What Makes A Novel Pretentious?

[OneOnOne1162]

I'm afraid of writing a book that comes off as pretentious rather than one that has something meaningful to say. So I'm wondering what some of the "symptoms" of a pretentious novel are and what saying a novel is "pretentious" really means (a definition that actually allows me to separate novels that are pretentious from novels that aren’t, more or less, objectively).

An example of a pretentious novel vs. one that isn’t with a sentence or so about why one is and the other isn’t would be appreciated.

Giving me a link to a site where I can learn more about this subject would be appreciated as well.

[cacian]

Well first of all I think a novel is a title to a book like we say a novella or a short story.
The word novel reminds me of novelty and so there is no other one like it hence novelty. This is how I interpret a novel.
A book however could be any as you know.
Pretentious for me is a big word that is small. I do not see books as pretentious but as a revelation to something else much deeper that the naked eye could not see. One need an eye magnifier to see through gold or silver for indentation but one may need to delve deeper into the world of books.
I am not however sure what you mean by pretention when it comes to a novel?
A novel is a statement in itself to be pretentious is to pretend to be something one is not. I cannot see how the two can link.
Maybe you could explain a bit more what you mean by pretentious.

[hillwalker]

I'm not sure how helpful the previous reply was.

As a writer you should try to appear invisible to the reader. If you're writing to impress the reader rather than express what you wish to say then you're probably being pretentious.
If you're using flowery language or using a dozen words to summarize what can be written in two or three words then again you're probably being pretentious.

That's not to say that some pretentious writing isn't a joy to read. . . but unless you're an established master of the craft, the chances are your attempts to appear profound will fall flat and prove to be off-putting to most readers.

H

[OneOnOne1162]

For clarity, I define the word novel as being any book that has over 50.000 words and falls under the category "fiction."
Well one of the problems I have is that I think the term "pretentious" is ill-defined or at least it's unclear to me what's meant by it when it's used in this context (relating to novels or movies). However I've often seen people refer to certain works as pretentious (seemingly using the term pretentious as an antonym of meaningful). I think the way I see it, in basis, is a work that pretends as if it's saying something meaningful and "deep" about a subject when it's actually not or rather a book that gives the impression that the author is trying to convince the reader that the book is saying something meaningful when it's actually not.

[OneOnOne1162]

So if I understand you correctly you're saying that the way you see it is that pretentious writing doesn't have much to do with the actual content of the novel but rather with the way things are phrased?

[cacian]

Sorry about my post earlier I have changed/marked few things.
A book only says what it has to say because it needs to. Through a story one tells something that we may get or not.
I think books are not all that black and white but are more meaningfuls, meaning they have various layers of meanings.
I think rereading the same book can help accentuate those meanings into becoming beings. I believe all books have within them ulteriour motives and whether those motives are contained or volatile is up to the individual to manifest whilst thinking about writing.
The reason I say this is because writers are different people when they write they become the hand that shakes the truth that is within them. Some do it very well and so others linger for fear of shaking it too far. Who knows!
So some writers may understand it some others don't realise they have said in a way they do not understand it themselves.
Language is a powerful tool and has many techniques assets that only unfold as you practice diligence with controversy together but never against each other. It is like a weapon and if you handle it right correctly it will tell you what it is you saying writing and if you mismanage it it will let you down and therefore what you write will come cross as pretentious and you with it. Begin with an intention but never with an indention. IT is not about leaving a mark it is about saying with effect to resounding and bouncing to staying.
Language is the brain that solidifies the thought that either works for you or against.
That is the power of language.
I don't know if this has helped at all.

[chrisvia]

OP, I see you are in Ghent. I traveled there thrice for work last year, and I must say it is a beautiful city! I managed to capture this photo (a group of people crested the hill right after the snap!):

https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-snc6/166965_10150552359442863_777216026_n.jpg

Anyway, this is a tricky question, but I think a good way to sum it up is that people feel a novel is pretentious when its references elude them. But this is tricky because, yes, it is largely subjective. For example, a lot of general readers panned Jeffrey Eugenides's latest novel, The Marriage Plot, as pretentious, but I savored it and thought it was spot on and easily grasped (perhaps I'm pretentious for saying that). Why? Well, because his setting and context centered around literary movements of the 1980s (especially all the French theories crossing the pond from France: Barthes, Poulet, Derrida, &c.). Just so happens, this is stuff we English majors study, and thus the references and caricatures didn't elude me. In fact, I felt I was reliving my time in college.

You can think of works such as Finnegans Wake, or Pound's Cantos--which has been referred to as Pound's lifetime notes from all his reading across all languages--as examples of pretentious works. And this is simply because they are absolutely packed with allusions, references, puns, multiple languages, &c. I mean, whenever someone practically creates another language by mashing all the languages they know together into multilingual portmanteaux--well, I think that'd be a good example of a pretentious work, because you, as a writer, have to know that a lot of people aren't going to get it (and probably aren't going to put in the work to understand it). At the same time, however, there is a voracious community of readers out there who will spend plenty of time savoring the work, analyzing it, and discussing it on forums, who may not view it as pretentious.

Unpretentious works are those that neatly follow E. B. Strunk's rules: small, clear, well-constructed sentences; don't use a 25-cent work where a 2-cent work will do; &c.

Hope this helps a bit.

[cafolini]

To pretend, I actually do the thing: I have therefore only pretended to pretend. ~ Jacques Derrida

[OneOnOne1162]

Why thank you very much (even though I didn’t build it or anything, I’ll take the burden of accepting this compliment in the name of my city =p). I think so too, although of course I’m not exactly being objective. Nice picture btw, I had to do a photography project in the city once when I was still in high school and I know it can be hard to take pictures on which you don’t have things being blockedby faces appearing out of nowhere.

I think there’s definitely a lot of truth to what you’re saying, I think it is very subjective in some cases and yet I can’t shake the feeling that a distinction can be made between novels that are often called pretentious (most likely, at least in part, because of the reasons you’ve just given) and novels that are actually pretentious. Even I find it hard to define exactly what I mean with that, but perhaps the distinction I make is between novels that have a lot of references to other works and statements about certain aspects of life (whether these statements are explicitly stated or they’re part of the subtext) where those actually add to what the story means and novels where they’re just there and they lack any real “depth.”

It’s definitely a very extensive response (and very well phrased too, might I add). I think references and the like that won't be understood by the general public and the use of more "flowery" language are certainly things I can pay attention to in my attempt to come to a more objective definition if there is one to be found (or one that can predict how likely it's going to be that what I write is going to be considered pretentious, at least in some circles). And the extent to which it can be subjective is certainly food for thought. Thank you.

[OneOnOne1162]

I don't think that's true though. You can move a brush across the floor over and over again without moving from your spot, and yet it will seem to a passerby as if you're sweeping the entire floor. You can tell a person you love them without actually loving them. And in a more literary context I think it's certainly possible to, for example, use a metaphor that actually means nothing or to use particular words that sound more impressive for no good reason (or perhaps even words the author doesn't understand). The point being that you can do one thing yet make it appear as if you're doing something else.

[Jack of Hearts]

'Attempts to be profound'- old man walker seems to have nailed it. There's a difference between trying to have your reader see things a certain way and trying to have your reader see things.







J (who never wrote substantially)

[cacian]

I don't think that's true though. You can move a brush across the floor over and over again without moving from your spot, and yet it will seem to a passerby as if you're sweeping the entire floor. You can tell a person you love them without actually loving them. And in a more literary context I think it's certainly possible to, for example, use a metaphor that actually means nothing or to use particular words that sound more impressive for no good reason (or perhaps even words the author doesn't understand). The point being that you can do one thing yet make it appear as if you're doing something else.

I think with love it's tricky. I only say if I feel I have to and it is mostly because I mean it. I have to because I feel the one I care needs to know I do.
About writing pretense it appears quickly to the reader because I believe readers are words sensitive. I can tell if someone is writing for the sake of saying something they feel I have ie under pressure or they are writing it because they think it.
Words by their own tell many things and one them is when one is shallow or not.

[OneOnOne1162]

'Attempts to be profound'- old man walker seems to have nailed it. There's a difference between trying to have your reader see things a certain way and trying to have your reader see things.







J (who never wrote substantially)

That's definitely an interesting way of making the distinction. The problem I have with that is that's it's not very practical simply because to make that distinction you'd have to be able to make a clear distinction between when you're doing one vs. when you're doing the other, a distinction which I also wouldn't really know how to make with any level of certainty.

[OneOnOne1162]

I think with love it's tricky. I only say if I feel I have to and it is mostly because I mean it. I have to because I feel the one I care needs to know I do.
About writing pretense it appears quickly to the reader because I believe readers are words sensitive. I can tell if someone is writing for the sake of saying something they feel I have ie under pressure or they are writing it because they think it.
Words by their own tell many things and one them is when one is shallow or not.

Well yes, but my point with the whole "love thing" was just that it's possible for something to seem to be there for the observer (in this case that observer is the person to whom you say you love them) without it really being there. It was in response to this comment made by cafolini:
"To pretend, I actually do the thing: I have therefore only pretended to pretend. ~ Jacques Derrida "
That may be so, but there's a reason why you come to that realisation and that's part of what I'm looking for here. What causes you to make that distinction in a way that I can apply to my work so that if I wrote something that will come off as pretentious to others, I'll realise that and be able to change it. Or rather so that I'll never write it at all because I'll know what not to do. Also this seems to imply that you think this difference is visible mostly in which words are used or in what combination, etc. is that correct? Or have I misunderstood what you mean?

[Adolescent09]

Jane Austen's writing is the greatest example of pretentious garble, but her literature is mostly satire... and when it comes to satire, the golden rule to 'never be pretentious' is chucked out the window. Satire or not, I did not find her writing to be in the least bit humorous, witty or entertaining for that matter. She was just trying too... hard.

Don Quixote, Candide, Vanity Fair and The Canterbury Tales on the other hand?

Now that is what I call satire drenched in wit and humour. The authors of those books made it seem effortless.

[OneOnOne1162]

Jane Austen's writing is the greatest example of pretentious garble, but her literature is mostly satire... and when it comes to satire, the golden rule to 'never be pretentious' is chucked out the window. Satire or not, I did not find her writing to be in the least bit humorous, witty or entertaining for that matter. She was just trying too... hard.

Don Quixote, Candide, Vanity Fair and The Canterbury Tales on the other hand?

Now that is what I call satire drenched in wit and humour. The authors of those books made it seem effortless.

So your definition of pretentious is that it's when people try too hard? How would you tell the difference between when a writer's trying to hard vs. when they aren't though?

[Adolescent09]

So your definition of pretentious is that it's when people try too hard? How would you tell the difference between when a writer's trying to hard vs. when they aren't though?

It's just my opinion, but I see pretentious writers as being so scrupulously preoccupied with words that the general idea they try to convey is either too abstract/unclear or nonexistent.

Kind of like my writing :p. But then again, I'm not a world renowned author and will most likely never be

[cacian]

So your definition of pretentious is that it's when people try too hard? How would you tell the difference between when a writer's trying to hard vs. when they aren't though?

Pretentious for me goes with manners and allusions. For example one that pretends to be someone else is pretentious but without the zeal necessarily. One can pretend to have degrees and masters when one has not. To pretend is to say one has done this or that when in fact they have not.
Pretence is easily achieved through sayings because it is not always required to prove what is being said in a conversation.
In writing however it is difficult to pretend. I mean one can pretend to be pompous in writing to show off and thus use writing techniques that are not his or her but then again that is just trying to show off a skill.