Jeanette Winterson
davey_wavey
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I am writing my dissertation on this woman at the moment, and I'm really struggling to disagree with anything she says! In my opinion, this woman is a complete and utter genius. Has anyone read any of her books?
In her essays, she comments on modern society and some of what she says is spot on. A few selected quotes from her book 'Art Objects'.
"Inability to cope is defined as a serious weakness in a macho culture like ours, but what is inability to cope, except a spasmodic, faint and fainter protest against a closed-in drugged-up life where suburban values are touted as the greatest good?"
"Notional life is the life encouraged by governments, mass education and the mass media. Each of those powerful agencies couples an assumption of its own importance with a disregard for individuality.The education system is not designed to turn out thoughtful individualists, it is there to get us to work. When we come home exhausted from the inanities of our jobs we can relax in front of the inanities of the TV screen. This pattern punctuated by birth, death and marriage and a new car, is offered to us as real life".
"I do not think it an exaggeration to say that most of the energy of most of the people is being diverted into a system which destroys them. Money is no antidote. If the imaginative life is to be renewed it needs its own coin".
Indeed, I believe there isn't much room for individuality in our society. We all have to toe the party line. When we apply for jobs, we have to use the same buzz words and the same cliches so we can work like robots 9-5. When we're asked how we are, we have to say we're fine when maybe we're not. We can only reveal our feelings, but only if we talk about the weather outside. Anything else is unacceptable. There's no room in this world for our imagination to be expressed. We can't express our imagination unless we can instantly make money from it.
"Money recognises no currency but its own. Whatever is not money, whatever is not making money, is useless to it. The entire efforts of our government as directed through our society are efforts towards making more and more money. This favours the survival of the dullest. This favours those who prefer to live in a notional reality where goods are worth more than time and where things are more important than ideas".
Money culture hates art. In this world, we need to know what we're getting, when we're getting it and how much it will cost.
I agree with every word she says. It certainly provides some food for thought.
In her essays, she comments on modern society and some of what she says is spot on. A few selected quotes from her book 'Art Objects'.
"Inability to cope is defined as a serious weakness in a macho culture like ours, but what is inability to cope, except a spasmodic, faint and fainter protest against a closed-in drugged-up life where suburban values are touted as the greatest good?"
"Notional life is the life encouraged by governments, mass education and the mass media. Each of those powerful agencies couples an assumption of its own importance with a disregard for individuality.The education system is not designed to turn out thoughtful individualists, it is there to get us to work. When we come home exhausted from the inanities of our jobs we can relax in front of the inanities of the TV screen. This pattern punctuated by birth, death and marriage and a new car, is offered to us as real life".
"I do not think it an exaggeration to say that most of the energy of most of the people is being diverted into a system which destroys them. Money is no antidote. If the imaginative life is to be renewed it needs its own coin".
Indeed, I believe there isn't much room for individuality in our society. We all have to toe the party line. When we apply for jobs, we have to use the same buzz words and the same cliches so we can work like robots 9-5. When we're asked how we are, we have to say we're fine when maybe we're not. We can only reveal our feelings, but only if we talk about the weather outside. Anything else is unacceptable. There's no room in this world for our imagination to be expressed. We can't express our imagination unless we can instantly make money from it.
"Money recognises no currency but its own. Whatever is not money, whatever is not making money, is useless to it. The entire efforts of our government as directed through our society are efforts towards making more and more money. This favours the survival of the dullest. This favours those who prefer to live in a notional reality where goods are worth more than time and where things are more important than ideas".
Money culture hates art. In this world, we need to know what we're getting, when we're getting it and how much it will cost.
I agree with every word she says. It certainly provides some food for thought.
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I'd already lost it by "macho culture"... :yawn::sleep:
Did she write that film, Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit ?
Whatever, I used to like seeing her on telly
Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit is one of her novels that got adapted to film.
She's just released her memoirs recently entitled 'Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?'
I chosen a couple of quotes above... you can, should you wish, turn the argument on it's head. Education is not solely about work otherwise why do we all choose subjects which have nothing to do with work. I'd suggest education is there to help us grow up and develop an interest in the bigger world. Reading Sassoon or the Reformation will not lead directly to many jobs but understanding other people's experience and how that relates to the lives people live today.
Imaginative life needs money, art and the artistic would be the lesser if it not for the funding that helps it have an audience. Whether it is direct private sales or goverment funding, if no one sees/reads the art, the idea will not get out in the wild.
Thinking someone is a genius might be something you need to overlook for this. Understand the flaws, it will help you see the strengths more clearly.
Nominally, I should agree with everything she ever says but sadly, i think she just had one good book in her - her first one. And even that only got published because she knew someone who knew someone who she met at a party, etc. And, to be honest, even that book is rather condescending, with the benefit of hindsight - although it seemed quite cool in the 80s.
She tried to pretend later her "I am the greatest" rant was post modern irony. But she meant every word of it at the time. Contemptible.
ETA: Is it just me, or does she have the look of Hilda Ogden?
Oranges was quite entertaining. I tried reading another of hers after that, but nothing in it resonated with me, and I just found it collosally boring. Then, (this was the 80s), I stopped reading much fiction, so that was that.
The quotes seem to correlate with what's going on in society pretty much though.
To be fair to her though, it was quite an odd childhood.
People have built careers on much lesser things.
I think I lost it on that sentence. If you're doing a dissertation, at least try to think critically, rather than lapping it all up like a good little puppy, or you could be in danger of proving
Try the books forum for people who might have read the books rather than watch the soft porn that passed for TV dramatisation 20 years ago:)
I do like some of JW's stuff but the quote in the OP seems to reflect how she views society, which is of course tinted by her own experience. What she might not accept is that there are many different constructions of individual, society and social life which are equally as valid as hers. She isn't necessarily stating some universal 'truth'. The 'system' she's railing against did not preclude her from educating herself and developing her 'art' but of course she might argue that she's achieved what she has done in spite of her background and environment.
The one thing that disturbs me about intellectuals and especially from within my own discipline (psychology) is that academics and intellectuals sometimes seem to think that they speak for society as whole when all they can ever do is reflect it through their own lens. Throughout the course of writing a large dissertation, I was shocked at some of the assumptions certain 'high up' academics held about 'ordinary' people and how conceited they were about their own world-view. Scary stuff indeed.
I have been thinking critically. Her comments in 'Art Objects' and the quotes I've posted on this thread all surround my final chapter.
In my other four chapters, I've been agreeing and disagreeing with different critics. It's hard though as I do think she's great
In this final chapter, I'm going to disagree with some of what she says to provide a different approach and to keep my dissertation interesting.
I just wanted to see what some of you thought of her on here and the opinions that she has on society. Some of the responses have been really interesting, thanks
Interesting quotes op. It's been a while since I've thought of her. Thanks.
My tutor at uni gave me this advice regarding library based dissertations - Spend the first half building up the opposing argument then spend the second half demolitioning it.
Yep, I had the same experience. I think being an intellectual sort of detaches you from the outside world- ivory tower and all that. I think academia, knowledge and art are very important, but I don't like the pretentiousness that sometimes comes with them.
Also what I found highly amusing was the attitude of the "radical" kids at uni. You know the type- mostly from middle class backgrounds, dressed like hippies, sporting the communist logo, going on about the evils of capitalism and how oppressive and unfair society is. Arts departments seem to be full of them. Being from a former Soviet country, I had to fight the temptation to tell them that they wouldn't last a day in a communist society!
Winterson's views are out of date. It's easy to sneer at 'suburban values' but most people do put having a degree of material comfort above art. It looks as though Winterson fancies herself as a modern bohemian.
OP, I assume you're a fan of Annie Proulx, judging by your username?
You forgot to mention that most of them then went on to well-paid jobs in the media and banking, courtesy of their middle-class backgrounds.:D