Lit. Hist.

[LARSSON at vax1.mankato.msus.edu]

Bob Fuhrel responds:
"         Regarding your two (really five) questions:  No, it is not a 
          "critical blow-off as you assume; it is in no way used
          pejoratively, at least by Stark.  Second, fans don't bother
          about this kind of generalization, nor, I suspect, do the
          authors.  Three, I see Pyncon gradually gaining in
          acceptance, assuming the next generation learns to read.
          Fourth, no one's place in literary history is secure beyond
          doubt and about a hundred years, but Pynchon has certainly a
          better chance than many of remaining known for his
          remarkable achievements, sheer eloquence, and
          transcendentally beautiful prose.  Finally, we MAY see Lot
          49 on high school reading lists, but I doubt if it will be
          required."


One thing to keep in mind about the legacy of literary history is how it has
been consistently reinvented since the Renaissance (when, we might say, the
modern conception of "literature" begain) and how its place in the academy
with its "canons,
" lists and so forth is continually being redefined.  For a complete gloss on
the subject see recent works by Gerald Graff, who notes the following
(the bad summaries of complex matters being entirely my own fault):

the study of "literature" as something separate from language (what used to
be called "philology") or rhetoric or Classics (meaning in the original
Greek and Latin) or even "belles lettres" is only maybe 150 years old or so
and was fairly controversial when it was first introduced.

The study of "American" literature is even more recent, becoming a real center
of academic interest in the 1920s (when the American Literature Assoc. was
founded), and that involved a substantial redefinition of American lit.,
moving away from the "parlor poets" (Whittier, Longfellow, et al.) and
discovering new authors or redefining others.  (Helped along the way by some
outside influence--eg., D.H. Lawrence's STUDIES IN CLASSIC AMERICAN LITERATURE).


One hundred years ago, who would have imagined that the following would be at
the center of the American canon?:
Walt Whitman--either a scandal-monger or the "good gray poet," not really a
*poet* at all of course!

Emily Dickenson--Who?

Melville--Wrote some pretty good adventure stories about cannibals, didn't he?
Whatever happened to him after he wrote that long, horrible mess of a book
about whales?

Twain--He's dirty-minded and corrupts children's grammar!

u.s.w.

Don Larsson, Mankato State U (MN)