I think an additional problem with jumping to label contemporary authors as "flavors of the week" and relying overmuch on staying power as a criterion for canon expansion is in the area of young genres. This policy actually ironically results in a lot of less meritable authors receiving the majority of the attention. For example, because of the relatively short history of Asian American literature, many people feel the only authors that merit mention are those time-tested favorites Amy Tan and Maxine Hong Kingston. Most people don't realize that these authors are less critically acclaimed and less well-regarded in the scholarly community than other relatively less widely published authors, such as Frank Chin. In these cases, the canon would do well to include these more obscure and less "time-tested" authors at the expense of more well-known favorites, if we're assuming that one important reason for canon expansion is to introduce players to literature worthy of merit. Of course, I recognize that in this sense, the test of critical study would also work - authors like Frank Chin actually have amassed a great deal of critical attention; even more if you discount the study of Amy Tan necessitated merely by the popularity of her particular body of work. It also begs the larger question - are relatively young genres that focus on relatively new voices worthy of inclusion in the canon? After all, the vast majority of this work has not had the opportunity to stand the test of time, and is admittedly particularly susceptible to including mediocre authors for political reasons.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0: Sat 12 Feb 2022 12:30:45 AM EST EST