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Ursula K. Le Guin at the National Book Awards

parkerhiggins.net

11–20 of 90 posts

Re: Ursula K. Le Guin at the National Book Awards

#11

> Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art—the art of words. I never really studied history in any depth. Do you think this is just hyperbole? By which I mean is she simply overstating or exaggerating the role of art in historic events? Am I taking it too literally - that art is the first step towards cultural upheaval? Can anyone give some examples of art effecting some kind of huge social…

"So you're the little woman who wrote the book that started this great war."

Supposedly Abraham Lincoln said this to Harriet Beecher Stowe in reference to her book, Uncle Tom's Cabin, which is often credited for changing the North's attitude towards slavery.

Re: Ursula K. Le Guin at the National Book Awards

#12

> Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art—the art of words. I never really studied history in any depth. Do you think this is just hyperbole? By which I mean is she simply overstating or exaggerating the role of art in historic events? Am I taking it too literally - that art is the first step towards cultural upheaval? Can anyone give some examples of art effecting some kind of huge social…

The "art of words" has certainly effected huge social change. This is self-evident if you include political commentary and philosophy (Common Sense, Wealth of Nations, Federalist Papers, Communist Manifesto, etc.). If you restrict it to fiction, a common example is 1906 novel The Jungle by Upton Sinclair.

If you're talking about art like paintings, plays, music, etc., I don't have any examples off the top of my head. However, I think it's a truism that art is often the first/only safe place to criticize the powerful. I don't know if that's really art effecting change as much as art giving a voice to underlying forces for change.

Re: Ursula K. Le Guin at the National Book Awards

#13

> Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art—the art of words. I never really studied history in any depth. Do you think this is just hyperbole? By which I mean is she simply overstating or exaggerating the role of art in historic events? Am I taking it too literally - that art is the first step towards cultural upheaval? Can anyone give some examples of art effecting some kind of huge social…

The gift of the artist is to express ideas that are in the air of a particular time, but have not yet been articulated. So it is inevitable that a cultural upheaval would have its origins in the art of a culture, even if it is not easy to draw a direct corollary. The art does not effect the change, except maybe in exceptional circumstances, it only expresses what is already in the air.

You don't have to look very hard to find examples. Take The Wire in the United States, which is all about the futility of the War on Drugs and the harm it causes to its citizens. Only now are we are seeing the first steps of decriminalization in states like Colorado, Oregon, and Washington. Did The Wire effect that change? No, probably not. But it did articulate the attitude long before it manifested in policy.

Re: Ursula K. Le Guin at the National Book Awards

#14
post #9

I heard her make remarks in a similar vein at the Washington State Book Awards in 2006: http://jakeseliger.com/2006/10/28/le-guin-at-the-seattle-pub... . Incidentally, though, I think this no longer true: "Developing written material to suit sales strategies in order to maximize corporate profit and advertising revenue is not quite the same thing as responsible book publishing or authorship." It's now easier than eve…

The problem with Le Guin's position is that it's so Manichean, a world composed of good guys and bad guys with no ambiguities. To her, it's either sell books like deodorant or some ideal system where it's quality, not marketability, that makes books sell. This sounds good, but it's tripe. As you say, the Internet in general and Amazon in particular have opened up publishing -- Amazon getting huge credit because it not only allows freer publishing, but has set up a system that allows many thousands of new authors to actually connect with readers. Yet, Amazon is also a business focused on selling products at high volume with tight margins. These two goals aren't opposed, they're different aspects of a complex business. Amazon can be both a great contributor and profit-motivated, it's not that hard to see how.

Who defines quality, anyway? The tastemakers, like newspaper reviewers, who nobody much pays attention to anymore? Or Le Guin -- she seems to think she knows what's good. I imagine, what if John Kennedy O'Toole had the opportunity to self-publish A Confederacy of Dunces, instead of facing despair when all the traditional publishers turned him down. What if he'd been able to sell his work like toothpaste on Amazon, even if the tastemakers thought it wasn't worth publishing. To Le Guin, this would somehow violate the ideals the publishing world ought to aspire to. To me, I wish the opportunities offered by Amazon had been around back then.

Re: Ursula K. Le Guin at the National Book Awards

#15
post #9

I heard her make remarks in a similar vein at the Washington State Book Awards in 2006: http://jakeseliger.com/2006/10/28/le-guin-at-the-seattle-pub... . Incidentally, though, I think this no longer true: "Developing written material to suit sales strategies in order to maximize corporate profit and advertising revenue is not quite the same thing as responsible book publishing or authorship." It's now easier than eve…

The problem with Le Guin's position is that it's so Manichean, a world composed of good guys and bad guys with no ambiguities. To her, it's either sell books like deodorant or some ideal system where it's quality, not marketability, that makes books sell. This sounds good, but it's tripe. As you say, the Internet in general and Amazon in particular have opened up publishing -- Amazon getting huge credit because it no…

Herman Melville's "Moby Dick" was a complete failure when published in 1851, and was essentially forgotten. It was rediscovered after WW1, becoming a great classic of American literature.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moby-Dick#Later_reception

Re: Ursula K. Le Guin at the National Book Awards

#17
Sorry, I admire her writing, but I call complete and utter bullshit on this speech. Books are commodities, not some magical elixer from the gods. Some are good, some are terrible. I buy mine from Amazon and Audible. New technologies, and they are helping more people to read more books than ever before.

Re: Ursula K. Le Guin at the National Book Awards

#19
post #13

> Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art—the art of words. I never really studied history in any depth. Do you think this is just hyperbole? By which I mean is she simply overstating or exaggerating the role of art in historic events? Am I taking it too literally - that art is the first step towards cultural upheaval? Can anyone give some examples of art effecting some kind of huge social…

The gift of the artist is to express ideas that are in the air of a particular time, but have not yet been articulated. So it is inevitable that a cultural upheaval would have its origins in the art of a culture, even if it is not easy to draw a direct corollary. The art does not effect the change, except maybe in exceptional circumstances, it only expresses what is already in the air. You don't have to look very har…

I think you've expressed my question a bit clearer than I did.

Does art cause change or reflect change that is occurring?

I think it's probably more like a feedback loop rather than a simple cause and effect with both reflecting and reacting to the other.

Re: Ursula K. Le Guin at the National Book Awards

#20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with Le Guin's position is that it's so Manichean, a world composed of good guys and bad guys with no ambiguities. To her, it's either sell books like deodorant or some ideal system where it's quality, not marketability, that makes books sell. This sounds good, but it's tripe. As you say, the Internet in general and Amazon in particular have opened up publishing -- Amazon getting huge credit because it no…

Herman Melville's "Moby Dick" was a complete failure when published in 1851, and was essentially forgotten. It was rediscovered after WW1, becoming a great classic of American literature. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moby-Dick#Later_reception

It was rediscovered after WW1, becoming a great classic of American literature.

There's also an open question about the book's intrinsic merit versus the need at the time to "discover" American literature and find exemplary American texts of the sort that were needed to instil a sense of unity in a country of disparate immigrant groups.

Menand discusses some of this in The Marketplace of Ideas: Reform and Resistance in the American University, which is an interesting and wonderful book. I wrote more about the book here: http://jakeseliger.com/2010/01/21/problems-in-the-academy-lo...

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