Quote:
Originally Posted by NicholasV
I don't think you will see any authors of the stature of a Dickens, Camus, Dostoevsky, Kafka, Orwell, Huxley, etc. with a prospect to become widely read anymore. Writers who had something to say to us about the human condition, and the social context that this condition finds itself in a given society. If writers of such stature emerge today of necessity they must remain hidden given the societal predilections, I think Kurt Cobain summed it up well: "here we are now, entertain us." Or perhaps Huxley with, "Never put off till tomorrow the fun you can have today." The debased public of today can only send writers like Koontz, J.K. Rowling, Dan Brown, King, Palahniuk*, etc. to the top of the bestseller lists with their cheap gimmicks and otherwise lack of literary merit.
*Perhaps this is not so fair with him because he has no seeming pretensions and uses a more down to earth writing style closer to the colloquial. At least in his debut novel Fight Club, he actually had some incisive social commentary.
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I think Dickens qualifies as a pulp writer, even though his work was masterful social commentary. His works were serialized for the the masses. As for Palahniuk, all his works contain social commentary. Some more subtle than others.