What does it mean to be a “good” reader?
Last weekend delivered a hat trick of essays on critical reading, two on KJ Charles’s m/m novel Think of England, and one on Deborah Fletcher Mello’s The Sweetest Thing, in which Liz McCausland also addresses the intertwined issues of “good writing” and “good reading.” More specifically, she argues,
I don’t think people should be afraid to talk about issues of quality if they want to. Criticism loses some of its power if there aren’t people willing to assert strong opinions that go beyond purely personal taste into reasoned argument. Of course these judgments are more or less subjective and open to debate, because language itself, and even more ideas of “good writing,” is a social construct. There are no scientific, objective standards, so a claim about quality should be backed up with reasons, examples, and an explanation of criteria (which may differ from reader to reader).
I’d agree with Steve Donoghue that some readers are better than others, but I think the definition of “good reader” varies a lot according to context. It means one thing in the classroom, another when one is reading for pleasure. We probably all have our own definitions of what constitutes a “good reader.” And when we’re reading–and reviewing/being critics–just for the love of it, we should be whatever kind of readers and critics we want. I do think, though, that when Romanceland discussion in general is reluctant to engage with questions of prose quality (just as with any other substantive craft issue), the genre suffers. Why write better if no one cares?
Her post, in combination with the multiple discussions about the religious and ethnic slurs in Charles’s Think of England, which include a long thread on Willaful’s review here, as well as Ann Somerville’s examination of the novel’s “unexamined bigotries” and Sunita’s commentary on the Romance community’s growing resistance to open critical discussion got me thinking about how we may be conflating the value of reading with certain values we associate with reading.
The distinction between these two things is evident in the distinction Liz makes between the stylistic and idiomatic elements of Mello’s book that she was unfamiliar with and the writing weaknesses that were a function of craftsmanship and not social or cultural context. In the first case, there is no judgment of quality made, because Liz admits her lack of familiarity with the stylistic choices of an author writing from a different cultural perspective. When it comes to those writing issues that can be objectively identified as incorrect, however, Liz’s experience of reading the book is compromised in a way that may lead to a judgment about the book’s quality.
I remember when I first started reading genre Romance, and among my first books were Judith Ivory’s Black Silk and Laura Kinsale’s The Shadow and the Star. The Ivory book made sense to me, because its prose was so similar to the literary fiction I was used to in my scholarly work with sentimental novels. The Kinsale, however, made use of genre tropes I was very unfamiliar with, and because of that. I initially judged them quite harshly. In that sense, I was not necessarily a good genre reader, because I lacked the knowledge and experience of those tropes, even though I was trained to be a strong critical reader and to identify “good” writing.
As Liz notes, there may be overlap between these two types of value judgments, because not everyone identifies the same “errors” or finds the same kind of prose to be superior. Stylistic differences may be identified as right or wrong, better or worse, strong or weak craftsmanship. One way around this has been to distinguish storytelling from writing, but as Liz points out, that has created a situation where the writing itself is often not addressed at all, perhaps because of the concern that readers may feel judged for tolerating or not identifying particular writing weaknesses or mistakes. The ability to identify specific “errors” may be perceived as “good” reading, while a tolerance for or the lack of recognition of specific “rules of composition” may be perceived as “bad” or “inadequate” reading.
And beyond the prose, we get into the question of reading tropes, like the use of “dago” in the Charles book, which, as Sunita points out, is both a religious and an ethnic slur. The difficulty here is that Think of England is an m/m Romance that many readers have praised for its craftsmanship, especially its writing, which creates kind of a double bind. On the one hand, is it easier to tolerate certain tropes is a book is well-written? And when it comes to m/m Romance, which is often openly interrogating social prejudices and inequities, how does a reader balance that progressive project against the use of a regressive trope that may not be well examined or challenged? Again we get to that place where readers may feel judged or defensive for not identifying all of the alleged weaknesses of a book and consciously calculating them into their overall reception of the book.
One of the particular difficulties with m/m, I think, is that there has been a movement to view reading the subgenre as an act of civil rights, which can add a layer of pressure to reading that makes it even more difficult to manage other, regressive elements of a text. It’s that whole ‘how to be a fan of problematic things’ dilemma. Reading Romance as a feminist genre can set up the same sort of dilemma, because those elements of a text that challenge or undermine that ideal (however the reader defines it) may create a feeling of discord for the reader that is unresolvable to the detriment of the reading experience.
Without question, social values are reflected in the books we read, because all of us are struggling with a variety of conflicts in the world we inhabit, and those conflicts will be communicated through what we write and what we read. So when we go into a book — either as readers or writers – with the expectation that the world represented there will be free of those social, cultural, religious, gender, sexual, racial, and ethnic conflicts, we may very well be setting a bar that can never be met. Add to that the way in which we will each see (or not) different things in the same book, we can begin to layer judgments about what kind of reader we are that seem much more like what kind of person we are. And it may very well be that those judgments are coming from inside the reader, not from anyone else, even though they may be triggered through someone else’s review or through discussion with other readers.
Of course, sometimes those judgments are made by others – case in point, the Goodreads review Sunita discusses in her post, which was somehow manipulated to sit at the top of the review queue and admonish readers who found fault with Charles’s novel. This is another level of the good reader/bad reader dichotomy, one that is tied to author loyalty, where being a good reader is tied up with representing the author and even perhaps filling in blanks that he or she may leave in the books themselves. For example, the more familiar one is the a certain author’s work, the easier it might be to assume that a trope is being used in a certain way, either to the advantage or detriment of the book, depending on the extent to which the reader likes or dislikes the author’s work. There is a whole different set of value judgments here that go beyond basic reading to interpretation and even identification with and as the authorial voice.
Although these issues make it seem like we’ve taken a big step backwards in terms of critical discourse, I think they’ve arisen as a result of the somewhat unstructured and broad-based online writing, reading, and reviewing environment. In some ways we may be lacking a vocabulary that helps us distinguish between aesthetic judgments and ethical/moral judgments in our critical exchanges, such that we can tackle these complex and problematic issues without feeling like we’re judging or being judged.
All texts present “problems” in the sense that they need to be interpreted and understood by a reader. In this sense, texts being problematic is value neutral, because there is an expectation of multiple interpretations. Some aspects of those texts also implicate the cultural values and contexts of both author and reader, and ideally, we should be able to exchange perspectives and insights without feeling like we need to defend ourselves — either in pointing out something problematic or in enjoying a problematic trope.
Years ago, when I was being trained as a graduate student writing instructor, I was required to read Mina Shaughnessy’s Errors and Expectations: A Guide for the Teacher of Basic Writing, which pushed against the denigration of non-standard usage as “bad” or other equally pejorative terms. Shaughnessy understood that the way we value so-called “good” writing as adhering to a certain standard can create a perceived hierarchy of values that interferes with both the teaching of writing and the process of learning to be a better writer.
I feel like we need a similar system, one that relies on a value-neutral vocabulary and an assumption of difference between reader and text, as well as the ability to share our reading experiences without an assumption of judgment about whether we’re good readers in some ethical, moral, or proper sense. We are all going to be strong readers in certain ways, and in other ways we may need to strengthen our skills. In other ways, we will all have different insights into texts, and that doesn’t mean that one insight is more or less valuable than another in an objective sense. Being good readers doesn’t mean we all have to read the same way.
Because of my own background in academia, I feel like if we got to a place where we could discuss the problematic aspects of books in a more open and intentional way, it would be good for both the genre (in terms of writing and the evolution of its tropes) and its readership. That it would encourage deeper engagement with the genre in all directions and to all kinds of ends – from thorough enjoyment to rigorous critique. But what do you think – do we need to come up with better, more value-neutral ways of talking about what it means to be a “good” reader, or is everything good enough as it is?
Hi Robin, thanks for the post. On one hand I do agree that value neutral terms in order to engage with the text, in order to critique the text is a good thing and the more of it would happen – the better. And of course I don’t consider reading m/m an act of civil rights. I don’t get cookies for reading the books I love to read because these books portray oppressed group of people in our society. On the other hand I am not sure if it will ever be possible to talk about m/m in a completely neutral way – not till homophobic reviews will continue to appear. No, not the reviews which state that the book is bad for whatever reasons – the reviews that say – gay men. Ewwww. Or – lesbian women, ewwww. I mostly read m/m, but some f/f as well. These reviews have nothing to do with the text and there were times when I would respond and my respond had nothing to do with the text either ( when I could not sit on my fingers that is).
I also do not think that conversation about “why straight women read mm” ( I am not a writer so I am not touching the “why straight women write mm” even though I really dislike that one as well) is helping with engaging in value neutral conversation about the text.
I don’t hide what I read but I stopped sharing the happiness about good mm books in my reading circle of work friends because why would I read gay romance? Hey how about I read it because I love it and the best books of the genre bring me joy that most m/f romance books can’t. And by now I can say that I tried hard – I picked up so many books here on enthusiastic reviews from Sunita, Jayne and Jane . And before you guys tell me that m/f romance readers get as much scorn for reading romance instead of other genres, I know. I see plenty of that idiocy online, but mostly from men. In my real life it is apparently totally ok to read m/f romance, at least for women whom I share my reading talks with. M/m is apparently totally different story, because hey am I gay? I am not offering that to say that I was insulted by the question because obviously being gay should not be an insult but as a desperate reaching for the reasons why I may love gay romance book besides the fact that I consider it to be a good book.
So in theory I am all for value neutral engagement with text, in reality I am not sure if it will ever be possible . I hope so though.
Just because something is a genre stereotype or trope doesn’t mean it’s good writing or should be considered above criticism. Far too often it is in fact a tired cliché or clunky shorthand. Far too often you can’t even state that a lot of romance is so reactionary it hurts. Talk about reasons why some readers hide what they read. Or dislike m/f. As to m/m, no one even dares mention the elephant in the room, so why do you expect people being allowed to be honest about what they read? Peer pressure works just fine there as everywhere. What you mention is just the tip of the iceberg anyway.
This is an excellent post about real issues in the reading / reviewing community. I agree that objective, critical analysis is necessary, enlightening, and rewarding of all text … *especially* problematic texts, which are often (but by no means always!) enshrined in genre tropes.
And I do want to stretch my brain, hone my craft, and improve my critical faculties…
but…
Okay, I’ll say it. Sometimes I don’t want to work that hard. Sometimes I just want to switch off the higher mental functions and just sink into a book and FEEL. And if the book promotes particularly strong “feels”, positive or negative, sometimes I just want to share them with other readers, through squee or .gifs or loud incoherent NOPE-ing.
And on the one hand I often get the impression that such visceral, immediate responses are judged as BAD reading: shallow, silly, “common”.
But on t’other hand… when I want something like the thoughtful, insightful analyses that the bloggers linked (and many others) often create; well, then I feel judged for not being “loyal”, or not vehemently rejecting something so obviously “repressive”.
I don’t know any good answers, except for encouraging the widest possible variety of responses in online Romancelandia. Or maybe magically zapping everyone else so they are completely in tune with what I want when I want it, and how boring would THAT be?
@hapax: Okay, I’ll say it. Sometimes I don’t want to work that hard. Sometimes I just want to switch off the higher mental functions and just sink into a book and FEEL. And if the book promotes particularly strong “feels”, positive or negative, sometimes I just want to share them with other readers, through squee or .gifs or loud incoherent NOPE-ing.
And on the one hand I often get the impression that such visceral, immediate responses are judged as BAD reading: shallow, silly, “common”.
But on t’other hand… when I want something like the thoughtful, insightful analyses that the bloggers linked (and many others) often create; well, then I feel judged for not being “loyal”, or not vehemently rejecting something so obviously “repressive”.
This is exactly what I’m trying to find a way around.
It’s so interesting to me, because until I entered the Romance community, I never encountered these kinds of pressures. All of the really problematic books I’ve worked on in a scholarly capacity never yielded that kind of judgment from other scholarly types. There just wasn’t that concern that we would be judged lacking because we enjoyed problematic books. Perhaps because all books are seen as problematic, and those “problems” are not necessarily a test of the reader’s moral or ethical integrity. So one could both enjoy and critique these works without feeling like you had to prove you weren’t being brainwashed, or something.
I know people sometimes think critique takes the fun out of reading, but if you have a vocabulary of critique that doesn’t hinge in readers being ethically or morally or intellectually superior or inferior, I think you can have both the enjoyment and the analysis without so much angst.
@hapax: I second what Hapax said. :) I feel the same way.
I feel as if there are a number of different levels at which people invest in their reading experiences. One is the emotional experience, which is perhaps more directly apparent in reading romance than in any other genre, because not only is the reader experiencing emotions, she’s reading about the emotional journeys of the characters. Every reading experience has some emotional component, but in romance it’s so fundamental that it can overshadow the other aspects of reading. As a result, when you point out problematic aspects of a story or a character, it feels like an attack on the emotional experience of the reader (and therefore the reader), not “merely” a criticism of the book.
Second is the interconnectedness of the author, reader, and text. I’m sure there are still plenty of readers who don’t seek information about authors. But if you’re online and active in the romance community you can’t help but learn about the people behind books you like. The author thus becomes identified with the text in a way that makes them very difficult to separate, and when you add personal interactions on top of that, criticism of the book all too often comes to seem like criticism of the author. Even if you explicitly stipulate that the criticism is of the finished product, not the author and her intentions, it is frequently conflated.
I try to talk about the text rather than the author. I can’t know what the author intended, I only know what the text says to me. But inevitably, in these discussions, part of the response is about what the author meant, what the author would or would not do, etc.
So, my short answer is much like Hapax’s. I don’t see a way around this conundrum. I think a starting point should be to discuss the text, but in practice we move away from that pretty often.
@Robin/Janet: My experience as a lit major (undergrad and grad school) was very similar to what you’ve described:
“All of the really problematic books I’ve worked on in a scholarly capacity never yielded that kind of judgment from other scholarly types. There just wasn’t that concern that we would be judged lacking because we enjoyed problematic books. Perhaps because all books are seen as problematic, and those “problems” are not necessarily a test of the reader’s moral or ethical integrity. So one could both enjoy and critique these works without feeling like you had to prove you weren’t being brainwashed, or something.”
I would even go further to suggest my peers and I were almost *congratulated* for finding value in problematic texts because doing so suggested that we could critically evaluate complex texts rather than using black-and-white or all-or-nothing thinking. We could appreciate one aspect while disagreeing with or taking little pleasure in another.
I do see some of these measured responses to books in online discussions, but certainly not all of the time. And like hapax and others have suggested, sometimes I even prefer the “unmeasured,” gut-reaction emotional responses; sometimes I don’t want to put in the mental work of evaluating thoughtfully what I read whereas other times performing that analysis can be half the fun of reading a book!
I will add in closing that I like the idea of finding more neutral terms for discussing books (where we clearly make judgments about the text rather than about the readers who enjoy or dislike the text). The really hard part of this is that the reader-judgments may be unintended or even self-imposed, and those can be harder to respond to in a thoughtful (non-defensive) way. I just try to be generous with myself and others by carefully avoiding judgments about the morals, ethics, etc of readers who find some pleasure in problematic texts because, like you said, all books have their problems for at least some of their readers.
“In that sense, I was not necessarily a good genre reader, because I lacked the knowledge and experience of those tropes, even though I was trained to be a strong critical reader and to identify “good” writing.”
I don’t have the academic background you do, but I had the same experience when first reading romance. Almost all the prose seemed “bad” to me in some way. A while ago I read an early Loretta Chase that I had once rejected as poorly written, and found it delightful. There was a definite learning curve.
@willaful: “There was a definite learning curve.”
I reject the idea that to enjoy genre writing, we have to accept poor writing (as opposed to tropes and implausibilities.) I reject the idea we should accept casual bigotries of any kind in a modern work either.
Reading fantasy, I accept magic which in my real life, I profoundly deny. Reading science fiction, I have to accept (at least to some extent) scientific impossibilities, like faster than light travel. In romance, I accept implausibly attractive men and first time lovers who have amazing sex (even when one is a virgin :) ).
But I won’t accept any of it if it’s clumsily or lazily written. Ironically writing fanfiction and my brief pro writing career has done more for my critical thinking about effective writing and story telling than my arts degree.
@Ann Somerville: Obviously I expressed myself poorly. I didn’t mean that the book was badly written… I mean, Loretta Chase! But I did have to learn how to read it.
@Willaful: “I didn’t mean that the book was badly written… I mean, Loretta Chase!”
No, that’s fine, I was making a general point. All too often the books in m/m which attract the most squee, are the worst written (ironically, Charles’s book – books, in fact – are a decided exception.)
The same is true in fanfic, in fact. Button pushing is rated far above craft, although there are plenty of fannish readers who value both quite highly. I’m one of those picky sods :)
Don’t discount the fact that commercial writing’s standards aim for broadest appeal-what might be “bad writing” can be a choice made in favor of appealing to a less well-read, but wider, audience, or choosing storytelling over mechanics. In fiction for entertainment’s sake, a ripping good yarn trumps stylistic mastercraftsmanship. The absence of the latter can be tolerated, the absence of the former is unforgivable.
As for the “problematic” stuff, I think it’s nigh on impossible to come up with any effective rule that makes any sort of blanket declaration. It’s always going to have to be a very personal choice on the reader as to where her boundaries lay, and how much guilt she should personally feel over her enjoyment of a story with problematic elements, and whether or not she ascribes intent to the author that may or may not be accurate, or if that intent makes a difference.
As social as we try to make it, reading is still an intensely personal, private thing. A story is still an individual exchange between author and individual reader.
I think there is room for all sorts of discussion in the romance genre. Sometimes, a book inspires me and I like to read/write critical engagement about the text, themes and tropes. Other times, I just want to post a gif of Jon Hamm crying to express my feelings, and engage with others in a squee/LOL-what-the-heck-did-I-read fest, and that’s it, I’m done and out. I think there’s always a middle ground, and the more voices we have, the better. There definitely should NEVER EVER be a silencing of critical voices, but I don’t think everyone should expect it to be THIS IS SRS BUSINESS GUYS FOR REAL all the time, either.
Incidentally, I don’t think the resistance to critical engagement is just in romance right now. I’m also involved in the Science Fiction/Fantasy reading community and…yeah. The “be nice/that wasn’t racist/it’s not sexist if I like it” wagon circling over critiques is painful and produces some awful flame wars. It’s been going on for years, too.