Monday, March 24, 2008
The Mystery Novel and Lowbrow Culture
Cultural critics seek to dispel the myth that culture is something static and all things can be classified as a part of a given culture, or not. They would argue that institutions like Queens College have been accomplices in that mission, claiming, "For that is where the old definitions of culture as high culture have been most vigorously preserved, defended, and reinforced" (Murfin, 261). When making the distinction between what is culture or art, and what is not, the university has time and again set the genre of the mystery novel as not a part of culture. The only reason that we are reading an Ian Fleming novel in a university setting is because the films have become a part of American culture. Had the movies not created the franchise that exists today, Fleming's novel would be written off as another somewhat well-written, mystery/spy novel and would not be on any syllabus across the country. Hopefully the cultural critics will be able to finally break down the man made barriers between highbrow and lowbrow culture and we'll get to read a lot more mystery novels in college.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Sean, perhaps I am just nitpicking, but I would think that opposed to your assumption that we are learning this novel because it has gained importance in American culture, I would like to think on a more practical level, that Casino Royale and similar novels are assigned as readings because the Professors have read them because they are popular.
Do you see the difference of what I mean? We do not read them because they are culturally important necessarily (although you are of course correct that they are), but rather because of it's popularity (which has the by-product of it being culturally important).
I think you bring up a very interesting point here. Say for example I write a novel that becomes internationally accepted as a masterpiece but never catches on in the American culture would it still be taught as a work of literature? From what I've noticed it is very hard to distinguish popularity from culture from a well written work. One could truly argue that we as a culture define what a well written work is based on popularity. Seeing as how culture is based on the ideas of at least a majority of the population you could then argue that culture is established by the very popularity it is made up of, so in order for a work to become accepted on some levels it would have to be popular. In that way you can then ask is the work popular cause its good or is it good cause its popular. I think thats a great conflict then to further it from popularity on the cultural level to the often minority on the 'scholarly' level and where the two meet.
Post a Comment