Standards of writing WAS:Etiquette WAS Re: polite Dumbledore?

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 142758

Carol earlier:
> I'd say, rather, that she has no intention of satisfying readers who
thirst for vengeance, and that craftsmanship has nothing to do with
the moral values implicit in a story.
> 
Lupinlore:
> Well, that's attempting to appeal to some objective standard of what
makes for good writing.  The problem is that there is absolutely no
objective standard for such things, despite all the thousands of pages
that attempt to claim the contrary.  Writing is by its very nature
utterly and totally subjective.  So yes, I judge JKR's writing
subjectively, and make absolutely no apologies for that, as there is
absolutely no other way to judge it. <snip>


Carol responds:
As an editor and a former English teacher, I have to disagree. There
*are* objective criteria by which to judge good writing. In the case
of fiction, they include a fully developed plot in which events follow
logically from what precedes them; clear, concise sentences with
varied sentence structure; precise, concrete diction that enables the
reader to visualize the characters, setting, and action; realistic,
natural-sounding dialogue that fits the characters; and (most
important) memorable and distinctive characters. Various genres also
have specific requirements, which I won't go into here, in part
because the genre(s) to which JKR's books belong is a somewhat
debatable topic (and I think the editors probably give her a bit of
leeway for genre-jumping).

If I could do so without abandoning professionalism, I would quote you
some genuinely bad writing from a manuscript I'm currently
editing--extremely wordy sentences, the same phrases (e.g., "he reined
in his mount") over and over, pompous diction, unrealistic and
unnatural dialogue, stereotyped characters, unbelievable situations
(even given the fantasy genre) extended descriptions in purple prose.
This is not merely my opinion of what constitutes bad writing. Any
editor faced with this manuscript would do as I do (grit my teeth and
cringe) every time I have to face another page (and take frequent
HPfGU and refrigerator breaks). Any publisher would reject it if
submitted as originally written. (Actually, they'll reject it even as
edited because there's not a scrap of originality in it. You ask why I
edit it if that's the case? Because I was assigned the project by a
firm that caters to first-time writers and I get paid whether the book
is published or not. If this writer submits a second manuscript, I'll
ask the managing editor to pass it to someone else. It's *that*
agonizing to revise or just cross out the sentences.) If I had the
chance to edit a manuscript of JKR's, OTOH, I'd jump for joy. Her
characters live, her plots work (some, I'll admit, work better than
others). Her work, admittedly, is not wholly original (I'm not sure
that total originality is even possible), but the wizarding world
seems, in the mind of the reader (even you, right, Lupinlore?), to be
a real place. We forget as we read that it doesn't exist and neither
do the characters. Only a well-written work of fiction succeeds on
that level.

You are confusing the reader's personal taste with the author's
craftsmanship or lack thereof. I work in the field of book publishing.
I have a PhD in English. I know good writing when I see it and can
produce it myself when called upon to do so. (If I didn't, I'd be
fired.) And it has nothing to do with how I view the characters or
what I think should happen to them. "Well-written" (determinable by
specific criteria) is not the same as "satisfying" (a wholly
subjective judgment).

Carol