
To be literary or not?
There is an ongoing argument about whether genre writers can be “literary.” It’s funny, the things people will argue about.
Charlie Jane Anders says “the ‘genre’ is what you see on the surface.” Genre is only the “skin” of the story. I agree. Of course genre novels can be literary, which to me is just a way of saying written fancy: writing with figurative language and no cliches. It’s writing that takes a little more thought to put together and to take apart.
I wrote in a more “literary” style when I was young, and I won prizes from Scholastic Magazine, and I was full of that self-confidence and self-importance that comes of being young and a winner of prizes from Scholastic and the Pacific Northwest Writer’s Association and the youngest member of a creative writing class taught by a real live published author.
But then I got married and paid bills and started teaching high school and had kids and got divorced and life just didn’t seem literary anymore. Life was a slog I wanted to escape, so I wrote fantasy and science fiction (which can be literary, but mine wasn’t). I associated 24/7 with children and teenagers, so I wrote for adults in a straightforward, un-metaphorical, non-literary way I wouldn’t have to explain (since it seemed like I explained things 24/7 and it exhausted me).
Now I’m coming out the other side, children grown and I’m approaching retirement, and I have time to think deep thoughts, like the scarecrow. Like him I am delighted and I feel like dancing, although I no longer have the self-confidence and self-importance which made it easy to submit my deep thoughts to literary publications.
It’s hard, but I take deep, calming breaths before I hit the send button and feel grateful that I no longer have to compile a whole package with a manuscript and SASE and print out strange far-away addresses on 9x12 manila envelopes like I did back then — all of which must have cost my parents a fortune.
The really weird thing is that nowadays the writing I am enjoying most is for young adults. How contrariwise is that?
