Comments on: Why We Would Read Something

By: Henry

Henry — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 21:53:58 +0000

Jena Isle: One Hundred Years of Solitude is a brilliant book, but I’d say it doesn’t quite make ‘book 4′ elite status. I’d say it’s maybe an 8 on both writing and story. Also, too many characters with the same name.

Anne: To be honest, I’ve never read any Stephen King, and wouldn’t really know where to begin were I inclined to. I have, however, seen both The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile. I figure that the truly great books of this world come from authors who have written few others and have really poured their heart and soul into a few great works, but I suppose some people have more and better books in them than others. At a guess, I’d say King probably does fit in with the third, but then I also suspect his works vary quite considerably in quality.

As for your question about writing for different age groups eliminating the fourth category, I don’t think it would at all. There’s an art to writing for younger people that many don’t appreciate. It’s not about ‘dumbing down’ but about capturing the imagination. In this respect something like Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar is, well, maybe not a ‘masterpiece’, but a very strong work. Similarly, Tove Janson’s Moomintroll books are both well-written and tell interesting stories, but they use a different register and tone for the younger audience. Also, as I’ve said before, something like The Odyssey is accessible to the point that a twelve-year-old could read and understand it. Now that’s considered one of the greatest works of Western literature, so I think that writing for a younger audience should neither imply nor excuse a lesser standard.

By: WOOF Contest for October 2, 2009 | Zorlone - Filipino Poet and Writer

WOOF Contest for October 2, 2009 | Zorlone - Filipino Poet and Writer — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 01:45:58 +0000

[...] Benjamin Petrie – “Why We Would Read Something” – There’s two reasons we would read something: i) it’s well-written ii) it has [...]

By: Anne

Anne — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 02:11:27 +0000

Where would you put Stephen King in this? Probably the third, although some his work [The Stand] is quite remarkable and intricate. Then there are the many genres in which one does write. Writing for a child or a young adult is different than writing for an older person. Would this eliminate the 4th category or would it just be considered a lesser standard due to the audience?

One day I hope to write in a manner that is befitting of the 3rd category. And if given the choice of the 1st or 2nd categories, then I would definitely choose interesting over well-written.

By: Jena Isle

Jena Isle — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 01:02:39 +0000

This is meaty, for book 4 I would say, “One Hundred Years of Solitude” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. It fulfills both.

By: Joe Wyatt

Joe Wyatt — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 14:34:10 +0000

Interesting stuff, Henry.

It reminded me about The Count of Monte Cristo, which Alexandre Dumas wrote following plotlines laid out by Auguste Maquet. Here we have a writer with a great story to tell but perhaps not the writing ability to tell it*, whose own work may have fit into your 2nd category, collaborating with a writer who would perhaps have fit into the 1st category and producing a book that would sit well in the 3rd category, if not the 4th (I’ll wait til I’ve finished the book before I start saying that, but I’m loving it so far).

Obviously I don’t know for sure what kind of work they’d have produced on their own because Dumas always used a ghostwriter for his books, and I haven’t been able to find any work by Maquet that hasn’t either disappeared into obscurity, never been translated into english, or both. Still, the fact that they were most successful while working together says quite a bit.