Comments on: Fable of My Deconstruction: A Response (of a sort) to Sonya Chung at The Millions

By: Will Certosimo

Will Certosimo — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 08:00:47 +0000

Have you ever considered about adding a little bit more than just your articles? I mean, what you say is valuable and everything. However just imagine if you added some great photos or videos to give your posts more, “pop”! Your content is excellent but with pics and clips, this website could certainly be one of the very best in its field. Fantastic blog!

By: best dishwasher

best dishwasher — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 08:33:24 +0000

Pretty good post. I just stumbled upon your blog and wanted to say that I have really enjoyed reading your blog posts. Any way I’ll be subscribing to your feed and I hope you post again soon.

By: Sharon Vedderson

Sharon Vedderson — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 05:13:51 +0000

Generally I don’t post on too many blogs but I just wanted to say that was great post. Great info. Thanks.

By: Terry Weyna

Terry Weyna — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 02:44:32 +0000

I read everything: literary fiction, science fiction, mysteries, fantasies, horror, slipstream, nonfiction in every subject. If it holds still long enough, I read it. Hell, I’ve been known to read the backs of cereal boxes if nothing else is to hand.
Without question, what most stretches my head is science fiction, fantasy and horror — and the slipstreamy stuff that combines all of it and/or crosses over into literary fiction. If you want to really exercise your imagination, read about another world entirely, with alien creatures. That’s not sitting back and being entertained; that’s using your head. Try reading some serious hard SF, like Robert Forward’s Dragon’s Egg, and wrap your head around the science that’s integral to the plot. Pick up China Mieville’s Perdido Street Station and try to picture the various characters and the city he has created, Bas-Lag. This is the work that makes your imagination go Zing! — not work set in this world, this time, this place.
Two of my most recent reads were P.F. Kluge’s Gone Tomorrow, an academic novel (and a really, really wonderful one, at that; finally, an academic novel that isn’t a satire, at least not wholly) and Richard Morgan’s The Steel Remains. Morgan was the tougher read, the one that took more out of me, that required more of my attention. Kluge’s was the escape, though it is clearly a more “literary” novel. Morgan’s will be hard to review on my blog; the review of Kluge’s novel practically wrote itself.
Snobs should do as you did, Bethanne, and read what they’re missing. Bet they’d change their minds.

By: JOANN

JOANN — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 18:40:44 +0000

What is Sonya Chung’s claim-to-fame anyway? I bet she is a lot of fun (NOT).
Margie, it IS snobbery when someone like this tootsie suggests that literature is the only way. To me, she throws the word literary around too much, as if it is a crutch she needs to help her. She even has called her own, upcoming novel, “literary fiction”.
I can hardly wait to see the reviews.
Right now I am going to her website to read some of her stories.

By: Keir Graff

Keir Graff — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 16:28:35 +0000

Great post–reminds me of an essay I liked last year, “Leaving Literature Behind,” by Bruce Fleming http://chronicle.com/free/v55/i17/17b01401.htm. I review both “literary fiction” and crime fiction and can’t imagine living without either. (And sometimes I can’t even tell the difference between them.)

By: Suzanne Arruda

Suzanne Arruda — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 15:54:39 +0000

At a faculty author’s reception, I once had a faculty member look at my historical mystery, turn up his nose and say “Oh. So you’re a market writer” in a voice that suggested that I ate children for snacks. I informed him politely that Shakespeare was a market writer, too. I’m in good company.

By: Virginia Guilford

Virginia Guilford — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 15:09:53 +0000

Maybe we should consider that it is not only ‘what you read’ but also ‘what you think’ that counts. My academic training was as an anthropologist and the habits of field work and observation of everyday life have stayed with me. Currently, my favorite reading is popular British women’s and children’s fiction written from the 1920s through the 1950′s. Just for fun, I am trying to create a mental picture of life at that time based on the clues provided in contemporary novels. Current favorite authors include Angela Thirkell, Barbara Pym, Enid Blyton, Elinor Brent-Dyer, Patricia Wentworth, Noel Streatfeild, EM Delafield. Most of their novels would be dismissed as mere genre fiction – and I do love the jolly stories. But the social history they reveal is fascinating to me, and every read and reread provides me with more to think about.

By: Gwenda

Gwenda — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 14:51:36 +0000

I often wonder if people indulge in blanket dismissals of genre literature because they haven’t tried it or because they don’t possess the imagination necessary to engage with the best of it as readers. The argument that only Blessed Academia or Lit Cabal-approved books can “augment” the human experience is COMPLETE nonsense and totally insupportable. I could go on, but I’ll stop.
Thanks for the post and looking forward to pt. 2. I’d somehow completely missed the one at the Millions.

By: David J. Montgomery

David J. Montgomery — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 12:29:16 +0000

p.s. I taught community college for 5.5 years and I don’t think most of my students even knew what a book was.
It wasn’t that they were dumb — although some of them certainly were. But a lot of them were from immigrant families, or lower-income families, or families that didn’t have books in the house for whatever reason. Even if those factors weren’t present, there just wasn’t a culture of reading among kids their age.
I’d have been ECSTATIC if one of them said s/he liked to read Dean Koontz. This type of snobbery is just so boring.