It used to be music snobbery. I used to be that annoying 13-year-old who sneered at my classmates for listening to chart music while I peppered my folder with pictures of Pulp, Ned’s Atomic Dustbin and The Wonder Stuff. And then this amazing thing happened: I grew up. I got over myself, and realised I was being a pain in the arse.
It seems that people don’t necessarily grow up anymore.
I suspect it’s partly because it’s so much easier to have a global phenomenon now. Technology and freedom of information are such that much of the globe knows about films, music and books faster than ever before. Massive followings develop quickly, and then the complaining starts.
Take Twilight. It’s really an okay book. The series goes a bit wobbly and there are some points of vampire physiology I don’t think Meyer really thought through. Plus sometimes the obsessive relationship borders on abuse. But as a vampire love story and examination of teenage alienation, it’s perfectly readable and quite ably characterised. Yes, I’m an adult and am unlikely to start fostering a scary crush on Edward Cullen (Jasper’s more my type, anyway), but that doesn’t mean that I ‘shouldn’t’ be reading it.
There was a lot of this surrounding the Harry Potter books as well. Just the other week, a friend announced: “they’re okay, I just think they’re not the best thing ever written”. Well, quite. I think that most measured, adult readers actually just enjoyed the imaginative setting, engaging plot and occasional clever turns of phrase. Many of us thought Order of the Phoenix could do with some judicious editing, but the series as a whole was worth a read.
For some reason, though, that’s not enough for the book snobs. The constant stream of bile directed towards adults who choose to read books written for any age is tiring. There are double standards, of course – it’s okay to read Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book because it’s Gaiman - and the people who do the most vocal complaining usually haven’t actually read the book they’re whining about.
It seems particularly the fact that I’m reading something out of my target market that inspires ire. When I read The Da Vinci Code (and bitterly regretted those hours out of my life), no-one said a word, because it’s okay to read rubbish if it’s rubbish for adults. When I said I’d read the Twilight series, I was looked upon with pity, even though Meyer’s teen angst is at least nearer reality than Dan Brown’s execrable, shoddily characterised, hackneyed religious hate-mongering. Neither of them will appear in my top ten – or even hundred – but I can’t quite work out what’s so bad about reading children’s books or teen novels.
Some books for younger readers are classics (The Phantom Tollbooth), some leave me cold (Stormbreaker) and some are, I think, like The Simpsons – they look like they’re for children and contain jokes about breaking wind, but they’re surprisingly adult-friendly (Artemis Fowl).
I’ve read – I continue to read – classics. Great Expectations is, and I hate to break this to you, extremely dull. I’ve read and understood philosophy texts, and not just via Alain de Botton. My favourite authors are a hodge-podge of styles and topics, from John Irving, Gregory Maguire and Louis de Bernieres to Lian Hearn and Terry Pratchett. I’m more than capable of concentrating on ‘grown up’ texts. I’m not gormlessly reading Meyer, Rowling or, for that matter, Ian Fleming because I’m emotionally or intellectually stunted, but – and I know this can be hard to accept for the common or garden snob – because I feel like it.
Constantly whining about popular phenomena and trying to set yourself apart from the crowd just highlights how insecure and dull you really are. Hating something because it’s popular is immature and just downright boring. By all means, draw attention to the faults and flaws you believe something has; popularity is, indeed, no measure of quality. But it’s also not a guarantee of the lack of it.
Now make a cup of tea and go get a book – any book.
Read, enjoy… and stop overthinking it.
Image via edenborough