Toothlessjoe
2008-10-26, 23:39
Tonight, in anticipation of a long diatribe against past literary theory that I will soon help someone write, I commit literary heresy. However, I hope to establish a glimpse, if nothing else, of something that I see as inevitable.
I find it strange that people would call today's literature "postmodern." Alternatively, some may define it as "post-postmodern," which really gives no practical definition at all. You might have a general idea of what "postmodern" means, but to say something is "post-postmodern" is really just saying "whatever the hell has come after postmodernism." It's absolutely useless, and a postmodern construct itself (in spite of the post-structuralism).
So where are we, exactly, in a literary sense? Well, let's be frank: literature, in the modern american sense, is virtually dead. Such a statement, of course, doesn't imply that writers aren't writing; it doesn't imply that editors aren't editing or critics aren't criticizing. What it means is far more catastrophic, in terms of the literary establishment, and far more urgent: contemporary literature, by and large, is syphoned through the past. It no longer reflects today's world, and when it does reflect current society it is largely ignored. Literature has entered a stage of regression, in contrast to its past progression.
We don't live in a realist world. We aren't in the modernist era, and the postmodern era effectively ended decades ago. Where we're at, nobody's too sure; and so they call it "post-postmodernism," in an attempt to define the undefined. Meta-fiction is fine and dandy, too, but it doesn't reflect our current age at all. The self-reflective literary work is indeed reflective itself of mankind at this moment in history, but it's an overdone and overused device.
Granted, some have indeed tried to define "post-postmodernism." Some have hailed it as a renewal of faith and utopian sentiment, a backlash against the extreme scepticism of the postmodern era. Some claim that it rejects both truth and falsehood, regardless of the cultural origins. Some scry that it rejects objectivism and yet also rejects the subjectivism of postmodernity, insisting that both are incomplete or can be wholly discarded.
Really, there's no cohesive definition--which makes it impossible to argue. Even in academia, the term hasn't worked too well. Normally, academics can run around in circles with a nonsensical phrase--sophistry at its finest. But still, they've not been able to reach a true definition, and one can rationally conclude (however much you reject rationalism) that they aren't interested in defining it.
Indeed, academia is entirely responsible for the current crisis in literature; they insist upon writing the future on stone tablets. The fact is, those literary academics are near synonymous with the same literary critics who proclaim all literature written after 1980 to be scarcely literature at all. In short, by announcing the death of new literature, they proclaim an end to history--for it is historical circumstance that shapes the ideas and conditions of a writer, which--intenionally or not--will always come to the forefront of any major work. In order to judge the present state of literature through past models, one can only disregard--intentionally or unintentionally--the entire future and the material circumstances that bear it.
Literature is NOT timeless. The children of today will not, nor will ever again in the history of humankind, relate to Hamlet in any real sense. Hamlet will always be remote precisely because Hamlet is remote; he belongs to a time far in the past, along with his concerns and values. Sure, we can dream of the past, especially if our culture finds its roots in the past literary works such as in this case; but a Hamlet written today would be a far cry from the Hamlet of yesterday. With the material circumstances, humanity itself has changed. We are no longer Elizabethan Drama drones, and the exuberant boredom of every child in a High School English class reflects this: they do not relate to the world of shakespeare, and the few relations they do have rarely coagulate into a cohesive interest in regressive fiction. Children are bored with literature because literature is bored with the contemporary world.
Yet, the question remains: if we are not at a stage yet defined by the literary establishment, then where are we? And I would answer that we are at a stage in which the literary establishment, by and large, dies. They could not foresee it because it is beyond their own self-centered imagination. The author is not dead, despite proclamations by the postmodernists; the novel is not dead, despite the instant, mind-numbing pleasure of television and the internet. The literary establishment itself has died: it has made itself irrelevant in its reactionary romanticism of past literary models.
A great many constituents of the literary status quo have decried the death of the "great american novel." With all of the malice in their soft bones, they've recently coined a new term to describe modern literature: "hysterical realism." And, with the advent of 9/11, they've proclaimed this trend to be dead itself, like ghosts preaching the end of times.
Of course, I wholly disagree; but first, let's explore what they mean by "hysterical realism."
Generally, there's a blur between fiction and non-fiction. The narration is patently manic, and the plot can range from plausible to absurd. Still, it maintains a sense of realism by stating agreed upon facts or commonly held beliefs in the given (western) culture, in much the same way a polemicist will use selective facts to push his point home. More than a mere story, "hysterical realism" is a work of social comentary against the background of a fictional setting: theme takes precedence over all other factors. And, in the opinion of its opponents, "hysterical realism" embodies ambition so high that it "knows a thousand things but does not know a single human being."
That's their complaint, anyhow; in much the same fashion that the literary establishment whined over the harsh realism overtaking the Romantic period in the late 1800s. "For shame," they'd say. "instead of going above and beyond reality, as art is apt to do, they instead confine themselves squarely in it, ugliness and all." How dare those realists, confined in their own world, describe the world in which they live, subjectively and objectively alike?
The fact is, the literary establishment (of then and of now) fails to consider a paradigm shift due to the immensely different material circumstances that separate this age from the previous. The truth is, people aren't so sure that the world is some magnificent linear narrative any longer. The truth is, contemporary people can't discount the rationalism of nearly a century ago like the postmodernists did, given the fact that I type this here and now with a digital machine that runs on pure boolean logic. People haven't just realized that the world is a brutal, ugly place that seems to defy all subjective intuition and aesthetic principle; the great majority can barely avoid its barrage. Aesthetics, along with the literary establishment, is near death; we have yet to accept it. Collectively, we spend billions a year on pills just to pretend we don't notice.
We live in a world of constantly flowing and constantly changing information. We live in a world of bland hegemonic consistency, and it's the statistical outliers that now catch our attention. Where the transcendentalists once lived in a world where the fringes of the natural order peeked at them from byond the social confines, we now live in a world where the man-made world stares at itself, reflecting and refracting. We live in a world in which the details, the background information, defines the existence of the foreground. We live in a world where all the human world is handed to us with a corporate logo, and our only path to meaning is the fringe--once again, like the transcendentalists; the difference being, the natural world exists only in our dreams of a distant past.
In sum, I would partially agree with the term "hysterical realism." Humanity, at this point, IS in a state of hysteria and constant flux, and literature will reflect that--even when its status quo denies it. Yet we're also in a transitional period; the realism of "hysterical realism" has yet to become its own form, apart from the material conditions of the past. We're still defining ourselves through the works of a whithered and distant past.
I propose a new term for a new, unprecedented future: freneticism. Call it hystericism if you prefer, the concept remains the same. As capitalism develops at an ever increasing pace, I wholly expect literature to become less linear, less classifiable, less plotted and so on. I expect all of the walls to be torn down at the base until the most defining and encompassing aspect of a literary work is left nigh alone: theme. Everything else is but the background.
And that leaves the writers to reach this new ground, in spite of the literary establishment that would like us to return to Dickens and Coleridge. Don't get me wrong, it won't be easy: the editors are mere pawns of the literary establishment, for the most part, and writers that press the boundaries will always be last to benefit. But we must do it, if not for art's sake then out of historical necessity. We can't deny the world in which we find ourself. We can't do otherwise.
I, for one, welcome the new freneticism, even if it has yet to fully morph into a new form. The manic prose that focuses on the ugly realities of the world instead of the *mere* realities reminds me that I'm not the only one that sees the world as it is. There are a great many of us, and there will be increasingly more. Whether or not the literati figure this out before their demise is another matter altogether.
I find it strange that people would call today's literature "postmodern." Alternatively, some may define it as "post-postmodern," which really gives no practical definition at all. You might have a general idea of what "postmodern" means, but to say something is "post-postmodern" is really just saying "whatever the hell has come after postmodernism." It's absolutely useless, and a postmodern construct itself (in spite of the post-structuralism).
So where are we, exactly, in a literary sense? Well, let's be frank: literature, in the modern american sense, is virtually dead. Such a statement, of course, doesn't imply that writers aren't writing; it doesn't imply that editors aren't editing or critics aren't criticizing. What it means is far more catastrophic, in terms of the literary establishment, and far more urgent: contemporary literature, by and large, is syphoned through the past. It no longer reflects today's world, and when it does reflect current society it is largely ignored. Literature has entered a stage of regression, in contrast to its past progression.
We don't live in a realist world. We aren't in the modernist era, and the postmodern era effectively ended decades ago. Where we're at, nobody's too sure; and so they call it "post-postmodernism," in an attempt to define the undefined. Meta-fiction is fine and dandy, too, but it doesn't reflect our current age at all. The self-reflective literary work is indeed reflective itself of mankind at this moment in history, but it's an overdone and overused device.
Granted, some have indeed tried to define "post-postmodernism." Some have hailed it as a renewal of faith and utopian sentiment, a backlash against the extreme scepticism of the postmodern era. Some claim that it rejects both truth and falsehood, regardless of the cultural origins. Some scry that it rejects objectivism and yet also rejects the subjectivism of postmodernity, insisting that both are incomplete or can be wholly discarded.
Really, there's no cohesive definition--which makes it impossible to argue. Even in academia, the term hasn't worked too well. Normally, academics can run around in circles with a nonsensical phrase--sophistry at its finest. But still, they've not been able to reach a true definition, and one can rationally conclude (however much you reject rationalism) that they aren't interested in defining it.
Indeed, academia is entirely responsible for the current crisis in literature; they insist upon writing the future on stone tablets. The fact is, those literary academics are near synonymous with the same literary critics who proclaim all literature written after 1980 to be scarcely literature at all. In short, by announcing the death of new literature, they proclaim an end to history--for it is historical circumstance that shapes the ideas and conditions of a writer, which--intenionally or not--will always come to the forefront of any major work. In order to judge the present state of literature through past models, one can only disregard--intentionally or unintentionally--the entire future and the material circumstances that bear it.
Literature is NOT timeless. The children of today will not, nor will ever again in the history of humankind, relate to Hamlet in any real sense. Hamlet will always be remote precisely because Hamlet is remote; he belongs to a time far in the past, along with his concerns and values. Sure, we can dream of the past, especially if our culture finds its roots in the past literary works such as in this case; but a Hamlet written today would be a far cry from the Hamlet of yesterday. With the material circumstances, humanity itself has changed. We are no longer Elizabethan Drama drones, and the exuberant boredom of every child in a High School English class reflects this: they do not relate to the world of shakespeare, and the few relations they do have rarely coagulate into a cohesive interest in regressive fiction. Children are bored with literature because literature is bored with the contemporary world.
Yet, the question remains: if we are not at a stage yet defined by the literary establishment, then where are we? And I would answer that we are at a stage in which the literary establishment, by and large, dies. They could not foresee it because it is beyond their own self-centered imagination. The author is not dead, despite proclamations by the postmodernists; the novel is not dead, despite the instant, mind-numbing pleasure of television and the internet. The literary establishment itself has died: it has made itself irrelevant in its reactionary romanticism of past literary models.
A great many constituents of the literary status quo have decried the death of the "great american novel." With all of the malice in their soft bones, they've recently coined a new term to describe modern literature: "hysterical realism." And, with the advent of 9/11, they've proclaimed this trend to be dead itself, like ghosts preaching the end of times.
Of course, I wholly disagree; but first, let's explore what they mean by "hysterical realism."
Generally, there's a blur between fiction and non-fiction. The narration is patently manic, and the plot can range from plausible to absurd. Still, it maintains a sense of realism by stating agreed upon facts or commonly held beliefs in the given (western) culture, in much the same way a polemicist will use selective facts to push his point home. More than a mere story, "hysterical realism" is a work of social comentary against the background of a fictional setting: theme takes precedence over all other factors. And, in the opinion of its opponents, "hysterical realism" embodies ambition so high that it "knows a thousand things but does not know a single human being."
That's their complaint, anyhow; in much the same fashion that the literary establishment whined over the harsh realism overtaking the Romantic period in the late 1800s. "For shame," they'd say. "instead of going above and beyond reality, as art is apt to do, they instead confine themselves squarely in it, ugliness and all." How dare those realists, confined in their own world, describe the world in which they live, subjectively and objectively alike?
The fact is, the literary establishment (of then and of now) fails to consider a paradigm shift due to the immensely different material circumstances that separate this age from the previous. The truth is, people aren't so sure that the world is some magnificent linear narrative any longer. The truth is, contemporary people can't discount the rationalism of nearly a century ago like the postmodernists did, given the fact that I type this here and now with a digital machine that runs on pure boolean logic. People haven't just realized that the world is a brutal, ugly place that seems to defy all subjective intuition and aesthetic principle; the great majority can barely avoid its barrage. Aesthetics, along with the literary establishment, is near death; we have yet to accept it. Collectively, we spend billions a year on pills just to pretend we don't notice.
We live in a world of constantly flowing and constantly changing information. We live in a world of bland hegemonic consistency, and it's the statistical outliers that now catch our attention. Where the transcendentalists once lived in a world where the fringes of the natural order peeked at them from byond the social confines, we now live in a world where the man-made world stares at itself, reflecting and refracting. We live in a world in which the details, the background information, defines the existence of the foreground. We live in a world where all the human world is handed to us with a corporate logo, and our only path to meaning is the fringe--once again, like the transcendentalists; the difference being, the natural world exists only in our dreams of a distant past.
In sum, I would partially agree with the term "hysterical realism." Humanity, at this point, IS in a state of hysteria and constant flux, and literature will reflect that--even when its status quo denies it. Yet we're also in a transitional period; the realism of "hysterical realism" has yet to become its own form, apart from the material conditions of the past. We're still defining ourselves through the works of a whithered and distant past.
I propose a new term for a new, unprecedented future: freneticism. Call it hystericism if you prefer, the concept remains the same. As capitalism develops at an ever increasing pace, I wholly expect literature to become less linear, less classifiable, less plotted and so on. I expect all of the walls to be torn down at the base until the most defining and encompassing aspect of a literary work is left nigh alone: theme. Everything else is but the background.
And that leaves the writers to reach this new ground, in spite of the literary establishment that would like us to return to Dickens and Coleridge. Don't get me wrong, it won't be easy: the editors are mere pawns of the literary establishment, for the most part, and writers that press the boundaries will always be last to benefit. But we must do it, if not for art's sake then out of historical necessity. We can't deny the world in which we find ourself. We can't do otherwise.
I, for one, welcome the new freneticism, even if it has yet to fully morph into a new form. The manic prose that focuses on the ugly realities of the world instead of the *mere* realities reminds me that I'm not the only one that sees the world as it is. There are a great many of us, and there will be increasingly more. Whether or not the literati figure this out before their demise is another matter altogether.