In Defense of the "Good Read"

four weeks. They are obliged to deal with a batch of novels—probably four—in a space of about twelve to fifteen thousand words. Like the theatre critics who have to spend so many evenings in the theatre that their reactions are dulled, some of these fiction reviewers noticeably deteriorate after three or four years on the job. It would be pleasant to end with some constructive suggestions about ways in which the system could be improved and the standard raised in both criticism and reviewing, but our culture is fundamentally inimical to high literary standards. The tendency is for the performer or entertainer to win more approbation than the thinker, and even reviewers can make themselves into "personalities" if they perform outstandingly. One of our most influential reviewers, Auberon Waugh, dismissed Saul Bellow's Humboldt's Gift as 487 pages of sententious drivel. "This book is going into my wastepaper basket," he declared. His aim is to be lively, provocative, controversial, and apparently it matters very little to him if he is unjust or wrong. The other reviewers who try to make an impact in a simUar way are not necessarily following his lead: they may merely be responding to the endemic feeling that the safest way to survive is to make oneself into a performer. In this cultural climate, it is not easy to remember that we all share the responsibility for keeping the tools clean. IN DEFENSE OF THE "GOOD READ" / Betsy Kline The concept of the gentleman newspaperman and literary critic is a relic of the past—shelved decades ago in the print media's headlong rush for hard-hitting immediacy and slicker feature pages. At most newspapers, the cozy armchair of the resident literary critic has been replaced by the video display terminal and the telephone—the tools of the reporter. It is no longer the function of the book review editor to pronounce what people of taste and breeding should read, but to report on what the masses are reading and why. Heated arguments over what is Literature and what is not will continue to be waged by any number of self-appointed arbiters of the art, thanks primarily to the largesse of the small presses and literary magazines devoted to the discovery of new talent and the appreciation of the written word. While the book review editor might exhort readers to headier levels of enlightenment and enjoyment within the realm of an occasional column, he or she must in the final analysis focus attention on the sort of popular fiction that is being read and why. Admittedly, it 272 · The Missouri Review Ronald Hayman is exhilarating to proclaim the virtues of the John Cheevers, Alice Walkers, John Updikes and Eudora Weltys, but the fact remains that more people are reading John Jakes, Robert Ludlum, Janet Dailey and Danielle Steele. The reporter, alas, cannot create tastes and trends: he or she can only report them. How crass, you say? Consider the challenge inherent in trying to discern the tastes and habits of a diverse audience of readers. Naturally, some like their reading matter light and frothy, while others prefer more demanding mental exercises, and it is naturally less than gratifying to learn that a growing population of college-educated, professional career women prefer romantic paperback pulp churned out by housewives to the witty and insightful fiction of writers like Ann Beattie, Toni Morrison or Laurie Colwin. Or that the men who hold sway in our courts and institutions of high finance prefer sex-laden, cloak-anddagger thrillers. But that is the challenge the book review editor-reporter faces: looking beyond the bestseller lists to examine the social phenomena which encourage the proliferation of such passionate drivel side by side with some of the best contemporary fiction to be produced in decades. As a book review editor and reviewer attempting to give newspaper readers a fair and accurate overview of the world of books on a daily or week-to-week basis, you find it necessary to enlarge your perspective in order to take in a wide range of reader inclinations and subject matter. First, you must consider your readership. Some newspapers, for example, indulge...