![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Tumblr crosspost (4 March 2023)
Mar. 4th, 2023 08:56 amHuh, I see a lot of lit-fic fans insisting that the stereotype of lit-fic as "college prof/writer having affairs and people being miserable in a stylistic way" is just a defensive genre fan take that took off.
I wouldn't know, myself, because nearly all my literary reading these days is in the periods I study, ending at around 1815. But my best friend is getting an MFA in creative writing and damn if every lit piece he gets assigned isn't "people being miserable in a stylistic way, especially writers having affairs."
This may not be representative of modern lit fic as a whole! Like I said, I wouldn't know. But the idea that the stereotype is completely manufactured by defensive genre fans seems ... maybe not quite fair.
(The ricochet from 'there's no bias against genre writers or fans any more, you just like feeling persecuted' to 'you're inventing unfair stereotypes of lit-fic because you don't want to challenge yourself with important deep things instead of the trash you read' is ... hmm, certainly an intriguing kind of whiplash.)
I wouldn't know, myself, because nearly all my literary reading these days is in the periods I study, ending at around 1815. But my best friend is getting an MFA in creative writing and damn if every lit piece he gets assigned isn't "people being miserable in a stylistic way, especially writers having affairs."
This may not be representative of modern lit fic as a whole! Like I said, I wouldn't know. But the idea that the stereotype is completely manufactured by defensive genre fans seems ... maybe not quite fair.
(The ricochet from 'there's no bias against genre writers or fans any more, you just like feeling persecuted' to 'you're inventing unfair stereotypes of lit-fic because you don't want to challenge yourself with important deep things instead of the trash you read' is ... hmm, certainly an intriguing kind of whiplash.)
