When Novels Mattered: A misread on what’s changed in the world of literature
David Brooks’ New York Times article When Novels Mattered (link to gift article) is the latest salvo against the declining relevance of fiction, and in particular literary fiction. He blames this decline on the popularity of genre fiction, the rise of the internet, M.F.A. programs, and ultimately (and predictably) on liberal politics. My two cents is that only one of those events had a significant impact on shaping the current literary marketplace.
The internet-driven collapse of the monoculture
In the mid- to late 20th century that Brooks idealizes, media was tightly controlled by a relatively small number of institutional players. And then came the internet. Web 1.0 shook the monoculture, but Web 2.0 destroyed it.
Streaming completely undid TV, which also competes with YouTube and TikTok. What remains of radio competes with streaming services and podcasts. News organizations compete with individuals and corporations and social media at large—a transition I have witnessed and experienced first hand as a journalist, then blogger, and then brand journalist and content marketer. And, of course, traditional book publishers now compete with self-publishing—another anti-establishment trend I have happily participated in. Because of their tremendous costs, movies are the last bastion of monoculture (which is why we’re seeing yet another Superman).
The consequence of all this new competition is that there are far fewer mega-hits in every medium, not just in books. At the same time, our culture is much richer and much more representative than it was 40 years ago. The democratization of media has been a wonderful thing. The pie is not only bigger, but way more people have gotten a slice of it. That’s good for creators and even better for consumers.
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