When Morals and Books Collide

[main-hoon-emily.livejournal.com]

I was going to just post this on my journal, but then I thought it might be better received here.

When it comes to what you read, how do you respond to characters or themes or plots that go against what you consider to be morally or religiously right?

Generally, I won't put down a book that has morally questionable content unless I dislike the writing style or the plot. But then, I'm not talking about truly repugnant subjects but things like, do the characters sleep together even though they aren't married? Does someone keep taking the Lord's name in vain or using the f-word every time they talk? Are the unpleasant activities described because they're necessary to the plot, or is this just a chance to wallow in filth?

There are a lot of books I wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole, though, because of what I know them to contain (either I started reading them and came across something distasteful, or I've heard about it from someone who did read them), and I've just been curious how others approach this. I don't want to give specific examples because I don't want to turn this into a debate about whether such-and-such a book was bad or good, but just in general. And, if you want to go a step beyond that, are you satisfied with the lines you have or haven't drawn, or do you feel that you're too permissive or too conservative?

Bleh, I hope this all makes sense!

Comments

[moredetails.livejournal.com]

Good topic, and thanks for posting it here!

I think I can be too permissive at times, because there are some really good stories that have a few risque scenes, but otherwise they are very enjoyable. Since most nonChristian books will involve the society norms (swearing, heavy drinking and premarital sex), it's very hard to avoid. I do avoid books that are gratuitous in those areas, but it's not always black and white.

I remember one book that started off really ungreat, and I was about to put it down, but I remembered several friends enjoyed it. I gave it a chance, and later I could see how that scene was somewhat necessary to the plot. Perhaps it could've been toned down a bit, but the author was trying to make a point about what sort of person this girl was, and the point definitely came across by having such a scene. It's really hard to say...but like I said, I generally feel I'm a bit too permissive when something comes up, but I don't seek out such books, of course. Often the scene will not show up until so far into the book that I'm already hooked on the story, so it seems silly to quit reading. But I should probably be more protective over my mind.

[seraphimsigrist.livejournal.com]

well it depends...I could think of examples
of writers whom I know to be,or to have been,
engaged in things that seem to me outside
what I would call Christian morality and also
who, or others who, are not Christian in belief
and whom nonetheless I cut a lot of slack for...
for various reasons, a sense of a nonetheless
real spiritual and artistic value etc.
recognition of a real inner quest etc.

but just now I am looking at a book called The
Snow Leopard by Peter Matthiessen which I read
yeats ago and now, going to see the snow leopards
at the Central Park Zoo on Saturday ,I pick up again.

Matthiessen's book describes his travel across the
plateau of Tibet hoping to see a rare snow leopard
and it becomes a spiritual quest. There is some
beautiful writing.
On the other hand I dislike on some level that he is
a Buddhist, presumably having started out as some sort
of Christian in background.
Let it be a prejudice but anyone who has left Christianity
and taken up another religion, not as something he admires
along side of his Christianity, but as his sole faith, anyone
like that starts with a couple of strikes against him in my
book...
Also he is leaving his wife with whom he had a rocky marriage
behind for this trip which he was able to do being a rich
cultured guy whereas most guys , or in another way wives of
course, but most guys can just go to a football game or
something when things are tough at home.
something about the whole business seems self indulgent...

I cannot say that I have drawn lines that hold from one
case to another but this is a book I have trouble with
and do not have a good feeling of.

this is what occurs to me to say in response to this just now
yours
+Seraphim

another line I will not cross

[seraphimsigrist.livejournal.com]

If I may add a silly note, I will
not be buying any new books about
Tiger Woods any time soon.

[kiwiria.livejournal.com]

I know exactly what you mean, so yes, it does make sense. I recently read a book that I assumed I was going to love because of what I had heard about it, but the main character's morals were so different from mine that I almost felt dirty reading it. She did redeem herself in the end, but it wasn't enough. Looking objectively at it, I can see it's a good book (as in captivating and well-written), but as most of it was spend justifying behaviour I find utterly amoral, I just couldn't like it.

It'll take a lot for me to put down a book though, because I always want to see if the characters redeem themselves in the end. Sometimes they do, and I'm glad I kept on with it. At other times I just want to burn the book afterwards.

a rambling reply

[barbarakelley.livejournal.com]

Very good questions--I know exactly what you mean, and I sometimes wrestle with that too. My dad has this thing about bad language in books--he doesn't mind reading them, but if, when I'm at his house, I pick up a book he knows has bad language in it, he will actively try to steer me away from it. I sometimes find his protectiveness mildly annoying (I am in my 40's) but also it is kind of funny. Bad language alone seldom bothers me; I hardly notice it, unless every other word is a curse word. And then it isn't so much that the language offends me, it is more that the character isn't someone I would want to spend time with if they were real. In effect, I'm simply evaluating the book as if the characters were real people, and reacting as I normally would. Some people I would simply avoid.

I've developed a kind of sense of there being differences in sexual content--at least according to my own perceptions. If a books seems to me to be written to titilate, or to revel in being "bad", then I will usually set it aside.

If the sex in the book seems to be presenting an aspect of humanity (good or bad) then it isn't usually offensive to me, even if it is something wicked. My perceptions of course might be different than another person's, and may not reflect the intentions of the writer at all, but they work for me.

One of the most "sinful" books (being about a sinful topic, I mean) I've read came to be spiritually helpful for me. I'm thinking of Nabokov's Lolita, in which the main character is a pedophile. Rather than being sickened and repulsed by it (the expected response to child abuse in real life) I was amazed at how the author could make this despicable character the protagonist of the story. As I was reading, I found myself (uncomfortably) understanding and relating to the character. Somehow, for me, the result was an understanding of sin as separate from the person, and a realization of how easily broken people can fall into terrible sins, and not even recognize the enormity of what they are doing. When I finished it, I felt like I understood humannkind just a little bit better. Though of course the understanding was dark and disturbing, too... but it helped me at the time.

Practically everything I read, I try to come up with some spiritual meaning in it. I don't always succeed, but usually there is something--even if only the wish that the author had been truer to goodness rather than writing the book the way they did.

I have just recently rejected a book--the sex scene didn't bother me, but the page after page of description of a fancy dress ball annoyed me. Oddly, this inflating the importance of the trivial was more offensive to me than the gratuitous sex.

[eattheolives.livejournal.com]

I'll freely admit I have rather liberal standards in literature. Part of it is that I know what sorts of things affect me and what doesn't - for the most part bad language isn't a issue for me; it's as if my eye glosses right over it without really seeing. There comes a point, though, where it becomes very distasteful and I will stop reading a book because of it. The same thing holds true with sex scenes or other content issues - as long as it's not just gratutious, and has some real point in the story, and the book is well-written, I'm usually okay with it. I often won't even remember content issues later, so I'm afraid I frequently recommend books without remembering things that might shock or offend others. *blush*

Although we may all have different standards, I think it's clear to all of us when something steps over the line and becomes unhealthy for us personally. :)

[main-hoon-emily.livejournal.com]

I should have said this yesterday, but what made me want to talk about this was reading a review for the book Cleaving, by Julie Powell (woman who wrote Julie and Julia). Apparently Powell reveals herself to be quite the floozy, cheating on her husband over and over again and treating him like crap, interspersed with musings on working as a butcher...or something. Anyway, it only has a 2-star average on Amazon right now, which surprised me, so I read a few of the reviews to see why and saw that most of them were critical of the book because it's so very focused on Powell's affairs and her self-congratulatory tone. And then I read the comments on a few reviews and saw several times over, "This is a sermon, not a review. Your feelings on infidelity have no bearing on the literary merit of the book."

Which frankly baffled me, because I judge books all the time based on their morality over any "literary merit". I can think of a dozen books off the top of my head that I've either refused to read or refused to finish based on something foul. Granted, I'll overlook a bit of swearing or a sex scene as long as it's not gratuitous or included only for titillation, but I don't want to read books where the characters, fictional or non-fictional, aren't people I would want to be around in real life.

Anyway...I probably should have put all this in the original post, but that's the story of my life. I write something, post it, and only later remember fourteen things I intended to say. :-P

[rosalinegunn.livejournal.com]

I think that irritates me the most is when a book has the overarching agenda of making a mockery of my faith. It is supposed to be a thriller, but it is really another book explaining to everyone why Christianity is for idiots. I absolutely hate that and immediately toss any book that falls into it. I actually find myself reading more and more teen focused literature because they seem to be able to tell a story without having gratuitous sex or resorting to swearing every word. I like good Christian fiction, unfortunately there isn't very much of it. Most of it is a sermon written as fiction. Jesus was a great storyteller, I wonder why most christian writers think it isn't good if it isn't overt. I really love good characters. I don't have a problem reading a book that has fallible human behavior in it. The Bible itself is full of sex, greed, murder, and various sins. It is more in whether that behavior is rewarded or denounced that I look at.