I’ll come straight to the point.  I have always believed that the term “Literary Fiction” should be applied retrospectively.  In other words, once others have read and assessed it they can choose to bestow the epithet upon a work.

This was the case in the nineteen-sixties when the term began to be used.  Nowadays, however, it appears that some people are actively engaged in promoting their own work as “Literary Fiction” (and, yes I do plan to put inverted commas around the term each time I use it).   

“Literary” is an attributive term relating to literature, “…especially of the kind valued for quality of form or associated with literary works or other formal writing…”  The OED has a definition that identifies the term when applied to writing as “…having a marked style intended to create a particular emotional effect…”  Curiously, none of my dictionaries even has an entry for “Literary Fiction” but then, they were written a while ago.

We all know the argument that works of “Literary Fiction” have no plot but I don’t believe this is entirely true. There is a plot – there has to be – but such as it is, it is subject to the author’s intentions regarding character, emotion, sensibility and so, frequently takes second place, a fact that seems to have escaped many film-makers. Think of all those literary novels that become feature films and ask, why are they so dull?  Mind you, I suppose a best-selling book, extant is a pretty good advert for the film.

Now, this falling away of plot, appears to have led to a number of people who did well in English at school, coming to believe that they need not worry about stories at all and still become a writer.  No research, no tying up of loose ends, no “arc”; just… literature.

This would not be a problem were it not for the fact that so many authors of “Literary Fiction” believe that their work rises above the mundane world of what they like to refer to as “Genre Fiction” (i.e. everything else).  They would contend, one supposes,  that their work is literary in nature – that is: “of literature” and so is to writing what fine art is to graphic design.  

A trawl of writing sites turned up the following: “Literary Fiction” novels:
 …employ a wide vocabulary.
…are character driven
…explore the human condition.
…are “serious”
…are “multi-levelled”
…and my own personal favourite from Robert McCrum “…those serious-minded novels of high artistic intent by writers with a passionate commitment to the moral purpose of fiction…”

So if “Literary Fiction” is to be defined by these terms, then “Genre Fiction” ipso facto possesses none of these attributes.  I pause whilst you take that in…  


Well, I’m convinced. 

Authors of “Literary Fiction” are clearly better than the rest of us and we should prostrate ourselves in their presence.  Except…

A very great amount of that which purports to be “Literary Fiction” (and by this, I mean that which is recognized as such by no-one, save its perpetrators) is really not terribly literary.  I would quote but I don’t want to get into trouble so I’ll finish with my own guide to those who would like to sit down and write themselves a “Literary Fiction” novel.

1 It is vital to use convoluted sentences, whose meaning is lost beneath a welter of inappropriate (and occasionally made-up) adjectives and adverbs:
“Charles takes solace in his lovesome Proust, this one last, needful time as Jennifer promptly regales him with the vagaries of her day.”
Oh, and use present tense whenever possible and sometimes, even when it isn’t.

2  Make sure that you use inappropriate and unnecessary similes and not using punctuation:
“The immensity of his words struck Abigail enormously like a heavy weight bearing upon her very soul”

3 Remember to use words whose meaning you only vaguely understand:
“It was as though, metaphorically, Jane’s death had been the progenitor of his distress.” 

4 Never display humour.
"...so deeply engaged in contemplation of his own anomie, Nigel failed to notice the discarded yellow fruit-cloak, already displaying evidence of brown, foetid decay, in his path.  Suddenly, it was as though he had been ejected from the very planet; thrust upwards in an arc, which echoed the bow of Athene on the bas-relief which he could now see as he turned ninety degrees from the perpendicular.  The sense of loss;  the grief and torment.  Gravity would not, could not allow him his freedom and, as he returned to her, he could almost sense the relief, the joy, the sheer grateful Wunderbarheit of the tired World, as she once more enfolded him in her arms..."

5 Employ, whenever you can, all of the above:
“…and here it was, beneath this portentious, loathsome, vertiginous, monolithic rock, overlooking the deep profundity of Devil’s Tarn, that the golden child drew her ultimate sussuratory gasp like the balloon she had been given on her birthday that turned out to have a hole in it.”
 
fin

Got any examples?

So much talk about Point of View.  POV is what writers call it and many are obsessed by it to the point where aspersions on parentage and references to body parts are invoked during discussions of it and even threats to person are not unheard of.  On the off chance that you are a reader and not a writer, perhaps I should explain.

The accepted wisdom is that in any story, there must be an MC (no, not a Master of Ceremonies – a Main Character) and the MC is the one through whom the story is told.  Now, that won't be an earth-shattering revelation to most people and one would be forgiven for wondering why the  concept excites such passion amongst writers.  Well, as I understand it, in 1965 an American gent by the name of Dwight Swain wrote a book called “Tricks and Techniques of the Selling Writer”, which has been elevated to the status of a religious text in many quarters of the writing world. (He also wrote a number of other books including the wonderfully titled, “The Terror Out of Space” and “Peace Mission to Planetoid X” about which, curiously, one hears very little, these days.

Swain it is, apparently, to whom we must turn if we wish to discover the arcana of POV.

From what I can make out, like the founders of many religions, Swain's words have undergone something of a metamorphosis at the hands of his followers so that many now believe that it is tantamount to heresy for a story to have more than one POV.

“Head hopping”, they call it – when the action is viewed and interpreted by more than one character.  If the Swainites (Swainians?) spot this in a story, their inquisitors pounce and the unfortunate apostate is cast into outer darkness for all eternity.  Or ridiculed, which is much worse.

In order to cleanse their work of any such horrors, the Swainians (I think I'm coming to prefer the term) are very fond of writing in first person.  This is the equivalent of the cilice, the spiked chain worn around the thigh of the strict adherent to Opus Dei. Or the legendary Mormon body stocking.  It's uncomfortable but a sure and certain way to avoid slipping into sin.  For, in first person narrative, only the narrator's experience and opinion can be shared with the reader and (so the doctrine states) a relationship between the two is forged.  

 The third person with omniscient narrator is often frowned upon but can be tolerated so long as the writer is utterly subsumed by the “Voice”.  The “Voice” is not really the writer; it is the character played by the writer so, in first person, there is no problem but in third, God forbid the narrator should know anything more than what his characters experience.

Now, there is nothing wrong with this. It is a way of writing.  The trouble is that, for many and particularly for many Americans, it is pretty much the only way.  Why the Americans should feel this way, I can only guess but I reckon it has much to do with two things: first, a “screen” rather than a “textual” vocabulary.  The camera is the dispassionate eye, which for the most part, simply shows what is happening; second, the American belief in the sanctity of the individual that is, it seems to me, the unquestioned common thread in much American writing and cinema.

Most writers reading this will have learned little but to readers it may be news.  Next time you read a novel, perhaps you might spare a thought for the technique employed and wonder how much of it stems from the teachings of  the author of “Peace Mission to Planetoid X”

My wife and my daughter’s boyfriend and I went to see a band last night.  Army of Freshmen are a power punk outfit from California who’ve been around for a while. My wife had taken a shine to them at Brixton Academy a couple of years ago and is what I suppose you might call “a fan”.  The gig was in Folkestone – a small town on the Kent coast – in a tiny room called the Quarter House.  There were three other bands on the bill and although they appeared to do their best, performances were only adequate and interaction with the audience, notional.

When Army of Freshmen came on stage, it was obvious that their attitude to performing was a little different.

Before they even began, the lead vocalist, Chris Jay, set about warming up the “crowd” of about seventy or so people and it was as though he were facing a 2,000 strong audience at the Albert Hall.  Not once, in the hour and a half, did any of the band – an extremely likeable crew and fine musicians all – make any reference to the tiny numbers who had turned out.  In fact, they gave fulsome thanks saying that, on their way over from France, they’d worried that no-one would turn up.  If they weren't happy to be there, they made a bloody good job of acting as if they did.

Being in Europe for only a couple of days, they were jet-lagged and, having travelled from Germany that day, they must have been exhausted but you’d never have known.  The set was, as they say, “blistering” and “High Octane” and other clichés and the respect and genuine affection they showed to the die-hard fans at the front was almost touching.

I was reminded of another gig I saw a couple of years back in a run-down little place in Deal (also on the Kent coast) called the Astoria.  This was Frank Zappa’s original band, now called The Grande Mothers and I remember feeling much the same way about their performance.  In fact, I’ve seen some of the members of that band actually playing the Albert Hall and again, there was no diminution of effort for the hundred or so at the Astoria that night.

This is one of the things that marks the professional out from the amateur.  No aloofness, no cynicism just an understanding that whoever bothers to make the effort and fork out their cash deserves the very best that the artist can offer. 

In some ways, it’s much easier for the writer because he/she never actually sees their audience.  Imagine if you had to be present for every reading, trying to gauge their reactions to each nuance, checking their response to characterisation and sentence structure.  Indeed, how many writers even bear their audience in mind?  How many will say that they are only writing to please themselves and that they don’t mind if no-one likes their stuff; that they can take it or leave it?

Such contempt for an audience would soon see a band booed off.  But on the other hand, at least the band learns instantly what an audience thinks of them whereas the writer must wait months or even years to learn if their "performance" has been a good one or not. 

So at such a remove, writers have to try to imagine their audience and make informed judgement as to what its expectations might be, then offer what they can to please. I’m not suggesting that writers pander to a taste but rather offer what they do in as attractive manner as possible.  No preaching, but no lack of passion either; no showing off but no appeal to the lowest common denominator; respect rather than appeasement and integrity rather than hubris.  These are what writers can offer and only hope that, when a review finally appears,  what they intended is what has been received. 

We can’t all do it.  Lord knows I don’t think I’ll ever be able to do it and that may be why I still see myself as a dilettante; I might say, rank amateur when considering my own audience.  Such as it is.

Army of Freshmen went up several notches in my estimation last evening. Good luck to them for the rest of their tour.

The Circling Song is on Kindle. For a few months, it performed very strongly on Authonomy and received some very nice comments from some very respected sources. It got into double figures – just but there are a lot of books on there! I was proud that it was championed on a good number of occasions by writers whose work leaves most standing.

Several people suggested that I expand it to novel length (at 30-odd thousand words, it qualifies as a novella) in order to get the interest of a publisher. Many times, I read it through looking for natural points that could be used as growth points – buds, which could sprout a couple of extra sub-plots or take the story off in another direction.  But to no avail.

At first, I was frustrated but eventually, I came to realise that the story would suffer if I made any changes just for the sake of it.  The advice was, I’m sure, well-intentioned but I think the starting point for those offering it was that I wanted it to be published more than anything else.

Of course, I wanted it to be published – still do – and I know that novellas don't apparently sell anymore but I couldn't bring myself to spoil, (as I saw it) a pretty solid story.  Ergo, I didn’t want it published more than anything else; I wanted it to remain a strong, powerful and entertaining story – which it is.

Hubris?  Possibly.  Laziness?  That’s what worries me.  Did I try hard enough?  Well, I think I did. The story is complete and its success lies in its readability.  Most people who begin reading, finish it and all who do, enjoy it.  That tells me it works.

I also have to say how delighted I was to finally upload it in a format that retains the epistolary nature of the original pretty well.  It took some doing, I can tell you and, as always with Kindle, much depends on the font size one chooses.  I recommend as small as possible with the minimum line spacing.

Anyway, if it sells well, I’ll submit the paperback version for those who have yet to bow to the inevitable.

Yesterday evening, in spite of being dog-tired and a bit under the weather, I decided to take up the local writers’ group open invitation to attend one of their meetings.  The invite stated (and still does, I understand) that they meet in a town centre pub and would be easily recognisable; “…we’re the ones with the books…”  Fair enough.

I turned up at eight – the appointed hour –  to find that the pub was really a bar.  Anice distinction, some might say but, by "bar" I mean a single room, brightly lit and very noisy.  I won’t say the place was small, but if anyone was thinking of organising a cat-swinging competition, it wouldn’t have been first on the list of possible venues.

Having driven there, (some twenty miles, which at £1.31 a litre, works out at about £3:00) I couldn’t really have a proper drink so I bought a half of some fairly passable bitter, as it happens and looked around to see if there was a party that might be described as a writers’ group.  Strangely, I drew a blank.

Thinking I might be early, I decided to sit down and read the paper for a while and keep an eye on the door at the same time.  I should have realised that the evening was doomed at the point when I discovered that the newspapers on the bar comprised a sports supplement from something or other that likes to use exclamation marks a lot and two copies of The Sun.  Mercifully, and abandoned owing to the fact that it was sitting in a puddle of beer, there was a Guardian arts section.  It was behind this that I pretended to be Holly Martins, waiting for Harry Lime in a Viennese coffee shop.

As I scoured the faces in the bar, I began to realise what a pillock I’d been.  What the boiling hell had I been thinking?  Did I really believe that I could spot a writer by the simple cut of his jib?  Well, obviously, I did: but not for long.  I’m fairly quick on the uptake and in the absence of big floppy hats, cravats and cigarette holders I soon realised there was absolutely nothing to go on at all.  

The group of four women were perusing menus.  If they were the writers, then I might as well leave.  My mind went over the contents of my pocket when I had dipped in to pay for my beer: four pounds sixty, a penknife and a guitar pick.  I guessed the lobster was out of the question.  Then there were the two men at the bar: animated and loud - too loud?  Writers aren’t loud.  Hemingway was loud but he didn’t, to my knowledge, stand unsteadily beside his bar-stool, demonstrating how best to deal with a full-toss from Monty Panesar (take it in the middle of the bat at sixty degrees from horizontal, if you must know) nor did he have a man-bag.

The couple laughing to each other in the window seemed far too content. Where was the angst, the, pain and the disillusionment?  They were all at my table, as it happens but I remained, steadfastly and increasing obviously it seemed to me, alone.  I went to the lavatory.

It was down a very steep and unnecessarily long set of stairs and was, of course, a tiny, tiled space, one wall of which sported two urinals.  I chose one and stood.  Within a nanosecond, a man was standing beside me.

‘I’ve never used this one before,’ he said, accusingly.
‘Oh,’ I said.
‘No. I usually use that one.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘I said, I usually use that one.’
‘No, I mean, I’m sorry that you’ve been inconvenienced. Ha Ha.’
‘Variety is important,’ he said.  Could he be a writer?
‘Not too bad, this pub,’ he went on ‘except on Friday when all the students come in.’

I finished, shook, zipped, washed and fled wet-handed.

Back in my seat, I kept my head buried in Deborah Orr until I was certain my fellow ablutionist must have returned to his own.

At about 8:45, having exhausted the soggy arts section, I decided to leave.  Such is the human spirit that I continued to glance around as I made for the door still with absolutely no idea what I was looking for.  Would anyone else, similarly seeking out the writers’ group have looked in my direction and thought,

‘He might be one of them?’

Sadly not.  I discovered that, somewhere in the tiny pub, I had indeed missed the three members of the group who had turned up that evening and, possibly more distressingly, they had missed me.