"It is not the ctitic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."

~Theodore Roosevelt

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Literary Criticism

All through school we are taught to find 'deeper meanings' in everything we read. Like the author really meant to put all those little details and multiple layers and meanings of things based on their colors. So many people look into such things that I could Google 'color meanings in The Great Gatsby' and come up with everything I could have needed on the subject.

As an English major I knew I would have to analyze books and papers and do all those things I've been doing for years. But, see, those were all books I didn't care about. They were books I would have never read for pleasure and therefore I had no problem ruining any chance that they could have had to be entertaining by analyzing everything. This semester I have a 'Writing Literary Criticism' class that focuses solely on Twilight. Now, I know it isn't the best book from a literary stance and all that. I hear the jokes in every one of my English classes. I don't care. I enjoyed the books-read them many times. I don't think I can ever read Twilight for pleasure again though.

This class has warped my view of the book-and much of literature for that matter. And sometimes I think seriously about my goals to write books. I don't want people to rip them apart and dwell on what social problems can be understood through my writing or how my Mormonism affects every aspect of a story. I have read several books and essays based on understanding Twilight and looking into if it is healthy for Christian teens to read or what it says about our culture's view of love or what we can learn from comparing our 'broken' and human families to the Cullens. Who cares? It's a book. Yes, it may be interesting to someone studying culture. Yes, I can see how they would think it beneficial for English majors to understand. But oh how I wish I didn't have to know.

Actually, that goes back to our unit on women and how they are naive and wish to be left in the dark on everything. Yep, that's why I am in college. That's why I'm studying the meanings behind literature. But seriously, I don't think we are all as messed up as our liking a book makes us out to be.

All right, sorry, on a little rant there. Basically I think it is silly for people to be able to write books criticizing other books. Let books be. Let readers enjoy their books. I prefer to analyze books read in schools for that purpose.
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1 comment:

  1. Windthicket FablesMarch 26, 2010 at 9:59 AM

    Just playing the devil's advocate here- all those books we read in highschool and anazlyzed and wrote essays on- those books are full of symbolism because it was stylish for the time period, but the writers wrote their books in the same way you want to write yours. They were meant to be read. Not torn apart. THe same goes for classic paintings or sculpture.

    However, one can always know that their art or literature has reached classic status by what is being taught in schools. It was once my dream to write something so earth shattering that it would be disected in a high school classroom.

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