A Paper Among Many on the 'Books-vs-Films' Debate

Tony Anderson

Are Books Still Worth Reading in the Age of TV and Film?

A Look at Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things Shows How Literature May Still Possess Redeeming Characteristics

“For me, what made writing The God of Small Things so worthwhile is that people all around the world are connecting with this book, that it’s somehow hitting some deeply human chord,” said Arundhati Roy of her Booker-Prize winning novel—a novel that earned her over one million dollars in sales in the first year alone (Jana). Her work is described as “dazzling” by The New York Times (Kakutani) and “glowing” by MSNBC (Shapiro). The Washington Post Book World even went so far as to state that it is the “strongest kind of novel” (Amirthanayagam).

In fact, this novel is making a case for not only itself as being an intrinsically worthwhile source of creative knowledge, but for novels—books—in general. Arundhati Roy has created a powerful work, employing advanced literary techniques that could hardly be duplicated through any other medium than the novel genre. One wonders, however, in an age when the popularity of film is at an all-time high—for example, Rotten Tomatoes’ collective group of critics considered the recent comedy Wild Hogs to be “87 percent rotten” (an essentially terrible film, in other words), yet in its first week it still garnered $39.7 million at the box office (Rotten Tomatoes)—whether even “the strongest kind of novel” still has something worthwhile to offer.

After all, one must concede that in the books-versus-film debate, film has the inherent upper hand. It functions much like the composer Richard Wagner’s concept of ‘Gesamtkuntswerk’ (total artwork), providing a complete presentation of images, words, and music. From this perspective, the world of books and reading—an act that focuses on a single aesthetic presentation, rather than a Wagnerian sensory attack—might seem one-dimensional to some, while appearing appropriately focused to others. To be sure, the overwhelming multifariousness of the filmic presentation, has itself fostered a diversity of opinions on whether or not such a strong shift from the page to the screen is, indeed, a positive thing.

New York University professor Mitchell Stephens optimistically welcomes the age of images through technology, considering it, in most respects, progress in the realm of fiction; he points out the ‘picture-is-worth-a-thousand-words’ argument, stating that when film came on to the historic scene, writers had the capacity to describe a landscape, but no writer had the ability to render the image of a landscape to his or her reader as accurately as a photograph. Photorealism was, according to Stephens, a “new development in the ancient competition between images and words. Nature, after all, has never been persuaded to pick up a pencil and ‘reproduce herself’ in words” (Stephens). Stephens goes on to explain that he views this new age in fiction as building on all of the achievements of prior ones. In the world of fiction, Stephens would suggest that we are moving away from the horse-and-buggy we call ‘literature’, and into the sleek, new Porsche: film. He writes:

Nevertheless, I can’t look at the history of human communication without
concluding—unfashionable as such a conclusion may currently be in
the historical community—that a kind of progress has been
made. Yes, we’ve lost some wisdom along the way, but I believe
we’ve gained more. And I can’t look at the magical devices we
are coming up with for capturing, editing and making available moving
images without concluding that they will help us make additional
progress (Stephens).

Not everyone, however, is an optimist. Some are downright leery of the potential dangers of having an explosion of information readily available through films, television, and the Internet. William Paulson, though speaking generally of technological advancement (and not specifically about television itself), still offers very trenchant remarks for this discussion. Paulson warns us:

The assumption that information (or even knowledge) should increase is not a
self-evident or even innocent one…Stockpiled information in general
provides the capacity to neutralize, control, and integrate aleatory
events…The ultra-communicativity produced by modern technology is a form of
ever -increasing complexity, but it is hardly progress; in fact, it
has nothing to do with the emancipation of the mind hoped for by the
Enlightenment. It is as if humanity, far from controlling or
creating its destiny, is simply caught up in an expanding dissipative
structure…” (Paulson 266).

Put in such dire terms, it is as though film and other technology-based sources of knowledge are rocketing mankind uncontrollably into some immense void; as though we are creators of our own epistemological atom bomb, which—as a result of our incapacity for understanding it—will lead to our imminent self-destruction. Sven Birkerts seems to share some of Paulson’s concerns, but pulls back on the reins a bit—perhaps with the realization that a good deal of the anxiety over this issue could simply be due to a nostalgic tie to the printed word: “Books—vessels of thought and creative impulse—[are] no more noble or sacred, any of them, than what they contain” (Birkerts 255). Birkerts concedes at the conclusion of his book that he may be superfluously worrying about the progressive death of the page (Birkerts 270).

Such are the varied opinions on the filmic usurpation of the printed word’s role in society. Most scholars prove somewhat skeptical about the issue, while a few embrace this progression wholeheartedly; all, however, seem to agree that it is happening, regardless of how attentive the world is to the collective warning cries. While I will not make even a feeble ten-page attempt to tackle that greater issue—whether or not books will survive, and what repercussions would attend their complete eclipse by film and computers—I am interested in discussing why I think books should survive the technological onslaught, why they ought to still have a meaningful place in our lives, by examining some of the features of Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things.

Books may be facing a not-so-distant demise, and defending their integrity makes one feel almost like baby boomers who defiantly cling to their IBM Selectric typewriters well into the age of the word processor. Yet, Roy’s novel clearly contains elements—such as powerful, though not all-encompassing character development; thematically significant word and phrasal usage and repetition; and the ability to address issues which are considered taboo in other genres. These uniquely literary elements, amalgamated, serve to illustrate my point: books, especially “the strongest kind” of books, have the potential to convey information in a still-unique way, despite the advantages which film, television, and the internet possess.

Part of what sets books apart from films is their capacity for creating believable characters: From Hamlet to Elizabeth Bennett to Holden Caulfield, a good author is able to create a set of intriguing and realistic people—those who could potentially exist in real life—and a poor author is certainly not able to do so. Unlike film, the printed word offers us a mode of freely representing an infinite number of characters without any limits or deterrents. “Now wait a minute,” one may argue, “there are a great number of films whose unique characters are portrayed flawlessly by gifted actors.”

Let us take as an example the highly acclaimed 1994 blockbuster smash, Forrest Gump, starring Tom Hanks. In the film, Hanks plays the difficult role of a mentally challenged man whose life follows through several pivotal decades of American history. Hanks’ performance is arguably very good. However, as the film ends and the credits roll, no viewer is left with the lasting impression that Tom Hanks is really Forrest Gump and that Forrest Gump is someone that actually exists somewhere. In fact, we have seen Tom Hanks in many other films before and since Forrest Gump: Big, Sleepless in Seattle, You’ve Got Mail, Castaway, etc. In all of these films, Hanks does a fine job of portraying his characters as believable, realistic people (he even acquires Eastern European mannerisms and speaks Bulgarian in The Terminal), but we are never left seriously convinced that Tom Hanks is literally Joe Fox in You’ve Got Mail. Instead, we find ourselves saying, “Boy, Hanks sure does a good job in that film.”

Books, on the other hand, require no intercessory medium, such as an actor, in order to give us a character. Words might be considered the vehicle in place of a human actor, but words differ in two important ways: 1.They can be manipulated exactly to the taste of the author, creating a very specific character who may or may not be reproducible in the real world. 2. On the opposite end of the spectrum (and which may initially sound contradictory), words do not give us a perfect likeness, but only at best a rough depiction of a character.

To get back to our literary example, The God of Small Things gives us two highly developed characters—the seven-year-old twins, Estha and Rahel. Perhaps an ambitious director, interested in making a filmic version of this novel, could find what he considered to be two similar-looking, young Indian children who could play the parts of Estha and Rahel. Upon finding such children, however, this director would have to somehow get the children to act their parts as convincingly as the experienced Tom Hanks does playing Forrest Gump; they would have to somehow take on the challenge of portraying seven-year-olds who are forced to grow up prematurely. Even if this is possible, every film has its casting problems, and more often than not, directors are simply required to alter the intended character to fit the actor, and not vice versa. In Roy’s novel, however, Estha and Rahel can be (and essentially are) whatever Roy wants them to be or not be, regardless of whether or not such a human being actually exists somewhere.

But even with Roy’s remarkable descriptions of Estha’s hair “poof” and Rahel’s “Love-in-Tokyo”, even after Roy takes such pains to give us an intense psychological gaze into the minds of the twins, it is the reader who is ultimately required to fill in the numberless blanks in order to create a seamless representation of Estha and Rahel. In this way it is the inexactitude—or, perhaps, the incompleteness—of writing which allows us to make the twins (and essentially all other well-developed literary characters) believable for ourselves.

This is, then, essentially the classic argument by those who advocate literature over film: books require some level of active participation on the part of the reader. Sven Birkerts boldly posits that without the “intellectual want” and the “ledges and baffles and barriers” which novels of themselves provide, essentially the television/film-viewers’ entire epistemological system is altered negatively over time (Birkerts). In other words, the very deficiency of a total or all-inclusive description (a kind of complete description which is more closely approximated through film than through books) allows the participant to “fill in” missing information, in the same way in which the human eye can recreate peripheral surroundings without observing them directly. I won’t venture too deeply on that vein; but it is important to recognize that Roy’s God of Small Things requires much more thought and participation in order to create for ourselves the more believable literary Estha and Rahel than would a filmic interpretation of it, which would offer us a very rigid set of characters—characters who are completely dependent on the acting skills of seven-year-olds for their accurate portrayal.

But it goes deeper than that. While Forrest Gump is a memorable character, he is now intrinsically linked with Tom Hanks, who is also unavoidably connected to several dozen other characters. We are almost unable to recall Gump without bringing to mind widower Sam Baldwin (Sleepless in Seattle) or Federal Express bigwig Chuck Noland (Castaway). Certainly few Americans can see the young actor Haley Joel Osmont on the screen without his Sixth Sense quote-turned-pop-idiom, “I see dead people,” echoing somewhere in their subconscious. Often, filmmakers will use this type of character identification to their advantage when casting roles, such as Harrison Ford—who is eternally remembered as the 1980s action hero, Indiana Jones—shocking the film-viewing world as a murderous adulterer in What Lies Beneath. Roy’s characters, Estha and Rahel, on the other hand, remain as real and unique to readers as George Washington, or Babe Ruth, or Martin Luther King, Jr., or any other personage of history one has never met. Readers are left with the sense that somewhere in India today exist two very real twins—by now in their forties—whose lives are chronicled in an account by Arundhati Roy.

Another thing The God of Small Things teaches us is that there are ways in which words can be manipulated in order to give the reader a deeper glimpse into the psyche of each character. Significant thought patterns are then repeated throughout the book. One example is how Estha seems to view himself as a “Little Man” in many situations. This is Roy’s way of showing how Estha is unnaturally forced to come of age before actually coming of age. Invariably, whenever Estha has such realizations that in many ways he is maturing, his mind connects the phrase “Little Man” with the Popeye The Sailor Man theme, that begins, “I’m Popeye the sailor man, I live in a caravan,” after which there is the rhythmic “dum dum” of drums or hands clapping or feet stomping, which completes the meter of the verse. Whenever Estha performs a task he considers to be “manly,” like holding the movie tickets for his mother, or fixing his hair ‘poof’ by himself, this thought works its way into his consciousness: “Little Man. He lived in a car-a-van. Dum dum.” In many poignant passages the narration returns to this thought of Estha’s, despite the dissonant, conflicting emotions which it evokes because of its out-of-place, overly-merry sense. In some cases, after this idea has been repeated sufficiently—such as one instance shortly after he is sexually abused—Estha will think of only the “dum dum” sound as he remembers the rhyme. The narration follows: “Estha Alone walked weavily to the bathroom. He vomited a clear, bitter, lemony, sparkling, fizzy liquid. The acrid aftertaste of a Little Man’s first encounter with Fear. Dum dum.”

The film director may attempt to reproduce this rhetorical motif in some way; he may have the musical score ever-so-faintly play the Popeye song (hopefully not, though), or perhaps have a voice speak Estha’s thoughts. However, there really is no subtle way to convey this idea through film—it is too word-based. In the above example, Estha’s thought—which interrupts even his most intense recollections of his abuser—is reduced to the simple “dum dum,” rather than the whole couplet. Would an audience pick up on a muffled background drum beat in a film adaptation? And if they did, would it produce an excess of comedy and ruin the moment? Arundhati Roy’s careful use of the “Popeye-Song” image has the effect of numbing the reader somewhat to the atrocity of the sexual abuse—in essence, it creates the kind of post-traumatic numbness that Estha was experiencing at the time. But in the fledgling film genre, where thoughts spoken aloud and overt musical sentimentality have already become clichéd devices, would any attempt at recreating this idea come off as (for lack of a more precise word) “cheesy?”

Let us return briefly to the scene in which Estha is sexually abused. Estha and his family are at the movie theater in 1969, watching The Sound of Music. Estha simply cannot restrain himself from singing aloud the words to the songs, which begins to annoy the other patrons at the theater, so he goes into the lobby to sing the remainder of the song—and gets molested. It is not unprecedented or impossible for filmmakers to recreate sexually charged scenes without being offensive or explicit. Nor is it unheard of for films to address morally sensitive issues. A good example of this is the relatively recent film, Brokeback Mountain, which features homosexual cowboys. To be sure, film is touching on themes that were socially forbidden just decades ago. Yet, it seems that the abruptness of this molestation scene would be very difficult for a filmmaker to reproduce tastefully (or legally, really). Roy’s book allows us, on many levels, to go along with Estha, as he sings joyfully in the lobby, and then endure with him the confusing sexual abuse, as well as the psychological consequences that follow. A filmic adaptation would allow us to sing with Estha, and it could in basic ways explore the consequences of Estha’s crude introduction into adulthood, but it would have trouble allowing us to experience the molestation itself without becoming pornographic, offensive, or, again, cheesy.

There are other taboo themes in the novel: incest, sexual relations between members of different societal castes, and even the caste system itself are all issues that are more fluidly dealt with on paper than on screen. That “picture-is-worth-a-thousand-words” power is sometimes counterproductive when it is focused in too sensitive a direction. We are, as a society, to some degree comfortable with graphic war scenes, consensual heterosexual love scenes, and other social issues. But when the subject is something that is deemed wrong, no matter what moral system one subscribes to, especially regarding sexuality and childhood innocence, there is simply too much sensitivity there for any other medium than the printed word. And even in print form, much care is chosen to introduce tender issues as appropriately as possible. The God of Small Things created quite a stir in India, facing obscenity charges for the eroticism at the book’s end (Jana). Indeed, Roy took quite a bit of heat for what she described with words only. Films would be both empowered by their ability to deliver lasting images which viewers would not soon forget and crippled by their lack of control over the power of those images. The advantage books have in this case would be their greater control over the subtlety of their eroticism (or violence or racism, etc.).

Clearly, books still have something to offer. There are ways in which characters can be developed—especially internally—which, despite the many advantages of film, is almost impossible to do successfully in any other medium than literature. There is a certain subtlety that lends itself much better to the metaphorical prose of literature than it does in filmic creations. There is some subject matter than can only be addressed through the written word. Some messages, even with all of the amperage of modern technology, can be spoken more distinctly, even more fluently—if not more forcefully—in print than films are currently capable of.

That said, I do not argue with that majority of scholars who, in my opinion, correctly state that film and television have the potential to impact the audience on a much more complete level: certainly the combination of aural, visual, and thematic presentations attack the senses in ways that are far superior to the book. Films will, as a consequence, present themselves in a much more memorable manner. Films have a stronger capacity for attracting (and entertaining) the masses. But books, I contend, are still able, in some ways, to go places films cannot go, at least for the time being; there may come a day when films will find a way to breach the intellectual/rhetorical gap between themselves and film, perhaps through a partial visual and aural retrograde of sorts, but such a day has not yet come. Those who oppose film and television’s ruthless supplanting of literature may have more than just a nostalgic basis for their concerns—books continue to have something completely fulfilling and worthwhile to offer. This is what makes the “strongest kind” of books still worth reading.

The question that remains for the future—will anyone care to read to read them?



Works Cited
Amirthanayagam, Guy. "Bitten By Destiny." The Washington Post 31 May 1998: X.05.

Birkerts, Sven. Readings. Saint Paul: Gray Wolf Press, 1999.

Jana, Reena. "Winds, Rivers, & Rain." 30 September 1997. The Salon. 25 March 2007 <http://www.salon.com/sept97/00roy.html>.

Kakutani, Michiko. "Melodrama as Structure for Subtlety." The New York Times 3 June 1997.

Paulson, William. "The Literary Canon in the Age of Its Technological Obsolescence."

Rotten Tomatoes. "Wild Hogs." March 2007. Rotten Tomatoes. 27 March 2007 <http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/wild_hogs/>.

Shapiro, Laura. "Books." 26 May 1997. http://www.msnbc.com/. 29 March 2007 <http://www.msnbc.com/M/nw/a/b/bk_r.asp>.

Stephens, Mitchell. the rise of the image the fall of the word. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998.

Tabbi, Joseph and Wutz, Michael. Reading Matters. London: Cornell University , 1997. 242-243.

Lazy Day

Today is a lucky day for me, all but one of my classes were cancelled and luckily all the classes that were cancelled were my morning classes! So, I have to stroll up to campus around 3 to take a test (which will be easy), and go to my last class. Lucky Duck, I know!

I know I should be studying for aforementioned test but I feel like being lazy. I'd like to talk about my new job! It was crazy, but I think I'm going to love it. The kids are so sweet, and it doesn't bother me much that they're throwing things at me, spitting on me, scratching me, etc. because I know I'm helping them. I'm learning a lot of parenting skills that I can use when I have chilren of my own, which I'm grateful for. If any of you want a fun, rewarding job, let me know! We are desperate for staff!!

I'm still pumped for Bulgaria, too! We are just awaiting some form of letter of recommendation from ANYONE so we can apply for the internship. We know we'll be accepted, it would just be nice to have an official "yes" from someone so we can get goin' on saving up and getting passports!

Friends, Fun, Excitement, & Crazy Men

I packed so much into this week it seems like it has lasted for a month's time. Sunday, I went to my good friend Caleb Hustedt's mission home-coming. It was so great to see him! I was so proud that one of my friends served a full two year mission and returned with honor. He got to meet Tony for the first time, and that was cool. He had a fan club of girls following behind him, so he'll be just fine adjusting to the dating world :).

On Wednesday (Halloween), I had a job interview at the House of Hope in Provo. It is a women and children's home for mothers who are drug addicts learning to form bonds and appropriate attachments with their children. I was hired on as a Child Development specialist working with the children to help them develop social skills that will cause them to develop normally...mmm, sounds much better than shoe associate at Sears, doesn't it? Yeah, definately. I also worked Halloween night, which I thought would be a blast because they had trick-or-treating at the mall, but it was so lame. No one came to shop, and they only gave out candy upstairs so Cecilia and I were bored out of our minds.

Because of this new job I have, I had to drive to Salt Lake City to get some tests done. So, Friday morning, I drove up there, leaving early so I would make sure I made it on time. Of course, I got there way too early and had nothing to do so I walked to the McDonalds across the street to get a drink and use the bathroom. The bathroom situation should have been a red flag to me that I was in a not-so-safe kind of place. I had to have someone escort me to the bathroom because you couldn't get in without a token. I had never seen anything like that before, especially not at a McDonald's! So, I did my thing, got my drink, and started walking back to my car to wait for my appointment. As I approached the crosswalk, I heard a man yell "Hey! Do you have change for a dollar?" I looked over at him and responded with a no, because I didn't. "Well, do you have a dollar?" he said. "Nope, I'm sorry" I replied and I began walking quite briskly in the opposite direction. The man began screaming at me saying things like "I know you have a dollar! Just give me the dollar! Everyone's got a dollar with them!" He was following me during all of this, so I began walking faster. He started walking faster. I began running, and he started chasing me. I was running as fast as I could with this man behind me screaming at me and chasing me. Luckily, I got my keys out in time and got in my car and locked it. The man ran up to my car and started pounding on my windows insisting that I did have a dollar with me. By this time, I was bawling my eyes out and shaking like crazy as he tried to open my door and pound my window in. Luckily, there was a cop that saw the whole chase and came to my rescue. He grabbed the crazy man and threw him in his car. The cop asked me if I was okay, and I said I was, and then he took me into the building where my appointment was and explained to the receptionist what had happened. She gave me some free hot chocolate and I sat there safely in a big office, grateful for policemen.

I still have my internship to look foward to. We've completed our applications and we're both just waiting for our letters of recommendations to come so we can submit them. We recently found out that for me to count this as an internship for school, we have to stay there for 14ish weeks. This thought scared me at first, but after talking to Tony about it, 14 weeks is perfect. I'll have the language down and by the time I get over the culture shock, I'll still have a while to enjoy my time there. Learning Bulgarian with Tony is really fun, and I feel like I'm pretty good at it. I'm so excited about this opportunity, even though my family doesn't really support the idea. Luckily everyone here LOVES it and wants to help us out, which is fantastic. Nobody can stop me from going. It won't make us poor, and if it does..well, we're poor now so it wouldn't make a difference. As far as our future family, we'll be just fine. We'll both get good jobs. Heck, I have a decent job now! Anyway, enough ranting. We're going to Bulgaria and that's that.