J E Boles wrote: I gather I may count on everyone here to hit the airwaves with academic criticism of my novel, if and when I ever get it done? And out there? It will definitely need expansion, deepening, broadening and enhancement from the academic quarter, I can guarantee you. Not to mention publicity. First novels rarely get noticed, and frequently do not lead to second novels. Notice is good. On Sun, 22 Apr 2012 11:12:28 -0400, Mark Dawidziak <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > One more thought: I wouldn't reduce this discussion to an either-or > argument. Twain is big enough to accommodate all kinds of views and > interpretations. And I certainly wouldn't want to see any polarization > along the lines of populist vs. academic approaches. We need both, and > Twain has benefited from both over the century since his death. I hardly > qualify as an academic. I've been a journalist and working writer for > almost 35 years. But I can't even begin to quantify and qualify the > number of times the work of academics and Twain scholars have expanded, > deepened, broadened and enhanced our understanding of Mark Twain. It's > all quite essential because we're talking about an essential American > writer. > > > On 4/22/2012 10:16 AM, J E Boles wrote: >> 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? >>> >>>