50 Literature Ideas You Really Need to Know

Previously published in the Herald magazine. 

In his introduction to 50 Literature Ideas You Really Need to Know, university professor and former chairman of the Booker prize John Sutherland clearly states that no criticism or theory can explain a literary work entirely. He is, of course, correct in believing that this inexplicability is what causes fascination with great literature, but that any intelligent reader would want the best ‘toolkit’ to understand what they are reading. This is just what 50 Literature Ideas aspires to do – and to a certain extent, for a certain audience it achieves this. For many readers though, particularly those hoping for a conveniently simple yet detailed package on literary criticism, this book may prove to be confusing. A single read through will not be enough to make an average reader sound any smarter. Of course, each person will at first have to decide whether they are an ‘average’ reader or an intelligent one.

The premise that this book makes literary critical theory easier to understand is ambitious, even though Sutherland attempts towards a casual, unconventional format that incorporates a variety of typography, layouts and methods. Each idea is ‘explained’ over just four pages, with a timeline showing the evolution of each through years of literature, along with the progress, popularity and usage of the idea. This timeline runs along the bottom of each page, acting as a constant to the book’s design. Sutherland even provides a ‘condensed read’ for those wanting a quick reference, similar to The Guardian’s ‘digested read’. Often, these condensed reads are quirkier, funnier and more apt than the previous three and a half pages worth of explanations. At first, the design and layout of the book appear appealing and fun, but eventually some elements do feel a little tedious, especially when, instead of a quick answer, a search is required. A few searches in, it becomes clear that there is no single simple answer. For instance: “Hermeneutics … adds to that process of extraction a focus on exactly how the meaning is communicated, and how, once communicated, we on our side ‘make sense’ of it” may well be enough explanation to those in the know, but is it to a complete novice? Some may even end up more confused than they were before even though Sutherland writes well, but in order to explain a great deal he is forced to take big leaps in the evolution of certain ideas. The time line should make up for this, but it’s still not enough for those new to the theories.

How can a writer cover each concept in just four pages? It does not seem possible and perhaps Sutherland agrees, because a complete understanding is not what he aims to provide.  50 Literature Ideas has as much as is needed to refresh an old memory but that’s about it. Literary theory is too vast for one book, but this does what it can for those slightly familiar to it. Of course, this may give trouble to those who are not in the least familiar with these ideas and are hoping to suddenly glean everything from one book in the course of a few hours. It is perfect for those who have forgotten most of what they learnt in college, and those who are ambitious enough to translate their passion for reading into something more serious and indepth.

All the possibilities of this being a difficult read for novices aside, Sutherland has made a clear effort to be contemporary and up to date with various literary modes, from e-books to fanfic. His writing style is straightforward and appealing. He is often irreverent, particularly in the ‘condensed ideas’: translation is explained as ‘impossible, but what choice do we have?’ Gothic literature is condensed as ‘terrify us, please!’ and Paradigm Shift as ‘it’s a battlefield’. The best simplified and brutally honest explanation may well be for Postmodernism: ‘make it new, then make it newer. Differently.’

Ultimately the question is whether reading this book will help increase the pleasure of reading other books – will this help in a deeper understanding of all literature? If you can contain all the information most critics gain after years in college and in the field and then proceed to apply it systematically to all future reading, then yes, 50 Literature Ideas can help you. But for the most part, this can be used as a reference book. Of course, if it is being read by those who already consider themselves intelligent readers and/or literary critics, they will inevitably have critical opinions about this book, probably just as Sutherland would want them to. See chapter 28: ‘Metafiction: nothing new under the literary sun.’