Reading Shaping People, or People Shaping Reading?

Dear MC,
I suppose many people ghost write because the writerly sort often does not want to be in the public eye. I mean, this isn't the case for every writer in the world, because I'm sure Lauren Conrad didn't publish her book under a modest hand. But the kind of observance a writer needs in order to be successful normally involves a certain level of distance from other people. Some people feed off ego; others feed off of anonymity. It's nice that it's a choice to not put your name out there, otherwise we'd have a lot less inspiration due to discomfort towards publicity.

Oftentimes I read people who had no problem being in the public eye. Many of my favorite writers participated in countless interviews and even had a YouTube page (cough cough John Green, cough). But as I expand to include classic literature, I realize many of the most inspiring writers were not only okay with, but wanted to be alone. As I identify more and more with these authors, it's put my whole introvert/extravert battle at (more) ease. Reading Emily Dickinson, I realize that staying completely secluded isn't always the best option (her poems sometimes got a bit too dark), but while I read books like Les Misérables and Jane Eyre, I tend to become more isolated and introspective.

Dickinson

While this leads me to believe that reading shapes the person, I've also always been naturally drawn towards realistic fiction. As much as I would love to fully engaged by fantasy novels, that hasn't been the case for 19 years. I love people watching, so my reading often reflects just sitting back at an airport and watching people's dynamics. Even in fifth grade, when we were taught to "expand our horizons," I curled up with Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and felt completely satisfied with that series.

So do you think someone's personality shapes their reading, or does someone's reading shape their personality? I suppose it's one of those nature/nurture debates. And you know how I feel about nature/nurture debates. It's like walking into a candy store with a thousand dollars.

Peace and Ponies,
Kira

The Song-Novel

Dear Kira,

I'm glad you brought up this topic, because I have stuff to say about it.

I'm a big fan of analyzing music in the same way some people analyze books. A lot of music has a good story behind it, like the series of songs Led Zeppelin wrote about Lord of the Rings ("Ramble On", "The Battle of Evermore", and "Misty Mountain Hop"). Also, as you know, there are entire bands who write songs specifically about specific stories, like Chameleon Circuit and Doctor Who and The Ministry of Magic and Harry Potter.

Like you said, purely instrumental music can also be analyzed. One of my favorite pieces of classical music is the Appalachian Spring suite by Aaron Copland. This piece tells the story of a pioneer wedding on the frontier. A lot of pieces of music are written with the intention of telling a story in this way.

I'm always trying to figure out the story behind the song and how it fits into the singer's life. Like, I was fascinated when I learned that the story behind Eric Clapton's song, Layla, was that Clapton feel in love with Patty Boyd, which was a problem for him because she was married to George Harrison. I think most songs, as long as they're good and written by someone who cares about music, have some sort of back story. I call this the Song-Novel. The problem is songs aren't as easy to analyze as novels. Usually you have to know something about the life of the person who wrote the song to be able to figure it out.

Which is why I have no respect for people who consistently sing/perform songs they didn't write. I'm not talking about covers here; I'm talking about who don't write their own songs. It used to be expected that if a band performed a song, they wrote it. These days, while a some people co-write songs, most people have nothing to do with the creation of their songs. While it can still be a good song, it lacks any real sincerity in performance. Books that are ghost written have the same problem. To me, it seems really insincere to have someone ghost write a book for you. While I have respect for ghost writers in general; I think if you want to write a book, you should write it yourself. Do you think it's possible to write a good book if you don't actually write it?

MC

The Intentional Fallacy and the Literary-ness of Dubstep

Dear Maria Cristina,
Part of what made English 200 such a tricky class, was that it often offered contradictory views. As the Formalists and New Critics demanded that only the text be looked at and the author/reader were totally irrelevant, other theories such as psychoanalysis and New Historicism claimed that yes, the author's intent matters and you Formalists can get off your high horses. Get some sober horses instead.

I must admit, coming out of the class I was all "New Critic happy" and to me, nothing but the text mattered. Forget readers; forget writers--the work was coming out of thin air! I was so against authorial intent, I almost tried giving myself half vision, where I could only see the top halves of books, while the author's name would be a blur.

Except I didn't. Because that would be weird.

Since then, I've reconsidered my views on literature. 

I've found that the writer-text-reader inclusive theories are both more poignant and less narrow. Rhetorical theory allows the author's voice to grow stronger through the text, but not be dominated by the text. You can still enjoy a book without knowing an author's biographical history, but it enriches the reading experience to gain some insight on the context in which the author is writing.

Sometimes, however, the author can become overshadowed by the tone of the text. Take Vladamir Knabokov's (sp?) Lolita. We might read the text, and automatically pinpoint the author as a filthy, perverted old man. While he might just be taking a completely different perspective, it's easy to associate the author's perspectives with the text's perspectives. This happens almost constantly with actors. I mean, if I were to meet Daniel Radcliffe, the first thing I'd say to him is "marry me!" but the second thing would be "dude, you're Harry Potter!"

A piece of music that I would argue poignantly mimics this phenomenon is "Shadows" by Lindsey Stirling:

Her shadow has all the complex dance moves that hold our attention, while the artist is seemingly left in the background. At times, she seems to be copying the creation, rather than the creation copying her. That's not to say this always happens in literature, but sometimes the author becomes the text.

Which leads me to a question: Do you think music can be studied in the same way literature can? I know at the tail end of English 201 we studied The Sex Pistols in relation to Shakespeare. Was that stretching it too far? Or could we use the same methods to deconstruct music as we use for deconstructing literature? It's especially interesting with music sans lyrics. There's still a certain tone, a certain effect it has on the audience, but could musical methods be akin to rhetorical devices?

Peace and Ponies,
Kira
(I almost had to pause and try to remember what my spiritual name was. Then I remembered I didn't have a spiritual name. Has it only been 2 days?).

The Memoir Dilemma

Dear Kira,

Again, I must answer your question with both a yes and a no.

I have a lot less experience with memoir than you, but I disagree with you when you say that 'memoirs' are disregarded as classics; The Diary of Anne Frank and Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass are two very good examples of classic memoirs. One of the earliest memoirs ever written, The Confessions of St. Augustine, is now considered a foundational text in Western Philosophy and Christianity. I guess the key to a classic memoir is to move beyond writing humorous stories about your life and personal experiences and write something that can transcend its genere to make a broader statement about life in general.

This all, of course, depends on what you define as a memoir. I have a very inclusive definition of the word. To me, a memoir is anything that somebody writes about their life. One can find published collections of letters and journals by many famous authors and political figures. For example, the letters  of Abraham Lincoln (particularly the Bixby letter) are widely read by some people (but not by me). I don't know if you would consider this a 'memoir', but, if you do, then it is certainly a classic. (And, if you want to talk about biographies, there's a whole mountain of classic texts from Plutarch's Lives to the epic, biographical poem John Brown's Body.)

Besides that, there are a ton of classic novels that read suspiciously like autobiographies  My personal favorite is David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens. Many historians have pointed out similarities between the lives of Copperfield and Dickens; David even became a novelist!

I know that these aren't the sort of memoirs you're thinking of. But, I think its important to remember that, until recently  creative non-fiction for the sake of creative non-fiction was sort of looked down on. Memoirs are experiencing a surge in popularity right now, but a few hundred years ago, if you someone wanted to write about their life, they would probably do it in the form of fiction. So, I can sympathize with your memoir woe in that respect.

This brings up a question that I'm sure we both discussed in English 200 and that we perhaps even touched on in this blog before. How important are the author's autobiographical details in understanding a novel? If David Copperfield was a wholly fictional piece, would it still have the same emotional impact? Would it still be considered a classic?

I hope so.

Maria