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Bennett and Royle

Apricot Fairy

16

Anyone else hate it? :biggrin:

Reply 1

~Jen~

That was one of my set texts last year! I'm not sure I ever read enough of it to judge :redface:

Love how the authors seemed to think they were soooo amusing though. Also how it claimed on the back to be "not patronising" and "unpretentious"

Reply 2

Apricot Fairy

OP

16

Exactly! Don't get me wrong - a lot of it is very useful. But half the time they just seem to be looking for excuses to slag off some book they don't like, or go off on a tangent about George Bush. It really annoys me. But Bennett is one of the professors here, so we all have to use it and agree with it. Grrr.

I've seen some of the most pretentious crap I've ever come across in that bloody book.

Reply 3

butterflew

i found it really useful actually! less dry than some theory.

Reply 4

Apricot Fairy

OP

16

But why all the unnecessary bitching that actually has nothing to do with theory at all? :confused:

FFS Bennett & Royle, grow up!

Reply 5

Tyler Durden

17

Oh come on, it's really not that bad. In fact it's good! The reference to Bush is in the chapter on 'Ideology' and frankly I think it's a pretty good analogy for their point that garbled language = garbled ideology. The book is good, if somewhat cursory - but the excellent recommended reading makes up for that. I think the way they write is pretty interesting and a lot of what they say helped clarify points of lit. crit. for me. A little by way of humour or political commentary actually makes these topics a hundred times more fascinating.

Reply 6

Apricot Fairy

OP

16

What about fabricating a whole unnecessary paragraph, just for the chance to say that one particular book is a pile of *****? :rolleyes:

Reply 7

Tyler Durden

17

Which bit do you mean?

Reply 8

Apricot Fairy

OP

16

Perhaps the most compelling and influential of literary monsters is Mary Shelley's creature in her first novel, Frankenstein. But Frankenstein is also the subject of one of the commonest misapprehensions in English literature, namely that Frankenstein is the name of a monster. This is almost as common as the error of thinking that Wordsworth's poetry is about daffodils, that James Joyce's Ulysses is unreadable, or that John Fowles's The Magus is a great novel. In fact, though, there are very few daffodils in Wordsworth, Ulysses is a wonderful if challenging novel (and a piece of cake compared to Finnegan's Wake), The Magus is verbose, dull, self-regarding and (too often) overrated - and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is as human as the rest of us.

So what, pray, is the point of this completely irrelevant and badly written paragraph? And why did the editor not make them cut out all this bloody crap?

Reply 9

Tyler Durden

17

Can I just get a chapter ref and I'll get back to you! :p:

Reply 10

Da Bachtopus

12

What is this book you're all slagging off? Is it an anthology of literary criticism?

Reply 11

Tyler Durden

17

susiemakemeblue

Perhaps the most compelling and influential of literary monsters is Mary Shelley's creature in her first novel, Frankenstein. But Frankenstein is also the subject of one of the commonest misapprehensions in English literature, namely that Frankenstein is the name of a monster. This is almost as common as the error of thinking that Wordsworth's poetry is about daffodils, that James Joyce's Ulysses is unreadable, or that John Fowles's The Magus is a great novel. In fact, though, there are very few daffodils in Wordsworth, Ulysses is a wonderful if challenging novel (and a piece of cake compared to Finnegan's Wake), The Magus is verbose, dull, self-regarding and (too often) overrated - and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is as human as the rest of us.

So what, pray, is the point of this completely irrelevant and badly written paragraph? And why did the editor not make them cut out all this bloody crap?

Ok so it's not the most helpful paragraph, but firstly I don't think it's typical of the book and secondly I don't see what's wrong with putting in a little bit of an aside. Also it does make a pretty valid point about the preconceptions people seem to have about literature.

Da Bachtopus

What is this book you're all slagging off? Is it an anthology of literary criticism?

It's this. Not the best book ever written, but it does it's job in that it introduces some ideas to think about when reading literature. I like the fact that it's not dogmatic. The way it's written is also engaging and witty. It's not really an anthology, no. Basically it's divided into chapters such as: "Readers and reading", "The Uncanny", "Voice", "History", "Ideology", "God" etc and gives some ideas about what might be useful in a textual analysis. It also has an amazing bibliography/recommended reading section after each chapter.

Reply 12

Apricot Fairy

OP

16

I'm sorry, but I can't see the point in that paragraph. Anyone studying for an English degree will know that Frankenstein is not the name of the monster. It was a long-winded, poorly written excuse to say The Magus is a piece of crap.

Reply 13

Tyler Durden

17

susiemakemeblue

I'm sorry, but I can't see the point in that paragraph. Anyone studying for an English degree will know that Frankenstein is not the name of the monster. It was a long-winded, poorly written excuse to say The Magus is a piece of crap.

Well ok, but if you read "original" criticism then it's really not much better and often considerably worse. I mean everything I've read in terms of literary criticism has had at least elements of that. From Wordsworth's Preface to the LBs to something like Interpreting the Variorum by Stanley Fish or essays by Terry Eagleton or Freud - everything has a personal slant to a greater or lesser extent. Anyway, that's one paragraph in a pretty long book and I certainly don't think it's a typical extract!

Reply 14

Apricot Fairy

OP

16

I don't know.....yes, a lot of the book it useful, but a lot of it is also irrelevant drivel. If they cut the crap it would be much lighter to carry around!

Reply 15

Tyler Durden

17

susiemakemeblue

I don't know.....yes, a lot of the book it useful, but a lot of it is also irrelevant drivel. If they cut the crap it would be much lighter to carry around!

Perhaps that's why we disagree, I never have to carry it around with me - it's not a set text here!

Reply 16

Da Bachtopus

12

Have Bennett and Royle added the apostrophe to Finnegans Wake? That would be very ironic, given that they're attacking common 'errors' in literary studies.

Reply 17

Tyler Durden

17

Da Bachtopus

Have Bennett and Royle added the apostrophe to Finnegans Wake? That would be very ironic, given that they're attacking common 'errors' in literary studies.