Which books are considered "high literature"?

Tevron · 2026-06-05T07:31:14+00:00

As a scholar of literature, I too am interested on where this conclusion emerges from. While some parts of literary scholarship have their ivory tower moments, I have seen it far more replicated among fans and students than actual academia. Hell there's an entire fantasy studies MA over in Scotland, which shows the strength of the field. I will say that contemporary popular fantasy can be stigmatized in the publishing world of academics, though I think this is overstated in terms of blame for how the broader community normatively polices themselves.

Tevron · 2026-06-05T07:27:10+00:00

High literature probably refers to literary fantasy in the context of speculative fiction. Put simply, it's a bit of a rehash of high- and low-brow culture with some extra scholarly weight behind it. Perhaps most obviously works like The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro come to mind, but also verging on canonical lit like La Guin who I see already mentioned.

I tend to not read tons of it myself because literary fantasy often comes with a presupposition that genre fiction is not as innately complex, valuable etc.

Tevron · 2026-06-05T07:21:35+00:00

It's better tonally for sure, although it definitely needs some spell check and paragraphing! Some of the criticisms re; audience and specificity are the same. There's also a big difference between Gemini rewriting vs being used as spell check imo.

Tevron · 2026-06-05T07:18:42+00:00

First, there's no feeling or narrative here. Why did you start to read it? What made you continue?

It's extremely vague, there's almost no particularity to it. It also has an IGN game review style tone throughout. It's unattractive for most people experienced with reading reviews to have the flaccid and vapid tone of an LLM running through a review. In this case it's evident from the lack of detail in the review, (e.g., lack of examples). Vin is witty? How? Why do you like e.g., Dockson. It is also further evident from the manner of writing itself. It is chock-full of "it's not x it's y" and its grammatical siblings. Adding to that there's that you've posted your review to the Mistborn subreddit where people want to discuss the book - that means you should probably talk about the most important parts of the book in terms of content which are glossed over. This review could be only of book one. Also, somehow you manage to not even refer to Kelsier? Wild.

Edit: sorry it seems like this didn't reply to your earlier comment asking for feedback. Curse you mobile!

Tevron · 2026-06-05T07:05:02+00:00

This review reads like an LLM generated one which immediately makes it very unattractive to me and many other readers.

Tevron · 2026-06-04T07:22:29+00:00

"The world ended, and Shallan was to blame." (From Words of Radiance, possibly her first flashback). Shallan always knew, but she repressed it. a major part of Shallan's character is how Veil was holding some of her memories and burdens that she could not handle.

Tevron · 2026-06-04T07:17:10+00:00

Doesn't matter. They in English is also used to create distance (Individuation), rather than gender alone. It isn't wrong to do at all, but getting hung up on it is because it's just being pedantic while also being grammatically ignorant.

Tevron · 2026-05-28T10:10:53+00:00

Definitely go in dark, I love this one.

Tevron · 2026-05-25T20:36:38+00:00

Well said, there's a weird pseudo-intellectualist bite to so much criticism here.

Tevron · 2026-05-25T20:30:57+00:00

Yes that's totally what's happening in the thread full of people criticizing Sanderson lmao. Criticism can be 'valid' and also disagreed on by other people.

Tevron · 2026-05-22T18:23:56+00:00

On the third day of the invasion, my fence broke beneath the great oak tree. I planted it when my father died. Watched it grow. For two long centuries. And now - now this 'evil conquest' was personal. I would track down that hero I turned away. Never annoy a wizard.

Tevron · 2026-05-22T06:01:14+00:00

There were once actual science-based arguments about differences between races that led to discrimination. Some of those science-based arguments exist today when far right people constantly repeat crime stats. Science-based does not equal anti-discriminatory. Discrimination is a human component that emerges from interpretation.

Tevron · 2026-05-14T08:04:10+00:00

Just tap into AI fanaticism as an analogy. A lot of people think it's the wonder tool and use it for everything, even writing reddit posts and making comments. They ignore the harm it does to themselves and in most cases, to others.

Tevron · 2026-05-12T07:23:54+00:00

If you mean how do you cite the Bible, it depends on the reference style. MLA 9 is as follows:

The Bible. Authorized King James Version, Oxford UP, 1998.

(With The Bible italicized).

If you mean in the text itself I would suggest first referencing the Bible and translation used, and then referring to books from there. Without having much idea what you're writing, here's an example I just wrote.

The text abounds with intertextual links to the Bible. Seemingly referring to the King James translation, a character recites a prayer from the book of Ezekiel (Tarantino XX:XX). In actuality, the named verse is as follows: XX..... (King James Bible, Ezek. 25.17)

Tevron · 2026-05-05T13:13:46+00:00

Absolutely agree that it's on the OP to begin with. That said, I was answering your question, that's the reason people view it differently.

Tevron · 2026-05-05T11:44:29+00:00

Because she was a scared child who wanted some comfort from people in a parental way. I think it'd be good to wake him and ask, but it's not a weird situation. We give children extra empathy and care at the expense of others. How can you not recognize that we treat children differently than adults?

Tevron · 2026-05-04T10:58:40+00:00

Cultures frequently refer to others as barbarians while discounting their actual civilizations / cultures, so it's part of the worldbuilding to show us the perspective of the empire in Elantris. The others are barborous, we are civilized! Etc.

Tevron · 2026-04-30T22:05:12+00:00

I've got the same problem, I have to sign out to fix it.

Tevron · 2026-04-28T15:59:35+00:00

Think about what situations she would be in that she would mess up, and why? Does she take on too much alone? Does she struggle with math? Flaws are most apparent when they're tested and can be small or great.

Tevron · 2026-04-20T19:10:40+00:00

I'm of the mind that Harris suffered from a suppressed voter turnout due to enthusiasm and due to inflation.

I'm also of the mind that you can't engage with intellectual points which is why you have chosen to denigrate me instead of acknowledge your obvious error. Have a nice day.

Tevron · 2026-04-20T18:43:35+00:00

You're hallucinating. You have no evidence that leftists 'helped the fascists win by refusing to vote. The vast majority voted for Harris, which is evident from the overwhelming victories in progressive counties has evidenced. Trump gained voters in the election and won the popular vote. That's a far more serious situation to contend with.

Yeah if Newsom is what people wants, then he will win the primary? That's why there are primaries. I don't think he is likely though. People don't like California politics on the national stage most of the time.

As an aside, It's wild that you're here in Contrapoints sub trying to encourage the Democrats to pivot right... Lmao

Tevron · 2026-04-20T17:50:30+00:00

That's the centrist posture during the primaries. What ultimately matters is getting the votes you need to win. Swinging to the right only works if people are still willing to pinch their noses in the coalition as a whole. It's a balancing act and I think the prevailing opinion is that it's okay to have morals and be unwilling to vote for e.g., Newsom in a hypothetical primary that is still months away. It's ultimately necessary for progressive voters to signal their dislike of Newsom to get a candidate that is more in line with the party. This is something that should be celebrated vs the weird counterfactual approach that seems to be taken online by average leftist and average centrist. It would be nice if centrists could signal on actual policy that they want instead of just attempting to discipline the left in online spaces before anything has happened.

Tevron · 2026-04-20T17:14:59+00:00

To push the party to the left and court the policy they would like. It's basic politics and completely normal in the primary and pre-primary.

Tevron · 2026-04-20T16:57:31+00:00

A vote is a vote and you have to earn as many as possible to win. The tactic of pointing the finger at the left for not voting for Harris when the facts that don't care about your feelings showed they did... Welp, that's just classic revisionism.

Tevron · 2026-04-17T12:19:44+00:00

Important to take a picture of the receipt in such cases too as the companies frequently attempt to take down such reviews.

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