Definition of literary novels...

[pepperlandgirl]

What is a literary novel? How do you know it when you see it? How do you know it when you write it?

ETA: i know there has been ample discussion and debate on this topic in the past. I've read it. I'm still confused. Is it defined by what it's not? (ie, not genre, not mainstream, it's got to fit somewhere! I know, literary!). I mean, I know I've read it and I'm still confused. I'm assuming it's character driven, not plot driven, but there must be more than that.

[mdin]

If it was written by someone who is either a professor or is a student at an MFA program, or if it doesn't make any sense, then it's literary.

/runs away giggling.

[PeeDee]

That whole effin' section of books you pass on your way to Sci-fi/fantasy/horror/romance/interesting-books? That's literary. It's the stuff that's probably a minority on my shelves. I go from the above categories into "classics" and "non-fiction" and seem to give literary a miss.

[egem]

If it was written by someone who is either a professor or is a student at an MFA program, or if it doesn't make any sense, then it's literary.

/runs away giggling.

Literary novels are hard to define. They are not always written by a prof or an MFA. In fact many aren't. Literary fiction generally deals with people outside of a genre. If you write or read a novel that does not fall into a genre like scifi or thriller, it is most-likely a literary novel. Most of the works you read in high school or even college, I've found, fall into this genre. It's easier to point to works that are literary than to define the genre, being that it is massive, The Catcher in the Rye, The Bluest Eye, Libra, Infinite Jest, Cider House Rules, these novels and works like them are literary.

Some believe that literary fiction speaks to a higher level of writing. I'm not sure about this definition. I believe there are many liteary books out there that are crap, just like any other genre.

As for others that say literary fiction does not make sense, those people need to read more. Maybe they should even study writing a little more.

[popmuze]

In another post, further down the page, I define literary novels as those where the insights and commentary (into life, the characters, the way the world works, the way fiction works) are more important than plot and story. Also the sentences. You could go nuts trying to figure out the plot of Thomas Pynchon's books, but some of his sentences are the greatest ever written if you're just talking about using words to rapturous effect. One of my favorite writers is Stanley Elkin who also had trouble ending a sentence without at least 27 subsidiary clauses, nineteen commas, several parenthesis and at least a couple of semi-colons.

If that's not literary, then I don't know what is.

[aghast]

Well written in a sense that prose is more importat than sstory but it doesn;'t mean there's no story -- lot of literary writers like Hemingway write well and they also have good stories.

[mdin]

As for others that say literary fiction does not make sense, those people need to read more. Maybe they should even study writing a little more.


I was joking, but that's a pretty sweeping statement. Many people feel the same as I do. I spent many years in the "if it's not literary it's hack" college evironment, and I've analyzed enough lines of prose to realize understanding that particular art form is more about taste than education. Either it speaks to you or it doesn't.

It's akin to those squiggly-line paintings in art museums. Some people see them as masterpieces. To others, they're just squiggly lines. It doesn't mean those people are stupid or need to learn more about art.

I am a big fan of some literary fiction, but I cringe at most of the stuff out there these days in journals like AQR, etc.. I decided I have no use for something that's beautifully written if it's difficult to decipher or if the plot is tediously boring. I find that sort of writing much, much worse than stale prose with a crackin' good plot.

Still, I understand the allure. I manage to find all the beautiful writing I crave in the commercial and small press world. Most of it is hidden, but it's there.

[pepperlandgirl]

The question came up for me today because I think I'm starting a story that might fit into the literary category. It's certainly not genre...at least, not right now. I suppose it could morph into a romance or something, but I doubt that very much.

Unfortunately for me, while I consider myself a competant writer, I certainly don't write elevated or beautiful prose...so maybe it's not literary either.

[pdr]

Yes, we have been here before haven't we?

Literary novels are about ideas.

Yes, they are well written, but that doesn't mean long passages of multi-syllabic words and a plethora of adjectives and adverbs.

Yes, characters are more important than plot but the plot is there. A literary novel makes a reader think. A superb one by an outstanding writer like Margaret Atwood can tell a story, make you think and entertain you as you read it.

[DivaNicoletta]

If it was written by someone who is either a professor or is a student at an MFA program, or if it doesn't make any sense, then it's literary.

/runs away giggling.

I thought this was funny.
:hooray:

[emeraldcite]

Yes, we have been here before haven't we?

It comes up a few months, it seems. I think the problem is that we never have a real definition. I think it's undefinable. It's like trying to define faith.

The "I know it when I see it" clause comes into play. I think it would be worthwhile to identify literary writers and see if they have anything in common. Also, I think literary writing now, as a genre, is different than literary writing studied in most college courses.

Is there a connection between Chabon and Irving? King and Grisham? Wolfe and Roth? I don't know. Literary writing is a nebulous thing. You can't tell if the shoe fits until you try to stuff the foot in.

[egem]

[QUOTE=XThe NavigatorX]I was joking, but that's a pretty sweeping statement. Many people feel the same as I do. I spent many years in the "if it's not literary it's hack" college evironment, and I've analyzed enough lines of prose to realize understanding that particular art form is more about taste than education. Either it speaks to you or it doesn't.

It's akin to those squiggly-line paintings in art museums. Some people see them as masterpieces. To others, they're just squiggly lines. It doesn't mean those people are stupid or need to learn more about art.

QUOTE]

I love literary fiction, but do not believe that people who write in genre are hacks. I think, like everyone else, if it is good writing with a good story and good characters, interesting, and says something about the human race than it is worth reading albeit a literary novel, scifi, ect. I don't believe that literary fiction is the only good writing out there. How many times have you read popular fiction and thought, "Wait, this isn't very good, the plot doesn't even make sense." The same thing happens in literary fiction.

As for dadaism, I believe there was a literary movement for this, and it is dead. I agree with you that if you read many of today's literary magazines you will find a large amount of, for lack of a better word, crap. People entertaining themselves by saying that "this is art," and all trying to agree on what it means. I also believe that in every one of those magazines you will find one, two, sometimes three great pieces that would move anyone. The same can be said about any genre magazine. Not everyone that gets published is a great writer. Not every work that makes its way into a magazine is "good writing."

[blacbird]

Literary novel: n., adjectivally modified. A lengthy piece of fictional narrative no agent will agree to represent, unless submitted by an already established writer.

caw.

[MattW]

In college, I defined "literary fiction" as anything the writer considered art, and everyone else considered liguistic masturbation. Elements usually included hogsheads of angst, breaking grammatical rules because they stifled creativity, long passages on menstruation, and the ubiquitous dirty heroin spoon.

All said, it created an interesting environment in all my writing classes - "novelists" vs "writers." We each looked down on the other, but their critiques mattered more to me than the others.

[jules]

Literary novels are about ideas.
The same could be said about a reasonable proportion of science fiction.

Yes, they are well written, but that doesn't mean long passages of multi-syllabic words and a plethora of adjectives and adverbs.
Also could be said about a lot of novels in most genres.

Yes, characters are more important than plot but the plot is there.
Again, true of a lot of novels in different genres.

A literary novel makes a reader think. A superb one by an outstanding writer like Margaret Atwood can tell a story, make you think and entertain you as you read it.
So does Stephen King's The Stand, but I've never heard that described as literary.

[pdr]

Come on Jules, be positive.

Literary novels are about ideas.
The same could be said about a reasonable proportion of science fiction.

But in SF the ideas are usually scientific, future possibles in a 'scientific' other world.

In a literary novel the ideas are cultural and apply to our world now. Often a literary writer seems to be a writer who can bring together a collection of social mores just through telling their storyand make the reader rethink. Jane Austen did this. Often a literary writer, simply by choosing their theme, can make comments happen in a reader's head and by doing so create new possibilities.

People on this board frequently mention John Irving as a literary writer. I don't think he is, to me he's a contemporary/mainstream writer because he lacks that extra 'cultural ideas' in his writing.

[gp101]

If you want to earn a living, go genre writing. If you want a nice shiny statue, or piece of paper that says you're different, go literary writing.

Elmore Leonard makes me think of the human condition, as does Stephen King; one is a crime writer, the other primarily horror/paranormal. Their characters tend to be dynamic, well-crafted. But they're not "literary". Maybe if they lost their plots and humor, or left off their final acts (no satisfying, apparent ending, IOW), then maybe they might have a chance at the New Yorker.

[jules]

But in SF the ideas are usually scientific, future possibles in a 'scientific' other world.

In a literary novel the ideas are cultural and apply to our world now.

That's also true of some SF, though. Charles Stross's Accelerando, for instance, contains interesting observations about the phenomenon of the "generation gap" that can be applied to the present-day world just as well as they can to his future one. Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 491 was as much about a culture of praising ignorance and thrill-seeking that he saw existing at the time he wrote than it was about the book burning that its main plot focussed on.

Does that mean these books are literary?

[PeeDee]

Just write. Let someone else figure out where in the bookstore you're going to be. Everything is literary, except for the things which are not, and those are genre, except for the ones that aren't, and those are children's, save for the one which isn't, and that's literary.

Honestly, of all terms, I've always thought that literary was one of the more vague. These days, I see "The Grapes of Wrath" defined as literary (likewise, the college that I attended) and I would've never thought of it in these terms.

Give it a few years. Fifty years from now, someone will "understand" that the creatures of horror in Stephen King's works are actually metaphorical symbols about society and the darkened blite of the human soul, and with a literary set of books like that, Stephen King's stuff will be taught in universities.

"All right, class. Today, we'll be reading pieces from Mister King's Thinner and discussing how this reflects modern culture and society..."

[zeprosnepsid]

my personal definition of literary fiction has always been the following.
a. that it is fiction
b. that it doesn't fit into any other genre
c. that the writing itself is of some importance -- an attention to word choice, sentence and paragraph structure etc... that is not common in mainstream fiction.

I think of writing with a poet's flare for language. I don't write literary fiction. I do not give each word and each sentence that amount of thought. I am not a true master of the English language. But I believe literary fiction can only be written by someone who is.

That is only my definition though -- for a term that has no real definition, one is really as good as another.

But for comparison, here is wikipedia's definition, although i don't know if it helps at all: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literary_fiction

[pdr]

Re: Cultural ideas
Jules says:
That's also true of some SF, though. Charles Stross's Accelerando, for instance, contains interesting observations about the phenomenon of the "generation gap" that can be applied to the present-day world just as well as they can to his future one.

But Stross doesn't apply them to the present does he? The story takes precedence.

Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 491 was as much about a culture of praising ignorance and thrill-seeking that he saw existing at the time he wrote than it was about the book burning that its main plot focussed on.

Yes, but Bradbury chose not to write about it as a contemporary novel.

Does that mean these books are literary?

For me, no. I think when it comes to definitions in literature we have to find the ones we are comfortable with and work with those.

It seems to me that writers fall into two schools. The outsider, observer who writes because s/he has things to say about the human race. Perhaps s/he even hopes that the human race can learn something from what s/he writes. Often s/he is impelled to write because things in the human condition appal, scare or intrigue hir.

Then there is the story teller. Someone who watches people and likes to entertain them with tales about themselves. These tales can be simple and amusing or with a little more depth and reveal things about people.

Neither is better or worse. They are different.

[emeraldcite]

Another way to look at it:

I buy most literary books for style, not subject, whereas I buy genre or popular fiction for subject, not style.

It's not that literary novels and popular fiction never bleed over. There are great novels out there that have great hooks and great writing, but for the most part, I read Chabon because he's a masterweaver. He could write about the most mundane things and make it interesting.

Would I have picked up Mysteries of Pittsburgh, read the back, and said to myself man, this sounds great!

Probably not. But I do pick up genre and popular fiction, read the back, and buy it based on the hook.

Maybe that doesn't define literary writing, but I think it gives me a clear picture as to why I read what I read and how I choose it.

[Sophie]

Yes, we have been here before haven't we?

Literary novels are about ideas.

Yes, they are well written, but that doesn't mean long passages of multi-syllabic words and a plethora of adjectives and adverbs.

Yes, characters are more important than plot but the plot is there. A literary novel makes a reader think. A superb one by an outstanding writer like Margaret Atwood can tell a story, make you think and entertain you as you read it.

You have it exactly right even if the writer is not as accomplished and well-known as Margaret Atwood. There are many novels, perhaps even, from writing novices, that "tell a story, make you think and entertain you as you read it." The problem, however, is finding the agent or editor that will take such novels on. The commercial publishing world is geared to genre. Most of the money is in easily, quickly understood genre. In fact, many readers look for the same author who just writes variations on a first book that made it. I'm thinking of John Grisham, but there are many like him.

Still, I think there is a waiting audience out there that would enjoy the three components you mention--good story, make you think, and also entertain you. The great problem is how to find those agents and editors who feel the same way. Many write a good game about looking for outstanding writers, etc. It's probably to see their name in print somewhere and get some publicity. But when someone contacts those people, the general answer is a "Dear Author" rejection.

It's very discouraging, but writers have to write what they need to write, however it turns out.

[Mike Martyn]

It is difficult to provide a definition of a "literary" novel.

Moing instead to the "I know it when I see it" approach, Steven King's novel "It" or "Thinner" would not be literary novels whereas "Dolores Clabourne" would be.

Any thoughts?

[HapiSofi]

Literary fiction is either a social construct or a subfandom. The only reliable way to differentiate it from genre fiction is (1.) how it's packaged and sold, (2.) who reviews it, and (3.) what social cachet attaches to having written, published, or read it.

Egem has no idea what he's talking about. I note this dispassionately.

One cure for thinking that literary respectability has anything to do with style or content is to read the contemporary literary establishment's reviews of John Keats. He got trashed for being a jumped-up guttersnipe, a former apothecary's assistant who should have stuck to his trade.

[pdr]

Um, yes well, Hapi Sofi that was a snuffer of a comment.

One cure for thinking that literary respectability has anything to do with style or content...

So why doesn't literary novel exist?

[Arkie]

My simple definition of literary novel would be it's about what's happening inside the characters (internal pressures). The middle is somewhat rambling, and the ending is sometimes ambigious, leaving the reader hanging.


The commercial novel is more about what's happening to the characters (external pressures) and the ending is usually definite, but hopefully not predictable.

[HConn]

Re: Cultural ideas
Jules says:
That's also true of some SF, though. Charles Stross's Accelerando, for instance, contains interesting observations about the phenomenon of the "generation gap" that can be applied to the present-day world just as well as they can to his future one.

But Stross doesn't apply them to the present does he? The story takes precedence.

Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 491 was as much about a culture of praising ignorance and thrill-seeking that he saw existing at the time he wrote than it was about the book burning that its main plot focussed on.

Yes, but Bradbury chose not to write about it as a contemporary novel.


Both are writing about the world around them, as all writers do. Their settings are not contemporary, but the issues in their stories are.

[M.A.Gardener]

Okay, here's one for you... Donna Tartt's "The Secret History" is about a murder. It could be classified as genre. However, the prose is flowing (if somewhat rambling, at times), making it literary. I see it as belonging to both classifications. Anyone else?

[Medievalist]

What is a literary novel?

The decision about whether a novel is "literary" or not is a marketing decision.

Really. I swear. I've been there when they decide what size book a finished ms. will be, how the cover will look, and the cover type. The decision is not based on the writing style or "quality"; the decision is based on "where will book stores shelve this book."

It's marketing. That's why a genre novel of the past can become "literary," or evolve into canon fodder.

The term "literary novel" is so imprecise and meaningless that it's not used in library metadata catalog terms--it's actually listed as a phrase not to use.

[pdr]

Is this 'literary genre as marketing tool' fairly new in publishing? It's just that a long time ago at University we spent a lot of time discussing the literary novel.

[Unique]

So why doesn't literary novel exist?

It would be too boring to read.

JMO, of course.

[Medievalist]

Is this 'literary genre as marketing tool' fairly new in publishing? It's just that a long time ago at University we spent a lot of time discussing the literary novel.

No; it's been part of publishing at least since DeFoe and Fielding.

It's an unfortunate fact that there are some half-witted English department faculty who see "literary novels" as meaning "Novels In The Canon I Approve Of."

This means that "genre" fiction--say SF, or Fantasy or Detective novels--are excluded. This is becoming increasingly less common, as pop culture and post modernism butt heads.

[Diviner]

The decision about whether a novel is "literary" or not is a marketing decision.

It may be a marketing decision, but beyond that, novels like Ulysses, Life of Pi, Last Year at Marienbad and other explorations of form concentrate more on the writer's style than simple exploration of character or telling of a tale. Like abstract art, the works demand struggle from readers, a struggle that includes slowing down in the reading, savoring the language, thinking about the message. The best of these are works of art with attention paid to every sentence and no extra words and . The language is important.

Books that concentrate on character are marketed as literary, but they are only moderately literary if compared to literary stylists efforts. For the purposes of this discussion, though, books marketed as literary are often slower paced, more introspective, and more nuanced than genre work.

[Medievalist]

I'm going to try, very hard, not to be tendentious. But we keep having the same discussion, over and over, with the same unsupported assertions.

It may be a marketing decision, but beyond that, novels like Ulysses, Life of Pi, Last Year at Marienbad and other explorations of form concentrate more on the writer's style than simple exploration of character or telling of a tale.

The novel doesn't concentrate on anything; the writer does. Any writer who's serious about craft is serious about style. The assertion of "style" is a literary marker is, well, naive. Have you looked closely, really closely at Ulysses? Joyce has a very limited stylistic range; his style consists of the frequent use of a handful of rhetorical figures--few enough that he's incredibly easy to imitate--and an assumption of a shared literary heritage. Ulysses is really not that difficult, unless the reader is a naive reader. Some readers may find it boring or dislike it--but that doesn't mean it's necessarily difficult.

Like abstract art, the works demand struggle from readers, a struggle that includes slowing down in the reading, savoring the language, thinking about the message. The best of these are works of art with attention paid to every sentence and no extra words and . The language is important.

This is a particularly weak argument on both points; first, the assertion that "[literary] works demand struggle from readers." That's silly; look at the works in the canon. The works that "demand struggle" are difficult either because they're archaic, or because they're trying to be different, like Ulysses. By these criteria, Finnegan's Wake is a fabulous piece of literature--yet it's not exactly beloved by the literary establishment, nor is it generally a core literary work in terms of the canon. The second assertion that "The best of these are works of art with attention paid to every sentence and no extra words . . . The language is important" is true of good writing in general, of any sort. That's what writers do.

Books that concentrate on character are marketed as literary, but they are only moderately literary if compared to literary stylists efforts. For the purposes of this discussion, though, books marketed as literary are often slower paced, more introspective, and more nuanced than genre work.

When I said a marketing decision, I really meant that. If they can't determine a clear genre, with an associated design and placement strategy, then the novel is going to be general fiction or "literature." If it's obscure, or being published by a small press, then they may use "literary novel" somewhere in the catalog or cover copy. In the publishing meetings I've been to, the acquisition editor may be present, but often just sends along the collaterals; the decision is made by marketing, by people who haven't even read the novel. In some houses, where the editors specialize, the decision is made at acquisition time, and by the acquisition editor, or at the very least the editor is very much part of the process.

Think about this for a minute. Is Clarissa literary? How about The Great Gatsby? How about Gravity's Rainbow? What about Oroonoco? What about The Old Man and the Sea? What about A Wizard of Earthsea? Or Delany's Triton, or Neveryona?

Again, the attempts to actually define "literary novel" are little more than "I know one when I see it"--the Humpty Dumpty sort of logic that one sees so often in such discussions.

Writers write; good writers write with an understanding of prose style, plot and theme, character and voice. It doesn't hurt to understand the underlying genetic code of a particular genre if one is deliberately writing for a specific genre, but an attempt to be "literary" on its own is more than likely to be wretched stylistically as well as thematically because the style is driven by the characters and plot.

[pdr]

Food for thought for 2006, Medievalist. Thank you. So rather than say Literary novel you would say mainstream if the setting was contemporary or historical if it were Victorian?

I would love to have you talk about this in NZ. You'd ruffle tons of feathers and have all the writers swooning!

[Carmy]

It would ruffle some feathers in this part of Canada, too.

The few literary novels I've forced myself to finish have been boring and usually leave the reader guessing at the end. And that includes some by Margaret Attwood.

I read for entertainment and escape. I had no patience to delve into the minds of boring characters who have dreary lives with no satifying outcome at the end. Heck, I can talk to any of my neighbours if I want that, or read my kitchen sink.

The 'literary novel' writers I know appear to be doing so to please the University crowd, not to appeal to a wider audience. The focus is not on a story, which has a beginning, middle and end, but on a writing exercise which usually ends up looking like a bad first draft. There are many big fish doing this is small ponds, swimming around in circles as they pat each other on the back.

As for literary short stories -- have you noticed how many literary magazines have gone under in the last few years?

[Diviner]

The 'literary novel' writers I know appear to be doing so to please the University crowd, not to appeal to a wider audience. The focus is not on a story, which has a beginning, middle and end, but on a writing exercise which usually ends up looking like a bad first draft. There are many big fish doing this is small ponds, swimming around in circles as they pat each other on the back.



This has always seemed to me to be true. I have never been able to figure out whether it is pure narcissim or a dog-like seeking for approval. Entertaining is certainly not their goal.

But many writers pay attention to style and form, including Atwood, and tell a good story. Some writers, like Stephen King tell stories which don't interest me much (and are not considered literary) but which are very well written. I wonder if he is taught in universities?

The very diversity out there is a boon.