Bittercon --why we love bad writing
Why We Love Bad Writing. In the Guardian, writer Edward Docx bemoaned the popularity of such writers as Stieg Larsson and insisted on a qualitative difference between “literary” and “genre” fiction. Critic Laura Miller, writing in Salon, disagreed with most of Docx’s assumptions, but wondered what it is that makes the books of Larsson or Dan Brown popular when few people would argue that either is a particularly good writer. Miller suggests that clichéd writing allows faster reading than unique language does, and the very ordinariness of the prose in The Da Vinci Code allows an average reader to devour its 400 pages in a few hours. Is this true, and if so, is it the only appeal of “bad writing”? Or are “entertaining writing” and “good writing” two entirely distinct ways of evaluating a book?
I see this one as somewhat different from the endless "what is bad writing/what is good writing?" because it seems to imply that the reader recognizes that the book in hand is not well written, and yet she is enjoying it anyway.
Why?
Maybe you can't get away from the whole "what is bad writing" thing. Dan Brown's writing signalled 'bad' to me because everything about the characters was reported in cliche--phrases so overused there was no sign of individuality here. The characters were stock, just interesting enough to move the drama along.
Yet for millions and millions of readers, that was obviously just the ticket, judging from his sales.
This makes me wonder if his books are reread by any of those millions--revisited for insights one might have missed, different takes on scenes.
I can't imagine rereading one. Besides the issues of prose (and I recognize that my cliche is someone else's accessibility) Brown fails me on the Theory of Mind front--the fun part of literature when I'm trying to figure out who knows what, and how that impinges the action. I love it when A knows something B doesn't, and C misunderstands both A and B thinking that A doesn't know, and B does. Etc.
Everyone in the two novels I tried seems to have little or no interior life, their motivations entirely on the plot at hand. I never got the sense that as soon as the MacGuffin left their notice, they'd duck around the corner to the falafel shop to talk to their cousin from Florida, and do a crossword puzzle together. It was more like they'd vanish like smoke as soon as the reader passed on.
Maybe this is what many readers want--a linear plot at a fast pace, and standard characters whose arcs are comfortably predictable.
This is not to say that I like, or admire, difficult prose for the sake of being difficult. Too much of it seems to be watching itself prance and pose in the mirror; there's the self-proclaimed genius whose difficult prose seems (to me) to mask the fact that there is no insight behind the distorted phantasmagoria of imagery, and very little actual content. To me, that is actually bad writing . . . and I don't like it, so it doesn't belong in this topic.
So bad writing that I do like. Well, Georgette Heyer. Actually, her prose seems a mix of bad and good. At her best, she turned in some of the wittiest dialogue--and some cinematically comical scenes. But oh, exclamation points! Ending pretty much every sentence! Certain phrases that occur with deadening frequency, and the occasional unfortunate clanker like the tag "he ejaculated" after an explosive remark on the part of Standard Mark I Hero--or villain.
Enid Blyton. She apparently was extremely bitter that she got no critical praise, though she sold extremely well. She seems to have not been able to perceive why her prose failed the critics.
When I was a kid, I could imagine the interior lives of her characters to the extent that my memory of my internal fanfics accompanied my memory of the books. I was shocked when I found the books again some twenty years after I'd read and reread them--and there on the page were the stockest of stock characters, in prose so cliche-ridden it was actually painful in places, especially when minorities showed up.
Maybe "bad" writing has an element of genius in the ability to sketch just enough of a character so that the reader can then bring their own preferences to the character and give it life?
I see this one as somewhat different from the endless "what is bad writing/what is good writing?" because it seems to imply that the reader recognizes that the book in hand is not well written, and yet she is enjoying it anyway.
Why?
Maybe you can't get away from the whole "what is bad writing" thing. Dan Brown's writing signalled 'bad' to me because everything about the characters was reported in cliche--phrases so overused there was no sign of individuality here. The characters were stock, just interesting enough to move the drama along.
Yet for millions and millions of readers, that was obviously just the ticket, judging from his sales.
This makes me wonder if his books are reread by any of those millions--revisited for insights one might have missed, different takes on scenes.
I can't imagine rereading one. Besides the issues of prose (and I recognize that my cliche is someone else's accessibility) Brown fails me on the Theory of Mind front--the fun part of literature when I'm trying to figure out who knows what, and how that impinges the action. I love it when A knows something B doesn't, and C misunderstands both A and B thinking that A doesn't know, and B does. Etc.
Everyone in the two novels I tried seems to have little or no interior life, their motivations entirely on the plot at hand. I never got the sense that as soon as the MacGuffin left their notice, they'd duck around the corner to the falafel shop to talk to their cousin from Florida, and do a crossword puzzle together. It was more like they'd vanish like smoke as soon as the reader passed on.
Maybe this is what many readers want--a linear plot at a fast pace, and standard characters whose arcs are comfortably predictable.
This is not to say that I like, or admire, difficult prose for the sake of being difficult. Too much of it seems to be watching itself prance and pose in the mirror; there's the self-proclaimed genius whose difficult prose seems (to me) to mask the fact that there is no insight behind the distorted phantasmagoria of imagery, and very little actual content. To me, that is actually bad writing . . . and I don't like it, so it doesn't belong in this topic.
So bad writing that I do like. Well, Georgette Heyer. Actually, her prose seems a mix of bad and good. At her best, she turned in some of the wittiest dialogue--and some cinematically comical scenes. But oh, exclamation points! Ending pretty much every sentence! Certain phrases that occur with deadening frequency, and the occasional unfortunate clanker like the tag "he ejaculated" after an explosive remark on the part of Standard Mark I Hero--or villain.
Enid Blyton. She apparently was extremely bitter that she got no critical praise, though she sold extremely well. She seems to have not been able to perceive why her prose failed the critics.
When I was a kid, I could imagine the interior lives of her characters to the extent that my memory of my internal fanfics accompanied my memory of the books. I was shocked when I found the books again some twenty years after I'd read and reread them--and there on the page were the stockest of stock characters, in prose so cliche-ridden it was actually painful in places, especially when minorities showed up.
Maybe "bad" writing has an element of genius in the ability to sketch just enough of a character so that the reader can then bring their own preferences to the character and give it life?