In Defense of Genre

Why Literary Fiction advocates need to reassess their snobbery

I keep seeing these hand-wringing jeremiads pop up about the domination of genre fiction over literary fiction in today’s book market.

Literary fiction advocates lament the fact that the masses seem to be neglecting “serious” literature and extending their adolescence by devoting their precious reading hours to “escapist” books, instead of elevated, mind-opening, soul-expanding Great Works.

These advocates mostly seem to behave as though reading is like taking a vitamin. It is something you do to improve and maintain your mental and intellectual health. They talk about ‘entertainment value’ like it is a dirty concept. But I didn't plow through 800 pages of The Count of Monte Cristo because I was interested in improving my mind. I did it because it was a corking good story. The fact that it made me think long and deeply, and informed my moral outlook on ideas like forgiveness and revenge were great benefits — but it isn't why I read it. I read it because it was thrilling, exciting, and glamorous. I was entranced, and yes, entertained. There’s nothing wrong with that — it is wonderful in fact.

Great literature — no matter how it is categorized, uses entertainment the way a dog owner uses peanut butter. Authors hide the pill of morality and empathy inside entertainment and escapism, and watch as we delight in lapping it all up.

These folks who moan about the rise of Genre remind me of the religious sects from Colonial America who believed that only a few select theological texts were “worthy” reads, and so forbade all other books to their members. Or, for a more modern example, all those people who will tell you with a curled lip and patronizing tone that they, “don’t read fiction”, since it is such a waste of time.

Now, I have nothing against Capital L Literature. I grew up reading almost nothing but the Classics. I’m working through a project to read every Pulitzer Prize for Fiction winner ever. I adore Literary Fiction, but no one is going to tell me to feel bad about loving Genre too.

I wasn't reading The Scarlet Letter as a ten year old because I was any great scholar or extraordinary human, but because I was a broke bookaholic. When I went into a bookstore with my fifteen dollars I’d make the rapid fire calculations that I could get one modern best seller (if I was lucky), or 3-4 satisfyingly thick, and ever inexpensive Classics, and then traipse home with a big gorgeous stack to dive into.

When I got a job working as a bookseller at a Borders bookstore when I was 19, suddenly the world of Genre exploded open to me. I could read whatever I wanted regardless of price. They gave me an allowance to buy books. And I did. All sorts of books, from nearly every section in my store. When I started reading Genre, what I saw everywhere were echoes and descendants of the Great Works I’d grown up with. They intertwined with and complemented each other.

So what exactly do these whinging pedants want? They seem to delight in taking the delight out of reading. They try to make people embarrassed and ashamed of their joys and passions, when they could be tapping into them.

Instead of decrying the fact we love The Fault in Our Stars why don’t these Genre Naysayers take the golden opportunity to influence us, “Oh — if you liked that you have got to read Little Women, which also deals with a young woman finding meaning in the face of chronic illness and death.”

Or to the graphic novel reading superhero lover, “Do you know what helped inspire Batman? It was this book called, The Scarlet Pimpernel — it is about this guy who was who was a rich playboy by day, and a disguised vigilante that rescued people from getting their heads chopped by the French Revolution by night. Totally awesome — you've got to read it.”

As for those who sneer at an adult who loves reading Harry Potter and other YA as childish — why not take that up with C.S. Lewis?

Lewis was the Oxford University don who was responsible for creating the first English Literature program at a university, and establishing Literature as a legitimate area of study in academic circles. A fierce intellectual, and blindingly brilliant mind, this man delighted in children’s literature all his life, and waited for new children’s book releases with as much excitement and anticipation as any Potterhead or Nerdfighter.

What these pearl-clutching snobs seem to forget is that many of their precious Classics and Works of Literature were the popular fiction of their day. Arthur Conan Doyle, Charles Dickens, and Mark Twain wrote much of their works as serials for magazines and newspapers. It was the fiction of the masses.

Genre is a marketing construct — it has always been there, but due to the organization of big box bookstores, and Amazon categories, it’s more visible now than it was in times past.

You have to be willfully blind and stupid to be an advocate of Literary Fiction without acknowledging that many of your most vaunted works are Genre in disguise. You are infected by YA, SciFi, Romance, and Mystery. What are A Woman in White, 2000 Leagues Under the Sea, Frankenstein, and Fahrenheit 451? What of Slaughterhouse 5, The Time Traveler’s Wife, The Life of Pi, or 1984? All Classics, or classified as top Literary Fiction picks, and all Genre reads, with dozens of other examples waiting in the wings.

Modern Genre fiction has the ability to produce masterfully crafted works that makes its reader think deeply and become more empathetic human beings, because it is literary fiction — at least the best of it is.

Of all the novels to come out of the Gothic period, most of them have been relegated to obscurity — but we still adore Jane Eyre, and call it great, even though nearly everything else from that antiquated genre was trash. Not every genre book is destined to be a great work of literature, but being genre doesn't preclude excellence, and being shelved in Literary Fiction doesn't guarantee it. I've read just as much trash and nonsense from those shelves as I have from any other section in the book shop.

Maybe the answer here isn't for the “real” grown ups to lecture the rest of us on how we need to grow up and put away our copies of Ender’s Game, and Lord of the Rings and start reading their books instead. Perhaps everyone would be happier if they brought the same passion to their reading as we Genre readers bring to ours.

Maybe Genre readers can teach Literary Fiction folks a trick or two. Instead of spending their time looking down their collective nose at Genre readers, why don’t they form fandoms, and forums, and follow their authors like rock stars? Where is the Tumblr for Marilynne Robinson, or Jonathan Franzen? These authors deserve it — so why aren't their fans big, fun, visible, and vocal? Genre fans make their literature part of their daily lives and identity —they’re a true community, and they make you want to be one of them.

And oh — you poor, sad, bitter Literary Fiction advocates, with your copy of A Brave New World, and Lady Chatterly’s Lover tucked under your arm — you already are one of them. So just embrace it.