tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post8119007791427022099..comments2024-03-29T03:04:00.853-05:00Comments on Wuthering <br>Expectations: Dreiser is a bad writer - or maybe he is good - those odd and mentally disturbed or distrait souls who are to be found in every placeAmateur Reader (Tom)http://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-71593625814138231842019-04-04T23:09:35.589-05:002019-04-04T23:09:35.589-05:00I suppose it is a generational process. Jess Oppe...I suppose it is a generational process. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jess_Oppenheimer" rel="nofollow">Jess Oppenheiimer</a>, creator and head writer of <i>I Love Lucy</i>, was just the right age to have grown up on Sinclair Lewis novels.Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-71655823964134437192019-04-04T21:00:31.030-05:002019-04-04T21:00:31.030-05:00That was also my impression when I first read Main...That was also my impression when I first read Main Street, how much it felt like a 50s television show, say I Love Lucy, specially the extended party scene that comes near the end of the novel.Cleanthesshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15363416290397892659noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-23969100639762156532019-04-04T11:30:08.222-05:002019-04-04T11:30:08.222-05:00Try Sister Carrie. It's 300 pages shorter tha...Try <i>Sister Carrie</i>. It's 300 pages shorter than <i>An American Tragedy</i>. I can't blame Dreiser's prose on the Spirit of the '20s, because it hadn't changed since 1900. Kind of a feat, actually.<br /><br />Younger hipper American writers, the <i>Smart Set</i> smart set, were doing pretty much what you described. Make it snap, make it, dare I say, new. The Edith Wharton of the 1920s at her worst sounded old-fashioned, and at her best sounded classic, and what young writer wanted to sound like either of those?<br /><br />And she is turning back to the 1880s or whenever. Lewis and Fitzgerald and Hammett want to right about <i>now</i>. One odd thing for me was that Lewis's "now" sounded a lot like the television of the 1950s ("Aw gee, pop!") but I guess that is an artifact of cultural transmission across genres or something.<br /><br />Lawrence, by the way, I think had a whole 'nother bug. He was truly doing his own thing. The spirit of the age in England was light and playful and quietly savage: Huxley, Waugh, and Wodehouse. Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-37996379465598779542019-04-04T11:00:12.818-05:002019-04-04T11:00:12.818-05:00The 20s were an awkward time for prose, especially...The 20s were an awkward time for prose, especially American prose. I don't know the cause of it. Maybe a raft of journalists taking on the novel, or a sudden interest in colloquialisms that keeps tripping over a misguided urge to elevated prose? Really, no idea, but I have noticed that writing gets plain weird around that time. Fitzgerald with his "yellow jazz" and all of that. Hemingway with his "she smiled smally." Honestly, <i>smally</i>? Lawrence caught the bug too, sometimes sailing, sometimes stumbling. Maybe everybody was trying to be jazzy and modern, putting on clothes that didn't fit (supply your own metaphor). Nobody seems to have noticed at the time how clumsy things were.<br /><br />I've never read either of these Dreiser novels. I've heard all my life that they're pretty heavy going, but that's almost a good reason to try them. Well, one of them anyway.scott g.f.baileyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05726743149139510832noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-24218157983693805022019-04-04T09:30:49.516-05:002019-04-04T09:30:49.516-05:00I think the labor is the point! There, that's...I think the labor is the point! There, that's my post for later today. Done.<br /><br />I would cut the first third, not the last, on the grounds that the first third has the highest proportion of bad writing, and is all preliminary to the main story, but I fear it has a purpose, too.<br /><br />The first third of <i>Sister Carrie</i> is also the worst(-written) part.Amateur Reader (Tom)https://www.blogger.com/profile/13675275555757408496noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3383938214852108244.post-91649194926642456232019-04-04T04:09:44.717-05:002019-04-04T04:09:44.717-05:00I haaated An American Tragedy. The first 2/3 weren...I haaated An American Tragedy. The first 2/3 weren't too bad, but the final 1/3 just went on forever, he could not stop belaboring the point. I'd forgotten about the bad writing, but that sentence is particularly terrible. It's like an entry into the Bulwer-Lytton Bad Fiction Contest. Karen K.https://www.blogger.com/profile/13483190930383406559noreply@blogger.com