Good and Gooder
I read a lot of books these days, the time to do that being one of the great gifts of retirement. After a lifetime of reading, I am in the position of the US judge (don’t recall the name) who said ‘I can’t define pornography, but I know it when I see it.”
Well, I think I know good writing when I read it, but don’t ask me to define it, or even enumerate its key ingredients. That being said, I have recently had some reading experiences that I think point at one key ingredient of good writing.
I was on a long history-reading jag for a while, which included re-reading Martin Gilbert’s very good history of WWI and then an even longer (but not as good) history of the Napoleonic Wars, which were probably the actual first world war(s). Gilbert’s book is notable because along with the narrative of the war itself, it includes what a lot of not-famous people had to say at the time. Some of those people are just folks caught up in the maelstrom, like a British woman who went to Serbia to nurse wounded soldiers, and a Cpl in the 2nd Royal Fusiliers who finds himself in the hell of the first Battle of the Marne, and writes home about it. Some folks whose words are in the book are playing minor roles, but will become major figures in WWII two decades later. People like Harry S Truman, Erwin Rommel and Douglas MacCarthur.
I noted that the Napoleonic Wars history was not so good, and I think it is easier to describe good historical writing than to describe good fiction writing. Good history needs to be grammatical of course, but it really needs to be clear and precise. The grammar in the Napoleonic Wars book was bad, but it looked like much of that was just bad editing. Words missing, or the wrong word used.
More seriously, the author did not always seem up to the task he had set himself. He wrote an entire chapter on Napoleon’s so-called Continental System, which was an attempt to keep English goods from being imported into the European continent (so more French goods would be purchased. Sound familiar?)
The key questions are – one, what mechanisms did Bonaparte put in place to make this work, and two, how effectively did it actually work. The chapter is a mess, with seemingly contradictory claims appearing on different pages. I think the author was simply not up to the task of understanding the details and workings of an admittedly complex economic and military system.
But that’s the deal with history and other non-fiction. Either you do the job of explaining clearly the phenomena you are writing about, or you don’t. Thus, either your writing is good or it is not, on that criterion.
To be sure, some historical writers like John Keegan, Victor Davis Hanson and Martin Gilbert are also able to write in such a way that the history they are relating is also an interesting tale. US Grant’s long campaign to take the Confederate fortress town of Vicksburg is a great story. Read Keegan’s or Shelby Foote’s account of it and that will be clear.
What makes good fiction writing I find harder to say, as I noted. Here’s my one recent insight.
I came out of that long history period mentioned above and did what I do. I made an expedition to The Book Addict and bought myself five new (to me) used books, all of them fiction. They cost me $31.
The first book I read from my cache was The Old Devils, by Kingsley Amis, published in the mid-80s. Amis had a long, successful career as a writer, which started with the publication of his best-known novel, Lucky Jim, in 1954. I think I read that long ago, although I remember nothing about it. Well, The Old Devils is very good, and no doubt I think that at least partly because it is a novel about old people, written by Amis in his 60s. However, and this is key for me, it is also very well-written. Amis is a talented writer.
The second book I read was The Apocalypse Watch by Robert Ludlum, published in the mid-90s. Ludlum is one of the most-read spy novelists of the 20th century, with an estimated 300 million copies of his books printed, in 33 languages and 40 countries – according to Wikipedia. A number of his books have been adapted into movies or mini-series, a sure indicator of popular success. I had read his stuff before, as on my shelf is a very large tome that contains four of his earliest novels. I don’t remember anything about them, but I don’t recall hating them, and I bought The Apocalypse Watch because I thought a good thriller would be a worthy addition to my set of fiction.
Be that as it may, my enjoyment of Ludlum’s book was quite noticeably diminished by having read The Old Devils first. I was barely into the Apocalypse Watch when I started thinking to myself ‘people don’t talk like that’. It was an inescapable, intrusive thought during the entire time it took me to read the Ludlum novel – and it took a while, it’s a looong book.
As I wrote, I think I recognize good writing when I come across it: Robertson Davies, Mark Helprin, E. M. Forster, others. I could not, however, for the life of me tell you what are the ingredients for good writing, but this experience showed me one; writing dialog that sounds like people talking to one another. Dialog that allows you to form a picture of each character in your head when you read the words they are saying.
The dialog in The Old Devils is like that, but in the Ludlum book, not at all. The characters in The Apocalypse Watch talk like characters in a spy novel, not like people. Part of it is that their sentences include all kinds of details that two people who know each other would never feel the need to include. I suppose this is a way for the author to convey information about a very complicated situation to his readers. But still, the situations in The Old Devils are also complex, even if they don’t involve some international intrigue. Amis just knows how to have his characters talk to one another in what sounds like real language, but also conveys info.
So, I think now that is part of what good writing contains. It’s not the only thing, I’m sure, but is one I can at least articulate. Beyond that I will say that reading good writing leaves me feeling mentally refreshed. Reading Ludlum is an exercise in getting to the end.
I am not dissing Ludlum – well, maybe a little – as I did finish his book. I really wanted to find out who the Top Bad Guy was, and whether the two key characters would survive to live happily ever after. (They do.) He does induce you to keep turning the pages. And it is surely presumptuous to say someone who has sold so many books is not a good writer. But Amis is definitely gooder.
Perhaps the ultimate indicator of quality is that I am sure I will not read the Ludlum book a second time, but there is every reason to think I will read The Old Devils again. It will go on my shelf to stay.