Possibly too neat a dichotomy

[oursin]

Further to this post yesterday, I have been trying to formulate a version of Tolstoy's annoying apothegm about happy and unhappy families to cover my sense of the difference between good and bad books and why I think it's possible to discuss bad books in general terms but with good books it has to be specific.

It comes out a bit IAMC (but naturalment).

Along the lines of 'all good books are different from one another (at least, they bring something unique to the mix)*, but bad books all have certain similarities (because of relying on stock characters, situations, tropes, etc without giving them any kind of twist)**.

I think there may be a further corollary about series, where there is often similarity and even a degree of repetition between books (Dallas and Roarke have Hott Sexxx! Richard has jealous whingeing snit at Anita! Spenser, Susan, and their bloody dog) but I'm still thinking about this.

Also about books which are using some particular formula and nonetheless work (possibly through quality of writing, characterisation, etc?).

But it does seem to me to follow that it's possible to talk in a general way about what the things are that make bad books bad, or at least unsatisfactory, and even if no-one else has read the one with the protag who's a werefox cop with disciplinary problems and a taste for doughnuts, who nonetheless does a lot of the equivalent of stamping her tiny foot, tossing her raven locks, and crying 'Fiddledeedee' before spraining her ankle, the general scenario will be o so recognisable.

*[I think this covers the issues of books which one realises are good but just don't work for oneself.]

**[Though of course some readers may be encountering these for the first time and going wow.]

Comments

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

Dunno. While I do think that Tolstoy got it either backward or pain wrong (that is, either happy families are all different or all families are), I do think there are at least a few ways for books to be bad. For example, I have left books unfinished that had at least reasonable plot, characters and setting just for having terrible writing. (I never believed telling instead of showing was such a great sin until I saw it demonstrated, all too vividly. That seems to be an especially common problem in recent mysteries, for some reason.)

[oursin.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, bad writing at the level of style - telling not showing, or clonk-clonk clonkety-clonk prose - another turn-off.

I'm not saying there is only one way for books to be bad: but I do think that one of the reasons they are bad are for reasons where one can perceive a similarity with other books that are also bad.

[hafren.livejournal.com]

I've always thought that what Tolstoy really meant was that happy families are damn difficult to write about...

[oursin.livejournal.com]

Well, applying the 'write what you know' dictum, Count L had very, very little experience of what a happy family might be like to start off with.

he was a true Poet, and of the Devil's party without knowing it

[livinglaurel.livejournal.com]

ZING

....altho I have always thought maybe part of the problem with describing happiness/goodness is, doesn't Aristotle describe happiness as basically a byproduct of right action/doing well/arete (OH GOD it has been SO LONG since I even glanced at Aristotle, as if that isn't obvious)? So happiness is complete in itself -- a final state. Suffering and misery, otoh, are easier to describe because they're ongoing; they don't have that completion.

(Possibly this is influenced too much by Julia's explanation of why the Junior Anti-Sex League exists to Winston Smith -- that after you make love you're all happy and complete in yourself and don't give a damn about who waves what flag -- but I digress.)

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

OT: do you know what has happened to the Feminist SF wiki, which now seems to have been made private? Is there an error, or were there troll/vandalism problems?

[oursin.livejournal.com]

Don't know - nothing about it on the blog.

[vito-excalibur.livejournal.com]

Pre-emptive troll treatment. I believe it's going to stay that way for a few weeks and then go public again.

[londonkds.livejournal.com]

Thanks. Pity, but I can guess why.

[vito-excalibur.livejournal.com]

even if no-one else has read the one with the protag who's a werefox cop with disciplinary problems and a taste for doughnuts, who nonetheless does a lot of the equivalent of stamping her tiny foot, tossing her raven locks, and crying 'Fiddledeedee' before spraining her ankle, the general scenario will be o so recognisable.

Yes, but see, that's sort of the problem I was talking about! If I say "Tossing her raven locks is annoying!" What can the rest of the panel do but agree, "er, yes, that is indeed annoying"? And then the panel is in danger of sinking into just talking about Stuff That Is Bad. Whereas if I say that Phedre tossing her raven locks is annoying, then you can point out that in fact it is one of the tools of her trade and she does it with full awareness, and then we are in a far more nuanced discussion of the different ways in which this trope can be used, and I think we are having more fun.

Although I should say that actually the panel seemed to go great and was probably my favorite one that I was on this year, so in reality, I did not think you should have done anything differently. :)

My understanding, btw, was that what Tolstoy was getting at was that happiness in a family requires like five thousand different factors all working out - there is enough money, the parents respect each other, the parents have been able to teach the kids to respect them, the parents like their kids, no one is being hunted by the police, there are no wildly incompatible cleanliness standards, no one is allergic to another person's favorite food, etc., etc. - so all happy families area alike because they all manage to satisfy those conditions, whereas there are at least five thousand different ways to miss satisfying at least one of those conditions and therefore be unhappy.

[oursin.livejournal.com]

If she only tosses her raven locks in the vicinity of the romance interest, rather than to distract the Bad Guy (while stamping her tiny foot with great force onto his), I think that is the bad.

Selfawareness and strategic use is the twist that makes it bearable. As I think I mentioned in that panel, I loved the account by highly respected foreign correspondent about using 'Ditzy Old Broad' tactics to get the story.

The trouble may be that I have read a sufficient number of books with annoying feisty heroines who do not seem particularly self-aware about themselves and their lock-tossing habits that they begin to blur into one another.

[rysmiel.livejournal.com]

I feel the sudden urge to include in an urban fantasy a form of magic based on summoning and binding death-aspected messenger spirits, such that the colloquial name for a defensive binding/warding against such is a "raven lock".

[oursin.livejournal.com]

And yes, that was a good panel. The 'Secret Decoder Ring' was pretty good but suffered from not opening it up to the audience at a much earlier stage of the proceedings I thought. Whereas the audience were integrally involved with strong or stroppy heroines.