Some of you mentioned here how frustrating it can be to have your reading choices questioned or criticized because of other readers’ reading prejudices. You know those readers, the ones who say “Fantasy stories? I grew out of those” or “Mysteries? I’ve never read one”. Yup, those readers.
Here’s a terrific quote from Walter Mosley that takes on this question. In Off the Page, Writers Talk about Beginnings, Endings, and Everything in Between (Ed. Carole Burns, Norton, 2008), he writes:
“In one way, you could see a difference between genre fiction and “literary fiction”. But really there’s an umbrella called “literary quality”. Everything that falls beneath that umbrella is literary fiction. And those books that do not are not. But a book that falls under the umbrella of literary quality could be a “literary” book, or science fiction, or romance, or thriller. Because what defines literary quality is the quality of the writing, not the subject, not the genre, and not even the author.”
He elaborates by drawing an example from his own works of literary quality:
“The best thing politically I like about the mystery genre is that if you write a book about a Chicano farmworker in central California and his trials and tribulations, the only people who read it are people who are that or who are interested in that world. But if a person is murdered on that farm, and you have a Chicano detective coming into that world and describing that world in order to solve the crime, then you have a much broader audience willing to find out about that world because of the genre. It’s one reason why I keep doing it.”
I’ve never read anything of his, but I’ve picked them up several times and would be more likely to actually bring one home with me the next time. Is there one of his books that you would recommend? Meantime I am reading another mystery of literary quality and I’m holding my head high when I’m asked about the book I’m carrying with me on these hot and humid commutes.
What do you think of Walter Mosley’s umbrella theory?
Thanks for all the comments! I agree that the subjective element of the reading experience would remain, but I really do appreciate Mosley’s attempt to alter word usage slightly, so that at least one of the common reading prejudices that we struggle against — the idea that genre writing is necessarily and essentially inferior — might be, at least, more openly challenged.
yes it is a nice theory, but who is to define the quality of the writing? I agree with Victoria that it is subjective. Any way you slice and dice the term “quality” some amount of personal opinion is subject to get in the way.
I’d like to see the idea of ‘literary fiction’ done away with altogether, because it doesn’t just suggest a different genre but a different *class* of fiction. This just serves to exclude people from reading books that they think may be too difficult or boring; and works the other way too when people won’t read fantasy/crime/sf etc because they consider it a lower form of art. I think Walter Mosley is right when he says we should look for ‘literary quality’ instead. But then we come up against new questions. What *is* literary quality? How is it to be defined when the reading experience is so subjective?
I like the theory, although I’m not sure it works. There are a lot of writers of “genre fiction” that are really superb writers but still get classified as genre writers, rather than being umbrella-ed into the literary fiction category. Alas!
I do agree! I’ve met science fiction writers who’ve argued that point for years. I do write about “genre” fiction at my blog, because it’s divided up that way in bookstores and I do think of it that way. But “literary fiction” is awfully vague, isn’t it?
Guy Gavriel Kay’s Under Heaven and Connie Willis’s Blackout are two of the best books I’ve read this year–literary novels, literary fantasies, whatever. And neatly categorized so they won’t be eligible for some awards…
I think the theory is spot on. Unfortunately, no matter how often I try to explain that to Those Readers, they seem to persist. It’s extraordinary how stubbornly people will go on believing what they want to believe.
I like it. It makes a lot of sense.
I just read his Little Yellow Dog from his Easy Rawlins series and it was fab. I don’t know how literary it was(I’m never sure what that means) but it seemed literary(well-written) to me.
I like it. It all depends on the quality of writing and the story they tell. I’ve never read any of Mosley’s work, but I think I’ll give it a go soon 🙂