I suggested analytical because it sounded neutral. It's not an overly positive or negative way to describe ones reading. When you argued that analytical was colder and lacking in human warmth, I thought you were suggesting I'd gone too far the other way. But then you suggest analytical is superior to unanlytical, so now you're just left me baffled.
It also contains the word anal, which is an apt term for anyone who chooses to over-analyse a harmless work of escapism
Threads getting a bit off track. I'm going to bring it back using the book, Divergent, as an example. I think the marketers and the film makers thought this story would take off, but it hasn't and I'm sure it won't. They looked at the elements: rebellious YAs fighting the defective system. But it missed the mark with the inability for readers to see themselves in the characters or the setting. The premise of a young person resisting the pigeon hole society would put them in is fine, but the author made the pigeon hole so far removed from the lives of young adults it missed the mark. We all dream about being likeable or popular, and having true love, so Twilight doesn't have to be realistic for vicarious reading. And Katniss' struggle against the system, that's relatable. But having some single quality based on your personality, picked out for you by testing like in Divergent, who can relate to that? I think that's where it missed the mark. Either we are writing great literature which is a different animal from popular works, or our stories have to be relatable. That might be living through Bella or Luke Skywalker, but it can also be something less personal, just joining in the fun in a great adventure, or getting caught up in a mystery or scaring oneself with a thriller or horror story or living in a sci-fi world like Hyperion. These books are popular for a different reason than great literature. We enjoy being there with the characters. By the way, whether a writer is skilled or not is a different thing than whether the story is interesting. Some books seem to be popular despite the author's lack of talent, and some very good writers write popular works.
@Lemex - re Coraline, in the film at least, the idea of the world being only half-built is part of the plot. It's supposed to be that way, so it's not a flaw. In Potter's case where it attempts to imagine a full, real world, and yet doesn't quite manage, that's why it can be seen as a fault. I've not read Coraline either but the film was freaky as all heck. I've only ever read one of Gaiman's books - he's indeed a good writer with a very quirky imagination and I can see why he's so successful. But that one book didn't grip me much. I did finish it, but I'm not thirsting for more. I'm interested to see what else he comes up with but not sure I can be bothered to put in the effort to read it lol. It's similar with Terry Prachett for me - clearly a gifted writer with some quirky, unique stories, but somehow the writing doesn't grab me. I've read 1.5 books by him so far, Hatful of Sky and about halfway through Mort. It's all right. I don't find him all that funny somehow. And re my ex - oh I'm very glad it didn't work out We still talk from time to time, maybe two, three times a year. We have very little in common these days.
It's interesting you bring Bella up as a relatable character. Her sheet actually reads like a scientology test. She's shy, dishonest, unengaged, arrogant, and for absolutely no rational reason everyone wants to be her friend.
I've not read Divergent but I thought it's hugely popular, isn't it? So why would you say it "missed the mark"? What do you mean by "missed the mark"? As in people didn't relate to it, or that it didn't meet the sort of quality or standard you might have for what you consider as a good book/story? Because my teenage students keep telling me to read it - I still haven't cus I'm just not interested. But my students loved it, and it was popular enough to have been translated to Czech and made into a film.
I wonder if it's worthwhile to create different categories of "talent". I mean, if a book is popular, it seems like probably the author did something right? So maybe there's "talent" at creating appealing characters doing interesting things, and then separately "talent" at putting words on the page in a manner that's pleasing to people who care about such things.
I have only watched part of the first film and never read the books, but dam she was a disagreeable character. But then almost everyone in that film was just painfully angst-ridden and so insufferably serious it was like watching a play where every actor is Russell Crowe. I mean I know I am not the target audience, but what a monumental pile of steaming manure.
Yeah, oddly that's exactly my opinion of both of those writers too. I used to like Prachett as a young teenager. But, I don't know? I just lost the ability to go along with it all. I'm not even sure why. Gaiman could be very good on a word-by-word, sentence construction level, I know he is in fact. I just don't get any pleasure from him. I even want to, but I just ... don't. We all have that ex. I still sometimes see the ex who broke up with me because I was 'too posh'.
I, on the other hand, like Gaiman quite a bit. Pratchett, I could never get into. I thought Bella was intentionally toned-down to a large degree, but she's not as passive as everyone makes out. She drives most of the big plot points in Twilight.
Not sure where you get arrogant and dishonest? I don't read her that way. I read her as a blank slate, fill in the blanks. From my point of view, I dislike the fact her main claim to fame is having a boyfriend. Finally in the end of the series Meyers gives her a vampire skill. It doesn't make the character much better in my eyes. But you have to look at why so many teens flocked to the story. (I'm talking about before the actors replaced the draw.) Readers want to be the girl that finds a love as true as Edward's. That's all it is. So Bella doesn't need to be particularly intelligent, skilled or creative. For my taste I like my heroines to have more to them than being defined by a male. But two guys fighting over me? Who wouldn't like that?
I don't know. It has approximate meaning to be something like a natural aptitude for something, but in terms of what that something is is open to interpretation.
@GingerCoffee I don't think she's defined by Edward more than he's defined by her. They're both obsessed and a bit dysfunctional (but that's an age-old theme). But having him as a boyfriend isn't all she does. She's the one that pursues him, she makes decisions to try to protect her father, she researches the native myths, and ultimately she heads off on her own to rescue her mother from the big bad (though in that regard she has to be saved because she's no match). The major points of conflict for her are consequences of her own decisions, so she has agency which is more than you can say for a lot of female characters.
Do you see a fan base waiting for the next installment? If it was wildly popular as a novel, seems like it was a flash in the pan. No one seems to be telling others to read this great book. Are your students still talking about it? Then again ... It would appear perhaps my experience differs from the evidence: Maybe people are picking it up because they want on the bandwagon. I tried to read it and I hated it, while I actually liked Twilight despite the poor writing. I like YA, it's the genre I'm writing in. But Divergent was seriously flawed. Oh well, let's see if they make a sequel.
But Bella looking into Edward's story is no more than attraction to Edward. Where is the goal there for herself? And the whole rescue business, repeated again and again, the heroine is supposed to fall into danger by self sacrifice, it's sooooo old. Maybe I shouldn't get started on that trope.
Well, it's partly a romance, and in a romance story the pursuit of a romantic interest is a goal. Often, even in stories featuring female leads, it's the other way around, with the female character reacting to pursuit by the male. I agree there are problems with Bella, chief among them that she isn't all that bright much of the time (putting herself into stupid positions so she has to be saved). I'm just pointing out that her actions end up driving much of the plot, where many people seem to have the impression that she's just entirely passive throughout the story.
No, I don't see her as a passive character, just one with little value as a female character. It's a stereotype I think is very tired.
She is constantly lying to her friends (or at least the people who want to be her friends) her family and her love interests. And she looks down on the other students at the school, too snobby to sit with them or engage them in any conversation. In the first book her reaction to anyone at the school trying to talk to her is to brush them off, she does the same thing with her father.
That's interesting Jack, because I didn't read it that way. Not arguing with you, people read the same thing yet see different things.
What if it says important things, things that people need, but not so well? I've mentioned more than once that Rumer Godden is my favorite author, and that Rumer Godden's main theme, as I read her books, is about a longing for a place in the world. I think that that's what Harry Potter is about, too. Rowling can't begin to compete with Rumer Godden. But that theme, whether at the beautifully crafted level of Rumer Godden, or the Twinkies-and-confetti escapist-fun level of Rowling, is one that can have a strong impact. So what do I mean by a place in the world? Most of it is obvious, I think, but I babble anyway: There's Harry's longing for a loving family. I think that this is felt by a lot of kids, including kids who have families. A lot of families are dysfunctional, and even when they're not, adolescents tend not to feel all that secure in their family or their role in that family. A lot of children's-book heroes are separated from their families and that fact doesn't really bother them. Harry's desperate longing is different, and I think it has a different appeal. There's the aspect of Harry--the magic--that first makes him rejected and alone, and then turns out to be what's special about him. This appeals to the chlid's belief that they're special, that they're above this boring stressful world, that something somehow sometime is going to make this all better. Children long for that to happen. There's a world where children can have a real impact on, well, the world. They're regulated and scheduled and ordered around and hampered by stupid-to-them rules, as in the real world, but despite that, in this fictional world they get things done. They're smarter and more important than the adults around them. Sure, the adults are mostly idiots who fail to offer guidance or even basic protection--that's partly the point. These kids aren't learning to join an adult world; they ARE the world. Harry IS the world. Children long to be important, to accomplish something, to change something. As for the implausible bits--kids are kids. They don't care how dreary and unpleasant the adult life of a Hogwarts graduate might be. They don't care how impractical the whole situation is, or how big the plot holes are. They don't care about extending the logic of the world to unpleasant conclusions. If the conclusion turns unpleasant they just back up and focus on some other part of that very, very detailed and rich world. I won't sit down and argue whether the plot and world are coherent or not coherent; my argument is that whether they are or aren't isn't the point of these books. Logic is not the point of these books. Most of the apparent plot isn't the point; most of the apparent plot is just scenery. The story is purely emotional, with trimmings that look like rules and systems and logic and plot, but that's all an illusion. The story below the apparent plot is about emotion--longing, vulnerability, hope, longing, comfort, longing, friendship, loneliness, loss, longing, grief, all that stuff. Oh, and longing. The initial rejection of Harry by his family is overcome, and then that's echoed later by the rejection of the magical good guys, which is also overcome. Harry loses many of the things that he longed for, loses them irrevocably, and grieves them, and moves beyond that loss, and finds his place in the world. Harry longs, and longs, and longs, and he finally gets what he longs for. Sort of. Frankly? I don't find that final conclusion all that satisfying. I think that to some extent the series fail to deliver on the promise of all that longing. But by the time you get to that book, you're tied too tight to walk away. You'll take whatever happiness and satisfaction Harry can get. OK, maybe not you, and maybe not me, but a lot of readers. A dream has no coherent logic but can hit you in the gut. For some readers, Harry Potter is the same. It's not deliberately, consciously dreamlike or surreal, but that's what it ends up being. The first book hit me that way, and would have hit me harder if I'd been a kid when it came out. The later books lost their grip on me, but clearly not on a whole lot of other readers. I'm not saying that the series is a magnificent but flawed creation, and I'm not saying that it's a dubious pile of print that happens to have appeal. I can't make up my mind about that. I'm saying that I can absolutely see why so many people love it. I think that it gives many people something that they need. If you're not one of those people, then it's not going to win you over, because it doesn't have the quality that a book has to have in order to win you over. There's nothing wrong with that, in either you or the series. It would have been nice if the series had everything, the quality and the gut punch and logical plots and world details. But apparently the gut punch was enough to make it a success. And JK Rowling is still pretty young. Who knows, maybe she'll get all of it right someday?
