JSB: An Invective Against Mere Fiction

Some writer friends and I were recently discussing the merits of Moby-Dick. I and another intrepid soul extolled the virtues of Melville's classic. It is the great American novel. The language is like the ocean itself, the highs and lows and storms and calms. (One of the other writers thought this sounded more like a Harlequin romance scene than a description of the book).
Anyway, comparing Moby-Dick to today's fiction is sort of like comparing the Empire State Building to the Dunkin' Donuts franchise. There's a lot of the latter, but only one of the former. And you only have to look at them to know there's no comparison.

It turns out that the loudest howls of protest came from those who had been forced to read Moby-Dick in school. Not many kids are ready for the great book. I can just see some harried juvenile back then, wanting to watch The Dukes of Hazard, but having to get to Moby-Dick instead. His mom sends him to his room as he kicks and screams, and he puts on the Stones and tries to read this novel.

He's a goner. No way he's going to like it. And that first, awkward introduction may shape his relationship with the book that lasts a lifetime.

Too bad. I was lucky to read Moby-Dick after college, because I wanted to. And loved it. (As an aside, if you do decide to give the book a try, or another try, be sure to pick up a version with illustrations by Rockwell Kent. They are the perfect meeting of artist and novel.)

I do think there is one point the critics and supporters of Moby-Dick can agree upon, and that is this: Melville can never be accused of writing mere fiction. He was going for it. In sports parlance, he was leaving it all out there on the floor. He could have made a good living writing penny dreadfuls, but he was after more than a living. He was pursuing a vision. He was about that elusive dream of literature as apotheosis. God love him.

By the way, that term mere fiction, and the title of this piece, come from an essay by the late John Gardner, a great novelist in his own right, but also a teacher and essayist. I like the title, because there is too little time for anyone to be writing mere fiction.

I had to laugh, then, when, a couple of days after what is now called The Great Moby Dustup, I picked up my new copy of Salem's Lot by Stephen King. I'd read it years ago, but my son got me a new, illustrated, hardback edition for Christmas last year. And it has a new introduction by the author.

At this point in his career, King was still an unpublished novelist. Carrie had yet to come out. But he had this vision for a vampire book that was breathtaking in its grandiosity, especially for a twenty-three year old unpublished novelist. He wanted to combine, he says, the vampire myth of Bran Stoker's Dracula with the "naturalistic fiction of Frank Norris and the EC horror comics I'd loved as a child….Did I really think I could combine Dracula and Tales from the Crypt and come out with Moby-Dick? I did. I really did….Was I daunted by the fact that Moby-Dick only sold about twelve copies in Melville's lifetime? Not I; one of my ideas was that a novelist takes the long view, the lofty view, and that does not include the price of eggs. (My wife would not have agreed, and I doubt if Mrs. Melville would have, either.)"

Well bravo for King. And Melville. No mere fiction for these two. And look! Melville, forgotten in his lifetime, is still talked about today and taught in college courses. King himself is taught right now, and has sold considerably more than twelve copies.

Which is to say, go for it. As a writer, may your reach exceed your grasp. Don't ever settle for mere fiction. You have a voice and a vision and we need to see it on the page.

Do not be timid or afraid. Have a little of the 23-year-old Stephen King 'tude. You won't fail. As the old advertising man Leo Burnett once said, "If you reach for the stars you may not quite get one, but you won't get a handful of mud, either."

And now I give you the opening of Moby-Dick. If you think you can top this, friend, then go ahead and do it. I'll blog about you next:

Call me Ishmael. Some years ago - never mind how long precisely - having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen, and regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin
warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street and methodically knocking people's hats off - then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship.

James Scott Bell's website is http://www.jamesscottbell.com/