The Age-old Pop vs Lit Debate

These “answers” to the question "is literary or popular fiction better?" illustrate the problem: no one these days wants to take a stand for anything. Is this question really so murky an area, which such complex nuances, that no satisfactory answer can be arrived at? Just back away and mumble something to the effect that “it depends”? So the fact that, no matter how hard our teachers try to get people to read once they've left grade school, they're too busy making money (got some) and babies (got 5) and chasing their tails (haven't got to bed before 12:00 so far this week) to sit down and read a challenging book every once in a while (I still read over a dozen novels last year; that may not be great, but it's better than some) doesn't have anything to do with it? So when that literary writer, that purveyor of high-concept, inaccessible metaphors comes along and tries to fashion something that, to him, seems beautiful, and people don't like it because they've never come across any metaphor that complicated before because they haven't, since the sixth grade, picked up a novel with words in it they didn't know, then the Jolly Roger goes up and the popular fiction Man O'War turns hard to port and gives a full broadside.

Popular fiction seeks to meet people where they're at. Literary fiction expects people to come to it. Which is better has direct correlation to which has inherently more capacity for reflecting the essence of Him who created Art because He loves beauty: literary fiction is better.

I don't think it's helpful to anyone to dance around the issue that most people don't read enough to stay literate. But if they're happy with where they are intellectually and in their judgement and (non-)consumption of artistic works, then no one, including myself, is suggesting they go out of their way. That they're not literate enough to like-appreciate-desire art for art's sake is the result of their own prioritization in life and that's an issue between them and God, not between them and the writer trying to do the best he knows how.

There's no line in the sand between popular and literary fiction. There's a gradually up-sloping curve of increasingly ambitious use of language and metaphor; a deepening of meaning that withstands ever higher levels of scrutiny. The more art a person consumes, the higher their expectations get for the next period of consumption. Somewhere along the way, some readers stop slogging upward. So what? Art is for enjoyment like the sunset is for enjoyment. If you're happy with what you've got, then fine.

But don't you dare begrudge those who want more. Those whose appetite for Art increases beyond their ability to feed it. Those who devour ever more complicated sentences with great alacrity. And if you do want to hold them back, protect them from the evil, arrogant, literary bourgeois, don't be surprised when they turn on you.

It's just as arrogant to begrudge a fellow pilgrim the enjoyment of his sunset as it is to begrudge another of his apathy.