> Today, the publishing industry as a whole turns its nose up to narratives that promote objective meaning.
> There’s a lot to unpack in that claim, but it is no accident that the publishing industry shies away from books that illustrate “the good life” in the Aristotelian sense.
Alright, let’s see what the comps are.
> These books will fade into oblivion in the next decade while great novels with moral messages—Anna Karenina, The Great Gatsby, East of Eden—will stay with us even after we leave this earth, for they are not only well-written but also meaningful.
Not one of these is about “the good life”! The Great Gatsby in particular is as close to a book about nihilism and hedonism as you can get, and was criticized in its own time for lacking morals.
So the essay is a little incoherent, a little “retvrn” to a past that doesn’t exist.
It’s convenient to blame Derrida, Barthes and Lyotard but my God, do the legwork to connect them to the thing you’re actually complaining about. If “English departments” are to blame for the nihilistic literature you don’t like, then show where that influence came from—the only connection the article provides is a flimsy “she also dislikes capitalism.” Moshfegh got her MFA from Brown, and last I checked there were few Derrida scholars there.
Most novelists these days don’t come from the university system, nor does theoretical literary criticism have much influence among the large publishers.
TimorousBestie•1h ago
> There’s a lot to unpack in that claim, but it is no accident that the publishing industry shies away from books that illustrate “the good life” in the Aristotelian sense.
Alright, let’s see what the comps are.
> These books will fade into oblivion in the next decade while great novels with moral messages—Anna Karenina, The Great Gatsby, East of Eden—will stay with us even after we leave this earth, for they are not only well-written but also meaningful.
Not one of these is about “the good life”! The Great Gatsby in particular is as close to a book about nihilism and hedonism as you can get, and was criticized in its own time for lacking morals.
So the essay is a little incoherent, a little “retvrn” to a past that doesn’t exist.
It’s convenient to blame Derrida, Barthes and Lyotard but my God, do the legwork to connect them to the thing you’re actually complaining about. If “English departments” are to blame for the nihilistic literature you don’t like, then show where that influence came from—the only connection the article provides is a flimsy “she also dislikes capitalism.” Moshfegh got her MFA from Brown, and last I checked there were few Derrida scholars there.
Most novelists these days don’t come from the university system, nor does theoretical literary criticism have much influence among the large publishers.