I linked to Garrison Keillor’s Death of Publishing article a while back and feel compelled to link to this collection of criticism. For example, Jason Boog of MediaBistro.com observes:
“‘In the New Era, writers will be self-anointed,’ [Keillor] writes in his op-ed, which is nonsense. In this new world, many more writers will self-publish, it’s true. But every one of them will have to build an audience just like he did. These new writers will use Twitter, Facebook, podcasts, blogs, book clubs, and all the 21st Century community-building tools at an author’s disposal, just like he used the radio.”
Maud Newton also notes, “Writers of books will always need good editors. Self-publishing is not a new phenomenon. Cf. Benjamin Franklin. Yes, publishing will change, but it will also continue to exist. And so, unfortunately, will ill-informed kids-these-days rants like this one.”
Had read that Op-Ed.
Thanks for this. Much more encouraged now.
I liked Keillor’s piece and I’ve yet to read the collection of criticism of it, but my initial reaction to this bit you’ve posted here could be summed up thusly: So basically a bunch of people who can’t write are now able to build audiences of people who don’t know what good writing is. This is only a win for literature in the same sense that those Saw movies are a win for the cinema.
How about those reading Dan Brown novels being a win for literature?
Jared, I think what you’ve said is good on the cynical side. The point the critics are making is that Keillor doesn’t have one. Writers aren’t self-anointed. They still must find readers, and many publishers aren’t the great friend of readers they claim to be.
But I wasn’t reading his original piece as a rail against building audiences. I read it as a lament of the death of the literati class. I know that’s pretty high falutin’, but I do think we’re losing something there. More and more readers cannot receive on the frequency with which literary writers broadcast. And for better or worse — I think worse — the democratization of publishing and the rise of gadgetry changes the way people read and write. I think it dulls the sensibilities.
I just read the collection of criticism, and I can’t find it in me to think of “werewolf and vampire porn” as contradictions of Keillor’s lament. I enjoy genre lit too, but the publishing world is rapidly going where the Christian publishing world has already been for years: all genre, no lit.
I don’t think the rise of social media and the glut of self-anointed writers with self-published works makes “literary” a viable category any more.
Yeah, that’s fair. I don’t think I understand your last sentence though. Do you think the rise of social media, etc. undermines literary works?
Yes, to the point of further marginalization of them and dulling of the appetite for them.
Somebody was telling me last year that in his son’s high school they don’t even assign entire books any more, just sections of the classics. So nobody reads all of Huck Finn or Wuthering Heights: they read a few chapters to get the “gist.”
This is all (partially) due to attention spans and ability of kids to read long blocks of text on a page as opposed to short bursts on a screen.
Meanwhile, the number of kids learning the craft of literary writing drops, and after they’ve received the anointing 🙂 they end up with fewer readers than the generation before them b/c who wants to read a literary novel?
I doubt it is only or mostly social media or self-publishing at the root of this problem. Primarily, it’s pleasure-driven lifestyles and idiotic education strategies like the one you mention. Also to blame are the literati themselves, who are self-referential and self-absorbed. We need more authors like Walker Percy, if I know what I’m saying here, who are great writers and generous people.
lso to blame are the literati themselves, who are self-referential and self-absorbed.
Well, I think some measure of navel-gazing has always aided the last great literary giants, but I think you’re on to something here in that the current crop of greats are not as great as the ones dying off. Who’s left? DeLillo? Writing at half his early genius? Is Roth still alive?
I fear that with Mailer’s and Updike’s deaths we’ve seen the death of the Great American Novelist.
But then again people have been saying that for generations, I suppose.
I still like Chabon and Auster.
Brandywine Books IS the new literati class. I’ve checked two books and a video out of the library in the past month based on recommendations found here.
And miles to go before we sleep . . .
I took Keillor’s comments along the same line as what I’ve heard veteran musical acts say about American Idol winners: they haven’t been out there (playing/singing in small clubs, etc.) paying their dues and truly honing their craft.