Among elusively indefinable terms vital to further understanding literature is the great white whale of literary merit. Its definition has been disputed, contemplated, and stretched to the vaguest of proportions until it no longer serves as a helpful tool in determining whether a work is, in fact, of literary merit. Its relative subjectivity comes into play when attempting to define such a term; what is meritorious to some may not be so to others. The variety of works considered exemplary does not help narrow the definition; very little can be found in common between every piece of literature that is indisputably deemed meritorious. It is not in spite of this variety, however, but because of it that the key to literary merit becomes clear:
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Barry Gilmore’s amalgam of student compiled parameters of literary merit includes it in the following requirement: “Demonstrates innovation in style, voice, structure, characterization, plot and/org description.” Mentioned by name here, innovation is also assumed in order for a work to “not merely conform to the expectations of a single genre” and “not fall into the traps of “pulp” fiction.” Seven other are listed, such as a need for “an artistic manner” or themes that “merit revisiting and study because they are complex and nuanced” (Gilmore 7), but without the originality called for in the innovation stipulation, these qualities do little to make the work substantially of …show more content…
After all— he is a murderer; Alëna and Lizaveta are dead at his hands (Dostoevsky 66-68). Yet he is the protagonist of the story, and not one the audience sees as overtly despicable. Unlike the “empty and anemic natures” of other nihilists Strakhov describes as having been created before, Raskolnikov's character does not allow him to sit comfortably in his sin against humanity while it becomes clear that the he is not evolving in his morality. Instead, Raskolnikov is “pale, abstracted, and gloomy. He looked like a man who has been wounded or suffered intense physical pain; his brows were knitted, his lips compressed, his eyes sunken (188).” The unrest he feels for his actions seeps into every facet of his life. His physical appearance shrieks of unfavorable disconnect from society; his mental stability certainly does the same. The burden he carries from his crime is obvious to the reader, as well as to Raskolnikov himself. Nihilism is evident only in his continuous intellectual battle to believe that he has done nothing wrong. Fruitlessly grasping at an ideal that he ethically and emotionally cannot bring himself to hold, Raskolnikov becomes frustrated and disappointed in himself. “[B]ecause I am just as much a louse as everybody else! [...] If I were not a louse, would I have come to you? (354).” Every time he allows himself to have an
Barry Gilmore’s amalgam of student compiled parameters of literary merit includes it in the following requirement: “Demonstrates innovation in style, voice, structure, characterization, plot and/org description.” Mentioned by name here, innovation is also assumed in order for a work to “not merely conform to the expectations of a single genre” and “not fall into the traps of “pulp” fiction.” Seven other are listed, such as a need for “an artistic manner” or themes that “merit revisiting and study because they are complex and nuanced” (Gilmore 7), but without the originality called for in the innovation stipulation, these qualities do little to make the work substantially of …show more content…
After all— he is a murderer; Alëna and Lizaveta are dead at his hands (Dostoevsky 66-68). Yet he is the protagonist of the story, and not one the audience sees as overtly despicable. Unlike the “empty and anemic natures” of other nihilists Strakhov describes as having been created before, Raskolnikov's character does not allow him to sit comfortably in his sin against humanity while it becomes clear that the he is not evolving in his morality. Instead, Raskolnikov is “pale, abstracted, and gloomy. He looked like a man who has been wounded or suffered intense physical pain; his brows were knitted, his lips compressed, his eyes sunken (188).” The unrest he feels for his actions seeps into every facet of his life. His physical appearance shrieks of unfavorable disconnect from society; his mental stability certainly does the same. The burden he carries from his crime is obvious to the reader, as well as to Raskolnikov himself. Nihilism is evident only in his continuous intellectual battle to believe that he has done nothing wrong. Fruitlessly grasping at an ideal that he ethically and emotionally cannot bring himself to hold, Raskolnikov becomes frustrated and disappointed in himself. “[B]ecause I am just as much a louse as everybody else! [...] If I were not a louse, would I have come to you? (354).” Every time he allows himself to have an