Jim wrote: In the second of his two articles, "Who Cares Who
Killed Roger Ackroyd," Wilson admitted that he found Chandler
worthwhile, but insisted that, in spite of the plots
involving the investigation of and solution to a crime,
Chandler wasn't really a mystery writer at all....Silly
comments like this led to that famous phrase so beloved of
academics, "transcends the genre!"
1) There are a few "academics," official & not, who read
& contribute to this list; I am one. There must be some
way for you to make your points other than by attacking &
insulting all of us, I would think.
2) While EW's shortcomings are well-documented (see his
contretemps with Nabokov over Eugene Onegin), & his
equivocation here may indeed be silly, "transcending genre"
is neither a difficult concept nor a particularly disputed
one, & is often quite convenient in separating rote genre
exercises from more literary efforts. We use the concept on
this list constantly, although without straight utterance of
the cliche of which you're so dismissive.
An academic, ese
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