Screenplay
Faulkner’s screen play sparked lively debate today and I think deserves some further investigation. The issue which interests me in that debate is the notion of value which we ascribe to the screenplay as an art form. We discussed the fact that we do not consider it an art form of real value, but why not?
Something having value is the product of a widely held and systematic attraction to roughly similar objects with relatively similar means of production. It is tricky because our way of speaking is conditioned into the mode of the university endorsed aesthetic institution. This involves an attempt to ascribe a certain value, rank it in terms of importance within the chain of developments in its historical context and in the development of the form. But, really, what the hell does that have to do with me reading a book? Watching a movie? Or listening to music? The connotations of all the endorsed words lock me out of actually enjoying it. ‘Beauty’, ‘Greatness’, ‘Aesthetics’ all leave me with a bitter taste in my mouth and a sense of distance between me and the work I’m engaging with. Why? The same reason it is almost impossible to enjoy Shakespeare, years of criticism have calcified around it into a hard shell of brittle and repugnant opinions.
What’s the flip side? Not only do we have to get round the debris, but it obscures our own decisions to ascribe value. Why not find anything beautiful? Anything at all that you can find the beauty in. It isn’t like it’s actually there anyway, its something we read into a bunch of other things. I find my cat outrageously mysterious, evil and wise, switching around in a type of chaotic haze of semi-divine incarnations of either benevolent or malicious spirits. That is a type of appreciation that art tries to express and has nothing to do with reality in the normal sense of the word. Art forms are no different, they try to capture these kinds of appreciations, but enjoying them is enjoying a form of representation which involves a skill and rapport in itself.
So, why shouldn’t screenplays be a perfectly adequate art form? I don’t get it and I’m not interested, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t perfectly legitimate. The thing which is not legitimate is letting the flotsam of critic’s opinions restrain us from prescribing value where ever the hell we feel like it.
Ra.
Hi Harry,
ReplyDeleteI agree with you about how frustrating I found the discussion surrounding Faulkner's screenplay. Ascribing aesthetic value and discussing whether his screenplay should be in the canon is uninteresting.
But this is possibly because I, and maybe you,couldn't give a toss about Faulkner's value. And this is essentially what value comes down to: personal value. I personally do not value Faulkner, but I do personally value cats, and so find your argument about your cat's playfulness as an art form a very convincing one.
Is this lame? Most likely, yes. But the personal value I ascribe to cats means a great deal to me, you and perhaps some critics. Is it then that critical opinions start to matter?
Hi there- Kira here- and firstly let me say my cat is far more meaningful to me than the question of the canonicity of Faulkner's screenplay! However, I do think that the screenplay itself can certainly be viewed as a singular text, as any actor, director or producer would argue. Maybe it is the legacy of the ideology of the canon itself that is most problematic, as historically screenplays have not been in circulation for very long and in comparison to the historicity of literary culture-they are a very new medium to consider. Now if my cat were to write a screenplay- that would be something!!
ReplyDeleteI think that if the screenplay has merit based on its own devices then why shouldn't it be part of something that we study and appreciate? However, if it is Faulkner's name that gives it ore meaning and merit than I wonder what your cat would have to say about that?
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