A bit ago, I got asked to do my standard rant on this. I put it off ’til the book was done, but it’s done now. So here’s the short form:
Read a story. Does it work?
Yes? Then it’s good.
The problem with the term “good writing” is that it assumes there is an agreed-upon standard, to which everything can be compared. If a piece of writing measures up, it’s “good;” if it doesn’t, it isn’t. Unfortunately, about fifteen minutes’ worth of open-minded examination of great literature ought to be enough to show anybody that there is no such standard. For each thing one can point at and claim confidently, “This is absolutely a feature of good literature,” one can go on to find half a dozen books or stories that don’t have it, or that gleefully violate its requirements.
The only inarguable definition of “good writing” is the same as Damon Knight’s famous definition of “science fiction” – “Good writing is what we mean when we point at something and say ‘That is good writing.'” Because different people have different taste, and different itches that need to be scratched, and what works well in one story for one person will work poorly for another person, or in another story. In addition, different genres frequently have different customs, some of which are explicitly considered “bad writing” in other genres. The clearest example of this is the “head hopping” viewpoint that is so common in Romance novels as to be unremarkable, but which is considered a hallmark of “bad writing” in many other genres (including SF).
And there’s that other truism, the one that says “You can never please everyone.” This is particularly important to remember in regard to “good writing,” because for every reader who thinks you have done something right, there’s another who’ll be sure you’ve done it wrong – and both of them will be able to back up their assertions with lots of plausible-sounding critical analysis that can be very hard to resist taking seriously.
“Good writing” is largely subjective…and views of “what is good writing” can and do change over time. Some of the currently accepted truisms about “good writing” are a result of changes in modern culture, including competition from movies, TV, and video games (though getting folks to admit this is the case is practically impossible). Back in the 19th century, when few people traveled, books were expensive, and families read books aloud together at the rate of a chapter a night, there was a lot more loving description of scenery, longer chapters, and a lot more reminders of whatever happened five or six chapters back (because the assumption was, people read those six weeks ago and might not recall now that it’s crucial). All that is now lumped under “slow paced,” and considered undesirable for many genres.
All that said, I don’t know any writers who don’t want to become better writers, which certainly implies some sort of standard for “better,” or at least, some way of figuring out what works and what doesn’t. Mostly, I think this comes from reading vast amounts in as many genres as possible (I do not know any writers who are not also voracious readers), but I personally find that analysing the stuff I read once in a while to figure out why they work (or don’t) and how they made something work (or didn’t) is extremely useful. More on that next time, I think.
Yep, that nicely sums up my own thoughts on recognizing good writing. (and the importance of doing so) Now I’m curious to what you’ll say next time about analyzing good writing. ^_^
This reminds me of Jesse Helms’ (I think it was him, anyway) famous comment about knowing pornography when he saw it (but in a much more positive way).
“Of course.” Quipped the square-jawed, steely-eyed super scribe, fending off an incoming fangirl (“Ooh!” ejaculated blonde Sary Mu H’Asenpfeffer, 19, as she bounced pertly off the original William Morris wallpaper), “on can learn a certain amount about Good Writing by studying its negative space, what, ‘old bean’?”
Good writing is as elusive and specific as grace; bad writing, if not precisely rule-bound, at least easier to categorize and… appreciate.
I think that a lot of the quest for ‘good writing’ definitions is really about the fear of committing ‘bad writing’. The two don’t strike me as being the same at all, and maybe a lot of harm comes of the confusion, at that.
I’m tempted to a flippant definition of Good Writing as that condition in which one is so far out of the habit of ‘bad writing’, that one only ever commits it on purpose.
Gray – Darn it, that was going to be my next post! Oh, well, I expect I’ll find quite a bit to say anyway. 😉
I think writing is good when the author can look back on it five years later and go, “Wow! I wrote that?”
Story Weaver – Works for a lot of writers…but I know a couple of really good ones who never like their finished stuff. It also makes it hard to decide whether someone else’s writing is “good” – though perhaps giving up on that entirely wouldn’t be a bad thing after all.
The book “The Zen and Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” had something interesting to say about about what is “good”. It gets to the point where your brain starts to hurt thinking about it too long, but its interesting. It talks about quality and what that is. It gets very philosophical and at one point leaves a little bit of a bad taste in my mouth. I think the question of “quality” is definitely worth considering.
There are many aspects to what makes something good. I would think the BEST books do well in many categories. While there is some personal preference influencing someone’s judgment on how good a book is, if it is good in many categories, it will do better over all. Also if one category is more important then the others to a particular person, I would think that would carry more weight for that person then the other facets of a “good” book. For me, for example, if the language is beautiful and flows well, I’m more likely to like that book.
That’s true. I guess it really depends on the writer; how critical they are of themselves.
Edgarthesnappingturtle – “Doing a lot of different things well” certainly helps attract a larger audience, and often goes along with “what we mean when we point at it”…but it’s still subjective. Some readers like gorgeous, poetic writing, but one of my friends calls that “fluffy sentences” and hates it because she says she finds it distracting. In other words, even “doing a lot of different things well” isn’t going to get everyone…because for each and every thing, some people thing that “doing it well” means X and other people thing that “doing it well” means Y, and never the twain shall agree.