COLLEGIAAAAAAAAATE!

litglutton:

I will never accept “boring” as a legitimate literary criticism. 

“OMG why do we have to read this? It’s so boring!”

“I couldn’t get more than 5 pages into it, the story was just too boring.”

“I can’t believe you like that book! The whole thing bored me to tears.”

When a reader tells me that a book is “boring,” they aren’t actually saying anything at all. They aren’t telling me what was wrong with the writing or the author’s use of setting. They aren’t commenting on the plot or character development. They aren’t letting me know about the social criticism or use of foreshadowing. They’re simply saying “Ugh, I didn’t want to finish it.” And that’s just a lazy review.

Using the word “boring” as a descriptor shows me that this person isn’t a conscious reader. While I wholly believe that they didn’t like the book, calling it “boring” usually means that they don’t understand why they had a bad experience with it. It’s a blanket statement that can cover any number of variables, so using it means that the reviewer hasn’t put forth the effort to think too hard about analyzing their feelings.

You see, “boring” is a personal descriptor that changes from reader to reader. What I find boring may excite the person next to me, while their ideal adventure/drama will absolutely bore me to tears. It isn’t a universal term that actually carries weight. If that were true, the game of chess would already be dead and middle school history teachers would be burned on the cross. (Oh, the horror!)

Even if we’re only looking at one person’s interests, “boring” can be inconsistent. What is fun in one context may suddenly become boring in another. Just think of your favorite song: Listening to it on the radio after weeks devoid of music can be a thrilling and amazing experience. Put your windows down, drive fast down the highway, sing it at the top of your lungs: It’s enough to make you want to hold onto that feeling for days afterward and soak up the world. But if you’re sitting in your grandmother’s living room during a family gathering when the song comes up on the radio, it might not be enough to drown out your uncle’s discussion of his latest colonoscopy. You’ll probably still be tired, slightly grossed out, and desperate to get away from the questionable cheese and crackers being served. That song isn’t enough to shake you from your boredom and it’s possible that the stale environment around you is enough to stop you from even noticing that music is playing.

Did the song suddenly get boring? Is the song to blame at all?  

Of course not. The boredom is instead an emotion that settled inside of you as the culmination of your environment and mood. One aspect, such as a book that you are trying to read, may heavily contribute to it. But it is just as likely that the rest of your environment, such as sitting in a lumpy chair within a hot high school English classroom, is coloring your experience. So it’s necessary to examine the text further in order to figure out where this boredom came from and what you are reacting against. 

“But wait!” I’m sure you’re all yelling from behind your computer screens. “You could argue this for any emotion! Am I not allowed to call a book ‘sad’ just because someone out there might not get teary-eyed from the writing? Is it impossible for a book to be ‘exciting’ just because James Bond finds the action too mundane?”

To an extent, you’d be right. You’re running this risk any time an emotion or feeling is used to describe a book. After all, it’s not the writing itself that is inherently “thrilling” or “depressing.” Instead, those are the emotions that the author evokes from you. Identifying this distinction is a great part of being a conscious reader and is nothing to be scoffed at. But saying “The book made me feel bored” expresses a different sentiment than “The book is boring,” even though a reviewer may say one while meaning the other.

So when reviewing or recommending books, try to stay away from the word “boring.” Instead, describe what made you feel bored in the first place. Was there too much world building in the first chapter? Do the characters have a ton of dialogue about their everyday routines? Is the book about a subject that doesn’t interest you? Identifying why a piece of writing is boring will not only help you become a better reader, but it will stop you from sounding like a whiny teenager. And no one likes a whiny teenager. 

It’s incredibly hard to read through a long text post about the word “boring”… but I did it and I agree. 

litglutton:

The Book: ”One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” by Ken Kesey

Reviewed by “Sarah Truly Asia” on Goodreads:

The book is verbatim the movie. I wasn’t impressed. The main character was the Indian not Randle Patrick McMurphy. I think the movie was GREAT and the book was too predictable. Maybe I should use another word other than predictable. The book was predictable because I saw the movie before reading the book, but Randles character intrigues me and I wanted to know more about him not the Indian.

litglutton:

The Book: ”The Giver” by Lois Lowry

Reviewed by an anonymous reader on Amazon:

This book tells the story of a boy that gets a job. The most impotent job in the whole community. That job is the giver. The Giver is a story that you never want to read. The book has no description. It is a waste of time.

That’s too bad. He got the most impotent job.

litglutton:

The book: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by JK Rowling

(3 for the price of 1!)

Written by reviewer “Confused” on Amazon (December 3, 2011):

I mean, what’s so exciting about witches, or about mean kids at a boarding school? Or something like that. I may be just a “Moogle” (as they say in the books) but I just don’t get it. I have to admit I only skimmed the books. I did, however, look at all five in the series. I hear they are going to make movies out of them, so perhaps I’ll get a better sense then. I do think that J.K. Rowling is a skilled writer. I predict that his future will be bright!

Written by an anonymous reviewer on Amazon:

Harry potter is a good book…that’s the problem…it’s just too good…all the other books don’t have a chance, so people think they are reading a good book but really the book is long and boring while other books are short and thrilling. There for other books that may be much greater are ignored because they are written by lesser known authors…

Written by an anonymous reviewer on Amazon:

SO I SUPPOSE THE POINT OF THIS BOOK IS THAT PEOPLE WHO WEAR TURBANS ARE EVIL??? THERE ARE NO MINORITIES IN THE BOOK AND HARRY “THE WHITE BOY” POTTER SAVES THE DAY THIS BOOK IS RACIST AND SHOULD BE CONDEMNED BUT NO PEOPLE READ AND THE ONLY GIRL IN THE STORY IS PORTRAYED AS A NERDY BOOKWORM SIDEKICK BUTT KISSER REAL GOOD PORTRAYAL OF WOMEN WASNT IT WRITTEN BY A WOMAN??? THIS BOOK IS STUPID AND RACIST AND DONT BUY IT

litglutton:

The book: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Written by reviewer “maria josée” on Amazon:

I am not satisfied with the book`s cover image. I would have greatly prefered to have the movie image as a cover, since I greatly appreciated the movie, and since we are in the 21 century, were we do not have this kind of image. I would have bought the book if the movie image was featured on it. 

litglutton:

The book: Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl 

(Got to start these bad reviews off with a bang, amiright?)

Written by an anonymous reviewer on Amazon:

I know that the holocoust was horrible and something that we do not want to repeat again but Anne Frank is just BORING. im not prejudice and i feel horrible about the holocaust but what i don’t get is why is this girl complaining about her life? she had it way better off then some people. And why this diary is even famous. Anyone from the holocaust could have written a diary and be made famous. But a real good diary would explain the holocaust more then her own love life. Anne Frank is the most boring person i have ever seen in my life. i admit, there were some holocaust parts but for every PARAGRAPH there was about the holocaust…there were 30 pages about her “peeling potatoes” “feeling depressed” “studying” and “peter”. There was no action whatsoever and people say that you could actually feel what she was going through…i mean get a life people. I know it’s bad being cooped up and all..but….ughhhhhhhaoiwerualishfd bad book. And also…i can skip like 100 pages of the book and still know whats going on. I mean WHY AM I READING A BOOK THAT TALKS ABOUT HER WANTING TO REACH PUBERTY. seriously. so if you want to read a book about food, and 5 other people, family trees, and useless things that will never come in handy in your life then i urge you to read this book. but serseiouly you will have wasted your time. read some REAL holocaust books

And just for fun, this little gem by another anonymous reviewer on Amazon:

Should come with a warning label, so don’t pick it up if you don’t want a bummer. Read it for school, didn’t enjoy the experience.

“but serseiouly”

tdmccall:

I’m reading The Last Ring Bearer (Post on this can be found on my other blog here), which is a re-telling about the events during and after The Lord of the Rings.

It becomes evident as to why Yeskov never intended for it to become a fanfiction. As a scientist he wrote it as a record seen by the losers. It seems silly since it is a spin-off of The Lord of the Rings, but it has some realistic elements added into the telling. An easy way to explain this would be to give a modern day example.

If an American were to travel to a place such as Yasukuni Shrine in Japan, they’d see an account on history praising the kamikaze and cunning of Japanese generals, and portraying American tactics as both cheap and unfair. As enraging as it was to personally witness this, I had to keep in mind that whatever fluff I was fed in history class all these years has also been twisted. Those crazy kamikaze pilots were more often than not forced to go through with their actions. An example of such altered history can be seen here on the Nanking Massacre.

Back to Middle Earth, Yeskov writes The Last Ring Bearer portraying an orc’s point of view of the war. It’s extremely off-putting to see Gandalf being portrayed as a manipulative war-monger, Eomer as a drunkard, and Aragorn as a cheap duelist, but the reality is that realistic war stories are manipulated by perspective - something that Yeskov sought to create with his essay. If that’s not strange enough, it’s incredibly bizarre to view orcs as a people, having family expectations, doing their job and fighting for a cause not completely revealed to them or apparent in The Lord of the Rings. It’s actually really brilliant. If you’re a Lord of the Rings fan and have an open mind, I seriously recommend taking a look at it.

^ Creepy man-slaughtering servant of Sauron? Or maybe just a misunderstood soul who couldn’t fit in as a child and is just trying to get back home to his orclings? You decide.

I want to read this.