Nice post of hers. The question is a classic but she tells it well.
Personally I think there's something for retention throughout the course of the book, something for how you feel during it, and something for how long it sticks with you after.
But that's probably not quite right either. I remember some select bits of fluffy stuff I read when I was thirteen or so, and I could only give you the barest outline of The House of the Scorpions.
Whenever I've thought upon this issue myself it seems to me that the only arguments you can really resort to is universality. A black reader of The Help likely would've felt that unfairness to the point of finding the piece unenjoyable. Fluff is always unfair to the way someone acts somewhere. And someone will feel a bit shortchanged.
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Date: 2012-05-28 11:53 pm (UTC)Personally I think there's something for retention throughout the course of the book, something for how you feel during it, and something for how long it sticks with you after.
But that's probably not quite right either. I remember some select bits of fluffy stuff I read when I was thirteen or so, and I could only give you the barest outline of The House of the Scorpions.
Whenever I've thought upon this issue myself it seems to me that the only arguments you can really resort to is universality. A black reader of The Help likely would've felt that unfairness to the point of finding the piece unenjoyable. Fluff is always unfair to the way someone acts somewhere. And someone will feel a bit shortchanged.