New Word: Retroliterary
After yesterday's post about the three books from the golden age of paperback originals (although the Goodis novel had originally appeared as a hardcover) I find myself wanting to rant against the notions of only reading what's current and popular. Instead I'd like to make a few generalizations about old vs. new and then tomorrow begin a sequence with three very different things I learned from those three very different books. I'll start it with the A. A. Fair book, Gold Comes in Bricks, and today's post can help lay some groundwork.
In earlier entries I wrote about vacating a session at a conference where two successful women authors were dictating what was right and what was wrong as far as writing a novel in today's world. They told a woman her protagonist was too old based solely on the writer's statement of her age. Not a word about the hero's story or what the book was about was uttered. Presumably the 50 some year old protagonist was not playing the part of an Olympic decathlete but was a successful businesswoman or aging housewife or some other appropriate role but it didn't matter to the speakers.
Keep in mind, they said, that many of today's editors are in their mid-twenties and won't understand cultural references made that pre-date Britney Spears; those must be avoided, too. And on and on.
Raymond Chandler said that writing for the market is a sure way to create something that will quickly sink to the bottom, fading away and taking the writer with it (or something like that). I want authors to aim high, take chances at will, be daring, just above all, create a good book. If you create something of quality, something truly worthwhile, it should find a home and it should find success. At worst, it helps the writer become a better writer. How could it not? And as I've said ad nauseum, producing better books is the surest fix for whatever ails the publishing industry.
I'm railing and I wasn't going to do that. Bad blogger. Deep breath, begin again. Read the old guys for:
Strong sense of style: It's missing in much of today's fiction which is too often filled with quick, short bursts, overwrought action scenes, and pacing too reminiscent of Arnold Schwarzenegger movies. Dan Simmons, on his site at www.dansimmons.com, is producing a series of essays on what he calls Writing Well. He's spending a lot of time on style and with his college lit background provides a lot of in depth information and analysis and is well worth checking out.
Use of simile and description: I'm not talking about spoofish Sam Spade passages and other ripoffs lampooning dated or now-cliched prose, but writing that was fresh then and still is now, probably because it's been forgotten. Why is that so? Dunno. Too many MFA programs to drum it out of writers? A marketplace that doesn't breed the sort of writers capable of writing a novel a month in order to make a living? A refinement of popular tastes? I submit that writing as well as one can as fast as one can will probably not produce a uniformly fine body of work but I do think as a training ground it can help one hone his or her voice and zero in on a style. It also accelerates the learning-by-doing of the craft of writing. The markets are different and this reality is no more.
Depiction of small town life: Most modern books now take place in either big cities or easily accessible suburbs or small towns whereas many classic noir settings take place in small out of the way towns no one from fifty miles away ever heard of. It's a smaller world now and not many places like this exist any longer. This gives them an atmosphere, a grit, that I don't find in books written about Florida beaches, Manhattan, or modern southern California. All those places are more similar than different, one not more alien than another. Not so of places like Lander, Texas in Charles Williams' Hell Hath No Fury. The small town becomes an exotic locale and adds to the style and atmosphere. I don't know if it's real anymore than I know if Rick's was a typical joint in Casablanca but it's absorbing as all get out nonetheless.
Some elements in these books are dated but that doesn't take away a lot for me. Sometimes there is too heavy a reliance on coincidence, sometimes a man and a woman fall in love after a single picnic, and there is no DNA or multi-million dollar police forces. None of this really matters when you're concerned about story and good writing anyway.
So these are some of the things I get out of reading from these unjustly forgotten masters. Not all their books are great but many, many of them are. And no matter what, I just can't get away from thinking how fresh and exciting a sixty year old novel can read when compared to most of what I read that's published today.
Can't we mix the two, write with the vivacity and vigor of a Peter Rabe and the atmosphere of a David Goodis with the characters of a Michael Connelly or a Randy White? Damn, I'd like to think so. We need to keep bringing back the old stuff first, bring it back into the light and make it part of what we read today. Keep going, Hard Case Crime, Stark House Press, and others. I really think we need you.
In earlier entries I wrote about vacating a session at a conference where two successful women authors were dictating what was right and what was wrong as far as writing a novel in today's world. They told a woman her protagonist was too old based solely on the writer's statement of her age. Not a word about the hero's story or what the book was about was uttered. Presumably the 50 some year old protagonist was not playing the part of an Olympic decathlete but was a successful businesswoman or aging housewife or some other appropriate role but it didn't matter to the speakers.
Keep in mind, they said, that many of today's editors are in their mid-twenties and won't understand cultural references made that pre-date Britney Spears; those must be avoided, too. And on and on.
Raymond Chandler said that writing for the market is a sure way to create something that will quickly sink to the bottom, fading away and taking the writer with it (or something like that). I want authors to aim high, take chances at will, be daring, just above all, create a good book. If you create something of quality, something truly worthwhile, it should find a home and it should find success. At worst, it helps the writer become a better writer. How could it not? And as I've said ad nauseum, producing better books is the surest fix for whatever ails the publishing industry.
I'm railing and I wasn't going to do that. Bad blogger. Deep breath, begin again. Read the old guys for:
Strong sense of style: It's missing in much of today's fiction which is too often filled with quick, short bursts, overwrought action scenes, and pacing too reminiscent of Arnold Schwarzenegger movies. Dan Simmons, on his site at www.dansimmons.com, is producing a series of essays on what he calls Writing Well. He's spending a lot of time on style and with his college lit background provides a lot of in depth information and analysis and is well worth checking out.
Use of simile and description: I'm not talking about spoofish Sam Spade passages and other ripoffs lampooning dated or now-cliched prose, but writing that was fresh then and still is now, probably because it's been forgotten. Why is that so? Dunno. Too many MFA programs to drum it out of writers? A marketplace that doesn't breed the sort of writers capable of writing a novel a month in order to make a living? A refinement of popular tastes? I submit that writing as well as one can as fast as one can will probably not produce a uniformly fine body of work but I do think as a training ground it can help one hone his or her voice and zero in on a style. It also accelerates the learning-by-doing of the craft of writing. The markets are different and this reality is no more.
Depiction of small town life: Most modern books now take place in either big cities or easily accessible suburbs or small towns whereas many classic noir settings take place in small out of the way towns no one from fifty miles away ever heard of. It's a smaller world now and not many places like this exist any longer. This gives them an atmosphere, a grit, that I don't find in books written about Florida beaches, Manhattan, or modern southern California. All those places are more similar than different, one not more alien than another. Not so of places like Lander, Texas in Charles Williams' Hell Hath No Fury. The small town becomes an exotic locale and adds to the style and atmosphere. I don't know if it's real anymore than I know if Rick's was a typical joint in Casablanca but it's absorbing as all get out nonetheless.
Some elements in these books are dated but that doesn't take away a lot for me. Sometimes there is too heavy a reliance on coincidence, sometimes a man and a woman fall in love after a single picnic, and there is no DNA or multi-million dollar police forces. None of this really matters when you're concerned about story and good writing anyway.
So these are some of the things I get out of reading from these unjustly forgotten masters. Not all their books are great but many, many of them are. And no matter what, I just can't get away from thinking how fresh and exciting a sixty year old novel can read when compared to most of what I read that's published today.
Can't we mix the two, write with the vivacity and vigor of a Peter Rabe and the atmosphere of a David Goodis with the characters of a Michael Connelly or a Randy White? Damn, I'd like to think so. We need to keep bringing back the old stuff first, bring it back into the light and make it part of what we read today. Keep going, Hard Case Crime, Stark House Press, and others. I really think we need you.
posted by Rick Ollerman at 6:25 PM
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