Arts Book Reviewers— Who Needs ’Em?
posted by on May 10 at 14:41 PM
Posted by Sage Van Wing
There’s a great hubbub going on in the book world these days over the recent firing of Teresa Weaver, the erstwhile book editor at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The decision comes as mainstream papers all across the country are slashing book sections and printing reviews generated by wire services or one of the larger papers (only four stand alone Sunday book review sections are left). The National Book Critics Circle is circulating a petition to re-instate Weaver, and their blog has posted a stream of entreaties from mid-list authors in favor of the petition. The New York Times, in an article last Tuesday, hinted that literary bloggers may be to blame. Blogs like Bookslut and The Elegant Variation, the logic goes, have become so popular with readers that there is no longer any market for the published book section. Others have speculated that the readers in question in fact no longer exist.
The death of the American Reader has been predicted and bemoaned for some time now. A survey by the National Endowment for the Arts found that only 47 percent of Americans can say they read a book for pleasure the previous year. Finger pointing is rampant. Jonathan Franzen blamed authors for writing high-minded literary bullshit. Ben Marcus shot back. So did Oprah. Then last month in Harper’s, Cynthia Ozick dissed everyone. In a brilliant and excoriating piece, she blamed all book critics everywhere for turning into that worst of useless creatures- the book reviewer. According to Ozick:
What separates reviewing from criticism—pragmatically—are the reductive limits of space; the end is always near. What separates reviewing—intrinsically—is that the critic must summon what the reviewer cannot: horizonless freedoms, multiple histories, multiple libraries, multiple metaphysics and intuitions. Reviewers are not merely critics of lesser degree, on the farther end of a spectrum. Critics belong to a wholly distinct phylum.
She also, in a Camille Paglia-esque turn, blames literary academics:
Their confining ideologies, heavily politicized and rendered in a kind of multi-syllabic pidgin, have for decades marinated literature in dogma.
James Wood, Ozick says, is the only book critic left in this country who writes about books with an aim towards making broader literary connections. I like James Wood, but I’m a long way from thinking he’s the only book critic worth reading out there. I would point her to this piece by Christopher Frizzelle. Or this one by Paul Constant.
Not to toot our own horn, but not every newspaper across the country is getting rid of their book section. It’s true that the newspaper industry is changing. And the publishing industry is changing even faster. Mainstream book sections for the most part have dropped the ball in keeping up with these changes. But there ARE reviewers out there who are thinking about books in bigger, more creative ways. There are plenty of independent papers and blogs and excited book geeks writing, and thinking, and even putting on events to champion authors they love. Before we bemoan the loss of American book culture, perhaps we ought to look a little bit harder at what’s actually out there.
Addendum: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution also fired their film critic.
paul constant's reviews are consistently among the best in the stranger.
I totally agree, bing. They're better than mine.
Only 47 Americans read a book last year? That is alarming.
snipey @ 4,
Alarming, yet totally believable.
I read a lot of books, but almost never pay attention to book reviews. I don't trust critics enough to invest considerable time reading a recommended book that turns out to be shit.
I can’t get too upset about how few people read books. Most so-called literary fiction is complete crap. Particularly the *short* literary fiction. I mean, how many fucking stories do we need to publish about an aging professor who wants to pork one of his students? Or the family tensions of New England Jews? There are plenty of literary rock stars, but the whole medium is weighted down with nepotistic academics who’ve spawned a persistent and ubiquitous tradition of navel-gazing derivative shit. Nonfiction is where most of the really interesting stuff is happening these days, and that’s obviously going to be a much narrower market.
Paper’s just too expensive to support a genuinely experimental milieu like the pulps of yesteryear—kind of like the real estate market is massacring all the good experimental theatre.
thank you for using the word "erstwhile" correctly. It REALLY bugs me when people think it's some vague synonym for "esteemed" or "earnest" and use it that way.
oh yeah, the rest of this post was good, too.
Judah your awesome takes on things. I read your writings on your website and you have knack for being right on target with your viewpoints. I find it hard to disagree with anything you've said. yet. I like the piece on Heros and the writers for t.v. shows. I find that so right on the money.
Anyway As for books and fiction or nonfiction, I stopped reading them so much. I've been busy doing design and graphic illustration of stories into
vectored templates from my rough drafts. I got real deep in researching but thats about it. trying to get in some writers head what he was thinking after 1000s of pages of pros and cons is way to involoved for me these days.
Besides it is easier to surf facts and fiction these days with the Book called a computer. You find everything you want. Someones got to draw life. Not just read about it. I choose to draw. Am I bad for not reading books?
Uh.
My take is that the publishing industry sucks. I think that fiction writing needs the same sort of creative vibrancy that keeps music, theater and visual arts alive. What fiction writing needs is some sort of movement akin to hip-hop, with an local community emphasis and an outreach to match readers with books.
I haven't read a book in ages because I was too busy reading web material.
Right on, Judah. I think that you're right for the most part--most contemporary fiction is bullshit. Especially the young generation of rock star novelists. At the same time, the aging guard continues to shine. I hated Roth's Everyman, but much of what he's written in the last five years is spectacular. And Old Man McCarthy's The Road was stunning. I have my problems with Oprah, but her book club is a major contribution to keeping books alive.
On another note, does this notion of competing ideologies and isms and politics still describe most literary academics? I just graduated from college last year and can't recall anyone using the loaded term "feminist literature." I think most of the top-tier academics have moved on. It seems to me that those wallowing in these false characterizations are dead-end grad students still in the throes of postmodern theory.
Aren't Paglia et al. beating a horse that died years ago?
Or am I wrong?
It just occurred to me that I'm wrong. During my oral exam I spent a good chunk of time trying to convince a very senior professor that I didn't think Leaves of Grass was an "abolitionist text."
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