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I was observing a conversation (taking place online) the other day between Kay and some other chump on Plurk (which is a little like Twitter + Facebook, I guess) who was asserting that Tolkien and, indeed, most fantasy can't be considered literature because it doesn't meet the right criteria. And that we needed to respect her authority on this matter because she's in college for an English degree and she's spent an entire semester learning about this.
Be still, my beating heart.
That's pretty much like me sitting at a bar and having a nice pint of something and overhearing someone announce in no uncertain terms that my parentage is up for debate and that I likely wear last season's women's underwear.* I pretty much spent the rest of that morning pacing back and forth, ranting aloud. The person in question brought up issues of Tolkien not being suitable for the literary canon along with Hunger Games and Harry Potter, and then going over their criteria.
I looked it up. Said chump deleted the thread, but here they were :
1) Commentary on society at large or events at the time/in the past 2) Contributes to a literary movement IE. Romanticism, Realism, so on. 3) Significant impact on society at large
Personally, I think the whole thing is bunk. Canon is something that, afaict, allows cultural experts to dictate what someone needs to read in order to be considered cultured, ie, part of the educated mono-culture which has been in decline since it was discovered that subaltern groups can read and write.** Canon's just a tool like any other, really, just like genres are. Canon, the term 'literature', and genres are just things we use to help us talk about writing, and we shouldn't let them control us. I see people frequently forget that, though, and act like these things are divinely received wisdom. Whoops. You've got it backwards, friends.
Even through those criteria, almost anything that you see written still falls under those criteria though, depending on how you want to interpret it. Hunger Games? Commentary. Contributes to a literary movement? Children's lit? A genre? Dystopian fiction? Too broad. I feel like she should have taken better notes, but this is what she gave us to work with. Significant impact on society at large! That's my favorite. Oh my. To say that Tolkien hasn't had an impact on society at large is laughable. But! Even terribly written work can do that. Don't make that a criteria for literature unless you want to let 50 Shades of Gray and Twilight in, since those are big in the White Person Accepted Media Sphere while other, terrifically written books by subaltern groups that have great impact on the readers and members of their attendant cultures, sub- and counter-cultures are neglected!
The truth is, though, that words are literature. Anything written to have an effect is literature just like anything created to have an effect on people falls under the larger subheading of art. The terms and distinctions we make serve only to provide ways to meaningfully discuss the larger fields under certain headings. Using the terms like they've been used in the past to break away large parts of work from the collective and call them not worth studying loses us too much and disregards the efforts of too many trying to be heard, in my opinion, to be a moral act.
* Is black not in anymore? It's difficult to keep up, these days.
** After the Fact Trigger Warning : Snark.
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What, seriously?
Someone's getting an A in freshman comp and she thinks it makes her an expert? Pfft.
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Commence eye rolls.
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I think that we can all agree that college education is the road to being an expert in a field and should not be discounted. I do think it is a valid reason for taking someone seriously. With that being said, *sigh*
It is also supposed to teach you how to be a critical thinker, back up an argument or statement, and know the difference between an isolated topic presented in a class and the implications of making it a general ecumenical statement that is supposed to apply outside of whatever topic you are engaging it on.
I would present/argue here that going after her supposed education is not the valid point because education is a valid defense of expertise. However, going after her ability to utilize it, support it, argue it... now we're on to something. Just saying my two cents.
Oh, and Weston, as always, you're analysis is wonderfully educated, thoughtful, and impressive- even in rant form :)
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I guess she just didn't bring enough?
I posted the same rant to tumblr (because I have a tumblr, and because that tumblr is dedicated to me doing whatever literary shit I'm up to, so it seemed relevant), and it made it back to her because someone else re-blogged it. The rant calls her a chump, and she called the person who re-blogged it a fuckhead, so I guess my only other issue with her is her terrible aim.
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Ahem
Shippey's argument is meticulous. His exploration of Tolkien's pedigree is fascinating -- Tolkien discovered for himself the challenge of re-creating an entire literary tradition, the Nordic saga, and met the challenge.
One of the most difficult tasks of literature is immersion, placing the reader inside the story -- Tolkien added to the challenge by making a completely different world to put the reader in. It's a twofold challenge, and he conquered. Arguably all fantasy that followed him relies upon him, because modern readers now all accept fantasy as reality. He isn't merely a genre writer, but rather created the genre. Which is to say that he created a literary movement.
The Lord of the Rings, although steeped in an ancient tradition, tackles three contemporary problems: death, myth, and addiction. As well as the eternal question of friendship.
The War of the Ring has often been compared to WWII, but Tolkien wrote most of it in the shadow of WWI. Sam and Frodo's relationship is peerless in literature, because it was based upon Tolkien's immortal friendships with his trenchmates. All of whom died in the war.
In order to cope with death, Tolkien makes immortality a reality, placing human life among the ever-living gods (the Elves), and makes a continuous argument that mankind is superior because the ability to die is a gift itself. The unnatural man who strives to live forever is a wretched creature. We are lucky who may look forward to the end.
Tolkien's middle-earth is a re-creation of the western mythos. It's infused with Christianity, even while ignoring it. Not for Tolkien are the ham-fisted allegories of Lewis. Rather he expresses the themes and values of pre-industrial Westernism through a new modern poetry. Environmentalists in the 1960s rose up to oppose the new works of Saruman poisoning their communities. Feminists can embrace the suffragette-infused spirit of Eowyn. It is *the* modern myth of the twentieth century. Tolkien's two main blind spots are racism and monarchism, and for this we can say only that he was English and conservative, and we are neither.
And if this was all that there was, we could still say that he belonged in the canon. But there is still one more thing, personal instead of political. Tolkien is the first author to deal seriously with the problem of addiction. As our society becomes richer, our problems are now diseases of affluence. As someone who has needed, rather than wanted, to smoke another cigarette, I understand the call of The Ring. It is the curse of modernity that we are able to destroy ourselves through our desires. Tolkien was a prophet.
So there.
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Re: Ahem