Slate has a very capable defense of Beloved's place as #1, but Salon basically takes the words right out of my mouth.
the idea of a single best novel struck me as not only a confining choice but one that completely missed the point of what has happened in American culture in general and American literature in particular over the past 30 years. Once, maybe, people could convince themselves that ours is a monoculture and writers like Norman Mailer and Philip Roth could compete for the alpha-dog position as the novelist who best defined the "American experience." That's not the world we live in anymore; no one gets to speak for "everybody."Let me just put it this way: The Adventures of Augie March marked a turning point in American letters. Bellow composed a novel which, with total self-consciousness, places itself as The Great American Novel, embodying the nature, destiny, and life of America in the titular character. But The Adventures also closed off for everyone succeeding it the possibility of once again assuming that pose, of creating a character who actually is America—there has not even been a serious attempt at it, or at least not in the novel.
How did Bellow accomplish this feat? Very simply—Augie March is Jewish, and his experience is tremendously grounded in that fact. After Augie, no character can be grounded merely in The American Tradition—there is no longer such a thing. Consider how relatively ungrounded Ishmael is, and then compare him to Rabbit Angstrom and Swede Levov—they are grounded, not just in their ethnicities, but also in a direct sense of place.
As Miller says, this canvassing act for The Best Work shows a total lack of comprehension as to what the American novel now is, and what it has been since 1953. There is simply no American fiction to be the best of. This poll's intent might not have been to suggest that there is, but its single-mindedness is simply incongruous with the facts on the ground. One cannot have a single mind about fiction in America any more.
A few points:
ReplyDelete1) Lists of best things, be they shiny baubles, or baby names, or books, attract people. They sell, and they provoke disucssion. The New York Times knows this. That list has been on their top ten most
2) Your argument that the meaning of the concept of the Great American Novel was somehow still intact until 1953, with the publication of a book which, according to you, constituted the Great American Novel, is ridiculous. This is obviously a book you read recently and are worked up about or some older hobbyhorse of yours, and though I haven't read it, it's completely arbitrary to mark such an imaginary change in the state of American literature at the very moment of this book. How exactly did it--and no other book, it seems you're saying--"close off the possibility" of the Great American Novel? I could make the same argument about a dozen other books before or after your Augie March which similarly subvert the myth of essential Americanness--why not those books? But that would require too much effort, and I also think it's a waste of time. Plus it reinforces the idea of a Great American Novel to begin with, as though there ever were that "possibility" (floating out there in the Platonic ether, perhaps?).
You're upset that people are still throwing around the idea of the Great American Novel, but then you want to define it as you see fit.
I'm guessing you wrote a paper about this Saul Bellow book sophomore year and you're just repeating your thesis from it here. Am I right or am I right? BOO-yeah
That sentence starting "That list has been on their top ten most" should continue, "emailed articles list longer than anything else, but despite that and all the following I would still enjoy a good fisting from you, Seal."
ReplyDeletePlease, go ahead and make that argument of which you speak. Otherwise, I have no other recourse but to think that you are full of shit. I at least explained why I think Augie March did what I said it did. Go ahead and give me your version. But saying "I could make the same argument about a dozen other books before or after your Augie March..." is not an argument. I could just as easily say, "I could make an argument about a dozen reasons why, if you go to Dartmouth, you should not have been admitted or even considered," but that isn't an argument. Back it up or I'm going to start deleting these grandiose promises of arguments which never come.
ReplyDelete"I'm going to start deleting these grandiose promises of arguments which never come."
ReplyDeleteNow that would be a commendable debate tactic. How about a little match of fisticuffs instead?
Arguably, EVERY work of "American" fiction, through the very non-identity (as uncovered by interpretation) of its characters and its signs with the myth of Americanness, which is chimerical to begin with, undermines that myth and the idea(l) of the Great American Novel. Saul Bellow's book would not be unique for participating in this continual process of displacement but could be credited with an especially radical contribution.
So you got a little carried away with your initial theme is alls I'm sayin'.
Andrew Seal Is A Neo-Malchowian!
ReplyDeletehar har.
ReplyDeleteArguably, EVERY work of "American" fiction, through the very non-identity (as uncovered by interpretation) of its characters and its signs with the myth of Americanness, which is chimerical to begin with, undermines that myth and the idea(l) of the Great American Novel.
This reads like a note taken from a Pease lecture.
"through the very non-identity (as uncovered by interpretation) of its characters and its signs"
This is quasi-mystical fluff, not any kind of critical analysis. This literally means nothing whatsoever. I assume you're being facetious here.
"the myth of Americanness, which is chimerical to begin with..."
A myth is chimerical? Really? What a novel concept. Let me remind you that we are speaking of the realm of fiction, where the chimerical is entirely accessible, is frequently used, and is often more dominant than any attempt at a faithful representation of "the real" could ever be. The fact that The Great American Novel is and always has been a chimera does not mean that a novel may not try to position itself as such--the point is in how the text treats itself, not in some veridicality test -- "O, is this really The Great American Novel, and how can we be sure?" is not a question that needs to be asked. Are the aspirations of a novel such that it claims to be The Great American Novel and does that claim become at any point convincing? -- that is the proper question, and a question I feel can be answered affirmatively about Augie March. Now if you disagree (in a well-supported argument) about that, or would like to offer a counterexample, great. But don't feed me bullshit lines about chimerical myths and discovering non-identity through interpretation.
I think the point, Andy, is that you're an asshole.
ReplyDelete