The news that Lauren Myracle was asked to remove Shine from the list of National Book Award finalists rocked the literary community on Monday. Myracle, who took the high rode with her response to the NBA’s ham-handed handling of their monumental error, is starting to make the media rounds—her cover designer at Abrams has posted a terrific rundown of the coverage so far, including today’s Vanity Fair Q&A. One of our favorite links to come out of the controversy is this collection of tweets in support of Myracle. More can be found here.
But the NBAs aren’t the only awards that have created a stir. When Julian Barnes was given the Booker Prize last night, the spotlight was stolen by a bizarre speech from committee chairman Stella Rimington, who had earlier been lambasted for this year’s shortlist selections. It seemed that Rimington, who has written several spy thrillers, was smarting over the insinuation that “books you can zip through,” as one judge described the novels on their shortlist, are less worthy of awards.
This crossing of swords between the “readable” and the literary has been given more nuanced treatment by Laura Miller in Salon. Also of interest: a post by NBA judge and novelist Victor LaValle, who rightly points out that the literary and the readable are not separate categories and gives a defense of this year’s fiction nominees.
I believe that book awards, as with movie and any other celebrity-related awards (not to mention reality show “winners”) have gotten out of hand. All of these awards are 100% subjective, and there’s no choosing “the best”. Opinions will always vary and I think the primary purpose of literary awards these days is to draw attention to literature – - which is just fine, as long as we don’t take the judgment calls too seriously.
Yes, anything that gets people talking about books can’t be all bad. And it’s true that there is no completely objective way to judge literature — especially fiction. Which is the reason these sorts of debates continue.
I *heart* Victor Lavalle and wish more people would read his books. Big Machine was such a weird, wonderful book.
Also, whenever I hear about a book being touted as “readable” I think about this post over at the Examiner about the top 20 reviewing clichés and laugh. http://www.examiner.com/book-in-national/the-top-20-most-annoying-book-reviewer-cliches-and-how-to-use-them-all-one-meaningless-review
Obviously you will not be surprised to hear that I think it’s ridiculous that people who are judging books have bolstered, if not started, this trend of claiming that “literary” and “readable” can’t coexist quite happily within a single book. It kind of makes you wonder what kind of books they’re reading (or not reading, as the case may be).
Absolutely. And I think this is the sort of attitude that Stella Rimington et. al think they are correcting for, but it’s an overcorrection in my opinion.