Confessions of a Literary Elitist
When it comes to the entity that is literatue, I have gone changed my stance as many times as I change my undershorts. In this dynamic transitition into where I stand today (and I may change my mind again tomorrow), there have been two periods in my life: I started out as an extreme literary elitist, and now I have learned to appreciate good literature. For anyone who has met the poor soul who refuses to read anything besides the best, it is a struggle to talk sense into them. And when I say the best, I mean to best- only the finest, e.g. Shakespeare, Vergil, Geothe and Scott O'Dell would do. For the uber-elitist, it is difficult to find someting to read on a daily basis.
I believe that my extreme literary elitism came when I discovered Steinbeck, then Shakespeare. It happened in two stages. First, when I read Steinbeck in seventh or eight grade, it was head and shoulders above anything I had heretofore read. I thought, "this is what literature is." All that crap about the theme, plot and essential literary elements came to light. I had gotten my first taste of good literature, and I wanted more. Little did I know that literature was like crack in the sense that once you had it, you craved it maniacally and would not settle for anything but the best. For better or worse, I met The Bard next.
I still have respect for Steinbeck, but he is not worthy of wiping the behind of Shakespeare, but to his credit few are. Note here that I believe that the finest works of "William Shakespeare" were actually written by Edward de Vere, the seventeenth Earl of Oxford, but that is discussed in an essay I have hitherto written but it is not yet blogworthy.
So I moved on to Shakespeare, before I may have been ready. It has been a blessing and a curse. My middle-school self deemed it the appropriate time to read Hamlet. I appologize if this is making some readers sick to their stomachs, but I went for it, regardless of how utterly cliche' it was.
In reading Hamlet, which was not an easy task, I was stunned by the incredible language, and the construction of dialogue. From reading it I learned a skill that has been exceedingly beneficial to me as a writer- I have this system of taking the dialogue, and running it through my head in a specific voice, and it allows me to determine emotion and if the dialogue is realistic. Note I know I am not special in this regard, but I do now posess the skill of writing halfway decent dialogue. I also learned what a truely great masterpiece is. I did not at the time appreciate it, but upon completion of Hamlet I knew that I held some form of greatness in my hands.
After reading the text of the play, I went on to read Shakespearian Scholarship, mostly Harold Bloom. Professor Bloom has probably shaped my view of literature more than I know nor would admit, but his immaculate criticism and praise were so profound that his writings themselves border on great literature.
Freshman year I emersed myself in some more Shakespeare, specifically The Merchant of Venice, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Romeo and Juliet, some of The Sonnets and The Poems, and A Midsummer Night's Dream. That, coupled with Bloomian criticism lead me to be an elitist before I was ready to be one. Granted, I was exceedingly well read for my age, (as I still am) but I did not have the fifty years of reading under my belt that Bloom had. Also, I had not written enough works on my own to be able to make such judgements.
Sophomore year, I was still the same elitist that I had been the past year. I will not discuss the nature of my English class or the professor, but I will say it was not me at my best. Regardless, I came across two novelists critical to my development as an intellectual and artist- Kurt Vonnegut and Francis Scott Key (F. Scott) Fitzgerald. The former is by no means one of the greatest of all the time, but as a second teir literary master he is qualified. The latter produced my favorite novel of all time, his immortal The Great Gatsby. This was the first time that I had encountered a work that was beautiful that was not overwritten at all, as some of Dickens and Shakesepare is by contemporary standards. Upon reading Gatsby a second time, I grasped its greatness, and as I am in the process of writing my own work of fiction I feel as if I am an heir to Fitzgerald. (It is this mindset that allows me to overcome my exteme anxiety and self doubt and lets my pen/keyboard do the talking. As a sidenote, I have found that musically, the best muses are Beethoven, Mozart, Juanes and Schubert- don't ask me why). Fitzgerald and Vonnegut shaped my view of literature, and allowed me to appreciate the novel to a fuller extent.
Since then I have read a fair amount of novels, and I see myself reading a few more novels in the next few months. My English class this year is Comparative Literature, and we do not read any novels for a short while, being scheduled to focus on some poetry and Homer's Odyssey. In Latin class, we are translating Vergil's Aeneid, which is something I have been wanting to do since I began studying Latin. See my post, "Diez Libros Leer" for a reading list.
Since I have dropped my view as a super-elitist, I have found some highly credible works of literature. Some of the hilights include Kafka's Trial, Wharton's Ethan Frome, Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms and Faulkner's As I Lay Dying. Unfortunately, I have also met some "less than stellar" works, e.g. Clemens' Huckleberry Finn and Hurston's Their Eyes were Watching God.
Over time, I believe that this shift in elitism is due to my dynamic definition of literature. At my most arrogant, literature was the finest and most reputable works of fiction the world has produce. Now I believe that literature is a work of fiction that has elements besides the plotline and is more complex than a short analysis of the plot. It is imperative to understand that all literature is not good literature. Good literature is much more difficult to define, and I am not ready to define it at this point in time. Regardless, I have come to appreciate all literature and I am now seeking out other works than just the immortal works to read, and contribute to my own personal style and understanding of written art.
I believe that my extreme literary elitism came when I discovered Steinbeck, then Shakespeare. It happened in two stages. First, when I read Steinbeck in seventh or eight grade, it was head and shoulders above anything I had heretofore read. I thought, "this is what literature is." All that crap about the theme, plot and essential literary elements came to light. I had gotten my first taste of good literature, and I wanted more. Little did I know that literature was like crack in the sense that once you had it, you craved it maniacally and would not settle for anything but the best. For better or worse, I met The Bard next.
I still have respect for Steinbeck, but he is not worthy of wiping the behind of Shakespeare, but to his credit few are. Note here that I believe that the finest works of "William Shakespeare" were actually written by Edward de Vere, the seventeenth Earl of Oxford, but that is discussed in an essay I have hitherto written but it is not yet blogworthy.
So I moved on to Shakespeare, before I may have been ready. It has been a blessing and a curse. My middle-school self deemed it the appropriate time to read Hamlet. I appologize if this is making some readers sick to their stomachs, but I went for it, regardless of how utterly cliche' it was.
In reading Hamlet, which was not an easy task, I was stunned by the incredible language, and the construction of dialogue. From reading it I learned a skill that has been exceedingly beneficial to me as a writer- I have this system of taking the dialogue, and running it through my head in a specific voice, and it allows me to determine emotion and if the dialogue is realistic. Note I know I am not special in this regard, but I do now posess the skill of writing halfway decent dialogue. I also learned what a truely great masterpiece is. I did not at the time appreciate it, but upon completion of Hamlet I knew that I held some form of greatness in my hands.
After reading the text of the play, I went on to read Shakespearian Scholarship, mostly Harold Bloom. Professor Bloom has probably shaped my view of literature more than I know nor would admit, but his immaculate criticism and praise were so profound that his writings themselves border on great literature.
Freshman year I emersed myself in some more Shakespeare, specifically The Merchant of Venice, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Romeo and Juliet, some of The Sonnets and The Poems, and A Midsummer Night's Dream. That, coupled with Bloomian criticism lead me to be an elitist before I was ready to be one. Granted, I was exceedingly well read for my age, (as I still am) but I did not have the fifty years of reading under my belt that Bloom had. Also, I had not written enough works on my own to be able to make such judgements.
Sophomore year, I was still the same elitist that I had been the past year. I will not discuss the nature of my English class or the professor, but I will say it was not me at my best. Regardless, I came across two novelists critical to my development as an intellectual and artist- Kurt Vonnegut and Francis Scott Key (F. Scott) Fitzgerald. The former is by no means one of the greatest of all the time, but as a second teir literary master he is qualified. The latter produced my favorite novel of all time, his immortal The Great Gatsby. This was the first time that I had encountered a work that was beautiful that was not overwritten at all, as some of Dickens and Shakesepare is by contemporary standards. Upon reading Gatsby a second time, I grasped its greatness, and as I am in the process of writing my own work of fiction I feel as if I am an heir to Fitzgerald. (It is this mindset that allows me to overcome my exteme anxiety and self doubt and lets my pen/keyboard do the talking. As a sidenote, I have found that musically, the best muses are Beethoven, Mozart, Juanes and Schubert- don't ask me why). Fitzgerald and Vonnegut shaped my view of literature, and allowed me to appreciate the novel to a fuller extent.
Since then I have read a fair amount of novels, and I see myself reading a few more novels in the next few months. My English class this year is Comparative Literature, and we do not read any novels for a short while, being scheduled to focus on some poetry and Homer's Odyssey. In Latin class, we are translating Vergil's Aeneid, which is something I have been wanting to do since I began studying Latin. See my post, "Diez Libros Leer" for a reading list.
Since I have dropped my view as a super-elitist, I have found some highly credible works of literature. Some of the hilights include Kafka's Trial, Wharton's Ethan Frome, Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms and Faulkner's As I Lay Dying. Unfortunately, I have also met some "less than stellar" works, e.g. Clemens' Huckleberry Finn and Hurston's Their Eyes were Watching God.
Over time, I believe that this shift in elitism is due to my dynamic definition of literature. At my most arrogant, literature was the finest and most reputable works of fiction the world has produce. Now I believe that literature is a work of fiction that has elements besides the plotline and is more complex than a short analysis of the plot. It is imperative to understand that all literature is not good literature. Good literature is much more difficult to define, and I am not ready to define it at this point in time. Regardless, I have come to appreciate all literature and I am now seeking out other works than just the immortal works to read, and contribute to my own personal style and understanding of written art.
posted by Brian Hillman at 5:21 PM
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