Subject
Re: Johnson-Wendel: "Time & Ebb" (fwd)
Date
Body
>From: goldsub3@rz-ruhr-uni-bochum.de
wrote
> if we are talking about quality, is it really our task to
>label a story as being "good" or "weak"? I think, this is perhaps the task
>of literary criticism, but surely not of literary scholarship.
In a detailed analysis of 60 stories, yes I think it's quite
permissible to call some of them "weak". If you look at the
studies as a whole you'll see that I also single out those
which I believe most accomplished ["The Return of Chorb"
for instance]. Yes - the sort of comparative evaluation
is literary criticism, not 'scholarship'.
>Are there really absolute criteria to discriminate the
>value of literary texts?
Absolute - no. There are just opinions (supported by evidence)
which are more or less persuasive. Literary judgements are an
Art, not a Science.
>I think, the task of literary scholarship is to unfold and
>extract the complex structures that hide under a possibly simple or even
>trivial surface.
That's what the analyses offer. Read them, and you'll see.
In fact the longer pieces focus very specifically on
demonstrating the complex structure underlying an
apparently glossy surface.
[Read "Spring in Fialta" for instance.]
> if VN was able to
>create a credible female narrator ... The point of interest is, why
>did VN choose a female narrator especially for this story about
>vulgarity and poshlost', and what may hide behind it? (And I'm
>convinced there is something hiding!).
Well, I'll tell you what I think lies behind it.
VN's rather dodgy [and no doubt unconscious] views of Woman.
... and if anyone else wishes to run after the
misogyny hare, keep Tolstoy, Dostoyevski, and Conrad
in mind too!
--
Roy Johnson
Manchester UK
wrote
> if we are talking about quality, is it really our task to
>label a story as being "good" or "weak"? I think, this is perhaps the task
>of literary criticism, but surely not of literary scholarship.
In a detailed analysis of 60 stories, yes I think it's quite
permissible to call some of them "weak". If you look at the
studies as a whole you'll see that I also single out those
which I believe most accomplished ["The Return of Chorb"
for instance]. Yes - the sort of comparative evaluation
is literary criticism, not 'scholarship'.
>Are there really absolute criteria to discriminate the
>value of literary texts?
Absolute - no. There are just opinions (supported by evidence)
which are more or less persuasive. Literary judgements are an
Art, not a Science.
>I think, the task of literary scholarship is to unfold and
>extract the complex structures that hide under a possibly simple or even
>trivial surface.
That's what the analyses offer. Read them, and you'll see.
In fact the longer pieces focus very specifically on
demonstrating the complex structure underlying an
apparently glossy surface.
[Read "Spring in Fialta" for instance.]
> if VN was able to
>create a credible female narrator ... The point of interest is, why
>did VN choose a female narrator especially for this story about
>vulgarity and poshlost', and what may hide behind it? (And I'm
>convinced there is something hiding!).
Well, I'll tell you what I think lies behind it.
VN's rather dodgy [and no doubt unconscious] views of Woman.
... and if anyone else wishes to run after the
misogyny hare, keep Tolstoy, Dostoyevski, and Conrad
in mind too!
--
Roy Johnson
Manchester UK