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In praise of authors
I've just read C. S. Lewis's essay on 'good' and 'bad' literature. Essentially he argues that 'good' literature is determined by the kind of reading it permits, invites, and perhaps even compels. Good literature may allow 'bad' readings, but bad literature (like bad music, bad poetry and bad art) will never sustain a 'good', literary reading. A literary reading is seen in things like the desire to re-read, an open-ness and receptiveness to allowing the text to mould and transform you, and time spent thinking about the text itself (rather than just the ideas it refers to). This is distinct from the 'unliterary' reading which 'uses' the text for information, entertainment or other things (which, Lewis asserts strongly, may be good things in themselves).
Anyway, it made me think quite a lot about fanfiction. I can count on less than the fingers of one hand the number of fanfics I've read that I've wanted to re-read, to savour, to mull over. Or those where I've been blown away by the literary artistry of the text itself. Or those that have done anything more for me than pass a dull hour or two. After the End, perhaps. Roger and Lisa springs to mind (and probably others of St M's too).
I'm sure that this is, at least in part, to do with the democratization of publishing. But I wonder if it's also partly to do with things like serial publication of chapters? And reading on screen?
Anyway, this is how Lewis's essay ends, and this is what I wanted to share with all of you who are authors, in grateful thanks:
Those of us who have been true readers all our life seldom fully realise the enormous extension of our being which we owe to authors. We realise it best when we talk with an unliterary friend. He may be full of goodness and good sense but he inhabits a tiny world. In it, we should be suffocated. The man who is contented to be only himself, and therefore less a self, is in prison. My own eyes are not enough for me, I will see through those of others. Reality, even seen through the eyes of many, is not enough. I will see what others have invented. Even the eyes of all humanity are not enough. I regret that the brutes [animals] cannot write books. Very gladly would I learn what face things present to a mouse or a bee; more gladly still would I perceive the olfactory world charged with all the information and emotion it carries for a dog.
Literary experience heals the wound, without undermining the privilege, of individuality. There are mass emotions which heal the wound; but they destroy the privilege. In them our separate selves are pooled and we sink back into sub-individuality. But in reading great literature I become a thousand men and yet remain myself. Like the night sky in the Greek poem, I see with a myriad eyes, but it is still I who see. Here, as in worship, in love, in moral action, and in knowing, I transcend myself; and am never more myself than when I do.
Thank you.
Anyway, it made me think quite a lot about fanfiction. I can count on less than the fingers of one hand the number of fanfics I've read that I've wanted to re-read, to savour, to mull over. Or those where I've been blown away by the literary artistry of the text itself. Or those that have done anything more for me than pass a dull hour or two. After the End, perhaps. Roger and Lisa springs to mind (and probably others of St M's too).
I'm sure that this is, at least in part, to do with the democratization of publishing. But I wonder if it's also partly to do with things like serial publication of chapters? And reading on screen?
Anyway, this is how Lewis's essay ends, and this is what I wanted to share with all of you who are authors, in grateful thanks:
Those of us who have been true readers all our life seldom fully realise the enormous extension of our being which we owe to authors. We realise it best when we talk with an unliterary friend. He may be full of goodness and good sense but he inhabits a tiny world. In it, we should be suffocated. The man who is contented to be only himself, and therefore less a self, is in prison. My own eyes are not enough for me, I will see through those of others. Reality, even seen through the eyes of many, is not enough. I will see what others have invented. Even the eyes of all humanity are not enough. I regret that the brutes [animals] cannot write books. Very gladly would I learn what face things present to a mouse or a bee; more gladly still would I perceive the olfactory world charged with all the information and emotion it carries for a dog.
Literary experience heals the wound, without undermining the privilege, of individuality. There are mass emotions which heal the wound; but they destroy the privilege. In them our separate selves are pooled and we sink back into sub-individuality. But in reading great literature I become a thousand men and yet remain myself. Like the night sky in the Greek poem, I see with a myriad eyes, but it is still I who see. Here, as in worship, in love, in moral action, and in knowing, I transcend myself; and am never more myself than when I do.
Thank you.
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When we went to Scotland I made my husband take me to Culloden - and when I saw the marker where the clan Fraser had been - I squeed - honestly - I don't usually squee. And said, "that's where Jamie was!"
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I don't think this particular Binchy book is the one for me. I've read the first chapter today- the protagonist is a late 40s male going through a mid-life crisis. I want to ESCAPE that! But it was the only one our library had. I can see how I would enjoy her writing in a different setting, though. One thing surprised me though. I found several abrupt POV shifts already. Don't editors catch that sort of thing?
OK - Gabaldon. I'm going to check it out. thanks so much!
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Jamie made a fire in a sheltered spot, and sat down next to it. The rain had eased to a faint drizzle that misted the air and spangled my eyelashes with rainbows when I looked at the flames.
He sat staring into the fire for a long time. Finally he looked up at me, hands clasped around his knees.
"I said before that I'd not ask ye things ye had no wish to tell me. And I'd not ask ye now; but I must know, for your safety as well as mine." He paused, hesitating.
"Claire, if you've never been honest wi' me, be so now, for I must know the truth. Claire, are ye a witch?"
I gaped at him. "A witch? You—you can really ask that?" I thought he must be joking. He wasn't.
He took me by the shoulders and gripped me hard, staring into my eyes as though willing me to answer him.
"I must ask it, Claire! And you must tell me!"
"And if I were?" I asked through dry lips. "If you had thought I were a witch? Would you still have fought for me?"
"I would have gone to the stake with you!" he said violently. "And to hell beyond, if I must. But may the Lord Jesus have mercy on my soul and on yours, tell me the truth!"
The strain of it all caught up with me. I tore myself out of his grasp and ran across the clearing. Not far, only to the edge of the trees; I could not bear the exposure of the open space. I clutched a tree; put my arms around it and dug my fingers hard into the bark, pressed my face to it and shrieked with hysterical laughter.
Jamie's face, white and shocked, loomed up on the other side of the tree. With the dim realization that what I was doing must sound unnervingly like cackling, I made a terrific effort and stopped. Panting, I stared at him for a moment.
"Yes," I said, backing away, still heaving with gasps of unhinged laughter. "Yes, I am a witch! To you, I must be. I've never had smallpox, but I can walk through a room full of dying men and never catch it. I can nurse the sick and breathe their air and touch their bodies, and the sickness can't touch me. I can't catch cholera, either, or lockjaw, or the morbid sore throat. And you must think it's an enchantment, because you've never heard of vaccine, and there's no other way you can explain it."
"The things I know—" I stopped backing away and stood still, breathing heavily, trying to control myself. "I know about Jonathan Randall because I was told about him. I know when he was born and when he'll die, I know about what he's done and what he'll do, I know about Sandringham because ... because Frank told me. He knew about Randall because he ... he ... oh, God!" I felt as though I might be sick, and closed my eyes to shut out the spinning stars overhead.
"And Colum ... he thinks I'm a witch, because I know Hamish isn't his own son. I know ... he can't sire children. But he thought I knew who Hamish's father is ... I thought maybe it was you, but then I knew it couldn't be, and..." I was talking faster and faster, trying to keep the vertigo at bay with the sound of my own voice.
"Everything I've ever told you about myself was true," I said, nodding madly as though to reassure myself. "Everything. I haven't any people, I haven't any history, because I haven't happened yet.
"Do you know when I was born?" I asked, looking up. I knew my hair was wild and my eyes staring, and I didn't care. "On the twentieth of October, in the Year of Our Lord nineteen hundred and eighteen. Do you hear me?" I demanded, for he was blinking at me unmoving, as though paying no attention to a word I said. "I said nineteen eighteen! Nearly two hundred years from now! Do you hear?"
I was shouting now, and he nodded slowly.
"I hear," he said softly.
"Yes, you hear!" I blazed. "And you think I'm raving mad. Don't you? Admit it! That's what you think. You have to think so, there isn't any other way you can explain me to yourself. You can't believe me, you can't dare to. Oh, Jamie..." I felt my face start to crumple. All this time spent hiding the truth, realizing that I could never tell anyone, and now I realized that I could tell Jamie, my beloved husband, the man I trusted beyond all others, and he wouldn't—he couldn't believe me either.
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I looked up at last, thinking that perhaps he had simply risen and left me, overcome by my revelations. He was still there, though, still sitting, hands braced on his knees, head bowed as though in thought.
The hairs on his arms shone stiff as copper wires in the firelight, though, and I realized that they stood erect, like the bristles on a dog. He was afraid of me.
"Jamie," I said, feeling my heart break with absolute loneliness. "Oh, Jamie."
I sat down and curled myself into a ball, trying to roll myself around the core of my pain. Nothing mattered any longer, and I sobbed my heart out.
His hands on my shoulders raised me, enough to see his face. Through the haze of tears, I saw the look he wore in battle, of struggle that had passed the point of strain and become calm certainty.
"I believe you," he said firmly. "I dinna understand it a bit—not yet—but I believe you. Claire, I believe you! Listen to me! There's the truth between us, you and I, and whatever ye tell me, I shall believe it." He gave me a gentle shake.
"It doesna matter what it is. You've told me. That's enough for now. Be still, mo duinne. Lay your head and rest. You'll tell me the rest of it later. And I'll believe you."
I was still sobbing, unable to grasp what he was telling me. I struggled, trying to pull away, but he gathered me up and held me tightly against himself, pushing my head into the folds of his plaid, and repeating over and over again, "I believe you."
At last, from sheer exhaustion, I grew calm enough to look up and say, "But you can't believe me."
He smiled down at me. His mouth trembled slightly, but he smiled.
"Ye'll no tell me what I canna do, Sassenach." He paused a moment. ... A long time later, he spoke.
"All right. Tell me now."
I told him. Told him everything, haltingly but coherently. I felt numb from exhaustion, but content, like a rabbit that has outrun a fox, and found temporary shelter under a log. It isn't sanctuary, but at least it is respite.
You won't be able to put it down!
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Wow. I went out and bought it at Barnes and Noble, LOL! I've read 6 pages and I'm hooked. (And I usually avoid first person POV!) I can't wait to get Gianna to bed so I can continue. Thanks!
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Let me know how you get on with Jamie. *winks*
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Did you know that Diana Gabaldon used a yahoo group for feedback on a lot of this? It was when the internet just started (early 90's) and she would post parts for comment. She has some interesting things to say about writing coming from a science background. (She has a PHD in biology)
Can't wait to hear what you think as you read more. I thought the opening was a little slow - but boy does she build momentum!
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Poor Jamie - she does put him through the wringer - and it gets worse because what she does save for the ending . . . *shudder* But escape you will - and you know my love of happy endings, so don't worry.
And it really is a read all night kind of book.
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Anyway, there are several chapters where she talks about writing and how she got into it and she gives tips on how to research (she had never been to Scotland until after this first book was published!) She has three kids and a husband with a good sense of humor and she's very Catholic and she loves to cook. I think you two would get along. :)
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