To engage a little more deeply: I'm not sure I would describe Austen as sincere! She's very arch and pointed in her character portraits. There's a delight in seeing these characters in all their ridiculousness (perhaps you're looking for the characters to know themselves better).
When it comes to wholesome, I think of something like Piranesi—I wanted to be a gentler, more welcoming person while reading it. There are books that make me ill-tempered when I read and ones like Piranesi. I don't think the wholesome ones are saccharine or over-simple, but they give me a sense of peace.
Kristin Lavransdatter did this for me, and thus I kept being surprised by all the murders on my reread! I thought of it as a book about the profound action of grace, and it is, but it's against a pretty messy backdrop.
This is good and I am sure you're right that I'm being unfair to Austen! It's hard to read well when you're not in a kind of fundamental sympathy with an author. That's a lovely comment about Piranesi, which is on my to-read list. I *love* books with truly gentle characters, although tbh I always want them to have that ridiculousness which Stillman gives so many of his good people--Cesar in The Cypresses Believe in God is a really perfect example of the type of thing I like, and it's sort of what I tried to do with a couple of the characters in Punishment. (I realize "book with gentle character" =/= "book which makes me want to be more gentle myself," so I'm just riffing on what you've said here, since I haven't yet actually read Piranesi.)
YES to "all people are bad!!!" "No one is good but God" etc. makes me think of how non Christians become so disappointed when their favorite celebs reveal they're not a "good person" and it's like, you guys don't even care about Jesus, the only perfect and good person ever and it's weird...
A. I have often wished to, (at my church) when someone talks with the "we're the good ones" assumption, look around surreptitiously and be like, "we're all bad people here, right?"
B. (more importantly) That idolatrous longing for favorite celebrities or heroes to be more than they really are... (I mean, it's worship! misplaced.) surely could be a starting-point for believers to describe ...how we can imagine wanting to live with Christ forever and never anticipate getting bored.
yup, misplaced worship for so! especially among stans. I hadn't thought of it that way before :o especially since Christ always reciprocates that love!
Okay, it had not occurred to me that the wave of (this present instantiation of) wholesomeness ...is in large part a reaction to "irony-culture," but seems plausible. (Ouch.)
I wonder if it is also a response to a [more internal] conflict about the meaningfulness of "life lived on a small scale."
Like, growing up, we were told, "The best things in life are free," (a sunset, your friend's face while laughing, the voice of a bird at dawn) and... it's very compelling. But I see millenials (and younger folks) finding it hard to say "no" to the temptation to go for the "impressive" job, (that overworks you) the social media post "makes a splash," (at a cost) and the showy life that wants to "make a difference!" (right now, immediately, for thousands of people. or it doesn't count!) And that life (or image of a life) also commands and compels.
Maybe that leaves 'em longing for "simpler times" - but possibly feeling that having "simple joys" filling up their daily life is like... a distant vision, un-bridgeably far away. (so instead, you revel in the "aww, how sweet" meme that takes 5 seconds of your time, and then get back to the desperate treadmill of trying to "crank out productivity"!)
"you feel the engaging helplessness and humiliations of the sleazoids as well as their cruelty."
THIS IS WICKHAM (and Willoughby, too).
To engage a little more deeply: I'm not sure I would describe Austen as sincere! She's very arch and pointed in her character portraits. There's a delight in seeing these characters in all their ridiculousness (perhaps you're looking for the characters to know themselves better).
When it comes to wholesome, I think of something like Piranesi—I wanted to be a gentler, more welcoming person while reading it. There are books that make me ill-tempered when I read and ones like Piranesi. I don't think the wholesome ones are saccharine or over-simple, but they give me a sense of peace.
Kristin Lavransdatter did this for me, and thus I kept being surprised by all the murders on my reread! I thought of it as a book about the profound action of grace, and it is, but it's against a pretty messy backdrop.
This is good and I am sure you're right that I'm being unfair to Austen! It's hard to read well when you're not in a kind of fundamental sympathy with an author. That's a lovely comment about Piranesi, which is on my to-read list. I *love* books with truly gentle characters, although tbh I always want them to have that ridiculousness which Stillman gives so many of his good people--Cesar in The Cypresses Believe in God is a really perfect example of the type of thing I like, and it's sort of what I tried to do with a couple of the characters in Punishment. (I realize "book with gentle character" =/= "book which makes me want to be more gentle myself," so I'm just riffing on what you've said here, since I haven't yet actually read Piranesi.)
YES to "all people are bad!!!" "No one is good but God" etc. makes me think of how non Christians become so disappointed when their favorite celebs reveal they're not a "good person" and it's like, you guys don't even care about Jesus, the only perfect and good person ever and it's weird...
Yahhh!
A. I have often wished to, (at my church) when someone talks with the "we're the good ones" assumption, look around surreptitiously and be like, "we're all bad people here, right?"
B. (more importantly) That idolatrous longing for favorite celebrities or heroes to be more than they really are... (I mean, it's worship! misplaced.) surely could be a starting-point for believers to describe ...how we can imagine wanting to live with Christ forever and never anticipate getting bored.
yup, misplaced worship for so! especially among stans. I hadn't thought of it that way before :o especially since Christ always reciprocates that love!
Okay, it had not occurred to me that the wave of (this present instantiation of) wholesomeness ...is in large part a reaction to "irony-culture," but seems plausible. (Ouch.)
I wonder if it is also a response to a [more internal] conflict about the meaningfulness of "life lived on a small scale."
Like, growing up, we were told, "The best things in life are free," (a sunset, your friend's face while laughing, the voice of a bird at dawn) and... it's very compelling. But I see millenials (and younger folks) finding it hard to say "no" to the temptation to go for the "impressive" job, (that overworks you) the social media post "makes a splash," (at a cost) and the showy life that wants to "make a difference!" (right now, immediately, for thousands of people. or it doesn't count!) And that life (or image of a life) also commands and compels.
Maybe that leaves 'em longing for "simpler times" - but possibly feeling that having "simple joys" filling up their daily life is like... a distant vision, un-bridgeably far away. (so instead, you revel in the "aww, how sweet" meme that takes 5 seconds of your time, and then get back to the desperate treadmill of trying to "crank out productivity"!)