The Rajpal Abeynayake Column

The Rajpal Abeynayake Column By Rajpal Abeynayake

What's a race sheet and what's a classic?
Those who call a good book bad, have an equal chance of calling a bad book good. Last week this column was on the subject of books. It is books again then -- but with a books-and-men twist to it…

All the professional reviews I read of Arundathi Roy's 1997 Booker prize winning God of Small Things were rave reviews. Most reviewers called the book exceptional -- utterly exceptional.

But, the Internet has discussion Boards for non- professional reviewers, or 'readers.'' One such reader says about God of Small Things that it's one of the worst books she read, actually the "second worse book I ever read in my life, the only book I gave away.''

Her reasons? She says there is 'incest" in the book, which is 'disgusting', and adds that the twins (in the book) could have grown up to be good people, without blaming God for their troubles!

I laughed for almost 15 minutes reading that comment. She also blames the author for depicting the average Indian family as one which is always beset by calamity from which it is eternally trying to emerge.

I laughed for another half an hour.Arundathi Roy never claims to portray the average Indian family. As if she has a mandate to do so? All she tries to do is to portray the story of one specific Indian family in Kerala, and as if it is against the law for her to do that -- to portray one Indian family and their story without making it representative of all Indian families in the sub-continent.

The professional reviewers obviously got the nuances of the almost poetic language in which Roy wrote. But more importantly, they were sensitive to the subtleties of the brilliant plot and the poignant theme of her story. Obviously the reader who calls it a "silly story'' and "a travelogue of Kerala'' (laughed another 30 minutes here) didn't get any of that. She must be even dumber than she sounds.

Pedestrian
Such a reader is also more likely to call a bad book a good one. A book ridden with clichés that she could have easily understood, or a book without subtle turns of plot which calls for a sensitive appraisal, or a pedestrian theme, would have, for her, been a "classic.''

Now, somebody can always turn around and say (as sombodies usually turn around and say) that there are no good books and bad books, that some people like some books (like the professional reviewers who all loved Arundathi Roy) and other people like other books (like the said reader, who dreads Arundathi Roy, and perhaps likes stories such as A is for Apple, B is for Bat.)

The problem with saying this is that there will never be classics if we were to say there are no good books and there are no bad books. We will all wallow in mediocrity. A is for Apple and B is for Bat may get the Nobel Prize.

But then, how do we account for the fact that even professional reviewers sometimes say different things about one book? For instance, though all professional reviewers say Arundathi Roy's God of Small Things is a good book - a great book - some professional reviewers might say Ishiguro's Inconsolable is a good book, while others might say it is not.

There is no problem there, in fact. One professional reviewer will say Ishiguro's is a bad book, because he is comparing Ishiguro's books with the books in the same class. He is saying that Ishiguro's book is 'bad'' by 'good' standards of literature. For him A is for Apple or B is for Bat (or Shoba De) does not count.

Determine
But then the question arises, how does one determine what books are in the "same class?'' Is there a minimum standard for good books, below which any book can be bounced as not worthy of the attention of a professional reviewer, or a reader who wants to be enriched by a work of literature?

To me it seems that there is such a minimum standard. Of course it is not one which is written in stone. It is not as if you can bring a book, put it through the spectrometer of critical review, and send it up for further review, or send it spiralling towards the dustbin of dead but read books.

But the minimum standard is clear to any one who has any critical appreciation of literature. It is reflected in the positive way which the professional reviewers reacted to Arundathi Roy's God of Small Things, and the negative way in which a few readers did.

The professional reviewers, and of course hundreds and thousands of readers like them were alive to the nuances of Arundathi Roy's language, and sensitive to her theme and plot which was dismissed as "silly'' by the uninitiated Internet reader. This fact confirms, in some elemental way, that there is a minimum standard for the use of language, and a minimum standard for nuance and sensitivity of plot, by which all good work can be separated from the bad. By which all literature can be separated from the pulp.

However supercilious that may unfortunately sound, the uninitiated will never know or acknowledge that standard. But that does not make it a standard of literary snobbery? No. That would be like saying connoisseurs are wine snobs, while the rest of them who drink any wine that's put in front of them should be allowed to be the "wine arbiters.''

Of course there may be true literary snobs also, like there are some true wine snobs. But these are generally the nut eminences on the fringe. The wine example may not be the best, because wine does have an inherent snob quality written into it, in our Sri Lankan non wine-drinking milieu.

But, literature is not like wine. If you don't drink wine, you can forget about all that vintage and live with it. But a lot of us can't live without reading, at least a race sheet. What's curious is that we now have to show the distinction between a race sheet and a literary classic.

So anyway, people without the minimum sensitivity to 'plot and theme '' (broadly speaking of course) and minimum sensitivity to 'nuance in language'' (broadly speaking again) will never understand why Arundathi Roy is good. And A is for Apple and B is for Bat is bad.

If such people sit on a panel of judges, they will give a bad book the winner's prize and trash the good book. How do you respond? "Forgive them for they do not know what they do?'' In Sri Lanka most judging panels whether they are for creative writing or other writing, seem to be peopled by such dunderheads.

That's because the general Sri Lankan denominator is unfortunately below the minimum standard, and you have to find judges from among people! As for the Gratiaen Award, it must be difficult to pick from scores of bad books often put in front of you, particularly when you are not allowed to say 'no award.'' So pity the Gratiaen judges.

But the man (or the woman who called Arundathi Roy's book silly) who is so dense he or she does not know what the minimum standard is, will never know what Excellence is. His or her Excellence will always be A is for Apple B is for Bat. Anything better, he wouldn't probably understand or relate to. A sure recipe for perpetuating mediocrity, as it happens in Sri Lanka all the time.

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