James Metcalf on the fictionality of the latest archaeological page-turners
Stephen Puddicombe looks at the unusual appeal of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot
Ciaran Rafferty investigates the science of book classification
I read the first book, The Power of Art by notable historian Simon Schama, rather carelessly and with little enthusiasm for the dying medium taking about a week to get from the first to last page and then gave up almost entirely on literature. Suddenly I found myself taken in by the new iPad and its myriad of features and technological advances and then I watched Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple, present the new product and it was his scathing review of the netbook that made me realize my error.
“In order for it to have a reason for being, it has to be better at these kinds of tasks (Internet, Photo Sharing) than a smartphone or a laptop... some people have thought that’s a netbook, the problem is the netbook isn’t better at anything”. That’s when it struck me. I can find knowledge on Wikipedia but it is never somewhere I would admit to having found it and it makes me less likely to trust it. My knowledge of apiaries comes entirely from Norman Mailer’s The Castle in the Forest – a semi-fictional biopic of Hitler. Insights and descriptions of poverty, and wealth, and war are never as vivid in the papers as they are in works by George Orwell, F. Scott Fitzgerald or Ernest Hemingway. Not one political commentator has ever made me as distrustful of political systems and scientific progress as Aldous Huxley and I’m still to see a detective film as haunting and tense as anything by George Simenon.
But that still leaves me with music, games, and people. Musically I think there is a lot of immediacy in lyrics that can not be gotten in literature with its 30 minute minimum period. Graham Greene came closest and Roald Dahl after him but the functions of music and literature are often very different.
I have never tried to dance to The Da Vinci Code and I wouldn’t know where to start.
Music on the other hand can not serve as a solitary function: it requires visual or physical aid. For this end music videos are not better than literature but it complements it rather well.
Games on the other hand are extremely entertaining but usually lack educational value. Yes you can learn history from war games and footballer’s names from PES or FIFA but these are expected when you start the game and lack the novelty of learning about Bavarian traditions or Parisian fashions. Games can be very exciting and addictive and there is a satisfaction in finishing a story mode or of having David Silva sign for you if only on loan but they rarely encourage new ideas and interpretations of games can be quite stagnant.
Finally people are entertaining and discussing literature or films or games or music together shared interpretations can be beneficial for all parties but the level of insight of professional authors is something that comes from extended periods of thinking, from extremely wide-reading, from their conversing with intellectuals at the highest levels and of course their own extraordinary intelligence.
Of course if you are friends with professional writers then the degree of mental acuity will be readily available to you, but it is likely they will expect you to read not only everything they have ever published in great detail but also every book they have ever been inspired by and everything their friends or protégés write. But don’t despair, this will give you the mental agility and knowledge to, at the very least make money out of Scrabble and crossword puzzles, and at the highest level to have the honour of being yourself a writer.
Upon coming to terms with the healthy reality of literature I finally read Scoop by Evelyn Waugh and between the jokes about telegrams, the satire of civil service, and the distrust of media I found something quite unlikely: true genius.
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