WHY EXPERIMENTAL FICTION THREATENS TO DESTROY PUBLISHING, JONATHAN FRANZEN, AND LIFE AS WE KNOW IT A correction By Ben Marcus I, the left temporal lobe ofthe brain, below the ofa reader. Language is meant to flow predigest central sulcus of Ronaldo, but above and tucked ed, like liquid down a feeding tube. Instead of behind both Broca’s area and Heschl’s gyri, sits the brain, ie the heart that writers are told they Wemicke's area, a tufted bun- dle of flesh responsible for lan- ‘guage comprehension. Ie gets its name from Carl Wernicke, a German neurologist who dis- covered in 1874 that damage to this region could cause an im- pairment of language compre hension. Think of Wernicke's area asthe reader’ muscle, with: ‘out which all written language is an impossible tangle of codes, a scribbled bit of abstract art chat can't be deciphered. Here is where what we tead is tumed into meaning, intangible strings of language animaced into legi- ble shapes. Ifwe do not read, or do so only rarely, the reader's muscle is slack and our of practice, and the strange, harder texts, the lyrically unique ones that work outside the realm of familiarity, just scatter into random words. The words may be familiar, but they fail to work together as architectural ele ments ofa larger world. In the literary worl, irs not politic to suggest that the brain is even involved in reading, or that our reading faculties might actually be im- proved. Mentions of the brain imply effort, and cffort is the last thing we are supposed to request Ben Marcus isthe author of the story collection The must reach in order to move readers, ro stirin them the deep. est, most intense feelings. lf we are successful, we touch or break ‘our readers heart. But the heart cannot be trained to understand Tanguage, let alone literary lan guage, which might come in complex and challenging guis cs, and which can at times seem put ro uses 0 foreign that it re- sembles the dialect of a new tribe of people. Although this language might ac first seem alien, immersion in its ways can show us unprecedented worlds of feeling and thought. Literary language is complex because it is seeking to accomplish some thing extraordinarily dificult: to engrave the elu: sive aspects of life's entanglements, to represent the intensity of consciousness, to produce the sort of stories chat transfix and mesmerize. And despite claims to the contrary by B. R. Myers, Jonathan Franzen, Jonathan Yardley, Tom Wolfe, and Dale Peck, among other crities and writers, literary language can also make a more abstract but no less vital enrertainment—subtle, unfa- miliar less wedded co preapproved modes, but exhilarating nevertheless. Age of Wire and String and the novel Notable American ‘Women. He recent edited The Anchor Book of New American Short Stories haps by Stun Fell, Page fe fre inemedi wks fr Sy Lm lors 2e Po jy Tan Nw MonsAnwriter laboring intensely to produce at from words would almost certainly hope for an active Wemicke’s area, rather than an atrophied one, on the part of his reader. As a writer of some times abstract, so-called experimental fiction that can take a more active attention to read, I would say that my ideal reader's Wemicke's area is staffed by an army of jumpsuited code-breakers, work ing a barsize space that isstrung about the rafters with a mathematically intricate lattice of rope and steel, and mayhe gusseted by a synthetic coil The true elitists in the literary world are the ones who have become annoyed by literary ambition in any form that is stronger and more sensitive than either, ike guitar strings made from an unraveled spinal cord, ‘each strand tuned to different tensions. The con duits of language that flow past iin liquid-cooled one-hollows could rigger unique vibrations that resonate into an original symphony when my ide al reader scanned a new sentence. This would be ‘scheme so elaborate that every portion of lan- ‘guage would be treated as unique, and its infinite ‘parts would be sent through such an exhaustive de- coding process that not even a carcass of a word ‘would remain. My ideal reader would cough up a thimble of fne gray powder atthe end of the read- ing session, and she could use this mineral-rch sub- stance to compost her garden. ‘Short ofthis desire fora supreme reader's mus- cle, a writer might be forgiven for wishing to slip readers enhancements to their Wernicke's areas, doses ofa potion that might rum them into fierce litle reading machines, devourers of new syntax, fluent interpreters of the most lyrically complex grammar, 90 that the more dificult kind of sense ‘writing mighe strive to make could find its appro- priate Turing machine, and would be revealed to the reader with the delicacy that the writer in- tended. This would liberate the writer to worry less about whether or not everyone could process even the most elementary sentences, and he might ‘then move deeper into/a medium that has ony be gun to be tapped, certain that at least some read- cers would be happily bushwhacking alongside bim. But these enhancements to Wemnicke’ area in fact already exist, and they're called books: the fuel chat allows this region of the brain to grow ‘ever more capable. If reading is a skill, with lev els of ability, and not simply something we can or cannot do, then it skill thae ean be improved by more, and more varied, reading, The more var- ious the styles we ingest, the better equipped we aero engage and be moved by those writers who 40. HARPER'S MAGAZINE / OGTORER 2005 ‘are looking deeply into the possibilty of syntaxas away to structure sense and feeling packing ex- perience into language, leveraging grammar asa ‘medium forthe making of art. Whether or notthis intense kind of reading makes us freaks is anoth- er matter, but the muscle grows and strengthens ‘every time we use it, leaving us ever hungrier to encounter sentences we've never seen before ‘And there are certain books that dorequiteusto be readers, that ask us to have spent some time with sentences ofall sorts, and presume an i tense desire for new language that might render notions of “effort” in reading meanings. But now, in the literary work, writer ae being warned off this ambitious approach, and everywhere are signs that if you happen to be interested in the possibilities of language if you appreciate the artistic achievements of others bur still dream for yourself, however foolishly, that new arrangements are possible, new styles, new concoctions of language that might set of a seties of delicious mental explosions—if you believe any of this, and worse, if you ty to race tice it, you are an elitist. You hate your au ence, you hate the literary industry, you proba bly even hate yourself. You stand not with the people but in a quiet dark hole, shouting t0 n0 one. pose, and it’s my view that the reverse i te The elitists are not suppesedly demanding wi crs such as myself but rather those who caution the culture away from literary development, who insist that the narrative achievements of the past be ossified, lacquered, and rehearsed by younger generations. In this climate artistic achievement isa legacy, and writers are encour aged to behave like cover bands, embelishing the oldies, maybe, while ensuring that buried in the song is an old familiar melody to make ws smile with recognition, so that we might read ‘more from memory than by active attention. ‘The true elitists in the literary world ae the ‘ones who have become annoyed by literary am bition in any form, who have converted the vey meaning of ambition so totally that it now rate tersasan act of dain, a hostility tothe poor cone ‘mon reader, who should never be asked todo any thing that might lead toa pulled muscle, (What a relief to be told there's no need to bother with a book that might seem thomy, or abstract, unusual) The elitists are the ones who become i try when itis suggested to them that a hook with low sales might actually deserve a prize, as hap pened with last year's National Book Awandin > tion, So insulted that they were being asked think quickly for themselves about the werkafthe finalists—which had largely gone unreviewed— crities and writers from major newspapers (Bdward Wyate, Lauta Miller, Caryn James, Thomas McGuane) rushed to defend che industry from these unknown books, al readers were asured that che low sales figures for some of the titles could mean only that the books had failed our culture’ single meaningfl literary tet The jues were of diverse artiste styles, and ther choices, in- stead of being seen as an excellent opportunity to discover overlooked and posibly extraordinary books, were dismissed out of hand. This was a clear announcement that the value system for li erature was tweaked to favor not people who a¢- tually ead a lot of books but a borderline reader, highly covered by the literary industry, who might read only one or two hooks ita year and who had dam sure better be recommended a prize-winning book that ill later his inelligeice and bring him warmly into the fod ofthe most audience: friendly writing. The literary industry, in other words, i struggling too much financially to issue a highly visible prize to an obscure, under. reviewed book that is more lyial than narta tive, more cerebral than sentimental. The jules, like had conporate team members, ha played too much to the interests of deeply committed read cs. There are only one or two chances each year to capture this borderline reader, afterall and its too dangerous to recommend a book that might take some effort and risk puzzling the poor soul who just wants to read a good old lane Monthly's B. R. Myers likes, and that is just about all. He is among the more dour of the ambition-scoming literary erties, afronted by the very notion that he must caze, eve a lite bi, bout contemporary weting as an artform in 0 derto discus it. Writing about contemporary ic tion while wearing a gas mask, Myers says not only that the emperor has no clothes but that there isno emperor. "Give mea time-tested mas- terpiece or what critics patroniingly calla fun read—Sister Cane or just plain Came.”) Hed very much prefer not to read anything new, to believe that noting more is posible i literary art after Hemingway: He isso thorough in his argu tents against any kind of ineremental shift away from established narrative practice, so complete in his condemnation of even some wellestab- lished contemporary writing (Paul Auster, Don Dalillo, Annie Proulx, and Commac McCarthy all get buried) that one might conclude he simply doesn't believe writing tobe ar artform, Jes more ‘fa ost art, like plastering, and the best pract= tioners are dead and gone. Myers seems t have soblie that literature might havea future that, change is possible, that something new and zen- uinely artistic might happen. Tes as though a ‘man has run onto baseball fied mid-game, de- claring that baseball no longer exists even as the same onbits beauriully around him. Irs never easy to debate a fatarther like My- crs but that alone isnot the reason I cannot win this argument. The other reason is that the writ- es championed! bythe likes of Myers are called re alist and I'm not. This will aways Took lke an argument between the realists and the experi- ‘mencalists—with the realists tackling life and all its complexities and the experimentalistsdry- humping whatever glory hole they can find. Tam told that 'm an elitist precisely because I don't practice easm, which i hy faethe reigning style of contemporary literature, the incumbent move, however loudly its adherents might claim under dog status, No matter my interest in reality, in the way it feels to be alive, and the way language can be shaped into contours tat surround ail luminare that feeling: because I don't write the conventional narrative language, and because | haven't often foregrounded the consciousness of characters in my fiction, and livestocked those characters in a recognizable setting, [will never be considered a reais. (Of the many kinds oflitrary-fiction writers, its the group called the realists who have, by far, both the most desirable and the least accurate rhame. One might easily think that they have the right of frst refusal to the true doings of the work, a pair of proprietary goweles with special reality-tuned lenses. Other kinds of writers ei- ther are not interested in reality (experimental- ists, postmodemists, antirealiss!) of must wait inline to graze the scraps of les matterfl ite left behind, the details deemed unworthy of literary report by their more world-concemned peers. The notion that reality ean be represented only through a certain kind of narrative attention isa desperate argument by realists themselves, rouo 4