On the classic scholarly
concept that can still help us think about what popular fiction does and means.
On the short
list of game-changing AmericanStudying scholarly texts has to be Jane Tompkins’
Sensational
Designs: The Cultural Work of American Fiction, 1790-1860 (1986). One
of a group of 1980s critics, along with Nina
Baym, Cathy
Davidson, and others, who helped challenge, redefine, and significantly
expand the canon of early American literature, Tompkins did so by rethinking
what makes a literary work “great.” In her argument, such greatness, both in a
work’s own moment and in helping it endure across generations, comes less from intrinsic
or aesthetic qualities and more from how the work and its author engage with
and impact their society. Tompkins called that social impact “cultural work,” and
the phrase and concept have contributed to numerous other scholarly perspectives
and analyses since she coined them.
I think the
concept can still do a lot of, well, work for our AmericanStudies analyses, but
would also extend it in two ways that Tompkins’ original book didn’t (at least
not as focal points). Tompkins focuses on authors and works that she sees as
doing their cultural work purposefully, as seeking overtly to impact their
societies (with Harriet Beecher Stowe’s
Uncle Tom’s Cabin as exhibit A); but to my mind it’s just
as interesting to think about the less purposeful work that other texts, and
perhaps especially popular fictions, do. To cite a recent, hugely successful
example: I don’t know that anybody would argue that Stephanie Meyer
intended for her Twilight books
to impact their society, so much as she hoped (correctly) that they would impact
her pocketbook; but it’s difficult to overstate the work that the series, and
the subsequent film adaptations, have done in our 21st century
moment. In fact, it’d be fair to say that you couldn’t AmericanStudy early 21st
century America without at least an awareness of Twilight.
Besides
extending “cultural work” to include such less deliberate versions, I also
believe there’s value in applying the concept to the work done around and with,
as well as by, popular fictions. For example, no figure or institution has done
more cultural work with popular literature in the last few decades than Oprah
Winfrey and her Oprah’s Book Club.
Whether you applaud her work in bringing authors
like Toni Morrison to a wider audience, join Jonathan
Franzen in (at least initially) bemoaning her influence, or fall anywhere
else on the spectrum of responses, it’s impossible to deny that the landscape
of late 20th and early 21st century American literature
was potently and irrevocably impacted by Oprah’s choices and conversations. I
don’t think cultural work gets any clearer, or more worth studying, than that.
Next popular
fiction post tomorrow,
Ben
PS. What do you
think? Thoughts on these themes? Suggestions, favorites, or other responses?
Oprah's Book Club definitely deserves a mention here. It has definitely been a catapult for many authors, living and deceased. In addition to the Jonathan Franzen controversy, there was a well-known controversy around the book, "A Million Little Pieces" which was first publicized as a memoir but soon found to be near-complete fabrication.
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