DO THRILLERS CORRUPT US?
Sir,-In the article published in your issue of December 6, W. J. Scott seems to have expressed a few essentially simple criticisms in somewhat pretentious language. If he means that the best literature would be expected to contain a true picture of men and women and their social relationships, one can hardly disagree with him; but it should be noticed while admitting this premiss that many of the recognised classics do not fulfill this condition. For instance, the many historical inaccuracies of Shakespeare, particularly the burlesque treatment of Jack Cade’s rebellion, or Dickens’s extravagantly villainously villains. It is obvious that many factors contribute to the worth of literature and that it is risky to attempt to pare off one hypothetical category, such as "thrillers" or "detective stories" and condemn them absolutely. Will Mr. Scott include Wells’s Invisible Man or Poe’s Murders in the Rue Morgue as "thrillers"? Will he claim the Sherlock Holmes novels inferior to The White Company? Will he say that the massproduced slush of Jeffrey Farnol, Donn Byrne, or Baroness Orezy is better than the mass-produced "thrillers" of Edgar Wallace? I do not think so, nor do I think he can suggest any method of eradicating the rubbish from our literary diet while the profit motive determines what books shall be printed and in what quantity, and while the majority of mankind are so busy with the details of scratching a crust for self and dependants in a driving and merciless society which affords little time for adequate education. Finally I doubt if reading "thrillers" as a recreation is any more indicative of a "shocking" deterioration of taste and reason than are such pastimes as chess, solitaire, or cross-word puzzling. In the past fortnight I have read King Lear, Some Modern Maoris by the Beagleholes, State and Revolution by Lenin, and a "thriller" by Freeman Wills Crofts called The Pit Prop Syndicate. I enjoyed each during the reading and while The Pit Prop Syndicate did not cause me much deep thought I cannot feel that I have surrendered either my taste or my reason to Freeman Wills Crofts. In point of fact Shakespeare is far more hypnotic-and if his output is accepted as one man’s work, as great a massproducer as any modern.
MAX
BOLLINGER
(Upper Hutt).
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 393, 3 January 1947, Page 5
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384DO THRILLERS CORRUPT US? New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 393, 3 January 1947, Page 5
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