--- Karin Montin <
kmontin@sympatico.ca> wrote: A second reading of a
good book can
> be as satisfying as the first.
Bill wrote:
> >Hey, Vicki, when you get to be my age, you
can
> enjoy those trick endings the
> >second time
There have been some
interesting studies of this - most linked to film, but I
think it applies just as well to fiction. If suspense is
created by the reader's wanting/dreading/needing to know what
comes next, why then does it frequently work just as well
after repeated viewings/readings. Much to be read about this
in places such as "Suspense: Conceptualizations, Theoretical
Analyses, and Empirical Explorations," Peter Vorderer, ed. -
but ultimately I think it comes down to the readers' own role
in the game.
As genre readers, quite often
we know full well what to expect, and relish the fulfilment
of those expectations as well as the piquancy of surprises -
including remembered surprises that we are willing to
rehearse anew. This may partly explain why a mystery reader -
(such as that poor benighted soul on the Edgar panel who
didn't know what to make of 'The Confession') - can be so
flummoxed by noir. They came to play chess, and it turned out
rugby. Genre readers love to accuse each other's genres of
being predictable, but I suspect really we just have
preferred formulae. Who is more predictable: Louis L'Amour or
Nora Roberts? Well jeez, neither, but its MY fantasy, and I'd
much rather have my dark hero save the day, take his prize
and walk out of town, than get tamed into domesticity and
hitched
- so Romances are 'formulaic and predictable,' and Westerns
are 'consistently satisfying.' As for Noir, most of the
readers on this list have a pretty good idea what outcomes to
expect and the sort of feeling it will leave them with. The
relative unpopularity of the genre may offer us some
protection from critiques of the genre as formulaic - were
Noir as popular as Romance those downbeat endings would start
to seem pretty cheesy, and doom would lose some of its
panache.
Of course best of all, in my book and
as others have said, are those all-rounders who have a
healthy respect for plot and suspense, and when it comes to
character, language and setting are strong on at least two
out of three. These are titles that I can confidently place
in the hands of bored genre and mainstream readers
alike.
David Wright - Seattle Public Library Fiction Dept.
"Literature is a luxury; fiction is a necessity."
-G.K.
Chesterton
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 10 Nov 2005 EST