In Which Rolanni Flails About
Sunday, October 19th, 2008 06:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rolanniThere was at Albacon a panel discussion around the topic of saving SF from academia. I wasn't on it; Steve moderated; it's been blogged elsewhere by another panelist, who is firmly in the "academia is not the enemy" camp. I tried a short rebuttal in her blog, because I'm just as firmly in the "oh, youbetcha academia is the enemy" side of the road. I'm bringing it over here because I don't want to get into a spitting match with this nice lady, but I do want to explore my own thoughts on the matter a little more, because the...strength... of my reaction surprises me.
There are a couple things going on in the deep background behind that question. I'll try to be brief.
Point One
Science Fiction has had an Inferiority Complex almost since its mass market birth, when it was viewed (by academics, my mom, high school English teachers, and other Right Thinking People) as being on the same intellectual level as porn, and was often displayed on the same spinners in the newstands (yes, this was a looooooonnnnnggggg time ago, in a very different world). Since then, it has, as a field, Ached to be Studied. Because Study = Validation. Validation means my Work is Worthy, and writers, as everyone else, need to feel that their work has value.
What seems not to be understood is that academics don't study and write articles in order to Validate the object of their study. Academics study and write articles in order to Validate themselves. As more and more people become academics, they must look further and further afield for subjects, and lo! suddenly Science Fiction isn't genre trash anymore; it's a way to secure tenure.
Still, there will be some folks in the field who lust after that Validation, and who will write in order to be studied. If that's what floats their boat, then they're welcome to it; I'll just sit over here in the corner and write escapist genre novels.
Escapist genre novels.
*Walks around the phrase and admires it from all sides*
Yeah.
Point Two
I write, in the words of the immortal Damon Knight, for people's beer money. My mission is to give you an escape from the mundane world for an hour or three. I do not write deathless, finely crafted prose, my sentences arrayed on the page like rows of cut emeralds. I write space opera, fantasy, and mystery. I write to give people pleasure.
Now, yes, sometimes it's pleasurable to sit down with a book that makes you sweat for every nuance. But that's not the only pleasure to be had from reading. It's perfectly legitimate to read a book because it makes you feel good. This is what genre books are for.
In my humble opinion, college English courses are the main reason that so many people say that they no longer read for pleasure at all. It's this fantastical notion that everything must be analyzed for nuance, scrutinized for detail, examined to discover the Real Story that's hiding under the Apparent Story. The message that many take away from their English teachers is that the only Right Way to read is by the Analysis Method, and yanno? after a long day? Much too fatiguing. Wanna watch a Jackie Chan movie?
Point Three
Some folks want to make the "should we teach SF" question into a discussion of Good Teachers vs. Bad Teachers. This is a Red Herring. The question is not, Should SF be taught badly or well? The question is: Should SF be taught at all? And the answer -- again, from my perspective -- is No.
Teach Shakespeare, teach Tolkien, teach, by all means and with my full support, how to Read Critically. Critical reading is a Necessary Life Skill. But, please, do not teach genre fiction. There's too little fun in the world anymore, and reading is one of life's greatest pleasures.
Sigh.
Well, I don't know that I've solved anything, but I sure feel better.
Edited to Add: Comments have been frozen on this entry as of 4:08 PM EDT Wednesday, October 22, 2008. Pilot's choice.
Son of Edited to Add: Unfortunately, there seems to be no way to disable further commenting on the main post while still allowing the comments that have already been made to remain visible. So, the comments are now invisible, which is a pity, but there you are.
There are a couple things going on in the deep background behind that question. I'll try to be brief.
Point One
Science Fiction has had an Inferiority Complex almost since its mass market birth, when it was viewed (by academics, my mom, high school English teachers, and other Right Thinking People) as being on the same intellectual level as porn, and was often displayed on the same spinners in the newstands (yes, this was a looooooonnnnnggggg time ago, in a very different world). Since then, it has, as a field, Ached to be Studied. Because Study = Validation. Validation means my Work is Worthy, and writers, as everyone else, need to feel that their work has value.
What seems not to be understood is that academics don't study and write articles in order to Validate the object of their study. Academics study and write articles in order to Validate themselves. As more and more people become academics, they must look further and further afield for subjects, and lo! suddenly Science Fiction isn't genre trash anymore; it's a way to secure tenure.
Still, there will be some folks in the field who lust after that Validation, and who will write in order to be studied. If that's what floats their boat, then they're welcome to it; I'll just sit over here in the corner and write escapist genre novels.
Escapist genre novels.
*Walks around the phrase and admires it from all sides*
Yeah.
Point Two
I write, in the words of the immortal Damon Knight, for people's beer money. My mission is to give you an escape from the mundane world for an hour or three. I do not write deathless, finely crafted prose, my sentences arrayed on the page like rows of cut emeralds. I write space opera, fantasy, and mystery. I write to give people pleasure.
Now, yes, sometimes it's pleasurable to sit down with a book that makes you sweat for every nuance. But that's not the only pleasure to be had from reading. It's perfectly legitimate to read a book because it makes you feel good. This is what genre books are for.
In my humble opinion, college English courses are the main reason that so many people say that they no longer read for pleasure at all. It's this fantastical notion that everything must be analyzed for nuance, scrutinized for detail, examined to discover the Real Story that's hiding under the Apparent Story. The message that many take away from their English teachers is that the only Right Way to read is by the Analysis Method, and yanno? after a long day? Much too fatiguing. Wanna watch a Jackie Chan movie?
Point Three
Some folks want to make the "should we teach SF" question into a discussion of Good Teachers vs. Bad Teachers. This is a Red Herring. The question is not, Should SF be taught badly or well? The question is: Should SF be taught at all? And the answer -- again, from my perspective -- is No.
Teach Shakespeare, teach Tolkien, teach, by all means and with my full support, how to Read Critically. Critical reading is a Necessary Life Skill. But, please, do not teach genre fiction. There's too little fun in the world anymore, and reading is one of life's greatest pleasures.
Sigh.
Well, I don't know that I've solved anything, but I sure feel better.
Edited to Add: Comments have been frozen on this entry as of 4:08 PM EDT Wednesday, October 22, 2008. Pilot's choice.
Son of Edited to Add: Unfortunately, there seems to be no way to disable further commenting on the main post while still allowing the comments that have already been made to remain visible. So, the comments are now invisible, which is a pity, but there you are.
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(frozen) no subject
Date: 2008-10-20 04:48 am (UTC)Oh yeah, I could not agree more. I finally got my wife, who graduated years ago as an English major in college, reading for pleasure again by pushing some of my books on her. Thank you to John Ringo, David Weber, and you and Steve for making her enjoy books again!
- Jacques
(frozen) no subject
Date: 2008-10-21 06:02 pm (UTC)The same is true of my fondness for Chaucer and my deep love affair with Shakespeare. Neither of these would exist had I not studied them in an academic setting with teachers who knew more about them than I did.
(But then I'm thinking of getting back into education and doing an access course so that I can go and study Eng Lit at Cambridge, so what do I know?)
(frozen) no subject
Date: 2008-10-21 10:06 pm (UTC)But in my case, or my wife's case really, reading became a chore since school was busy, so if you read it was because of class, and class reading always required an analysis of the text, figuring out if/what sub-texts existed, looking for symbolism, and determining (guessing) what the author meant by the text, etc.
So in the end, my wife stopped looking at books as enjoyment.
And to be fair, are there books and authors I/we enjoy because of required reading at school? Yup. I too like Shakespeare (not a love affair, but at least a like), but I agree that this probably would not have occurred without school.
And to be further fair, the more I read and understand how other stories, characters, etc combine does improve my love for a story/universe. The Liaden Universe is great, and you learn a lot as you read the main books. But reading the Chap books gives you the side stories, the history, and additional context which supplement to the main book and cause additional questions and thought.
The same with David Weber's Honorverse. Sure, the main books are good and you want to know the progression, the continuation of the story, but reading the side books lets you truly get a better understanding of the characters and how things interact.
But, for me, these days, I come to reading more so to enjoy a story, to follow a character's journey, than to delve into the social commentary an author might (or might not) have meant the story to represent.
- Jacques
(frozen) no subject
Date: 2008-10-22 03:44 am (UTC)That's fair enough.
But I think it's just different way of interacting with the literature. I get that analysis isn't everyone's style. But taking literature courses as an undergrad didn't make me hate literature. It made me want more. Always more, more, more. And where are the applications for grad school? And can I please teach this? And never, never make me leave campus, or I'll die...
For me, criticism is an enormous three (or four) dimensional map that you (general "you", sorry) couldn't possibly explore in a lifetime.
Exhaust all of your passion trying, and you still could never get to the bottom of even one of the truly great books. Not really.
I don't feel that way about casual fiction. That's a one-night stand. Nice, but ultimately not for me.
Right now I'm working with Mary Shelley and Frankenstein. I may never exhaust the possibilities. It may not last, but right now I am in love.
There's nothing like it.
(frozen) no subject
Date: 2008-10-22 07:07 pm (UTC)My only complaint about academic training in literature is that during graduate school I spent less time reading the artists whose style I love and more time reading critical material that was atrociously written. Loved the info, but the prose generally reeks. Too ironic. However, that was necessary to get a good background & much less true now.