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Originally Posted by Hitch
The reader is the ultimate judge of the author, not the other way around, let's not forget. It's the reader who does indeed get to rubbish a piece of work that doesn't work for them. If a book doesn't live up to my expectations, I do get to rubbish it. That's why there are reviews, and why "word of mouth" works as it does. Because it's readers who get to say if a book is great, or good, or dreadful--not the book's creator. If it were the latter, every book on Amazon would be a best-seller; and we all know that they certainly are not.
If a piece of literary fiction has "more to it" than mere storytelling, it's the job of the author to make it available to the reader in some form or fashion. If the reader doesn't "get it," then the author didn't do his job, because he didn't leave it on the page.
The idea that readers are "too stupid to get" something, and therefore, are not entitled to an opinion, is the fiction. Readers are the consumers, the audience, the applauders, the boo-ers, and the ultimate Deciders. If one reader doesn't get it? Then that's likely true--that person "doesn't get it." If most don't, then the author quite simply did not do their job. It's as straightforward as that.
And, to get back OT: I see a lot of "experimental fiction" coming through our doors--with and without quotation marks. With dialogue paragraphs flush-left, and narrative indented (yes, in the same book). With no dialogue TAGS, never mind quotation marks, so you never know who's speaking. Thus far, I have yet to see one I found readable, much less innovative and note-worthy.
The lack of quotation marks, or some reasonable method of inferring dialogue, irritates me to no end and yes, goes on my metaphysical "annoyed the snot out of me" shelf. Yes, McCarthy did it successfully, but like first-person present tense, it's incredibly hard to pull off, and I think that there are exceedingly few authors who should even attempt it. {shrug}. That's my $.02. I'm with Xanthe; if they don't care enough about their dialogue to make it reasonably find-able, I can't find the change in my pocket to buy the book.
Hitch
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This is a jekyl and hyde post. The second half is a legitimate and pertinent critique of the effect of ommitting quotation marks in experimental fiction. The first half is a trite harangue that completely misses the point of the poster it was addressed to.
Here is what TGS wrote
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There is often more to literary fiction than telling a story. If you don't get that, that's OK, but it doesn't really warrant you, or anyone else, rubbishing a piece of work because it rubs up against your expectations.
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To paraphrase, you shouldn't judge a work if you falsely expect something to be what it is not.
If you pick up a romance novel expecting it to be a thriller, the work doesn't warrant your judgement based on your faulty expectations.
Just as i wouldn't call a physics dissertation a bad work because it doesn't tell a rip-roaring story.
Or call a horse defective because it doesn't do algebra.
A thing should be judged on the basis of what it is. Many people pick up literary fiction expecting a conventional story with conventional language and grammar. Then they rubbish the work based on those expectations and criteria.
To repeat TGS's points, literary fiction often experiments with form to see what effect that has on meaning and experience. As we see on this thread, to many posters think a work is ipso facto "pretentious" if it doesn't focus exclusively on the story, as if conventional format was handed down by god as the perfect means of expression for all meaning and experience.
To add a point of my own, literary fiction also tries to get us to think about how and why we use language and grammar. The fact that we are here discussing the effects of ommitting quotation marks means that those works have succeeded, even if you don't like them. In other words, literary fiction doesn't have to likeable to be effective. Indeed, it is often most effective when it is not likeable. The market-place standard is not the only legitimate standard.
If you don't like literary fiction that's fine. But there is a difference between saying something like "i don't like horses" and saying "that is a defective horse because it doesn't do algebra." The former is a personal preference, which are always valid, although not always legal or moral. The latter is a silly, incongruous judgement, which is what many do with literary fiction.