“Wuxia Novel so includes Violence, Torture, Cannabilsm, Sexual Assault, as well as values that may disturb the modern reader.”
Exclamation points shot up above my head. What is going on here? Since when has this type of thing existed in the adult book sphere? Why are readers being so coddled? I think I need to take a step back...
To my knowledge it has always been an unwritten rule when picking up an adult book: here may be dragons. You're cracking the covers of a world, an experience, a view to existence that is likely distant from your own. That view may be wildly fantastical or edgily realistic. Regardless, reader beware. Steel yourself. You may encounter dark things.
But what we have in the disclaimer above is different. It's a situation in which publishers (of adult novels, remember) now feel the need to provide warnings of the obvious: that readers may encounter the hard realities of life. I counter with: If you're not ready to encounter the hard realities in fiction, then you're probably not ready to be an adult in reality. If there is person who reads the disclaimer and thinks “I'm not reading The Water Outlaws because I'm afraid of those things.”, then I would question that person's readiness to take on the responsibilities of adulthood. Not liking those elements in fiction is one thing, but being afraid of them is a red flag. Publishers having to point them out is a thousand flags indicating a potentially deeper problem.
Life is tough and can be unfair. This is a message to my children. The judges at your karate competition may get something wrong despite your efforts. All you can do is your best. And yes, someday our cute, lovely pup Toto will die. There is no need to share the details of his death to a seven year old, but when she asked: “Will Toto die?” The answer was “Yes, just like all living things.” It's part of my job as father to help her be resilient, to not fall apart like a house of cards when life surprises with a shitty moment—which will happen. That doesn't mean my kids should have a soulless response to the end of Toto's days. Do cry. I will too. But yes, there are immutable realities. The majority of people are good, but there is a minority who do violence against others, who torture, who commit sexual assault, and in an extreme minority, who are cannibals.
The last point I will address is around semantics—the opening and closing of the disclaimer. The opening says “Wuxia Novel so includes Violence...”. I am far from an expert on Wuxia, but what little I've read doesn't seem to warrant the idea Wuxia automatically includes the list of vice which follows. Some perhaps, but all? The final two words are likewise inaccurate: the “modern reader”. I am a modern reader, and I am a modern reader mildly uncomfortable being auto included in that statement. In fact, I don't want to be included; leave me the possibility of getting out!
The first part is easy to fix: remove “Wuxia”. That's it. “Novel” is already capitalized, even. For “modern reader”, we have two options for revision: the simple and the realistic:
Simple: Add the word 'some', i.e. “...disturb some modern readers.” Fair enough.
Realistic: Change the phrase to: “...disturb the modern reader who believes that closing their eyes makes the monsters disappear.”
I have more comments on the overall direction of Western society, the fact so many 18-year olds have the mental resilience of 12-year olds, but I will save that for another day. For now, I'm having trouble squaring the fact that such disclaimers exist, yet adults everywhere gobble up the sex and violence of George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire like jelly beans. We'll see how Huang's novel goes. Who knows <cue ghost noises>, I may emerge scarred for life...
It´s hard to quantify if people overall really have become less resilient, or stopped suffering in silence. My gut says it´s a bit of both - but I have no idea about how big each factor is in relation to the other.
ReplyDeleteI recently read that 1 in 5 Belgian people suffer from some kind of psychological disorder. What might be happening is that more people with certain traumas are more vocal about it than they used to be, coupled with the fact that there´s both more scientific understanding of and more empathy for such people.
Either way, 1 in 5, especially in an evergrowing population, is a big enough part of the demographic for publishers and other companies to take into account in their strategies for profit optimazation.
An interesting take. A cynical take (divide and conquer). A scary take (1 in 5)...
DeleteI don't want it to be a realist take, but it's leaning that way...