Books in Our Pluralistic Culture

Cultural Pluralism and the Book World

John P. Dessauer

M ost Americans are accustomed to complying with the demands of a plu- ralistic society. They recognize that the indulgence of prejudices against

people of other races and beliefs is not only immoral but intolerable if civil concord is to be maintained. They are persuaded that their acceptance of diversity in others will help guarantee to them the free exercise of their own individuality.

Thus, we have come to terms with racial, ethnic, linguistic, religious, and politi- cal pluralism as inevitable conditions of our national life. Indeed, our view of history prompts us to perceive our diversity as a glorious heritage that has consis- tently enriched our past. Our sense of fair play demands that we approach others with the same openness and respect we hope they will accord to us, while our civic and religious traditions prompt us to reach out to them with genuine regard.

But if most of us have therefore accepted the reality of social and political pluralism, few of us have attuned ourselves to the cultural pluralism that also confronts us. In fact, very few have even given thought to the existence of a cultural pluralism and its implications. Yet, like other forms of discrimination, cultural prejudices can be deeply destructive, inflicting great psychic injury on their victims. They can inhibit social development, retard aesthetic fulfillment, diminish artistic growth, and effectively prevent cultural communities, like the book world, from playing their destined roles.

How do I define cultural pluralism? As the social reality whereby the aesthetic tastes and interests of individuals vary greatly from one to the next. Thus some people love classical music while others prefer jazz, some like "easy listening" whereas others are soft- or hard-rock fans, some enjoy every musical style while still others are indifferent to all music. Some individuals admire Italian Renais- sance painting yet cannot abide abstract art, others are put off by any work earlier than the Impressionists'. Some find all art satisfying while many more rarely set foot in a museum and are content with the images they encounter in their every- day experience. Some people read only literary fiction and poetry while others pursue only serious nonfiction; some enjoy only genre fiction while still others will read only how-to books, or perhaps no book whatever.

Personality makeup, home and educational background, and life experiences work together to shape our interests and aesthetic preferences. Their shape never becomes permanently fixed, for, like our moral character, our intellectual and

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aesthetic self is always growing--or regressing. No matter what its disposition or sophistication, however, the intellectual and aesthetic self represents an integral aspect of our identity, a vital dimension of our souls. One cannot affirm or deny its value without, to a significant extent, affirming or denying our value as human beings.

This is why cultural pluralism, like other forms of pluralism in a free society, demands that we respect persuasions with which we differ. Just as I may disagree profoundly with your religious convictions but respect them because you, a neigh- bor and fellow human, hold them, so might I find your artistic and literary tastes incompatible with mine yet still respect them and you for the humanity they manifest. Even if I believe my cultural attainments to be superior to yours I cannot deny you my respect for, in justice, I recognize that my "superiority" is largely due to circumstances beyond my control--native gifts, a favorable home environment, a good education--and cannot claim that you would not have achieved a great deal more than I if you had enjoyed my advantages.

Yet cultural prejudice is rampant in American society. That simple respect, which acknowledges the dignity of every individual and which most of us prize supremely in our relations with others, is often denied by those who fancy them- selves culturally superior to fellow citizens who haven't attended the "right" kind of school, worked at the "right" kind of job, or read the "right" kind of books. At the very least, such snobbery inflicts deep psychic wounds on its victims; at its worst, when it denies well-earned opportunities to otherwise qualified individu- als, it can damage or even destroy lives.

However, here we are concerned more with the cultural consequences of such prejudices, particularly with their effects in the world of books. It is well known that many book people--authors, editors, booksellers, reviewers, librarians, and educators--believe that of all books published only literary fiction and poetry are of real value and that all else can be justified only insofar as it contributes to the creation of and is "redeemed" by fiction and poetry. This attitude is based on conviction that artistic/literary creation constitutes the ultimate achievement and therefore the goal of life, an idea which in turn grows out of the "art for art's sake" persuasion of the modernist movement.

As a child, I was exposed to this philosophy. My father, a Viennese art critic and painter, believed that the entire universe had been created only so that an occa- sional Michelangelo or del Sarto might emerge from it. I loved my father, but I was discriminating enough to conclude that his conviction was inspired more by his unbounded enthusiasm for art than by sound judgment. Even at the age of eight or nine I was persuaded that God made me and the many people I knew and loved--parents, relatives, servants, and kindly storekeepers--for our own sake, not merely as stepping stones to a Raphael or da Vinci.

And that touches the heart of the matter, does it not? For ultimately a book, like any work of art or artifact from the most sublime creation to the humblest tool, derives its civilized value from the human service it is capable of performing, be that to enrapture or to enlighten, to inspire or to entertain. Human creation, including literature and art, is a social endeavor; it lacks meaning and fulfillment

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without an audience; it justifies its existence by contributing to the welfare of that audience. That at their best books of all descriptions contribute to the welfare of their readers is obvious. Therefore the claim that out of tens of thousands of educational texts, legal, medical, technical and business handbooks, and general titles of instruction, information, inspiration, practical guidance, and diversion only a handful of literary novels and verses contribute sufficiently to our benefit to warrant genuine admiration and support betokens a cultural bias of monumental proportions.

Significantly, most literary elitists do not even take the educational, profes- sional, and scholarly provinces into account when they discuss the state of the book world. So preoccupied are they with fiction and poetry that they focus their attention only on the consumer sector, where such titles are actually distributed, as though the role of books in education and scholarship were of no consequence for cultural phenomena, including the public's interest in literary writing. But even their view of the consumer book segment is distorted by preconceptions. For them, bestselling books are automatically suspect. Behind that suspicion lurks the persuasion that most book buyers are insensitive and undiscriminating, that to be popular a book must have a coarse and vulgar appeal. A comparable view in the political realm would hold that American voters have so little good sense and judgment that the greater the popularity of a candidate or issue, the less their worth. Most people in a democratic society would reject such a notion as arrogant and absurd.

The elitists complain that popular books, notably popular fiction, are badly written. On examination it develops that they make no distinction between truly bad writing and writing that merely fails to conform to their preferred style or manner, and so very often their dislike is less a product of discriminating judg- ment than of the familiar bias. Furthermore, they themselves must shoulder re- sponsibility for much of the bad writing and mediocrity in the popular book field. How can they expect other publishers to accord such material the respect and care it deserves when they themselves doubt its value and have contempt for its au- dience? Their cynicism in justifying the publication of worthless trash so long as it helps pay for the launching of literary creations is an encouragement to others to do likewise for greed alone, while to the betrayed public it matters little for what reasons the integrity of popular material is being sacrificed.

The literary elitists in the critical community share this responsibility. Because of the excessive emphasis given to literary material by some general review media, the critical praise that should encourage worthwhile popular writing and the censure that should be meted out to the mediocre have often been lacking. Yet constructive criticism could play a significant role in raising the quality of popular literature to levels consonant with its maturing readership.

A publication purporting to serve the general public whose book coverage is limited largely to literary material should certainly ask itself how it can justify serving only a very small segment of its book-reading audience. Not that I would advocate a quota system as an alternative. Important books, literary or otherwise, deserve critical priority and in making cultural judgments we can never be guided

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solely by numerical popularity. On the other hand, a general medium cannot totally ignore its responsibility to popular books and to the popular audience in discharging its cultural obligation.

Some elitist booksellers stock and promote not the titles their customers most want to read, but only books they themselves admire. Because their economic base is therefore weak, they are vulnerable to competition from more pluralistically oriented chain and independent stores and sometimes are forced out of business. When such an event occurs elitist critics usually cite it as proof that "good" bookstores cannot survive in the present, "hostile" environment.

Similarly, librarians and educators who insist on guiding readers by elitist pref- erences, rather than allowing them to follow their own bent in selecting material, usually succeed only in creating boredom where there might have been satisfac- tion and, very often, in encouraging a reader to abandon an incipient reading habit altogether.

During the past 40 years the acceptance of books by American consumers has grown dramatically, and today books play a role in almost every facet of national life. As they became "democratized," the number of books sold, as well as the number of publishers and bookstores in the U.S., increased substantially. But the growth occured largely in the educational, professional, and popular sectors of the field, especially among consumers who in earlier decades would not have bought books at all. Expectably the markets for literary fiction and poetry grew at a much slower pace.

Elitists, alarmed at their shrinking influence, have bemoaned the entire de- velopment, complaining of a decline in public tastes and vulgarization of the book world. But those who value all sorts of people and all kinds of books have witnessed the exploding popularity of books with gratitude and pride. For my part, I wish that the elitists would match their literary sensitivity with humanity and civic spirit and accept the inevitability of cultural democracy in America.