Review: Tyson, Using Critical Theory

Using Critical Theory: How to Read and Write about Literature by Lois Tyson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


(3rd edition)
This is a textbook. It teaches the basics of writing papers using critical theories (New Criticism, feminism, postcolonialism, Marxism, etc.) It's clearly written and laid out, and it boils down the process of writing an English paper into a series of very simple steps. It also defangs the most common student questions (E.g. My interpretation is my opinion, so how can it be wrong?) and I think provides a pretty good understanding of what it is you're being asked to do when you write an English paper. I disagree with it in places (she does not do a good job of explaining the concept of "othering" and I think misuses it), but overall, yes, this would have been super helpful to have when I was teaching intro lit courses.



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Review: Mittelmark & Newman, How NOT to Write a Novel (2008)

How Not to Write a Novel: 200 Classic Mistakes and How to Avoid Them—A Misstep-by-Misstep Guide by Howard Mittelmark

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


I found this mildly amusing, occasionally helpfully pithy ("When there is a plan, things cannot go according to it."), and a quick read. They don't stick consistently to their conceit that they are trying to teach readers how not to write a novel, which is mildly irritating. (Rather, the conceit is mildly irritating; I much prefer the parts of the book where they forget to cleave to it.)

They do explain very clearly why their 200 mistakes are mistakes (they do a great job with all the ways you can misuse a speech tag) and provide good advice about avoiding them.

Three and a half stars, round up to four.



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Review: Solnit, Men Explain Things to Me (2014)

Men Explain Things to Me by Rebecca Solnit

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


Crawling back through the funhouse mirror that was 2016, this is a collection of topical essays, mostly on politics, although there's a great one about Virigina Woolf and negative capability. Solnit is an good writer and she's very passionate about women's rights and the culture of male violence, about which she is still, in 2020, not wrong. She keeps looking for the paradigm-shifting event, the one that will make domestic violence and rape suddenly matter to the dominant culture, and I don't think she finds it.

(Her title essay is NOT where the word "mansplaining" comes from, but it is calling out the same phenomenon.)



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Review: Hills, Writing in General and the Short Story in Particular (1977)

Writing in General and the Short Story in Particular by Lawrence Rust Hills

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I was a lot less impressed with Mr. Hills than he seemed to be with himself, but then I don't actually think the "literary short story" is the be-all and end-all of creative writing.

He said three things I liked.

1. "Most of the playwright's theories about 'plot structure' and 'dramatic action' are solutions to problems the fiction writer doesn't even have" (p. 94).

2. "For surely a great part of what is called a writer's 'vision' comes from how he listens" (164).

3. [about writing] "The truth is that the only way not to feel really terrible is to work.

"But sometimes it seems easier just to feel really terrible" (190).



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Review: Forster, Aspects of the Novel (1927)

Aspects of the Novel by E.M. Forster

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I regret not coming across this book sooner, for I find it delightful. I disagree with Forster about almost everything, but such is the pleasure of listening to him talk about books he loves that I don't mind.

I don't know that I would call it useful, either for novelists or critics, because Forster's way of looking at novels is extremely individual (he's right about Tristram Shandy, though), but it was thought-provoking, and I like how much he's able to extract from a single sentence of Mansfield Park.



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Review: Alison, Meander Spiral Explode (2019)

Meander, Spiral, Explode: Design and Pattern in Narrative by Jane Alison

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is a book looking at alternatives to Aristotle, which I'm always in favor of. (Aristotle, in this case, being the Poetics and the rising action-climax-falling action pattern that we're taught to expect our narratives to take.) Alison looks at narratives in the traditional wave form to start with, but spends most of the book looking at other ways of putting a text together.

I enjoy reading people analyzing books they love (and Alison's enthusiasm for her examples is very clear), so I found this book pleasant to read, even though the books she's discussing are probably not books I myself will ever want to read. And it is interesting to get away from Aristotelian precepts and see other ways to do things.



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Review: Zinsser, On Writing Well (2006 ed.)

On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction by William Zinsser

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This is a book on writing nonfiction, but the first part, which is about the mechanics of writing, is applicable to fiction as well and is full of good advice. Zinsser wrote it to be a companion to Strunk & White, and it's much less dictatorial in tone (although it's very clear that Zinsser believes in the rightness of what he's saying)---more "helpful wisdom" than "fiats from on high." He also does a really good job of explaining clearly why the mechanics matter. I found the later parts of the book, about writing specific kinds of nonfiction, interesting if not personally useful (and you never know what might come in handy).

Four and a half stars, round up to five.



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Review: Truby, The Anatomy of Story (2007)

The Anatomy of Story: 22 Steps to Becoming a Master Storyteller by John Truby

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I have, first of all, a beef with Mr. Truby. At an early point in the book, he says, literally parenthetically, "I'm going to assume that the main character is male, simply because it's easier for me to write that way" (40). And he does. Throughout the book, he uses the pronoun "he" exclusively---not just for the hero, but also for the writer--- unless he's actually talking about a woman. And it's like, I'm sorry half the human race is INCONVENIENCING YOU BY EXISTING, Mr. Truby, but maybe you could go the extra mile here? Also, in talking about The African Queen, a story with two heroes, he is plainly only talking about Humphrey Bogart. Katharine Hepburn is so much chopped liver. So it's NOT just, This is easier for me. It's, Hi, I'm trying to be sexist without you noticing.

So, yeah, I have a personal-is-politlcal beef with Mr. Truby.

And then there's what he's trying to sell.

In fairness to Mr. Truby, I have to say that I believe that he truly believes his system is the only right way to write stories. In fairness to me and everybody else, I have to say that he is wrong. His elaborate 22-step system is, to me, both artificial and awkward, and while he can impose it on certain stories (his favorites are The Godfather, Casablanca, and Tootsie), it's very like Aristotle basing his entire theory of drama on Oedipus Rex and thereby forcing generations of high school students to find Hamlet's fatal flaw. (Hint: he doesn't have one.) Truby insists that his formula is not a formula, but a formula is exactly what it is, just at a structurally deeper level than "boy meets girl." He also doesn't understand symbolism or irony, and he's somehow made a quite successful career as a script doctor without ever running into the idea that other people may write stories differently than he does and still have them come out okay.

I found this book very interesting, in a no-I-will-not-join-your-cult way, but I cannot say that it was at all helpful.

I would give this book three stars, except that he DOES insist his is the only way to successfully write a story, and that's pernicious. Two stars.



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