and ask if she deserved to be dropped from the canon (the Norton no longer contains "The Lottery"). I've even taught Stephen King's "All That You Love Will Be Carried Away" in the context of the canon.

[ergative]

I do like Jane Tompkins's chapter "But Is It Any Good?" for a discussion of the sentimental (and UTC factors into this discussion) and the canon. I generally don't like Dickens for the same reasons that you list, but I think it's an unavoidable issue of the Victorian literary marketplace. I do like to ask my grad students to consider Hawthorne's position the canon -- having a BIL on the state board of education, who can make your novel required reading in school, probably helps your literary reputation.

Whenever I teach a class in post-war American literature, I like to discuss canon. The Norton includes one Dick story as a token SF story, but I try to bring in a few other genre writers. It's fun to teach something like "The Call of Cthulhu" in this context -- Lovecraft certainly has a strong influence on contemporary SF and horror, and he works well in discussing the genre conventions of the Modernists. Then I ask if his blatant racism should exclude him from the canon, and if not, how do we address it (especially given the influence of his mythos). I've also assigned Shirley Jackson who is having somewhat of a resurgence, and ask if she deserved to be dropped from the canon (the Norton no longer contains "The Lottery"). I've even taught Stephen King's "All That You Love Will Be Carried Away" in the context of the canon.

That sounds like a fun set of discussions! I was never invited to consider the idea that canon decisions could be overruled when I was in college. I think if I'd had such a class I might have had a great deal more confidence in forming my own opinions about 'great literature' much earlier.

There's been a regular feature on the tor.com blog about Lovecraftian horror, in an attempt to reclaim the good bits of the mythos and disconnect it a bit from the assholery of its originator.  They started by reading and discussing Lovecraft's own works, and then moved on to other works that are similarly Lovecraftian.

[apl68]

I finally got around to reading something by Jane Austen.  I know that Northanger Abbey isn't considered her masterpiece, but it's what wasn't checked out from the library at the time, so...

It's quite funny (even laugh-out-loud funny) in places, and the characters and settings are well drawn.  No question that Jane Austen knew her craft.  However, my ability to get into what is after all basically a romance involving very upper-crust people of two centuries ago is limited.  Heroine Catherine Moreland may marry well above her station, but her station was pretty high to start with.  Note that the romance comes with a solid dose of realism.  To marry well you've GOT to have money and negotiate a deal between the two families, no matter how much the lovers might like each other.

I wonder what Jane Austen's future in the literary canon will be?  Feminist literary critics long ago convinced themselves that she was a proto-feminist, and that it was therefore okay to enjoy her works as a break from more conventionally dreary literary fiction.  But she was a member of the upper classes in colonial-era Britain, and surely had family whose money came partly or entirely from some colonial business that would have involved the labor or traffic of slaves.  That she reportedly expressed abolitionist sympathies back in the day might not be enough to save her from being "cancelled."  Laura Ingalls Wilder and other long-recognized classic authors have already been unpersoned, and the pace of this sort of thing has greatly quickened recently.

[ergative]

I finally got around to reading something by Jane Austen.  I know that Northanger Abbey isn't considered her masterpiece, but it's what wasn't checked out from the library at the time, so...

It's quite funny (even laugh-out-loud funny) in places, and the characters and settings are well drawn.  No question that Jane Austen knew her craft.  However, my ability to get into what is after all basically a romance involving very upper-crust people of two centuries ago is limited.  Heroine Catherine Moreland may marry well above her station, but her station was pretty high to start with.  Note that the romance comes with a solid dose of realism.  To marry well you've GOT to have money and negotiate a deal between the two families, no matter how much the lovers might like each other.

I wonder what Jane Austen's future in the literary canon will be?  Feminist literary critics long ago convinced themselves that she was a proto-feminist, and that it was therefore okay to enjoy her works as a break from more conventionally dreary literary fiction.  But she was a member of the upper classes in colonial-era Britain, and surely had family whose money came partly or entirely from some colonial business that would have involved the labor or traffic of slaves.  That she reportedly expressed abolitionist sympathies back in the day might not be enough to save her from being "cancelled."  Laura Ingalls Wilder and other long-recognized classic authors have already been unpersoned, and the pace of this sort of thing has greatly quickened recently.

Eh---lots of people choose not to teach Jane Austen for all sorts of reasons. If they decide that their reading lists contain too much upper-class privilege and want to replace some of it with other types of authors, that seems perfectly reasonable to me.

In general, there are so many reasons not to teach an author---ranging from 'he's morally reprehensible' to 'I don't really like him and there are so many others that I do like'---that fussing about making a decision because of 'cancel culture' seems a bit disingenuous to me. For one thing, it depends on the assumption that certain books have an indisputable right to belong to the canon--and I've already said what I think about that higher up. And anyway, if the concern about cancelling Austen were genuinely motivated by the belief that Austen always belongs on reading lists, then there would be equal outrage around instructors who remove her for other reasons (such as, 'I just don't like her all that much'.) But while we might disagree with such decisions, they don't make us clutch our pearls and bemoan today's Philistinism. So I believe that worries over 'canceling' Austen are really just using Austen as an excuse to complain about cancel culture more generally. And I myself think such complaints are misplaced.