Anyway, a question came up in Doris Booth’s class. The question was, “What is the difference between literary and commercial fiction?” Ms. Booth said that the answer was complex, but the commercial fiction was more plot-driven, while literary fiction was more based on character development.
Although I have to congratulate Booth for handling the question so neatly and quickly, this answer did not go into enough depth for me. Furthermore, fools rush in where angels fear to tread, and after the class I went over to the questioner to see if I could further discuss the topic of literary fiction, though I had to admit, if only to myself, that no one really knows what literary fiction is, only what it is not – and generally, what literary fiction is not is books written by authors you don’t like, and/or any personal enemies.
So. We discussed the plot vs. character angle, and I claimed that literary fiction has more to do with the quality of the writing concerned than something quantifiable. The discussion ranged through themes of what she was writing right now, opinions of people known in college, contests, professors, Alfred A. Knopf, publishers ... it was a tough discussion. “Look, do you read the New Yorker?” I finally asked.
“Yes, I do.” The questioner answered.
“Okay, well, I don’t always like their stories, but that is one definition of literary fiction.” And then I got out of there fast, shaking my head. “What is wrong?” friends asked. “You look sick.” I felt sick!
“I got caught trying to explain about literary fiction and in the middle of the discussion, I realized I didn't know the definition, that perhaps, it was indefinable! I had to fall back on the idea that “literary fiction is anything that appears in the New Yorker.”
“Anything? Even Talk of the Town?”
“It’s time for you to go to lunch,” a friend told me. So I did. Literary fiction and the definability of the same is a big deal, just not big enough to get upset about. I felt better after lunch, sat in the bookstall with Alyssa, went to A Lee Martinez’ class, and met with Yvonne to work on a book proposal she now needs quite badly since two agents at the conference requested it.
But all the way home, I still thought to myself. 'Literary fiction. What is it? '
Stay turned, gentle reader, for my attempt at answering this question using on-line research and a 20-year old college textbook, “A Glossary of Literary Terms.”
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Then once I'd taken some writing classes, I learned it was the stuff people were writing who didn't use a plot. "It's about character," they would sniff (snoot in air). ...what about the character? I always wanted to ask.
Now - I'm not sure...
I think commercial fiction is pretty easy. That's the stuff that sells in great numbers to the mainstream readers that isn't genre specific.
I think that Ms. Booth's answer that literary fiction is based more on character development is true to a large degree, but doesn't all fiction need to have character growth? So is the difference in *how* they grow? and doesn't literary fiction still need a plot? Maybe it means that the character growth *is* the plot? How do you have character growth without some kind of molding stress or action?
I think that a character finding God in a foxhole would be commercial fiction where a character finding God through the changing lives of their growing children would be literary fiction.
...so does that mean that literary fiction is more subtle, internal and more deeply layered? But that's a comparative definition and I'm not sure that isn't cheating because the other genre's are more easily defined.
Romance is the story about falling in love and overcoming difficulty to find Happily Ever After.
Science Fiction features advanced science in the plotting and resolution
Fantasy encompasses magic, elves and other worlds
Historical.... do I really need to say this one? ;)
So is literary fiction 'intellectual' fiction? ... Does that leave us genre-monkeys flipping our lips inside out, picking fleas off each other and scratching our privates?
However I look at it, I don't see an easy answer.
One thing I have found out in my research on the subject is that literary fiction is apparently different, at least to some, than classic fiction. At least according to many sources. That means that genre fiction, if well enough written, has the potential to become classic -- but literary fiction as talked about by agents may be something different, more along the lines of what Doris said.
After seeing the movie the English Patient, I wanted to read the book. Now that is what they call literary fiction in the post-1970's, genre sense. And it's not really so much about character development. It's about a certain fractured, artistic way of putting the book together. S had it assigned to her in college, and she couldn't get anywhere with understanding/feeling the action because the language was so poetic and fractured -- I told her to watch the movie, and that would help, and she said it did. But what many call literary fiction seems to be more a game with words, for a certain, highly-developed reader, and I'm not completely convinced that it's really the finest written art being produced.
Now, off to do post 2 ...
But in truth, with regard to Russian fiction, I still prefer Tolstoy. Though I was permanantly astouded when Prince Andres died.