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Date Posted: 22:45:03 10/21/04 Thu
Author: Retrofitted: Aristotle's Poetics
Author Host/IP: 4.27.250.92
Subject: perezoso



The serious work of literature is addressed to important, weighty themes (i.e. historical/philosophical/scientific, not porno or silly comedies, though satire might also be serious); it has a certain necessary relation to reality (that could be imagined realities as well, though that is debatable ); the plot (story's relation to reality) is in a sense more important than the characters; and the aesthetic qualities--poetry, rhetoric, imagery, etc.-- are subservient or adapted, shaped by the theme, plots, and characters. The writer also assumes he is writing for an educated audience, and that is where some notion of agency is relevant. William Gibson is not writing for bored midwestern housewives ( maybe a few if they are "tech savvy" as mgmt. says); he knows his audience--geeks, tech people, engineers as well as slacker types, maybe some post-modernist lit freaks. WG blurs the boundaries between literature and entertainment--yet that is part of his ironic "pop" aesthetic which demonstrates a hyper-consumerism, instantly obsolete technology, and corporate-driven society; yet this hyper-consumerist "Sprawl" is not exactly a utopia. Hyper-consumerism and technological-- driven hedonism are sufficiently serious themes as well.



The question is asked whether an immoral work could also be a well-designed, well-painted, well-written or well-composed one. Perhaps, but this is where we differ. The entire effect of the piece is not only dependent on formal aspects such as prose style or organization, but on theme, plot, characters. A biker cartoonist might draw a wicked picture of a Hells Angels gangbang but I would say the theme and materials prevent the work from being taken seriously or as anything other than porno.

So the aesthetic elements become part of the overall political effect. Certainly that is true reading someone like Orwell or Vonnegut. The message or intent or theme
(which is not always completely clear or traditionally "moral") takes priority over the literary style; though I will agree assessing the "style" is part of the criteria...

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