telepathic paranoia

I came here today thinking I wanted to write about genre fiction, and why it gets such a bad rap from most “literary” writers. But then, as I stuck those scare quotes around the word “literary”, I realized that was my story… what the hell does literary really mean?

Literary is a slippery little word — it gets used a lot by people both on the creative side of this industry, and on the money side (and there’s a false dichotomy if I ever saw one, but that’s a post for another day). Like any word, the meaning of literary is context dependent, and since it is used so differently in different contexts, a lot of confusion tends to arise surrounding it, and sometimes even bad feeling.

For example, writers who consider themselves “genre” or “mainstream” or “commercial” often use literary as an insult. In such circles, literary is taken to mean pretentious, plotless, boring, and inaccessible. Literary writers are often denigrated as writers who make their real money as professors (or something similar), so they can afford to write wholly self-indulgent books that appeal to no one but themselves and their friends. Harsh.

And then there are the people who use the word “literary” as a synonym for good, or well-written. For these people, pretty much any book they admire can be considered literary, even if it has space monsters or pirates or terse detectives. As long as the book is doing something new, interesting, evocative, or aesthetically compelling, then that’s all that’s necessary to be considered literary.

Then there are the publishing people — the people who really have to think directly about who is going to buy a certain book, and how to use that information to help everyone pay their electricity bills. For them, literary is often a simple classification, rather than a value judgment. Literary is a genre like any other, in that certain books that can be classified as “literary” will be most likely bought by a predictable group of people. Once you know who that group of people is, you can more easily market directly toward them, and thus spend your publicity money more efficiently. This system, of course, has a tendency to be a bit reductive — no matter how brilliant and ground-breaking your pirate masterpiece is, there’s a good chance someone’s going to shelve it with the other pirate dramas, figuring that people who love pirates are the most likely audience for a book about pirates.

On the other hand, if you write story about a faltering marriage on a windswept Nebraska farm, no matter how hackneyed, predictable, and poorly written it may be, someone in the industry is going to call it “literary”.

So it should be obvious by now why sometimes feelings get hurt when folks get together and aren’t clear about what definition they’re using. Someone might call you literary, referring to your most likely market, and you might think they’re calling you boring and pretentious. Someone might call you a genre writer simply because your book takes place in an imagined future, and you think they’re calling it formulaic and cheesy. Or someone might call your book literary, meaning it’s a meandering snooze-fest, and you mistakenly feel flattered that they’re calling you a genius in line with Shakespeare and Melville.

For my part, I try to avoid using the word at all — once a word has too many meanings, it ceases to have any useful meaning at all. How about you? How do you define literary?  Be honest, now…

Tags: definition, genre, literary, literary life, literature, pirates

Talking to a writer friend over drinks the other night got me thinking about the various paths to success in this industry.  Industry?  Or is it an art form?

Which kind of gets to my point.  Over the past few years, I have made the acquaintance of some very ambitious writers.  And on some level, I think we’d all like to be multi-published bestsellers as well as critical darlings with an assured place in the literary canon.  But at a certain point, most writers seem to make a choice – either they’re going to put all their energy into getting published, or they’re going to put it all into perfecting their craft.  And while the two approaches certainly aren’t mutually exclusive, they’re not identical, either.

Let’s take for granted that writers on either path will begin by writing a LOT.  Whether your goal is publication or aesthetic perfection, you’re not going to get anywhere without writing, writing, and more writing.

But that aside, the writer who wants, above all, the legitimacy of publication is going to take certain distinct steps toward his goal:  he’ll read all the agent blogs, follow the industry gossip, network with other aspiring writers, scan the best-seller lists, devour every book review that comes out.  All this research will help him discern what the popular trends are, and determine how he might “position himself in the current market”, as they say.  It will also prepare him to send out a dazzling query letter, impress people at conferences with his pithy pitch, and know exactly the right thing to say when an agent finally calls. It’s not an easy path, and it comes with no guarantees, but I think this route does prepare people for the realities of the publishing industry pretty well.  And if what you want is to get published, that can only be helpful.

On the other hand, the writer who is craft-focused may follow a pretty different path.  She’s going to start by reading a ton – the very best books she can get her hands on, in a variety of styles.  She may enter an MFA program, or look around for a hard-hitting critique group.  Or she may simply lock herself away with her work-in-progress and spend five to ten years honing it to near perfection.  She may seek out advice from the authors she most admires, attend writers’ retreats and conferences – whatever it takes to learn from the people who take craft seriously.  This is also not an easy path, and comes with no guarantees – but it’s probably the best bet for producing accomplished writing.

So then what?  Shall never these paths meet?  God, that’s a depressing thought – and not one I subscribe to.  From what I’ve seen, writers who are driven by publication usually find themselves working pretty hard on craft at some point, even if they come on it through the back door.  And those who devote themselves to great writing usually have to take a remedial course in “the bizz” before they find a home for their masterwork.

Still, even if our paths will inevitably cross here and there, we could probably all benefit from checking out the other route more often.

So lately I’ve been hearing from a lot of frustrated writers (though most recently from literary enfant terrible Steve Almond) about how the current publishing model needs to change, and we should all look to the music industry for a system that allows non-mainstream talent to find its niche and gain success.

It seems like a good analogy, at first glance. After all, writers and musicians are about equally arty, and both art forms are distributed via mass-media (as opposed to say, sculpture or… beadwork).

But as much as I love the idea of being the literary equivalent of Built to Spill or Gravy Train!!!!, I’ve spotted some crucial differences between music and literature. Musicians don’t need a label to distribute their work because they can build buzz and sell albums at shows. And it’s relatively easy for a band to get booked for small shows, because bars and clubs are desperate for talent. They won’t always pay, but at least there’s exposure and a fairly captive audience. If you’re good, it won’t be long before people notice.

Already famous authors can work a similar angle by doing local readings. But the world isn’t exactly clamouring to hear unknown authors read. The temptation for many of us is to put writing on the internet to build buzz, but the internet is the opposite of a captive audience. Only the very grabbiest, pulpiest fiction has a ghost of a chance on the internet (if produced by an unknown), and that’s very limiting.

Does it have to be this way? I don’t think so. I think it might be possible to create a world in which unknowns could read a few pages of their stuff to a room full of drunks and maybe get a little recognition, if they’re good — kind of like poetry slams, or amateur night at the Apollo, or the Gong Show. I’d personally love to see such a thing in action, but so far… I haven’t thought of any good way to make it happen.

So… I’m putting the idea out into the internet. Maybe somewhere out there is an unpublished author more desperate/enterprising than I am, and I’d be glad to jump on his bandwagon.

Tags: built to spill, desperation, fame and fortune, gravy train!!!!, indie labels, music industry, publishing, self-publishing, Steve Almond, writing