By Christopher Carver
Discussed: Books in competition with other forms of media, creative writing classes, and what makes a strong novel.
The Digested Read is John Crace's gift to the modern reader enabling, in five hundred words or less, a "digested" synopsis of contemporary books in several different genres. In his own words: "The basic premise for The Digested Read is that it should be the book that has created the most media noise that week. Unfortunately publishing is an industry like any other and books are published on their perceived ability to make money. It goes without saying that authors with big reputations tend to sell more, even though their books often fail to match their reputation."
I can tell you, as an American reader, I thumbed right to the section of his book titled Americana, and was summarily unhappy with the result. Many of the writers I admired had been torn to shreds. So let's just say I started forming an unfavorable opinion of the guy. I will also tell you, however, that after talking with him I began to understand the approach he had to both his column and reading books, disarming any negative feelings I'd had of his abilities as a reviewer. He chatted with me from his office at The Guardian in London.
RDR BOOKS: What led you to the approach/form that you have for your column (aside from the obvious length of a newspaper column)? Does it have anything to do with the dwindling attention span/competition with other forms of media on the modern reader? Or did this just happen to be what worked best for you?
JOHN CRACE: I think books can sustain themselves. Within the self-limiting genre of a newspaper column, if you’re going to digest something as a reader than you’ve got to kind of keep it short really. I don’t think there’s any point of trying to digest it in 5,000 words. [The reader] would sort of lose the point and immediacy. It is part review but it’s also part entertainment as well. They are meant to be accurate, but they’re meant to be kind of funny, too. I mean, I guess, it’s always quite difficult because with the classics it’s slightly different because a lot of people will know them. People may not have read or have a good idea about [a contemporary book I'm reviewing], but the point is to keep them interested, get enough information across, and give them something to nourish them and entertain them at the same time.
RDR BOOKS: You’ve reviewed the works of some of my favorite writers and artists – Dave Eggers, Bill Bryson, Nick Hornby, & Bob Dylan to name a few – all of whom weren’t spared your acerbic wit, but it does seem like you’re less harsher to some than others. To you, what makes a great novel or book? What are some contemporary examples on either side of the Atlantic that have strong potential?
JOHN CRACE: For me, it’s really important that a book has a strong narrative arc and good characters. Books have to have a good idea, and have to be saying something at the same time. I don’t have the time for high-concept, postmodernist type books. Great fiction focuses on major themes of broad general interest and always requires an author who is passionate about his subject.
RDR BOOKS: To what extent do you think literature can compete with television and other forms of media? Why do you think, with a dwindling readership, that short stories aren’t more popular? What do you make of this?
JOHN CRACE: I don't know. I think it’s really hard to write consistently good short stories. In recent years Will Self (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Self) has written some really good short stories, but four out of ten will be duff. I’ve never attempted to write a short story. Publishers don’t want them because they can’t sell them. People don’t write them because publishers don’t want to publish them anyway.
RDR BOOKS: What do you think of the countless M.F.A. programs cropping up across the United States or of creative writing classes in general? Do you think they have the danger of producing, essentially, the same kind of writer?
JOHN CRACE: I don't think you can teach creativity. You can teach people technique and how to be more skillful writers, but I think that the creative bit is misleading, or a kind of misnomer. I can tell a mile off by someone that has done a creative writing course – utterly sterile and utterly formulaic – very competent, overwritten, and over-analyzed.
RDR BOOKS: You’ve written books yourself (“Baby Alarm” & “The Second Half”), which The Guardian describes as “semi-fictional memoirs” – where do they come from? What inspires your own writing?
JOHN CRACE: Other people, talking with other people, you think about things, or I'll have general ideas that I’m kind of kicking around. I’m not one of these people that can start writing and see where it’s going to go. I generally like to have a fairly clear idea of where I’m going. That’s not to say I have everything nailed down before I begin, but I’d like to have a certain amount worked out in my head – plot, characters, ideas that will sustain me -- rather than just start with a very loose character and see what happens.
The Digested Read is published by RDR Books in America. You can find it here.
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