Why the Novel is Dead in 2024

Why is the novel dead in the modern world? Who killed it? Can we revive reading? Today, we will hear from Phillip Roth on the death of the novel, and I will offer some holistic solutions on how we can bring it back!
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[@jurgenmeyer7602]

When I read Infinite Jest for the first time it took me an average of 4 minutes per page for at least the first 200 pages. That's more than 13 hours spent on the first fifth of a novel. To read the entire novel takes more than an entire workweek. For someone who also has a real 40h workweek in addition to chores etc., finishing the book in under 2 weeks would be near impossible.

[@WriteConscious]

Exactly. I grinded hard on the book and it took me a month earlier this year.

[@michaelchurch1324]

I don't agree with that two-week deadline. In fact, I think it's bullshit. It depends on the genre, the length, and one's intention in reading the novel. I think it's more accurate to say that (a) if you put a novel away for two weeks, you do start to lose context and the quality of your reading suffers, and (b) there's inverted causation here, because if you *can* stay away from a novel for 14 days, you probably weren't that into it in the first place. If it takes you 3 weeks to read Lord of the Rings (one novel split into three) this doesn't mean you got nothing out of it.

[@alexbenz370]

It took me a month and a half to get to page 600. I read 100 pages these last two days. It depends a lot on the concentration you develop.

[@doublestarships646]

I think the market might be in smaller books. Seeing how Japanese light novels are selling like hotcakes, I imagine people probably are more into pocket sized experiences than long epics that don't have your limiited access to time in mind.

[@nightmareofsovereigntynos8440]

I once had the idea of releasing 3 long novels for a trilogy, but changed my mind. I've added manga-style illustrations, and broke the 3 bricks into 9 digestible books. - Why? I asked people, "Which would you prefer to read, three novels that are 600 words each, or nine novels that are 200 words each?" All the responses were in favor of 9 short novels. - Makes sense. People have no problem binge watching six 30-minute episodes, but asking them to watch one 3-hour film is near impossible. People will happily listen to five 2-minute songs, but expecting them to sit still for one 10 minute song is too much to ask.

[@toddjacksonpoetry]

Just a reminder to everybody, we're on KZbin - right now!, Why not do something on KZbin? It's more natural for me as a poet, but if you're a novelist, you could make a few minutes-long video of any random good passage you've got. Then don't get discouraged when the algorithm doesn't support you. You can promote your videos at the price of a moderate weed habit.

[@toddjacksonpoetry]

Also, Roth is awesome. The Human Stain, alone...

[@R.L.Kramer]

Thanks for your devotion

[@WriteConscious]

Thanks for the support brotha!

[@TheDave-bn2tx]

It's simple math: Millions of books vs thousands of readers.

[@chelseyummali]

I applied for the school. Cant wait! I'm currently writing an outline for a new story. I'm hoping this is the one I finally finish. Yes I'm sad to admit I am a repeat offender of never finishing my novels. I will say, I've never outlined my stories as I am now. Feeling good about this one. Id love the help from your free writing school.

[@WriteConscious]

Let's go! You're releasing this one!

[@chelseyummali]

@@WriteConscious thanks 😊 🤞

[@ExxylcrothEagle]

I didn't read "Against The Day" in 2 weeks. I took almost 3 weeks off after the snots in the harmonica scene because I was going through a break-up and I needed something else. I read "mountains in the desert"in 2 days though cuz that's what I needed.... I needed a non-fiction adventure. But I came right back to "Against the Day" with even more focus

[@MoeShinola1]

I read once that there's a difference between someone who wants to read a book and someone who just wants a book to read.

[@benrex7775]

_"If you read a novel in more than two weeks you don't read the novel really."_ lol. Try reading a wuxia novel in two weeks. I'm in the slow process of reading 40 millenniums of cultivation. If my guess is correct, it would be an audiobook of around 600h. Two weeks have 336h if you don't sleep at all. Some books require a bit of memorization skill to read them. And if you have that then even breaks in between allows for reading it properly. By the way I recommend it. The author is very intelligent, the plots are never predictable, he plays with expectations that he builds up, he goes into philosophy of politics and the characters are smart and work based on their actual ideology and environment. MarcoMeatball makes the very same argument you make, but from the opera space. He invites a few people from the world of opera and let's them react to computer game music. It is quite fascinating how the traditional media influence modern media and how people who value similar things gatekeep each other because they give off a different vibe.

[@jeffrey3498]

I don't care if the novel is dead. It's not dead for me.

[@FrancisGo.]

Jordan Peterson might not like the philosophy of recent French theorists, but neither did Harold Bloom, and he was best friends with Jaques Derrida. 😅

[@TheDave-bn2tx]

Also, I've noticed that there are more people giving writing advice than actually writing books. Seems Roth was right.

[@WriteConscious]

Not true lol. 4 million books are published each year. We need more people giving advice to all the people releasing crap.

[@kiethveseyofficial]

@@WriteConscious I don’t think that’s with the OP means. I think like he means is like mid 2010s or so there was a lot of Book tubers giving Good/Bad tropes advice and what tropes that are “problematic” and what to avoid throughout all their videos. By the time they actually write a novel and release it to their fan base, (I’m not gonna name any KZbinr names of course) and the books that they come out with turn out to be mostly ghostwritten, or turn out to be fan fic garbage (Cough…Handbook For White Femini…I mean Mortals) going against what they preach in my opinion. I believe that most Booktubers (or Booktokers now)have to practice what they preach before they write any of their own material being honest on what they put out for their audiences in my honest opinion.

[@Esirre]

12:09 the short but unpalatable answer - you can't. I tried through most of my 20's to pique people's interest in philosophy and it's impact on culture. I had to get very old and worn down before i just learned to accept the fact that most people are anti-intellectual. If they like anything from literature or western and eastern philosophy it is how it manifests into popular entertainment.

[@roelgarcia8386]

Preach! I like what you’re saying. We will have to create the market - by inspiring it. Keep it up! from Houston, TX.

[@michaelchurch1324]

The literary novel, I think, is an artifact that disappears when directly looked upon. It is something like the saying that scenes are made by people who wish they were elsewhere. Most great literature was written in a time when its genre and format (whatever they were) lacked prestige--Shakespeare's plays were considered sensationalist, popular dreck; no one admitted to reading Dickens. The trad publishing world has gone so stale that it's not even relevant anymore, except as a museum that generates new variations of old work; the problem with self-publishing, on the other hand, is the massive expense of author time that gets sucked into marketing black holes. It's a statistical guarantee that at least 7 of the 10 best novels in the 2030s will come from self-publishers, but we still don't have the systems to pick those books out of a massive slush pile, and probably the biggest problem "self-publishing" (put in quotes because it isn't one thing, it's all the things outside of trad) has is that the incentives favor quantity. Anyway, great video essay and I really enjoy your analysis of McCarthy's work.

[@Yatukih_001]

3 weeks ago, I resurrected it.

[@cisa-hp8uh]

7:38 that yeah felt so relatable also maybe you've considered it but anyways watching a whole video about your experience as a teacher would be very cool. I mean, hearing your standpoint on the profession and its relation with your literary interests. btw your work is great. greetings from Chile!!

[@ernestschultz5065]

Is it just me or does this guy bring up Infinite Jest in every video?

[@Pasuhdina]

This video is amazing!!! Literally how I think about it def glad I subbed. These are talks are needed:

[@batman5224]

I think writers in the past didn’t personally promote their work as much because they had publishers and media outlets who would do it for them. As a self-published author, I don’t have that luxury. I have to promote my work on KZbin and TikTok because it won’t be read otherwise. I especially like reading from my work in videos. Many people have been exposed to poetic writing for the first time by watching my content. I think the average person would care more about literature if the education system prioritized it, but it doesn’t. People value what they are exposed to.

[@WriteConscious]

Good work and good luck brotha! You've already published 1k videos. That's dedication and I thank you for caring about books/writing!

[@Iron-Bridge]

Good points. The education system or lack thereof does play a huge part. Attention spans, imagination and ability for reflection seems to have plummeted in recent decades.

[@SeveringJuan]

I think a lot has to do that in "academic" circles, being excited about art is seeing as childish, you CAN write long essays and analysis but it seems you're discourage to "be a fan". I like that you ARE a fan of literature in your videos but I sense it because it is not common, so one can imagine why few people want to read 2666 (to give an example) when they hear from "academic" people about the "literary value" and all the awards it won instead of the sincere joy it can bring to their lives.

[@racine1967]

Philip Roth was a great writer and there is an excellent bio that came out 2021 by Blake Bailey.

[@TheItFactorMMA]

I strongly disagree with the assertion that novels must be read within 2 weeks, although it sounds like you have your own issues with that argument. I get the point about withering attention spans, I feel like it’s entirely subjective. Samuel Johnson is considered a titan of 18th century literature, and was known to have highly unusual reading habits. For example he would pick something up and start reading from the middle of the novel instead of the beginning 😂 iirc he was also known to stop reading books half way through, then years later would start reading them again right where he left off and finish them. Not comparing the average reader to Samuel Johnson, but I think highly intellectual people possibly aren’t limited that way.

[@marlinthecreative118]

There are almost eight billiion people on the Earth. If only 10% of those people read a novel in a month that is a great number of people. Also there are other ways that people use their time (watching sports) on activities that I don’t find interesting at all. I read novel and love it. When I’m not reading a lot I can read a novel in a couple of weeks. When I am reading I can read between two and three novels.

[@abcdeshole]

We’re not supposed to take two weeks to read a novel? I’ve screwed up reading a lot of novels then.

[@RiverheadSkate]

Academia be handwringing and scratching their heads during the next literary movement 😂

[@ekurisona663]

'the housewife kantemplates'

[@mr.spideruchoa3558]

This video was necessary, congratulations for the knowledge. I read some books by Jonh Fante, starting with Philip Roth, any tips for young people to improve their reading?

[@WriteConscious]

Just reading more. I make my classes read 10 minutes a day for 170 days a year. That means they read 4-6 books a year in that time, and another four as class. If other teachers got on board from 6-12th grade we kids could read 70 books. That is more than enough to make them super strong readers. All in school.

[@hugoblack4133]

Roth's comments say more about Roth and his attention span than the state of the novel or of readership. Obviously Roth believes he does not write novels worth spending two weeks with. Fair enough. He's probably right.

[@ekurisona663]

great topic

[@captainnolan5062]

I thought you said (in your reply to me in the Cormac McCarthy on 'Why Modern Literature Sucks' video) that this was a channel about writing novels, not reading them. I notice that you sure talked a lot about reading in this video.

[@TheDave-bn2tx]

Charles portis > Cormac McCarthy

[@samantaluna3870]

You know what? Good. I actually prefer novellas and anthologies way better. Sometimes they are better stories.

[@WriteConscious]

lol

[@davidstewart7678]

You lost me when you named wendigoon. He does a really good job, imo. I’ve enjoyed a lot of your content but the pretentiousness while being dismissive of another (named) KZbinrs content is disappointing.

[@WriteConscious]

Hey, I just released a video on this lmao.

[@emilymitchell6823]

I get why you'd feel that, I personally didn't take it as dismissive at all - i loved that Wendigoon video, and it seems like what's being said here is that those creators are important, and culturally signposting people to the deeper layers of engagement with these books is just as important.

[@mikescott4195]

Comments like this make me very intrigued in writing a story about the parasocial nature of social media and the white knights that make it up

[@davidstewart7678]

@@greatcoldemptiness nope lmao. I do try and pay attention to how people speak of others and make note of derogatory comments, I’ll consider if they hold any water

[@davidstewart7678]

@@emilymitchell6823 that’s how I see it too! I definitely would’ve agreed with the video if I thought that was what he was articulating, it’s not what I took from it though. I was hoping it was an offhanded comment but he clarifies his opinion more, and his opinion of wendigoons audience, in his “Cormacs anti-Christian novel explained” video essay

[@hugoblack4133]

The phrase "open mind" is a misnomer (12:55). Intelligent people don't have open minds any more than they have open doors. Doors close for good reasons: We don't want just anybody or anything stepping into our homes and having their run of the place. It doesn't take an observant reader long to realize that Derrida, Hegel, Vonnegut and most post-mod authors fundamentally disagree with the classical or modern worldview of Homer, Melville, Dostoyevsky or Eliot, as well as 50K years of human history. There are few people who “cross over” because the distance between the two sides have reached chasmic proportions - largely as a result of post-modern philosophy. If, as a mature reader with adequate shelf space, one has encountered this contradiction and logically concluded that objective Truth does in fact exist, then the ideas of postmodern authors don't have much to offer. If you drive to Chicago five different ways and discover one way is an hour faster than the others, you don't continue driving the other four to see if you somehow (miraculously?) arrive sooner. And if you do, you're simply wasting your time. Life is short. Progress requires clarity. Ultimately and fundamentally, Foucault and Bacon will never agree; Rand and Nagarjuna will never agree; Muhammed and Jesus will never agree. Just as a wise investor refrains from throwing good money after bad, those who identify a fundamental logic flaw in a philosophical argument gain nothing by continuing to follow that argument’s flawed logic. Those who have figured out this relatively elementary and expedient fact are not hillbillies, bigots, closed-minded, or whatever bad accent that (13:30) was intended to be. (And your assumptions that the “hidden shadow” of conservatism and Christianity (13:05) is “anti-government” and that they secretly desire to “tear down" things are hilariously self-revelatory.) Some people read to be entertained or confused, and that is certainly their perogative. But those who read for enlightenment are not inferior for having attained some.

[@tbonestillz]

If the greatest minds in history will never agree then that alone should clue one in on the nature of “objective truth”

[@hugoblack4133]

@@tbonestillz It clues one in on the fact that our understanding of Objective Truth is, and MUST be, subjective, given the nature of human consciousness. However, that does not negate the obvious fact that Objective Truth EXISTS. Kierkegaard explained this very well centuries ago.

[@hugoblack4133]

@SeanHickey-lr3pk If you had to "Google" it, you're a student. Hilarious. Nice try, son.

[@mrnegative48]

if the book is good then the audience will find it, if it's mainstream trash then it needs marketing

[@WriteConscious]

What about Blood Meridian? It sold 1,700 copies in seven years and was marketed by a major house? What about his four other novels that sold the same? Were they not good? I could go on with countless examples.

[@mrnegative48]

@@WriteConscious these days social media will find it

[@sp123]

​@@mrnegative48 marketing is a huge part of sales, regardless of how good the product is. Coca-Cola is the biggest soda brand and they still spend tens of millions on advertising every year.

[@coleride]

Like pretty much every other writing expert you are pretending that politics isn't the elephant in the room. Good luck getting a literary novel published if it isn't overly left-wing, or at the very least in absolutely no way conservative, in other words honest.. There are almost no straight men left in publishing, hollywood readers will put your script straight in the trash if it doesn't toe the line. There are small houses willing to publish overly conservatives fiction, but is anything that political left or right high-quality? What is the solution to this problem?

[@mikelpelaez]

There are some cases of classic novels written by very radical people, surprisingly in the past (knut hamsun and Louis Ferdinand Celine are two of the most respected authors of their time, hamsun was a great influence on Herman Hesse, Franz kafka and Thomas Mann. Celine was a great influence on Kurt vonnegut, for example. And both were nazi simpatizers. For left wing examples we can go with Ernesto Sabato and Roberto Bolaño, both anarchist, Bolaño was a Trotskyist in his youth, and Ernesto Sabato was openly anti-capitalist and one of the most respected Argentinian writers). The thing is that what is now considered radical is basically being an idiot, not like those authors that were well studied in their belief systems (as much as you can agree or disagree with them) and had actual opinions about the word, they weren't parroting what people on their ideology told them. Nowadays it looks like making literature is more about doing "activism" than doing art,and a ridiculous way of doing it, if you ask me. I don't think there is an easy solution here because in my opinion there is a lot of that problem that is related with eco chambers and how radicalization works today, where books aren't an aesthetic experience or a way of obtaining knowledge, but a way of further confirming your beliefs and finding an identity. I think the best thing we can do is making smaller literary communities, by authors that at least need to be more skeptical of their ideologies, and hope they could become a more important movement in the future. I don't think great epic novels (like the 19'th century epics or the postmodern colossus) can become mainstream in contemporary culture. I think that a big reason is that reading has become relatively niche, almost everyone sees at least a movie every year, most people listen to music, but a ton of people haven't read a book voluntarily in years or even decades. That way, books in general are already niche, meanwhile music or film can have smaller niches where making more brave stuff is profitable enough. Sorry for writing such a big mess, I started writing like a madman and I couldn't stop. I'm gonna be honest, I'm quite left leaning(some could call me a radical, even despite there are typical elements of the left I disagree with), but I think it's still an important issue, and the thing with small authors I think is pretty necessary to at least see how can be fixed.

[@CasperLCat]

Conservative = honest ? In the Trump era ? You shouldn’t say stuff like that out loud. You’re just another ideological mouthpiece, same as the leftist thought police. - Centrist Independent

[@sp123]

Smart phones have ruined men's attention span required to read books. Women still read on a regular basis so the publishers pander to them.

[@CasperLCat]

@@sp123 Also video games, and of course video porn, as far as the declining male mind is concerned.

[@waltonsmith7210]

Wow. No one has a persecution complex like conservatives, the snowflake-iest of snowflakes. "Conservative" and "honest" don't belong in the same sentence.

[@josephnunes868]

Yes every contemporary novel ive read in the last 10 years, had so gay agenda .. basically publishers think only gay men read..

[@sp123]

I'm a straight male and I only read non-fiction so I may be part of the problem.

[@shenotski]

There isn’t money in most writing. I know people who have work published the majority of it doesn’t sell. Writing is for the privileged academic or well to do white women. IE people with the same politics. Look at every book agent and look for those that are actively looking for conservative voices vs the absurd number of them looking for instance LGBT, women, diversity ect. Your side managed to get rid of those they disliked and own the culture. You brought this on yourselves.

[@WriteConscious]

my side??? 😂 you're lost in politics brotha. There are people out there smart enough to transcend politics and create positivity in the world

[@wrathofatlantis2316]

​@@WriteConsciousAll mainstream US publishing houses combined are 87% staffed by women. AVERAGE. Most of the West is similar. You do realise this means dozens if not hundreds are 100% women staffed? Do you have any inkling how detached from reality is your view that any kind of positivity will level this playing field?