A novelist is an
author
An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states:
"''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...
or
writer
A writer is a person who uses written words in different writing styles and techniques to communicate ideas. Writers produce different forms of literary art and creative writing such as novels, short stories, books, poetry, travelogues, p ...
of
novel
A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...
s, though often novelists also write in other
genre
Genre () is any form or type of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially-agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other for ...
s of both
fiction
Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying individuals, events, or places that are imaginary, or in ways that are imaginary. Fictional portrayals are thus inconsistent with history, fact, or plausibility. In a traditi ...
and
non-fiction
Nonfiction, or non-fiction, is any document or media content that attempts, in good faith, to provide information (and sometimes opinions) grounded only in facts and real life, rather than in imagination. Nonfiction is often associated with be ...
. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a
living
Living or The Living may refer to:
Common meanings
*Life, a condition that distinguishes organisms from inorganic objects and dead organisms
** Living species, one that is not extinct
*Personal life, the course of an individual human's life
* Hu ...
writing novels and other fiction, while others aspire to support themselves in this way or write as an
avocation
An avocation is an activity that someone engages in as a hobby outside their main occupation. There are many examples of people whose professions were the ways that they made their livings, but for whom their activities outside their workplaces w ...
. Most novelists struggle to have their
debut novel
A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to p ...
published, but once published they often continue to be published, although very few become literary celebrities, thus gaining prestige or a considerable income from their work.
Description
Novelists come from a variety of backgrounds and social classes, and frequently this shapes the content of their works.
Public reception of a novelist's work, the
literary criticism
Literary criticism (or literary studies) is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often influenced by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of literature's goals and methods. Th ...
commenting on it, and the novelists' incorporation of their own experiences into works and characters can lead to the author's personal life and identity being associated with a novel's fictional content. For this reason, the environment within which a novelist works and the reception of their novels by both the public and publishers can be influenced by their demographics or identity; important among these
culturally constructed identities are
gender
Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures u ...
,
sexual identity
Sexual identity is how one thinks of oneself in terms of to whom one is romantically and/or sexually attracted.
''Sex ...
,
social class
A social class is a grouping of people into a set of Dominance hierarchy, hierarchical social categories, the most common being the Upper class, upper, Middle class, middle and Working class, lower classes. Membership in a social class can for ...
,
race
Race, RACE or "The Race" may refer to:
* Race (biology), an informal taxonomic classification within a species, generally within a sub-species
* Race (human categorization), classification of humans into groups based on physical traits, and/or s ...
or
ethnicity
An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...
,
nationality
Nationality is a legal identification of a person in international law, establishing the person as a subject, a ''national'', of a sovereign state. It affords the state jurisdiction over the person and affords the person the protection of the ...
,
religion
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatural, ...
, and
an association with place. Similarly, some novelists have creative identities derived from their focus on different
genres of fiction
Genre fiction, also known as popular fiction, is a term used in the book-trade for fictional works written with the intent of fitting into a specific literary genre, in order to appeal to readers and fans already familiar with that genre.
A num ...
, such as
crime
In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a State (polity), state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definit ...
,
romance
Romance (from Vulgar Latin , "in the Roman language", i.e., "Latin") may refer to:
Common meanings
* Romance (love), emotional attraction towards another person and the courtship behaviors undertaken to express the feelings
* Romance languages, ...
or
historical novel
Historical fiction is a literary genre in which the plot takes place in a setting related to the past events, but is fictional. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to other ty ...
s.
While many novelists compose fiction to satisfy personal desires, novelists and commentators often ascribe a particular social responsibility or role to novel writers. Many authors use such moral imperatives to justify different approaches to novel writing, including activism or different approaches to representing reality "truthfully."
Etymology
Novelist is a term derivative from the term "novel" describing the "writer of novels." The
Oxford English Dictionary
The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a com ...
recognizes other definitions of novelist, first appearing in the 16th and 17th centuries to refer to either "An innovator (in thought or belief); someone who introduces something new or who favours novelty" or "An inexperienced person; a novice."
[ However, the ]OED
The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a com ...
attributes the primary contemporary meaning of "a writer of novels" as first appearing in the 1633 book "" by C. Farewell citing the passage According to the Google
Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...
Ngrams, the term novelist first appears in the Google Books database in 1521.
Process, publication and profession
The difference between professional and amateur novelists often is the author's ability to publish. Many people take up novel writing as a hobby, but the difficulties of completing large scale fictional works of quality prevent the completion of novels. Once authors have completed a novel, they often will try to publish it. The publishing industry requires novels to have accessible profitable markets, thus many novelists will self-publish
Self-publishing is the publication of media by its author at their own cost, without the involvement of a publisher. The term usually refers to written media, such as books and magazines, either as an ebook or as a physical copy using POD (pri ...
to circumvent the editorial control of publishers. Self-publishing
Self-publishing is the publication of media by its author at their own cost, without the involvement of a publisher. The term usually refers to written media, such as books and magazines, either as an ebook or as a physical copy using POD (pr ...
has long been an option for writers, with vanity press
A vanity press or vanity publisher, sometimes also subsidy publisher, is a publishing house where anyone can pay to have a book published.. The term "vanity press" is often used pejoratively, implying that an author who uses such a service is publ ...
es printing bound books for a fee paid by the writer. In these settings, unlike the more traditional publishing industry, activities usually reserved for a publishing house, like the distribution and promotion of the book, become the author's responsibility. The rise of the Internet and electronic book
An ebook (short for electronic book), also known as an e-book or eBook, is a book publication made available in digital form, consisting of text, images, or both, readable on the flat-panel display of computers or other electronic devices. Alth ...
s has made self publishing far less expensive and a realistic way for authors to realize income.
Novelists apply a number of different methods to writing their novels, relying on a variety of approaches to inspire creativity. Some communities actively encourage amateurs to practice writing novels to develop these unique practices, that vary from author to author. For example, the internet-based group, National Novel Writing Month
National Novel Writing Month (often shortened to NaNoWriMo ) is a U.S.-based nonprofit organization that promotes creative writing around the world. Its flagship program is an annual, international creative writing event in which participants att ...
, encourages people to write 50,000-word novels in the month of November, to give novelists practice completing such works. In the 2010 event, over 200,000 people took part – writing a total of over 2.8 billion words.
Age and experience
Novelists don't usually publish their first novels
A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to p ...
until later in life. However, many novelists begin writing at a young age. For example, Iain Banks
Iain Banks (16 February 1954 – 9 June 2013) was a Scottish author, writing mainstream fiction as Iain Banks and science fiction as Iain M. Banks, adding the initial of his adopted middle name Menzies (). After the success of ''The Wasp Factor ...
(1954-2013) began writing at eleven, and at sixteen completed his first novel, "The Hungarian Lift-Jet", about international arms dealers, "in pencil in a larger-than-foolscap log book". However, he was thirty before he published his first novel, the highly controversial ''The Wasp Factory
''The Wasp Factory'' is the first novel by Scottish writer Iain Banks, published in 1984. Before the publication of ''The Wasp Factory,'' Banks had written several science fiction novels that had not been accepted for publication. Banks decided t ...
'' in 1984. The success of this novel enabled Banks to become a full-time novelist. Often an important writers' juvenilia
Juvenilia are literary, musical or artistic works produced by authors during their youth. Written juvenilia, if published at all, usually appears as a retrospective publication, some time after the author has become well known for later works.
...
, even if not published, is prized by scholars because it provides insight into an author's biography and approach to writing; for example, the Brontë family
The Brontës () were a nineteenth-century literary family, born in the village of Thornton and later associated with the village of Haworth in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England. The sisters, Charlotte (1816–1855), Emily (1818–1848) ...
's juvenilia that depicts their imaginary world of Gondal, currently in the British Library
The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom and is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British ...
, has provided important information on their development as writers.
Occasionally, novelists publish as early as their teens. For example, Patrick O'Brian
Patrick O'Brian, Order of the British Empire, CBE (12 December 1914 – 2 January 2000), born Richard Patrick Russ, was an English novelist and translator, best known for his Aubrey–Maturin series of sea novels set in the Royal Navy during t ...
published his first novel, '' Caesar: The Life Story of a Panda-Leopard'', at the age of 15, which brought him considerable critical attention. Similarly, 's ''The House Without Windows'', was accepted and published in 1927 when she was 13 by the Knopf
Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. () is an American publishing house that was founded by Alfred A. Knopf Sr. and Blanche Knopf in 1915. Blanche and Alfred traveled abroad regularly and were known for publishing European, Asian, and Latin American writers in ...
publishing house and earned critical acclaim from the ''New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'', the '' Saturday Review'', and H. L. Mencken
Henry Louis Mencken (September 12, 1880 – January 29, 1956) was an American journalist, essayist, satirist, cultural critic, and scholar of American English. He commented widely on the social scene, literature, music, prominent politicians, ...
. Occasionally, these works will achieve popular success as well. For example, though Christopher Paolini
Christopher James Paolini (born November 17, 1983) is an American author and screenwriter. He is best known for ''The Inheritance Cycle'', which consists of the books ''Eragon'', ''Eldest'', ''Brisingr'', ''Inheritance'', and the follow up short ...
's ''Eragon
''Eragon'' is the first book in ''The Inheritance Cycle'' by American fantasy writer Christopher Paolini. Paolini, born in 1983, began writing the novel after graduating from home school at the age of fifteen. After writing the first draft for a ...
'' (published at age 15) was not a great critical success, its popularity among readers placed it on the ''New York Times'' Children's Books Best Seller list for 121 weeks.
First-time novelists of any age often are unable to have their works published, because of a number of reasons reflecting the inexperience of the author and the economic realities of publishers. Often authors must find advocates in the publishing industry, usually literary agents
A literary agent is an agent who represents writers and their written works to publishers, theatrical producers, film producers, and film studios, and assists in sale and deal negotiation. Literary agents most often represent novelists, screenwri ...
, to successfully publish their debut novel
A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to p ...
s. Sometimes new novelists will self-publish
Self-publishing is the publication of media by its author at their own cost, without the involvement of a publisher. The term usually refers to written media, such as books and magazines, either as an ebook or as a physical copy using POD (pri ...
, because publishing houses will not risk the capital needed to market books by an unknown author to the public.
Responding to the difficulty of successfully writing and publishing first novels, especially at a young age, there are a number of awards for young and first time novelists to highlight exceptional works from new and/or young authors (for examples see :Literary awards honouring young writers and :First book awards).
Income
In contemporary British and American publishing markets, most authors receive only a small monetary advance before publication of their debut novel; in the rare exceptions when a large print run and high volume of sales are anticipated, the advance can be larger. However, once an author has established themselves in print, some authors can make steady income as long as they remain productive as writers. Additionally, many novelists, even published ones, will take on outside work, such as teaching creative writing in academic institutions, or leave novel writing as a secondary hobby.
Few novelists become literary celebrities or become very wealthy from the sale of their novels alone. Often those authors who are wealthy and successful will produce extremely popular genre fiction. Examples include authors like James Patterson
James Brendan Patterson (born March 22, 1947) is an American author. Among his works are the ''Alex Cross'', '' Michael Bennett'', '' Women's Murder Club'', ''Maximum Ride'', '' Daniel X'', '' NYPD Red'', '' Witch & Wizard'', and ''Private'' se ...
, who was the highest paid author in 2010, making 70 million dollars, topping both other novelists and authors of non-fiction. Other famous literary millionaires include popular successes like J. K. Rowling
Joanne Rowling ( "rolling"; born 31 July 1965), also known by her pen name J. K. Rowling, is a British author and Philanthropy, philanthropist. She wrote ''Harry Potter'', a seven-volume children's fantasy series published from 1997 to ...
, author of the Harry Potter
''Harry Potter'' is a series of seven fantasy literature, fantasy novels written by British author J. K. Rowling. The novels chronicle the lives of a young Magician (fantasy), wizard, Harry Potter (character), Harry Potter, and his friends ...
series, Dan Brown
Daniel Gerhard Brown (born June 22, 1964) is an American author best known for his Thriller (genre), thriller novels, including the Robert Langdon novels ''Angels & Demons'' (2000), ''The Da Vinci Code'' (2003), ''The Lost Symbol'' (2009), ''In ...
author of ''The Da Vinci Code
''The Da Vinci Code'' is a 2003 mystery thriller novel by Dan Brown. It is Brown's second novel to include the character Robert Langdon: the first was his 2000 novel ''Angels & Demons''. ''The Da Vinci Code'' follows symbologist Robert Langdon ...
'', historical novelist Bernard Cornwell
Bernard Cornwell (born 23 February 1944) is an English-American author of historical novels and a history of the Waterloo Campaign. He is best known for his novels about Napoleonic Wars rifleman Richard Sharpe. He has also written ''The Saxon ...
, and ''Twilight
Twilight is light produced by sunlight scattering in the upper atmosphere, when the Sun is below the horizon, which illuminates the lower atmosphere and the Earth's surface. The word twilight can also refer to the periods of time when this il ...
'' author Stephenie Meyer
Stephenie Meyer (; née Morgan; born December 24, 1973) is an American novelist and film producer. She is best known for writing the vampire literature, vampire romance series ''Twilight (novel series), Twilight'', which has sold over 100 mill ...
.
Personal experience
The personal experiences of the novelist will often shape what they write and how readers and critics will interpret their novels. Literary reception has long relied on practices of reading literature through biographical criticism
Biographical criticism is a form of literary criticism which analyzes a writer's biography to show the relationship between the author's life and their works of literature. Biographical criticism is often associated with historical-biographical c ...
, in which the author's life is presumed to have influence on the topical and thematic concerns of works. Some veins of criticism use this information about the novelist to derive an understanding of the novelist's intentions within his work. However, postmodern literary critics often denounce such an approach; the most notable of these critiques comes from Roland Barthes
Roland Gérard Barthes (; ; 12 November 1915 – 26 March 1980) was a French literary theorist, essayist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. His work engaged in the analysis of a variety of sign systems, mainly derived from Western popular ...
who argues in his essay "Death of the Author
"The Death of the Author" ( French: ''La mort de l'auteur'') is a 1967 essay by the French literary critic and theorist Roland Barthes (1915–1980). Barthes's essay argues against traditional literary criticism's practice of relying on the inten ...
" that the author no longer should dictate the reception and meaning derived from their work.
Other, theoretical approaches to literary criticism
Literary criticism (or literary studies) is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often influenced by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of literature's goals and methods. Th ...
attempt to explore the author's unintentional influence over their work; methods like psychoanalytic theory
Psychoanalytic theory is the theory of personality organization and the dynamics of personality development that guides psychoanalysis, a clinical method for treating psychopathology. First laid out by Sigmund Freud in the late 19th century, psyc ...
or cultural studies
Cultural studies is an interdisciplinary field that examines the political dynamics of contemporary culture (including popular culture) and its historical foundations. Cultural studies researchers generally investigate how cultural practices re ...
, presume that the work produced by a novelist represents fundamental parts of the author's identity. Milan Kundera
Milan Kundera (, ; born 1 April 1929) is a Czech writer who went into exile in France in 1975, becoming a naturalised French citizen in 1981. Kundera's Czechoslovak citizenship was revoked in 1979, then conferred again in 2019. He "sees himself ...
describes the tensions between the novelist's own identity and the work that the author produces in his essay in ''The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'' titled "What is a novelist?"; he says that the novelist's "honesty is bound to the vile stake of his megalomania ..he work is not simply everything a novelist writes-notebooks, diaries, articles. It is the end result of long labor on an aesthetic project ..he novelist is the sole master of his work. He is his work." The close intimacy of identity with the novelist's work ensures that particular elements, whether for class, gender, sexuality, nationality, race, or place-based identity, will influence the reception of their work.
Socio-economic class
Historically, because of the amount of leisure time and education required to write novels, most novelists have come from the upper or the educated middle classes. However, working men and women began publishing novels in the twentieth century. This includes in Britain Walter Greenwood
Walter Greenwood (17 December 1903 – 13 September 1974) was an English novelist, best known for the socially influential novel ''Love on the Dole'' (1933).
Early life
Greenwood was born at 56 Ellor Street, his father's house and hairdres ...
's ''Love on the Dole
''Love on the Dole'' is a novel by Walter Greenwood, about working-class poverty in 1930s Northern England. It has been made into both a play and a film.
The novel
Walter Greenwood's novel (1933) was written during the early 1930s as a respons ...
'' (1933), from America B. Traven
B. Traven (; Bruno Traven in some accounts) was the pen name of a novelist, presumed to be German, whose real name, nationality, date and place of birth and details of biography are all subject to dispute. One certainty about Traven's life is ...
's, ''The Death Ship
''The Death Ship'' (German title: ''Das Totenschiff'') is a novel by the pseudonymous author known as B. Traven. Originally published in German in 1926, and in English in 1934, it was Traven's first major success and is still the author's second ...
'' (1926) and Agnes Smedley
Agnes Smedley (February 23, 1892 – May 6, 1950) was an American journalist, writer, and activist who supported the Indian Independence Movement and the Chinese Communist Revolution. Raised in a poverty-stricken miner's family in Missouri and Co ...
, ''Daughter of Earth
''Daughter of Earth'' (1929) is an autobiographical novel by the American author and journalist Agnes Smedley. The novel chronicles the years of Marie Rogers's tumultuous childhood, struggles in relationships with men (both physical and emotional) ...
'' (1929) and from the Soviet Union Nikolay Ostrovsky
Nikolai Alexeevich Ostrovsky (russian: Никола́й Алексе́евич Остро́вский; uk, Мико́ла Олексі́йович Остро́вський; 29 September 1904 – 22 December 1936) was a Soviet Union, Soviet socia ...
's ''How the Steel Was Tempered
''How the Steel Was Tempered'' (russian: Как закалялась сталь, ''Kak zakalyalas' stal) or ''The Making of a Hero'', is a socialist realist novel written by Nikolai Ostrovsky (1904–1936). With 36.4 million copies sold, it is o ...
'' (1932). Later, in 1950s Britain, came a group of writers known as the "Angry young men
The "angry young men" were a group of mostly working- and middle-class British playwrights and novelists who became prominent in the 1950s. The group's leading figures included John Osborne and Kingsley Amis; other popular figures included John ...
," which included the novelists Alan Sillitoe
Alan Sillitoe Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, FRSL (4 March 192825 April 2010) was an English writer and one of the so-called "angry young men" of the 1950s. He disliked the label, as did most of the other writers to whom it was appl ...
and Kingsley Amis
Sir Kingsley William Amis (16 April 1922 – 22 October 1995) was an English novelist, poet, critic, and teacher. He wrote more than 20 novels, six volumes of poetry, a memoir, short stories, radio and television scripts, and works of social an ...
, who came from the working class and who wrote about working class culture
Working-class culture is a range of cultures created by or popular among working-class people. The cultures can be contrasted with high culture and folk culture, and are often equated with popular culture and low culture (the counterpart of high ...
.
Some novelists deliberately write for a working class audience for political ends, profiling "the working classes and working-class life; perhaps with the intention of making propaganda". Such literature, sometimes called proletarian literature
Proletarian literature refers here to the literature created by left-wing writers mainly for the class-conscious proletariat. Though the ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' states that because it "is essentially an intended device of revolution", it is ...
, maybe associated with the political agendas of the Communist party
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A ...
or left wing sympathizers, and seen as a "device of revolution". However, the British tradition of working class literature, unlike the Russian and American, was not especially inspired by the Communist Party, but had its roots in the Chartist movement
Chartism was a working-class movement for political reform in the United Kingdom that erupted from 1838 to 1857 and was strongest in 1839, 1842 and 1848. It took its name from the People's Charter of 1838 and was a national protest movement, w ...
, and socialism
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the e ...
, amongst others.
National or place-based identity
Novelists are often classified by their national affiliation, suggesting that novels take on a particular character based on the national identity of the authors. In some literature, national identity shapes the self-definition of many novelists. For example, in American literature
American literature is literature written or produced in the United States of America and in the colonies that preceded it. The American literary tradition thus is part of the broader tradition of English-language literature, but also inc ...
, many novelists set out to create the "Great American Novel
The Great American Novel (sometimes abbreviated as GAN) is a canonical novel that is thought to embody the essence of America, generally written by an American and dealing in some way with the question of America's national character. The ter ...
", or a novel that defines the American experience in their time. Other novelists engage politically or socially with the identity of other members of their nationality, and thus help define that national identity. For instance, critic Nicola Minott-Ahl describes Victor Hugo's ''Notre-Dame de Paris
Notre-Dame de Paris (; meaning "Our Lady of Paris"), referred to simply as Notre-Dame, is a medieval Catholic cathedral on the Île de la Cité (an island in the Seine River), in the 4th arrondissement of Paris. The cathedral, dedicated to the ...
'' directly helping in the creation of French political and social identity in mid-nineteenth century France.
Some novelists become intimately linked with a particular place or geographic region and therefore receive a place-based identity
Place identity or place-based identity refers to a cluster of ideas about place and identity in the fields of geography, urban planning, urban design, landscape architecture, environmental psychology, ecocriticism and urban sociology/ecological so ...
. In his discussion of the history of the association of particular novelists with place in British literature
British literature is literature from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islands. This article covers British literature in the English language. Anglo-Saxon (Old English) literature is inc ...
, critic D. C. D. Pocock, described the sense of place not developing in that canon until a century after the novel form first solidified at the beginning of the 19th century. Often such British regional literature
In literature regionalism refers to fiction or poetry that focuses on specific features, such as dialect, customs, history, and landscape, of a particular region (also called "local colour"). The setting is particularly important in regional li ...
captures the social and local character of a particular region in Britain, focussing on specific features, such as dialect, customs, history, and landscape (also called local colour): "Such a locale is likely to be rural and/or provincial." Thomas Hardy
Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry of William Word ...
's (1840-1928) novels can be described as regional because of the way he makes use of these elements in relation to a part of the West of England, that he names Wessex
la, Regnum Occidentalium Saxonum
, conventional_long_name = Kingdom of the West Saxons
, common_name = Wessex
, image_map = Southern British Isles 9th century.svg
, map_caption = S ...
. Other British writers that have been characterized as regional novelists, are the Brontë sisters, and writers like Mary Webb
Mary Gladys Webb (25 March 1881 – 8 October 1927) was an English Romance (literary fiction), romance novelist and poet of the early 20th century, whose work is set chiefly in the Shropshire countryside and among Shropshire characters and ...
(1881-1927), Margiad Evans
Margiad Evans was the pseudonym of Peggy Eileen Whistler (17 March 1909 – 17 March 1958), an English poet, novelist and illustrator with a lifelong identification with the Welsh border country.Ceridwen Lloyd-Morgan: 'Williams , Peggy Eileen a ...
(1909–58) and Geraint Goodwin
Arthur Geraint Goodwin (1 May 1903 – 10 October 1941) was a Welsh literature in English, Welsh journalist, novelist and short story writer from near Newtown, Montgomeryshire, who wrote about rural life on the Welsh border. His first novel, publi ...
(1903–42), who are associate with the Welsh border
Welsh may refer to:
Related to Wales
* Welsh, referring or related to Wales
* Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales
* Welsh people
People
* Welsh (surname)
* Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peopl ...
region. George Eliot
Mary Ann Evans (22 November 1819 – 22 December 1880; alternatively Mary Anne or Marian), known by her pen name George Eliot, was an English novelist, poet, journalist, translator, and one of the leading writers of the Victorian era. She wro ...
(1801–86) on the other hand is particularly associated with the rural English Midlands, whereas Arnold Bennett
Enoch Arnold Bennett (27 May 1867 – 27 March 1931) was an English author, best known as a novelist. He wrote prolifically: between the 1890s and the 1930s he completed 34 novels, seven volumes of short stories, 13 plays (some in collaboratio ...
(1867–1931) is the novelist of the Potteries in Staffordshire
Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation Staffs.) is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands Cou ...
, or the "Five Towns", (actually six) that now make-up Stoke-on-Trent
Stoke-on-Trent (often abbreviated to Stoke) is a city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Staffordshire, England, with an area of . In 2019, the city had an estimated population of 256,375. It is the largest settlement ...
. Similarly, novelist and poet Walter Scott
Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (15 August 1771 – 21 September 1832), was a Scottish novelist, poet, playwright and historian. Many of his works remain classics of European and Scottish literature, notably the novels ''Ivanhoe'', ''Rob Roy (n ...
's (1771-1832) contribution in creating a unified identity for Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
and were some of the most popular in all of Europe during the subsequent century. Scott's novels were influential in recreating a Scottish identity that the upper-class British society could embrace.
In American fiction, the concept of American literary regionalism
American literary regionalism or local color is a style or genre of writing in the United States that gained popularity in the mid to late 19th century into the early 20th century. In this style of writing, which includes both poetry and prose, the ...
ensures that many genres of novel associated with particular regions often define the reception of the novelists. For example, in writing Western novels
Western fiction is a genre of literature set in the American Old West frontier and typically set from the late eighteenth to the late nineteenth century. Well-known writers of Western fiction include Zane Grey from the early 20th century and ...
, Zane Grey
Pearl Zane Grey (January 31, 1872 – October 23, 1939) was an American author and dentist. He is known for his popular adventure novels and stories associated with the Western genre in literature and the arts; he idealized the American frontie ...
has been described as a "place-defining novelist", credited for defining the western frontier in America consciousness at the beginning of the 20th century while becoming linked as an individual to his depiction of that space.
Similarly, novelist such as Mark Twain
Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, entrepreneur, publisher, and lecturer. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has p ...
, William Faulkner
William Cuthbert Faulkner (; September 25, 1897 – July 6, 1962) was an American writer known for his novels and short stories set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha County, based on Lafayette County, Mississippi, where Faulkner spent most of ...
, Eudora Welty
Eudora Alice Welty (April 13, 1909 – July 23, 2001) was an American short story writer, novelist and photographer who wrote about the American South. Her novel ''The Optimist's Daughter'' won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973. Welty received numero ...
, and Flannery O'Connor
Mary Flannery O'Connor (March 25, 1925August 3, 1964) was an American novelist, short story writer and essayist. She wrote two novels and 31 short stories, as well as a number of reviews and commentaries.
She was a Southern writer who often ...
are often describe as writing within a particular tradition of Southern literature
Southern United States literature consists of American literature written about the Southern United States or by writers from the region. Literature written about the American South first began during the colonial era, and developed significan ...
, in which subject matter relevant to the South is associated with their own identities as authors. For example, William Faulkner set many of his short stories and novels in Yoknapatawpha County
Yoknapatawpha County () is a fictional Mississippi county created by the American author William Faulkner, largely based upon and inspired by Lafayette County, Mississippi, and its county seat of Oxford (which Faulkner renamed "Jefferson"). Faulk ...
, which is based on, and nearly geographically identical to, Lafayette County, of which his hometown of Oxford, Mississippi
Oxford is a city and college town in the U.S. state of Mississippi. Oxford lies 75 miles (121 km) south-southeast of Memphis, Tennessee, and is the county seat of Lafayette County. Founded in 1837, it was named after the British city of Oxf ...
. In addition to the geographical component of Southern literature, certain themes have appeared because of the similar histories of the Southern states in regard to slavery
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
, the American Civil War
The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...
, and Reconstruction
Reconstruction may refer to:
Politics, history, and sociology
*Reconstruction (law), the transfer of a company's (or several companies') business to a new company
*''Perestroika'' (Russian for "reconstruction"), a late 20th century Soviet Union ...
. The conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
culture in the South has also produced a strong focus by novelists from there on the significance of family, religion, community, the use of the Southern dialect, along with a strong sense of place. The South's troubled history with racial
A race is a categorization of humans based on shared physical or social qualities into groups generally viewed as distinct within a given society. The term came into common usage during the 1500s, when it was used to refer to groups of variou ...
issues has also continually concerned its novelists.
In Latin America
Latin America or
* french: Amérique Latine, link=no
* ht, Amerik Latin, link=no
* pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived f ...
a literary movement called Criollismo
''Criollismo'' () is a literary movement that was active from the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century throughout Hispanic America. It is considered the Hispanic counterpart to American literary regionalism. Using a realist ...
or costumbrismo was active from the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century, which is considered equivalent to American literary regionalism. It used a realist style to portray the scenes, language, customs and manners of the country the writer was from, especially the lower and peasant classes, ''criollismo'' led to an original literature based on the continent's natural elements, mostly epic and foundational. It was strongly influenced by the wars of independence from Spain
, image_flag = Bandera de España.svg
, image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg
, national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond")
, national_anthem = (English: "Royal March")
, i ...
and also denotes how each country in its own way defines ''criollo
Criollo or criolla (Spanish for creole) may refer to:
People
* Criollo people, a social class in the Spanish race-based colonial caste system (the European descendants)
Animals
* Criollo duck, a species of duck native to Central and South Ameri ...
'', which in Latin America
Latin America or
* french: Amérique Latine, link=no
* ht, Amerik Latin, link=no
* pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived f ...
refers to locally-born people of Spanish ancestry.
Gender and sexuality
Novelists often will be assessed in contemporary criticism based on their gender or treatment of gender. Largely, this has to do with the impacts of cultural expectations of gender on the literary market, readership and authorship. Literary criticism
Literary criticism (or literary studies) is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often influenced by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of literature's goals and methods. Th ...
, especially since the rise of feminist theory
Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical, fictional, or philosophical discourse. It aims to understand the nature of gender inequality. It examines women's and men's social roles, experiences, interests, chores, and feminist ...
, pays attention to how women, historically, have experienced a very different set of writing expectations based on their gender; for example, the editors of ''The Feminist Companion to Literature in English
''The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present'' is a biographical dictionary about women writers.
''Companion'' was edited by Virginia Blain, Patricia Clements, and Isobel Grundy. It was ...
'' point out: "Their texts emerge from and intervene in conditions usually very different from those which produced most writing by men." It is not a question of the subject matter or political stance of a particular author, but of her gender
Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures u ...
: her position as a woman within the literary marketplace. However, the publishing market's orientation to favor the primary reading audience of women may increasingly skew the market towards female novelists; for this reason, novelist Teddy Wayne
Teddy Wayne (born 1979) is an American novelist and short story writer whose books include '' The Love Song of Jonny Valentine'' (2013) and ''Loner'' (2016). He is a frequent contributor to ''The New Yorker'', ''McSweeney's'', and many other pub ...
argued in a 2012 ''Salon
Salon may refer to:
Common meanings
* Beauty salon, a venue for cosmetic treatments
* French term for a drawing room, an architectural space in a home
* Salon (gathering), a meeting for learning or enjoyment
Arts and entertainment
* Salon (P ...
'' article titled "The agony of the male novelist" that midlist male novelists are less likely to find success than midlist female novelist, even though men tend to dominate "literary fiction" spaces.[
The position of women in the literary marketplace can change public conversation about novelists and their place within popular culture, leading to debates over sexism. For example, in 2013, American female novelist Amanda Filipacchi wrote a New York Times editorial challenging Wikipedia's categorization of American female novelists within a distinct category, which precipitated a significant amount of press coverage describing that Wikipedia's approach to categorization as sexism. For her, the public representation of women novelists within another category marginalizes and defines women novelists like herself outside of a field of "American novelists" dominated by men. However, other commentators, discussing the controversy also note that by removing such categories as "Women novelist" or "Lesbian writer" from the description of gendered or sexual minorities, the discover-ability of those authors plummet for other people who share that identity.
Similarly, because of the conversations brought by feminism, examinations of masculine subjects and an author's performance of "maleness" are a new and increasingly prominent approach critical studies of novels. For example, some academics studying ]Victorian fiction
Victorian literature refers to English literature during the reign of Queen Victoria (1837–1901). The 19th century is considered by some to be the Golden Age of English Literature, especially for British novels. It was in the Victorian era th ...
spend considerable time examining how masculinity shapes and effects the works, because of its prominence within fiction from the Victorian period.
Genre
Traditionally, the publishing industry has distinguished between "literary fiction
Literary fiction, mainstream fiction, non-genre fiction or serious fiction is a label that, in the book trade, refers to market novels that do not fit neatly into an established genre (see genre fiction); or, otherwise, refers to novels that are ch ...
", works lauded as achieving greater literary merit
Artistic merit is the artistic quality or value of any given work of art, music, film, literature, sculpture or painting.
Obscenity and literary merit
The 1921 US trial of James Joyce's novel ''Ulysses'' concerned the publication of the ''Nausi ...
, and "genre fiction
Genre fiction, also known as popular fiction, is a term used in the book-trade for fictional works written with the intent of fitting into a specific literary genre, in order to appeal to readers and fans already familiar with that genre.
A num ...
", novels written within the expectations of genres and published as consumer products.[ Thus, many novelists become slotted as writers of one or the other.][ Novelist ]Kim Wright
Kim or KIM may refer to:
Names
* Kim (given name)
* Kim (surname)
** Kim (Korean surname)
*** Kim family (disambiguation), several dynasties
**** Kim family (North Korea), the rulers of North Korea since Kim Il-sung in 1948
** Kim, Vietnamese f ...
, however, notes that both publishers and traditional literary novelist are turning towards genre fiction because of their potential for financial success and their increasingly positive reception amongst critics.[ Wright gives examples of authors like ]Justin Cronin
Justin Cronin (born 1962) is an American author. He has written five novels: ''Mary and O'Neil'' and ''The Summer Guest'', as well as a vampire trilogy consisting of ''The Passage,'' '' The Twelve'' and '' City of Mirrors''. He has won the Heming ...
, Tom Perrotta
Tom or TOM may refer to:
* Tom (given name), a diminutive of Thomas or Tomás or an independent Aramaic given name (and a list of people with the name)
Characters
* Tom Anderson, a character in ''Beavis and Butt-Head''
* Tom Beck, a character ...
and Colson Whitehead
Arch Colson Chipp Whitehead (born November 6, 1969) is an American novelist. He is the author of eight novels, including his 1999 debut work '' The Intuitionist''; '' The Underground Railroad'' (2016), for which he won the 2016 National Book Awa ...
all making that transition.[
However, publishing genre novels does not always allow novelist to continue writing outside the genre or within their own interests. In describing the place within the industry, novelist ]Kim Wright
Kim or KIM may refer to:
Names
* Kim (given name)
* Kim (surname)
** Kim (Korean surname)
*** Kim family (disambiguation), several dynasties
**** Kim family (North Korea), the rulers of North Korea since Kim Il-sung in 1948
** Kim, Vietnamese f ...
says that many authors, especially authors who usually write literary fiction, worry about "the danger that genre is a cul-de-sac" where publishers will only publish similar genre fiction from that author because of reader expectations,"and that once a writer turns into it, he’ll never get out." Similarly, very few authors start in genre fiction and move to more "literary" publications; Wright describes novelists like Stephen King as the exception rather than the norm.[ Other critics and writers defending the merits of genre fiction often point towards King as an example of bridging the gap between popular genres and literary merit.]
Role and objective
Both literary critics and novelists question what role novelists play in society and within art. For example, Eudora Welty
Eudora Alice Welty (April 13, 1909 – July 23, 2001) was an American short story writer, novelist and photographer who wrote about the American South. Her novel ''The Optimist's Daughter'' won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973. Welty received numero ...
writing in 1965 for in her essay "Must the Novelist Crusade?" draws a distinction between novelists who report reality by "taking life as it already exists, not to report it, but to make an object, toward the end that the finished work might contain this life inside it, and offer it to the reader" and journalists, whose role is to act as "crusaders" advocating for particular positions, and using their craft as a political tool. Similarly, writing in the 1950s, Ralph Ellison in his essay "Society, Morality, and the Novel", sees the novelist as needing to "re-create reality in the forms which his personal vision assumes as it plays and struggles with the vivid illusory "eidetic-like" imagery left in the mind's eye by the process of social change."[ However, Ellison also describes novelists of the Lost Generation, like Ernest Hemingway, not taking full advantage of the moral weight and influence available to novelists, pointing to Mark Twain and Herman Melville as better examples.] A number of such essays, such as literary critic Frank Norris's "Responsibilities of a Novelist", highlight such moral and ethical justifications for their approach to both writing novels and criticizing them.
When defining her description of the role of the modernist novelist in the essay "Modern Fiction (essay), Modern Fiction", Virginia Woolf argues for a representation of life not interested in the exhaustive specific details represented in Literary realism, realism in favor of representing a "myriad of impressions" created in experience life.[ Her definition made in this essay, and developed in others, helped define the literary movement of modernist literature. She argues that the novelist should represent "not a series of gig-lamps symmetrically arranged; [rather] life is luminous halo, a semitransparent envelope surrounding us from the beginning of the conscious to the end. Is it not the task of the novelist to convey this varying, this unknown and uncircumscribed spirit, whatever aberration or complexity it may display, with as little mixture of the alien and external as possible?"]
See also
*Author
*:Novelists, a category containing all Wikipedia articles about novelists
*Imagination
*List of novelists by genre
*List of novelists by nationality
*Narrative
*Storytelling
References
Works cited
*
*
{{Authority control
Novelists,
Hobbies
Occupations in literature