Understanding Literature

I've only lived through the first big wave of postmodernism but have seen literature and politics blend so that it's hard to name things anymore, and maybe that is the essence of postmodernism. Everything had been named, and so we had to rename it, brand it, present it as new, even if it was merely a collection of things we'd already seen. There are so many sub genres for the types of literature I write that I have no idea which to choose from, and can only see it as marketing. My first take on what I wanted to write was that it was fiction and shelved in the literature section at bookstores. There were other kinds of fictions too, and the first that comes to mind is "Science Fiction," so that there were at least two distinct kinds of fiction within the big tent. I'd want to put romance into that tent but I don't think the word fiction was used to designate it. There were probably was also a teenage literature section that was technically a kind of fiction, but I think high brow culture gave it so little significance that books of fiction mixed with diaries could got shelved in there under the age bracket, teenage. The biggest difference between science fiction and literary fiction was that one imagined impossible events in outer space, while the other was more steeped in realism, even if the stories were made up as reflections on real life. There was also an unspoken assertion that fiction/literature was far better written than science fiction, that was usually pulp. Over course, there were science fiction novels that were regarded highly by people who liked the classics, but by in large science fiction was trash writing, like mystery while literature implied a real emphasis on words.

In the '90's, this loosely assembled shelving started to break down. I grew up wanting to write like Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Salinger, with the literary ramblings of Kerouac thrown in there, not to mention the new journalists from the '60's. This form of writing was called "literary fiction," and I hated those words together (still do). I got it at the time but had never heard it before and squirmed at the implications of those words together: "literary fiction." What did that mean? I really don't know, but it must've been an attempt to say that anything with literary ambition (not pulp) was literary fiction, whether it was autobiographical or not. It's my guess that literary scholars were burnt out by the argument of whether or not you could write a pice of fiction (i.e. a made up story) if the story were factually true. In the early days, writers like Hemingway and Fitzgerald railed against Thomas Wolfe for writing factually true stories without the art of composite characters. I think (?) the composite character argument defined their rationale, because from a stylistic point of view Wolfe was definitely writing literature with a capital L. The Beats sharpened this argument by asserting that it was difficult to know whether a story was made up or real since life was like a dream and it was the storytelling ability that made something literature. This idea was bolstered by the new journalists who wrote in a very idiosyncratic/literary manner and told their own stories cloaked as essay's.

I mostly write autobiographical fiction and mostly think those two words together say it all. The word autobiography is one writing about themselves, but fiction implies its not a straight ahead autobiography. So what is a straight ahead autobiography? It's a lot like a biography, an account of someone's life for posterity, but not structured like a story. Again, the best of any genre breaks genre, but autobiographies and biographies want to present a person to the public, almost like a resume, and usually function best in the hands of famous people, or at least ones with renown. The autobiographical fictionalist would say that he was using his life for artistic ends, and simply finding archetypal examples of love, loss, death, sex, etc., and doing it through the filter of characters chosen to express these ideas, so the life is really existing for the art. In biographies or autobiographies, the art is secondary to the life. Maybe better words would be "autobiographical literary fiction."

Circa 2017, I don't think anyone thinks of literature as fiction anymore. I'll admit it's a fair thing to ask an author if he writes composite characters or not, but it seems like most literature is now autobiographical, and the art of making up characters and/or events is over. I think (?) when you use the word fiction now you are almost certainly referencing fantasy, and doing it rather awkwardly since the words "science fiction" don't really exist anymore, either, because I'm not sure fantasy is science fiction. Science Fiction often dealt with alien worlds or the effects of radiation and had a lot to do with the post WW II world, and linked to science. Fantasy might not take science into account at all, but it is most certainly fiction. YA is also fiction, I think, and usually written by middle aged authors trying to make a dime, and some lighthearted teenage romance. I guess Judy Blume was the great YA author of my youth and that was definitely fiction.

Literature has been overtaken by first person "I" poetry. There are now so many first person books (mine included) that the genre is floating. The two labels (brands?) I liked the most were creative non-fiction and memoir: I started calling "If So Carried by the Wind" creative non-fiction, but changed it to memoir. I initially called it a memoir when I typed it up in 2001, with my cats circling me, and mostly think that describes it best, but there is a problem with what the word "memoir" connotes to me. I suppose the french sound of it lends some poetry to it so that it's more of an account or literally a memory of something that happened to someone, but without the weight of trying to present a life like a biography or an autobiography. For example, I wrote a memoir about my two months in Paso Robles for an unforgettable summer, or a soldier could write about his life in polynesia. The hang up with the word memoir is that it has taken on many of the attributes of an autobiography and seem to imply that the person writing the memoir is of some significance. In "If So Carried by the Wind" I was writing about people of significance, but not me. In the self help era (the '90's) it was common for people to write memoirs about rehab, diet camp, etc., and this also has tarnished the genre.

Creative non-fiction is a bold attempt at redefining contemporary literature and this makes me want to take it on more fully than I have and not hedge. Broken down literally it means creative non-fiction, or the mirror image of autobiographical fiction. The non-fiction to me is an homage to journalism that was shelved squarely in non-fiction, along with biography and autobiography. The word creative to me say's that it's creative journalism, and a nod to the new journalists that have largely spearheaded contemporary literature (Didion, Wolfe, Thompson, etc.), but without the word journalism in there so there is no pretense of an essay. The word creative also ties into the creative writing programs that many of our young writers have gone to, including yours truly, though I got out as an undergraduate. So, what don't I like about the brand creative non-fiction? It feels gimmicky. I may be influenced by Didion, Hunter S. Thompson, and Tom Wolfe, but I'm not writing an essay. I realize with these writers the essay was secondary to creative self expression, and in that way they changed journalism forever, but I'm not cloaking my art as an essay. "If So Carried by the Wind" is presented as a story, and if anything I was trying to write like S.E. Hinton who probably wrote YA Literary Fiction full of composite characters, but in the '60 was considered a smart author for teenagers. If there were a brand, that said "I write from my life but with an artistic intent," I'd wear that proudly, and maybe why memoir is the best word. It does imply that you are living your life for a memory, and within that memory is a story.

I don't think everyone has an autobiography within them and that would include me and maybe why the label autobiographical fiction didn't hold up. For a biography or an autobiography the art is secondary to a larger than life life that must be told, but I'm not sure a memoir suggests this. It may suggest larger than life people trapped in a memory, and in that way is like "If So Carried by the Wind." But I just wrote a book about growing up in the '70's and it's neither autobiography or memoir.... it's too confined and character driven for autobiography, and too sprawling for a memoir, so maybe it's creative non-fiction. But creative non fiction = fiction. The difference is it implies playing with a true account of events, while fiction implies made up events. Maybe fiction shouldn't imply this anymore, like when I was growing up. The label science fiction is nearly dead, and while fantasy, erotica, and YA, all imply fiction, the word has been left out of describing them.

I'm going to sleep soon. This is just too confusing.