Bob,
Prescient words, perceptive observation...
Mark Twain is still the best medicine on the shelf.
Mac
On Sun, Apr 22, 2012 at 8:09 AM, Robert E Stewart <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Fascinating discussion.
> I am reminded of Twain's comment at the beginning of Roughing It:
> "...Its object is rather to help theresting reader while away an idle hour
> than afflict him with metaphysics, or goad him with science. . . ."
>
>
>
>
> In a message dated 4/22/2012 7:23:57 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
> [log in to unmask] writes:
>
> J E Boles wrote: A journalist, as Mark Twain had been, has in his
> experience the observation of enormous reader fear and reaction to the
> printed word. He has likely noted the occasional piece of writing which
> does turn around some social reality and make real change. Any former
> journalist writing fiction might reasonably hope for such change as a
> result of his works. Indeed, Twain's works are still making change today
>
> But for academics to declare a century and more later that Twain's works
> were in any sense failures or flawed is ridiculous. Academic
> declarations are not significant, compared to the overwhelming voice of
> a whole people's continuous attention to a work of fiction. Twain's
> characters and fictional events are permanently embedded in the entire
> culture of the Western World, and always will be so. There can be no
> greater achievement than that for a writer. The academic voice is
> rarely heard, and seldom remembered, in contrast.
>
>
> On 4/21/2012 3:45 PM, Lawrence Howe wrote:
> > Dear forum--
> >
> > I've really enjoyed the exchange that has been unfolding from Scott
> Holmes =
> > observation. Since my name and work was invoked at the beginning of
> this t=
> > hread, I feel obligated to qualify the basis of my characterization of
> Twai=
> > n's texts as failures. My position was influenced by Jim Cox's work,
> but I=
> > can't speak for him, so I'll offer only a clarification of my
> position. =20
> >
> > I have never suggested that his works are failures of literary art. I
> woul=
> > dn't return to them as often as I do if that were the case. I have
> little i=
> > nterest in the finding fault with the structural flaws that many early
> crit=
> > ics cited. I very deliberately avoid the questions of formal unity and
> str=
> > uctural consistency that New Criticism often hung its hat on because it
> thi=
> > nk those expectations are inappropriate criteria for a writer who
> processed=
> > his work as Twain did. To do so is akin to dismissing Picasso because
> no =
> > actual person has two eyes on one side of one's face. =20
> >
> > Rather, my argument is rooted in narrative theories that posit the
> novel's =
> > existence as a social genre, one committed to subverting the status quo
> (an=
> > d note that, from this theoretical perspective, not all narrative
> fiction i=
> > n book length qualifies generically as a novel). But in this regard, not
> on=
> > ly Twain's novels but all novels are failures. Now it might seem rather
> ab=
> > surd to think that a story about a fictional character could motivate
> anyon=
> > e to attempt to change the world. But novelists have often expressed
> their=
> > sense of having failed to achieve pretty big changes. =20
> >
> > This does not mean that novels have absolutely no social impact. One
> examp=
> > le of a novel that did achieve real change is _the Jungle_, but even
> when =
> > that example is raised, we must acknowledge that Sinclair himself judged
> it=
> > a failure: he was trying to bring down capitalism but the result of
> his e=
> > fforts was the FDA. Doris Lessing is another novelist who aimed for
> large =
> > social impact, and she dismissed her acclaimed _The Golden Notebooks_
> as a=
> > failure because it did not achieve the kind of feminist structural
> changes=
> > that she expected. The one example that often comes up as a challenge
> to =
> > my point is _Uncle Tom's Cabin_, which even Lincoln is said to have
> cited a=
> > s the cause of the Civil War. If Lincoln ever said that, I assume that
> he =
> > was being ironic. But Lincoln aside, I find it incredibly unsettling to
> th=
> > ink that it took a story about someone who never existed, who was
> nothing m=
> > ore than marks on a page, to inspire the sympathy of people who couldn't
> ge=
> > t worked up by narratives written by actual fugitive slaves. While the
> tra=
> > dition of sentimental philosophy cited the emotional affinity that a
> reader=
> > might feel for a character as a mark of that reader's sentimental
> pedigree=
> > , I find it more troubling that a character--an artifice--would generate
> sy=
> > mpathy where flesh and blood humans could not do so. Richard Wright
> apparen=
> > tly felt similarly because it was the fact that banker's daughters cried
> up=
> > on reading Richard Wright's collection of novellas, _Uncle Tom's
> Children, =
> > that goaded him to compose _Native Son_, a text that he was determined
> woul=
> > d shock those readers rather than move them to tears.
> >
> > What is most intriguing about Twain is that even when his books were
> popula=
> > r or critically praised, he signaled his sense of disappointment about
> them=
> > along the lines that I'm describing. But even more intriguing, and
> satisf=
> > ying, is the fact that he didn't just abandon novels given what he'd
> experi=
> > enced. He continued to push the edges of the genre to see if he could
> achi=
> > eve a social impact (I can see no other way to explain _CY_) or to
> expose t=
> > he unfulfillable promise of the genre of the novel itself. =20
> >
> > So I hope I've made the terms of my argument somewhat clearer. When I
> use =
> > the term "failure," I don't mean it in the sense that Hemingway did when
> he=
> > discounted the ending of HF_ (rather stupidly in my view, for without
> that=
> > ending the satirical and novelistic purpose of the narrative
> evaporates). =
> > Twain produced remarkably engaging, deceptively complex, and
> profoundly pr=
> > ovocative narrative literature. By that measure his career is a genuine
> tr=
> > iumph. But he also worked in a form that imposes rather lofty
> ambitions; a=
> > nd what his remarkably adept writing shows is that the genre of the
> novel t=
> > antalizes its practitioners into chasing its promise: that a truly
> successf=
> > ul novel can re-make the world. And that promise is more like a
> confidence=
> > game, as Melville suggests, or a Catch 22, as Heller does. =20
> >
> > --Larry Howe =20
> > ________________________________________
> > From: Mark Twain Forum [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Mark Dawidziak
> [hlgr=
> > [log in to unmask]]
> > Sent: Saturday, April 21, 2012 4:38 PM
> > To: [log in to unmask]
> > Subject: Re: Failures in the works of Mark Twain
> >
> > Just a thought tossed into what's already an extremely thoughtful
> > mix: there's a monumental difference between "flawed" and "failure." It
> > certainly could be argued that "Huckleberry Finn" and "Connecticut
> > Yankee" are structurally flawed. I'm trying to wrap my brain around the
> > notion that either of these books would be classified as failures. If
> > this be failure, please, let me write something 1/100th as good.
> > But flawed? Is there a work of art that isn't flawed in some way?
> > And just because something is flawed doesn't mean it's not a
> > masterpiece. In his introduction to an annotated edition of Bram
> > Stoker's "Dracula," scholar Leonard Wolf writes, "Let me say at once
> > that we have a complete masterpiece, flawed here and there, as the
> > Chinese insist masterpieces should be, but, nevertheless, the real
> thing."
> > Seems to me the same might be said of "Huckleberry Finn,"
> > "Connecticut Yankee" and many other Twain works. Which isn't to say
> > there are not failures within these works -- flaws, if you will. Even
> > the last third of "Huckleberry Finn" is now viewed in a vastly different
> > light, thanks to the scholarship of Vic Doyno and others. The appraisal
> > presented by William M. Gibson and others, if hardly overturned, has
> > been treated to a substantive alternate interpretation. Whatever the
> > view of this ending, or "Connecticut Yankee," for that matter, I'm
> > guessing that most of us would contend that we are in the presence of
> > the real thing.
> >
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message----- From: Scott Holmes
> > <[log in to unmask]> To: TWAIN-L<[log in to unmask]> Sent: Fri,
> > Apr 20, 2012 6:44 pm Subject: Failures in the works of Mark Twain I've
> > been aware for some time now that there has been dissatisfaction with
> > the concluding portion of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, but not until
> > this last year have I become aware of what seems to be a sense of
> > failure in much of his work. =3D20 A few weeks back I mentioned I was
> > reading Cox's Mark Twain The Fate of Humor and I was surprised at the
> > thought that Connecticut Yankee and/or The Prince and the Pauper were
> > failures. Upon finishing this book it seems to me that Cox felt most of
> > Twains work were failures. And this surprised me greatly especially
> > sense he seems to be so well informed on the topic. =3D20 I started
> today
> > on Lawrence Howe's Mark Twain and the Novel. This appears to argue that
> > the failures were not Twain's but are structural. Nevertheless, the idea
> > that there are failures or faults in these works surprises me. In fact
> > it disturbs me. I suppose this is because I am not a literary critic or
> > even academically trained in English (my degrees are in Geography). In
> > my mind, a book, in this case a novel, is a failure only if it fails to
> > interest the reader and/or proves to be unreadable. This is not the case
> > with any of Twain's works in my experience.=3D20 On further searching
> for
> > why this sense of failure exists I came upon a review of Cox's book by
> > Kristin Brown. It would seem that Mark Twain IS a Humorist and must
> > write humorous material, otherwise "Twain had attempted to suppress his
> > genius". This is the crux of my problem with the idea that there are
> > failures. This strikes me very much like the argument that Miles Davis
> > was a failure after he progressed beyond Bebop. An artist is not
> allowed
> > to venture away from their established genre. Humor might have been his
> > "strongest suit" but by no means need it be his only suit. Thoughts?
> >
> >
>
--
McAvoy Layne
ghostoftwain.org
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Diligently train your ideals upward toward a summit where you will find
your chiefest pleasure in conduct, which while contenting you, will be sure
to confer benefits upon your neighbor and the community. -Mark Twain
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