tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24992235.post115971953796258280..comments2024-03-11T05:59:48.984-05:00Comments on Costanza Book Club: Reading With IgnorancePacifist Vikinghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16630996018868040440noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24992235.post-1160150597278684042006-10-06T11:03:00.000-05:002006-10-06T11:03:00.000-05:00What social action, though? Unionization? Wage i...What social action, though? Unionization? Wage increases?Pacifist Vikinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16630996018868040440noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24992235.post-1160097646488046652006-10-05T20:20:00.000-05:002006-10-05T20:20:00.000-05:00i think of mice and men is a deliberate call to so...i think of mice and men is a deliberate call to social action.Robert Klosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09365699937486632768noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24992235.post-1160097573169128742006-10-05T20:19:00.000-05:002006-10-05T20:19:00.000-05:00i didn't like the pearl, either. i did, however, l...i didn't like the pearl, either. i did, however, like east of eden which indulges in biblical archetypes and i think grapes of wrath is a great novel because of its expansiveness. what i was trying to say about bellow is that the ideas and the character is there. but i don't need character-- kafka is one of my favorites and so is beckett.Robert Klosshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09365699937486632768noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24992235.post-1159798393160607382006-10-02T09:13:00.000-05:002006-10-02T09:13:00.000-05:00I think I prefer lit where "characters are embodim...I think I prefer lit where "characters are embodiments of ideas." It comes down to why we read. I read for ideas, not intimate character portrayals.Pacifist Vikinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16630996018868040440noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24992235.post-1159798338938964072006-10-02T09:12:00.000-05:002006-10-02T09:12:00.000-05:00I would also suggest it is quite arrogant to claim...I would also suggest it is quite arrogant to claim that it is only ignorance which allows an emotional impact. It could be for some individuals, the less-specific, archetypal portrayals have a deeper resonance than more unique character portrayals. But this is based on my belief that Steinbeck isn't writing propaganda.Pacifist Vikinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16630996018868040440noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24992235.post-1159792911488928132006-10-02T07:41:00.000-05:002006-10-02T07:41:00.000-05:00Once, in a flurry of hyperbole, I was telling Dere...Once, in a flurry of hyperbole, I was telling Derek Anderson that Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Faulkner, and Steinbeck were the four great masters of the modernist novel, like the four fathers of the church. He told me he didn't think Steinbeck was at their level; he was the great social writer, but his prose wasn't at that level of mastery. I tended to agree.<BR/><BR/>I think it is a serious error, however, to reduce Steinbeck to propaganda. Propaganda is a deliberate call for political action. "Of Mice and Men" has flat characters and a social message, but that's not propaganda. It's a flat description of the tragic nature of the current system, of the struggle for the working class to make it, etc., but it's at least an examination. It's not propaganda.<BR/><BR/>Besides, Steinbeck wrote some of these short novels (like "Of Mice and Men" and "The Pearl") deliberately to be flat. They were intended to be like myths, like realist fables, like brief stories of the tragedy of existence. When he wrote longer works (like "The Grapes of Wrath"), he was able to bring in a personal, alive nature to the characters and situations. This is why people still remember Ma Joad and Tom Joad so vividly (among others)--in "The Grapes of Wrath," Steinbeck created characters that were not only archetypal, but real, unique, personal. That was never his intent in the shorter novels (also, you have a sort of distaste for characters that are archetypal rather than individual, is that not the case?). I remember in "Travels with Charlie" hoping for the grand authorial explanation of the meaning of it all...and never getting it. Steinbeck was fully capable of the sorts of exploration you ascribe to Bellow, it was just never his intent to do so in the short novels.Pacifist Vikinghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16630996018868040440noreply@blogger.com