I spent part of Friday afternoon happily reading the
SinC quarterly newsletter. Margaret Maron's essay “Mystery Writers vs.
'Literary' Writers” surprised me and made me think. Her essay was prompted by an
article by Francine Prose, in which the author complains about “commercial
fiction.” In the following week, a reader complains about the lack of
supportive groups for women writers. Really?
First, Prose’s essay is about the imbalance in reviews
of fiction by men and women. It seems that men are getting all the reviews. In
addition, some consider this justified because women don’t write as well and
don’t take on important topics as much as men do. The article was published in
June 1998. But I decided Margaret’s ire was justified when I read the whole
Prose essay a second time. (“The Scent of a Woman’s Ink,” Harpers, June 1998.)
Prose’s essay wasn’t about the decline in literature
and why is everyone reading formula fiction to his or her intellectual
detriment. Her slap at commercial fiction had nothing whatsoever to do with her
topic. It was gratuitous. If commercial fiction has “an autonomous existence”
outside the literary world of reviews and contests, why even mention it? And if
writers of literary fiction have no organizations to help support women writers,
why not? After all, writers in commercial fiction have lots of supportive
organizations. Sisters in Crime was founded in 1986 to support women writers,
challenge the male-dominated world of book reviews, and protest misogynistic
trends in fiction.
The literary versus commercial fiction debate has been
going on for a hundred years, and the only point I can see seems to be to give
so-called literary fiction writers the opportunity to imply that their work is
superior to those of us who write so-called commercial fiction. Prose’s comment
had nothing to do with the point of the article, which is the neglect of
fiction written by women when it comes to handing out reviews and awards. Prose
spends close to nine pages comparing passages by different writers, one male
and one female, to challenge as rigorously as possible the idea that anyone can
tell a woman’s sentence from a man’s.
I like to read. I like to read lots of things--novels,
essays, history, biography, memoirs, poetry, parody, and just about everything
else I come across. I go to book signings and readings by all sorts of writers.
I almost never say I'm also a writer because I'm there for the writer whose
event it is, but sometimes the other writer is someone I know and is welcoming
and generous in his or her greeting. Andre Dubus III is one of them. Another,
who shall remain nameless, is not. Madam Anonymous has written six novels, so
had I when we met. Madam A signed my book, and then said, without prompting, “I
don't read crime fiction. It's so crass, don't you think?” Madam A, did you
forget that we had dinner together and discussed that I write crime fiction?
What sort of person goes out of her way to throw out an insult like that?
Let me answer my own question. Someone who is
resentful and jealous. It's hard to believe that someone of Madam A’s stature
would be jealous, but I think literary writers carry a certain resentment
against other writers. First, so-called commercial writers are clearly having a
lot of fun. Our characters can be (and often are) anything we want them to be.
They are crazy, wild, funny, dangerous, scary, beyond belief much of the time.
Second, if we’re still in the business after one book, we’re earning out our
advances and then some. (I sat next to a first-time novelist on a panel who
announced that no first-time novelist is ever expected to earn out her advance;
I could not let that pass.) Third, readers love our stuff. They love our
characters and adopt them as their own. They love our villages and islands and
mountain castles and depressed cities and trailer parks. Every mystery writer
has encountered the reader who walks up and asks, “But what about Joe's family?
Why doesn’t he visit them? Is there trouble there?” (I sometimes worry
the reader is so concerned she will follow up with an offer of help.)
Fourth, and the real reason, is that mystery writers
know why we write. We’re storytellers. We have not forgotten the point of
fiction is to tell a good story, to sweep the reader away into another world
where he or she will undergo experiences otherwise beyond their ordinary life.
Yes, the reader will experience suspense, romance, fear, and wonder, all those
crass human emotions. These are fabulous depths of life that many of us in our
need to hold a job and pay the bills never get to experience except through
fiction, and if we as writers can get them into a story, we should do so.
In these stories that are so formulaic and offensive
to literary writers we are tapping into ancient patterns in how humans see and
experience the world. We deal honestly with important questions of justice and
character and the consequences of our acts. Readers get to test their
principles and dreams against those of another and larger world. And readers of
crime fiction are not so easily misled by “literary” prose to give a pass to
unscrupulous behavior. We might feel compassion for an officer forced to carry
out an execution, but we still know he’s a murderer. The real man of courage is
the soldier who refuses.
At the end of her essay Margaret Maron asks the other
question prompted by Prose's essay: Why are mystery writers so nice to each
other? We help each other build careers. We don't see every other writer as a
competitor we have to undermine in order to get ahead. We take criticism from
editors and reviewers well for the most part, and offer it humanely in return. Editors
have been commenting on this for years, and I think the reason is simple.
Mystery writers maintain a certain perspective on their characters and their
stories--we create pretty awful people and watch what happens to them. We don't
forgive or protect characters who have a bad end coming to them. We don’t use
our talents to convince readers that black is white or white is black. Crime
fiction requires a high degree of emotional honesty. We don’t fall into
the temptation of believing that we’re “important” and therefore readers have
to appreciate us. We know what our job is, and we do it.
Those are my theories. What are yours?
