(no subject)
13/7/09 23:09![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
owlectomyIt bothers me when people say, "Oh, well, taste is just subjective" as a way of shutting down discussions about aesthetics, or about the quality of art.
"Oh, well, taste is just subjective" because lots of people like Stephen King, or lots of people like Stephenie Meyer. Does that mean we can't discuss what works and doesn't work in their books? Does that mean that we have to accept something as good because lots of people think so?
I'm not interested in selling a lot of books except to the extent that I'd like to keep writing, and I'd like to keep writing and have enough leisure time, and I'd like to have enough money to finance that. I am interested in working on my craft. And when people say, "Oh, well, taste is just subjective," what they're really saying is: there is no point in working on your craft. There is no such thing as craft. If you try to write better, some people might like your writing more, or some people might not.
And it's not as if there's some Olympic Committee of Art handing out 5.8s and 5.9s so there's some objective measurement of exactly how you stack up compared to the Dan Browns of the world. It's even true that as some authors get closer and closer to what they're trying to achieve, they start to write work that is dense, obscure, alienating. And on the other hand I don't think that accessibility is the highest of virtues; it's delightful and impressive when a writer has built something dense and obscure and absolutely necessary to the story. Even when I read, say, Greer Gilman, and I don't know what the heck is going on and I don't understand it/ love it enough to persevere, I'm not going to say it was done badly just because it doesn't work for me.
Perhaps this discussion is still stuck between the Scylla and Charybdis of populism and elitism. Elitism has been rightly exposed as a force that gets used to reinforce privileges and exclude people. But doing creative work means trusting the art, committing yourself to the art, and you cannot do that and at the same time throw up your hands and say there's no such thing as good and bad.
"Oh, well, taste is just subjective" because lots of people like Stephen King, or lots of people like Stephenie Meyer. Does that mean we can't discuss what works and doesn't work in their books? Does that mean that we have to accept something as good because lots of people think so?
I'm not interested in selling a lot of books except to the extent that I'd like to keep writing, and I'd like to keep writing and have enough leisure time, and I'd like to have enough money to finance that. I am interested in working on my craft. And when people say, "Oh, well, taste is just subjective," what they're really saying is: there is no point in working on your craft. There is no such thing as craft. If you try to write better, some people might like your writing more, or some people might not.
And it's not as if there's some Olympic Committee of Art handing out 5.8s and 5.9s so there's some objective measurement of exactly how you stack up compared to the Dan Browns of the world. It's even true that as some authors get closer and closer to what they're trying to achieve, they start to write work that is dense, obscure, alienating. And on the other hand I don't think that accessibility is the highest of virtues; it's delightful and impressive when a writer has built something dense and obscure and absolutely necessary to the story. Even when I read, say, Greer Gilman, and I don't know what the heck is going on and I don't understand it/ love it enough to persevere, I'm not going to say it was done badly just because it doesn't work for me.
Perhaps this discussion is still stuck between the Scylla and Charybdis of populism and elitism. Elitism has been rightly exposed as a force that gets used to reinforce privileges and exclude people. But doing creative work means trusting the art, committing yourself to the art, and you cannot do that and at the same time throw up your hands and say there's no such thing as good and bad.
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(no subject)
14/7/09 11:51 (UTC)Taste is subjective yes; but quality isn't, necessarily. And lots of readers conflate the two, which means they can and will interchange the statements "I hated it" and "It was bad". As you point out, just because it doesn't work for you doesn't mean it's of low quality.
But doing creative work means trusting the art, committing yourself to the art, and you cannot do that and at the same time throw up your hands and say there's no such thing as good and bad.
Yes. This. Because "making it as good as you can" sometimes isn't enough. You still have to strive for a standard of "good", whatever it might be and whoever's definition you're working with at the time.
Also? Saying taste is subjective and not trying to improve your writing is just lazy.
(no subject)
14/7/09 14:12 (UTC)