Who is the Great American Novelist?

[Argobot]

Saw this a few days ago:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/booksblog/2012/jul/23/great-american-novelist-tournament-final-32

Pretty good list! I'm actually surprised at how varied it is and that Ursula Le Guin actually got a (deserved) spot.

Who do you think will win? Who is missing from the original list? Is Nabokov really a great 'American' author? (Not even sure how I feel about that one. It's true that he wrote most of his most famous stuff while living in America and he obviously influenced the American writers that came after him, but is he part of the American author canon or is his a purely Russian author who just happened to write in English? Maybe he's a little bit of both! All I know is that Pnin was a great book.)

[MrHoatzin]

I think Nabokov is fair game. He wrote everything after The Real Life of Sebastian Knight in English, in the US, about the US, and those are his best works. Of all the ones that they put on the list, Pnin is the most wacky and curious choice. Pale Fire, Lolita and Ada are all amazing books that I wholly recommend. I should really give Ada another go; I don't think I ever finished it.

[juv3nal]

I would say Nabokov is fair game, but the "greatest American novelist" phrasing strikes me as ambiguous:

Is it a search for the greatest, nominally at least, American novelist?

Or is it the search for the novelist who wrote the greatest American novel, by which I mean the greatest novel that is somehow quintessentially about America? In the latter case, I can imagine the hypothetical where someone who has never set foot in America could qualify. I think it's pretty clear that the Guardian is after the former, but I think the latter is more interesting.

I love Bill Burroughs, for instance, but you'd be hard pressed to say, outside of his Billy the Kid obsession, that his books are about America or what it means to be American. They often aren't even set in America.

[Chris]

Interesting article! Much more interesting than most list-based articles, certainly.

I would say Nabokov is fair game, but the "greatest American novelist" phrasing strikes me as ambiguous:

Is it a search for the greatest, nominally at least, American novelist?

Or is it the search for the novelist who wrote the greatest American novel, by which I mean the greatest novel that is somehow quintessentially about America? In the latter case, I can imagine the hypothetical where someone who has never set foot in America could qualify. I think it's pretty clear that the Guardian is after the former, but I think the latter is more interesting.

I love Bill Burroughs, for instance, but you'd be hard pressed to say, outside of his Billy the Kid obsession, that his books are about America or what it means to be American. They often aren't even set in America.

I think the former is far more appropriate. Regardless of whether you're explicitly writing about the place you call home, you can't fully escape it. An American writer is an American writer even when he or she is setting a story elsewhere, just as a Brit writing a novel about India should still be placed in the British canon.

[gregbrown]

A big omission from that list that just hit me is James Ellroy. He's often unfairly shunned from literary examination because he uses pulpy tropes in his novels, but they nonetheless represent a coherent and searing portrait of the US through the 20th century.

[Chris]

A big omission from that list that just hit me is James Ellroy. He's often unfairly shunned from literary examination because he uses pulpy tropes in his novels, but they nonetheless represent a coherent and searing portrait of the US through the 20th century.

"My lack of inclusion is total bullshit." -James Ellroy, probably.

[Thyroid]

I'm surprised neither Herman Melville nor Mark Twain got a mention.

I've read very, very few of these writers, and there's a handful I hadn't heard of. There's always another book, isn't there? Or another two dozen books, as the case may be.

[Argobot]

Yeah, Melville's exclusion is the one glaring mistake in this list; Moby-Dick is the first 'real' American novel, so to not have him here seems really weird.

[gregbrown]

I'm surprised neither Herman Melville nor Mark Twain got a mention.

The list is just intended to survey the last 100 years.

[Thyroid]

Argh, goes to show why I should read more carefully and not read minutes after I wake-up.

[MrHoatzin]

I've had this kind of thing in the back of my consciousness forever—it recently resurfaced when a friend described Sal and myself to a third party as the foreign couple. When if ever will it be kosher for me to include myself and my work in the American canon? At this point, I've lived in the US longer than I've lived in Serbia. I am a citizen. A lot of my artistic development happened in San Antonio, I am very much a part and an evangelist of the art scene here. I feel a certain kinship with the cowboy artist archetype. Hobo Lobo is all about America...

But people will interpret my work as a product of some radical ornery Eastern European no matter what. Yet I am totally not speaking to any Serbian audience. I haven't the slightest what I would say to them. I don't really fit in either place—perhaps not as drastically as Nabokov who couldn't go back to Soviet Russia—but pretty definitely all the same. And while I don't have a foreign accent when I speak Serbian, my vocabulary and grammar are utter shit and for any kind of complicated conversation I have to either segue into English or take a gamble with sloppily transmuting Latin-rooted words into Serbian...

I don't think my work should be deemed any less American because I haven't been born American, just as it shouldn't be grouped into the Serbian canon because it doesn't fit there. Ultimately this kind of bird's-eye-view taxonomy has no direct bearing on my work. But it does affect the interpretation of it in ways that I can't quite grasp or anticipate. People are too eager to interpret shit through what they imagine I've been through. I don't know how to really feel about that.

[Chris]

I've had this kind of thing in the back of my consciousness forever—it recently resurfaced when a friend described Sal and myself to a third party as the foreign couple. When if ever will it be kosher for me to include myself and my work in the American canon? At this point, I've lived in the US longer than I've lived in Serbia. I am a citizen. A lot of my artistic development happened in San Antonio, I am very much a part and an evangelist of the art scene here. I feel a certain kinship with the cowboy artist archetype. Hobo Lobo is all about America...

But people will interpret my work as a product of some radical ornery Eastern European no matter what. Yet I am totally not speaking to any Serbian audience. I haven't the slightest what I would say to them. I don't really fit in either place—perhaps not as drastically as Nabokov who couldn't go back to Soviet Russia—but pretty definitely all the same. And while I don't have a foreign accent when I speak Serbian, my vocabulary and grammar are utter shit and for any kind of complicated conversation I have to either segue into English or take a gamble with sloppily transmuting Latin-rooted words into Serbian...

I don't think my work should be deemed any less American because I haven't been born American, just as it shouldn't be grouped into the Serbian canon because it doesn't fit there. Ultimately this kind of bird's-eye-view taxonomy has no direct bearing on my work. But it does affect the interpretation of it in ways that I can't quite grasp or anticipate. People are too eager to interpret shit through what they imagine I've been through. I don't know how to really feel about that.

I don't think you should wait on your friend to catch up to your identity. I think any immigrant is going to have that issue, for obvious reasons, but fuck it. To be honest with you, at this particular moment in history, I imagine it's simply more fashionable for an artist to be seen as having an ethnic identity with perceived flair, rather than to be simply perceived as "American," which is either boring or carries negative connotations depending on your perspective. And like the professor you mention in that blog post did, it's much easier to place someone in a School when you can lump him together with others based on an easy criterion like geographical origin.

[gregbrown]

I imagine it's simply more fashionable for an artist to be seen as having an ethnic identity with perceived flair, rather than to be simply perceived as "American," which is either boring or carries negative connotations depending on your perspective.

To expand on this, it's an outgrowth of the "write what you know" movement within creative writing programs. A unique background—whether it's ethnic, or geographical—is seen as your own edge over other writers, and a well of unique/personal inspiration. McGurl explains it a lot better than I can.

[MrHoatzin]

Funny. Both the McGurl book and the Dave Hickey presentation I linked to talk about the same sort of malaise in the face of post-WWII art support systems.

[Chris]

Christopher Hitchens has also spoken and written on the topic of having an internalized American identity that isn't immediately apparent to others:

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2005/05/on-becoming-american/3889/

[Gormongous]

I don't think you should wait on your friend to catch up to your identity. I think any immigrant is going to have that issue, for obvious reasons, but fuck it. To be honest with you, at this particular moment in history, I imagine it's simply more fashionable for an artist to be seen as having an ethnic identity with perceived flair, rather than to be simply perceived as "American," which is either boring or carries negative connotations depending on your perspective. And like the professor you mention in that blog post did, it's much easier to place someone in a School when you can lump him together with others based on an easy criterion like geographical origin.

I'll always remember a massive fight I had with some students in a postcolonial lit course over America's supposedly cultural homogeneity, compared to India or China. Between the Northeast and the Deep South and the Midwest and the Pacific Northwest, there's massive differences in American culture that approach the ethnic divides of many modern European states, but the melting-pot rhetoric is such a strong part of the discourse that people tend to see American culture as the negative space filling the gaps between older and more legitimate ethnic cultures.

[savdec449]

Was I the only one who smirked upon realizing Franzen didn't make the cut? His coronation seems like its been all but forgotten now that we're almost two years out from Freedom.

[Chris]

Was I the only one who smirked upon realizing Franzen didn't make the cut? His coronation seems like its been all but forgotten now that we're almost two years out from Freedom.

He's published four novels, which technically makes him eligible, but only two of those novels are highly celebrated. He's also considerably younger than most of the authors on the list (many of whom are dead). I think these lists tend to implicitly evaluate the body of work of a relatively full life.

Anyway, I thought Freedom was a really incredible novel.

[Thyroid]

The Corrections is well worth a read as well, though it's a bit pretentious in places (why use "diurnal" instead of "daily" I'll never know). I did enjoy parts of How to Be Alone.

I do kind of wish these more modern high-brow(ish) books talked about something besides a dysfunctional family, though. It seems that half the meatier stuff I run into is about that.

It makes me happy that "genre fiction" (whatever the hell that means) is finally getting its due. It's not like Jim Thompson doesn't write characters like the best of 'em.

[Gwardinen]

I do kind of wish these more modern high-brow(ish) books talked about something besides a dysfunctional family, though. It seems that half the meatier stuff I run into is about that.

At a guess, that also springs from the "write what you know" movement mentioned earlier. Family is one of the most common human experiences, which both means it's likely to be something the writer has experienced and means it's likely to be something the potential audience has experienced. Makes it an obvious common ground to interact with.

Not to mention, family is something that significantly shapes the worldview of many people. Even the lack of family, or having a comparatively "normal" family can have a profound impact on someone. Same kinda reason why there are so many pieces of art dedicated to romantic relationships.

That said, I do understand your frustration. Sometimes I want to read something that has relevance to my life, and sometimes I want to read something that introduces me to something entirely new.

[gregbrown]

I just began The Corrections, and by god is there a lot of Franzen's self-loathing packed into Chip. I'm only around 100 pages in, though, so it might be just a hangover from soaking in IJ (where Wallace seems to genuinely love all the characters).

[Chris]

I do kind of wish these more modern high-brow(ish) books talked about something besides a dysfunctional family, though. It seems that half the meatier stuff I run into is about that.

Lots of modern literature does talk about other stuff. I think the field is unjustly pigeonholed in that way; there's a huge range of material. Here are some currently-working authors I've read whose most recent novels (released in the last couple years) can't be described that way: David Mitchell, Umberto Eco, Ann Patchett, Hilary Mantel, Jeffrey Eugenides, Alice LaPlante, Michael Chabon, Haruki Murakami. Debatable: Hari Kunzru, Tom Perotta. No doubt there are countless more examples, but this is just from my recent experience.

[savdec449]

The Corrections is well worth a read as well, though it's a bit pretentious in places (why use "diurnal" instead of "daily" I'll never know). I did enjoy parts of How to Be Alone.

I do kind of wish these more modern high-brow(ish) books talked about something besides a dysfunctional family, though. It seems that half the meatier stuff I run into is about that.

Yeah, I didn't mean to say that he wasn't very good; I devoured all of Freedom in the first half of my short spring break. But, for me, he kind of has this old-school kind of ambition that I can read and enjoy but not be blown away by. I kind of think of him like I think of the bands that are swiping stuff from Springsteen, fun to listen to but not going to change my life.

[Chris]

Yeah, I didn't mean to say that he wasn't very good; I devoured all of Freedom in the first half of my short spring break. But, for me, he kind of has this old-school kind of ambition that I can read and enjoy but not be blown away by. I kind of think of him like I think of the bands that are swiping stuff from Springsteen, fun to listen to but not going to change my life.

To me what really hit home about Freedom was not so much its scale of ambition or anything like that; its value for me came, on the most direct level, in the truthfulness of its characters. Without going into specific personal context, there were many subtleties in characters' motivations and actions that were shockingly (in some cases, sort of distressingly) reminiscent of and accurate to--and, by extension, revealing with respect to--people within my own family. And although I know some people don't agree about this, I found Franzen's portrayal of his characters to be humane and generous (I haven't read The Corrections, but as I understand it, that is a big difference between the two novels?), which was very valuable to me in reflecting on those people in my life, especially during difficult interactions.

[Thyroid]

When you say "I found Franzen's portrayal of his characters to be humane and generous", do you mean that he presented them truthfully and as objectively as he could? Because he did do that in The Corrections.

I know what you mean about things being reminiscent of your own life. For example, the eldest son in The Corrections, Gary, struggles not to be like his father, but finds himself being like that anyway. This struck home for me; and, every once in a while, I feel the notch of that particular arrow still quivering.

You know, if you like characters so alive they breathe off the page, you would maybe like noir. Jim Thompson (who I discovered through Tim Schafer from an interview he did years ago) write some of the most believable characters in any fiction I've seen, and dissected them gleefully to show things about human nature most people would rather not think about. The Grifters is the best book I've read so far this year.

Lots of modern literature does talk about other stuff. I think the field is unjustly pigeonholed in that way; there's a huge range of material.

I know. It just feels like the literary equivalent of, say, spaceships in sci-fiction. Not all sci-fi has spaceships, but there are days when it feels like it does. The day I wrote that, I came home frustrated because everything I'd looked at had somehow been about dysfunctional families.