When Genre Fiction Goes Literary

[pameladlloyd]

I knew there was a reason, beyond simple pique, that I disliked seeing genre fiction being marketed as mainstream or literary fiction. Now Kit Whitfield, discussing Saki and Angela Carter's writings about werewolves, in her article "The Story of the Werewolf" in the farewell issue of The Journal of Mythic Arts explains why this is a bad thing for genre fiction.

Saki and Carter are too good to fiddle around with — they stand alone, and elaborating on them seems rather pointless. Besides this, they have both managed the trick we sometimes witness in non–mainstream writing: an author writes a story, in a certain genre, and produces something so well–crafted and intelligent that people end up not thinking of it as a member of that genre at all, but rather as a literary work, which happens to include elements of a particular genre but, as it were, rises above them. Write a good enough genre story, and it doesn't get considered genre. It's a self–perpetuating trend, because if all the best works get officially sublimated out of, say, the horror category, then what's left are the less advanced works, and any author who writes another good horror story will be likewise sublimated out of a kind of critical courtesy, so as not to confound him with the works that have officially failed to transcend their genre and remain just plain horror, romance, or whatever. With all the best examples labelled [sic] as something else, a genre's reputation sinks, ambitious and innovative writers start to avoid it, and it remains publicly perceived as trashy, even when there's no artistic reason why it should be.

What do you think? Is it bad for genre fiction when all the best works are labeled something else? Or does it help the status of the genre to have works that might otherwise be categorized as genre fiction be labeled as literary fiction?

Comments

[cedunkley.livejournal.com]

This is a problem. We've seen recent books that are clearly in the SF/F genre that literary critics either ignore or brush aside so as not to diminish the book.

If a book is greeted by literary critics as transcending the genre I would hope a book store would have a knowledgeable enough staff to also stock a few copies of the book in the proper genre section.

What I don't get is the writer who writes a genre book and then goes along with literary circles who intentionally ignore the genre label.

[pdlloyd.livejournal.com]

This is a problem. We've seen recent books that are clearly in the SF/F genre that literary critics either ignore or brush aside so as not to diminish the book.

I'm confused. Do you mean that the literary critics are simply ignoring the SF/F elements of a book when they review it, because to mention them would somehow diminish the book?

If a book is greeted by literary critics as transcending the genre I would hope a book store would have a knowledgeable enough staff to also stock a few copies of the book in the proper genre section.

Unfortunately, the move to big box book stores has meant that many, if not most, of the staff are not knowledgeable about books. The books are usually filed wherever the publisher indicates they should be. Alternatively, you may find that the books of authors who publish in multiple marketing categories will all be filed in one section, so that they are all together, instead of each being in the appropriate area. If they had enough books to file in both areas, I wouldn't mind so much, but that's rarely the case. I don't know as much about how things are filed in the library, but at least there you can go online and find books based on multiple categories.

What I don't get is the writer who writes a genre book and then goes along with literary circles who intentionally ignore the genre label.

I think, often, these writers are academics, as well as writers, and make their choices based on what they think will be best for their academic standing within those literary circles.

[cedunkley.livejournal.com]

I'm confused. Do you mean that the literary critics are simply ignoring the SF/F elements of a book when they review it, because to mention them would somehow diminish the book?


I don't think it would diminish the book, but I do believe the literary critic thinks it would. When they do mention it, it seems to usually be in the context of the book transcending the genre it belongs to, because it apparently needs to for the literary critic since they can't lower themselves to review simply a genre book.

[pdlloyd.livejournal.com]

Gotcha.

It's really sad. As if there's something terribly threatening about genre fiction.

It also seems indicative of a kind of prejudice that goes far beyond the literary genre divide: If every example of a category, any category, that one is willing to acknowledge as "good," is either redefined as not belonging to the category, or said to be an exception, then one can never see or admit that there is nothing inherently wrong with the category.