Conversation

Have been thinking about this all morning. I partly agree, but I also wonder whether repulsion is sometimes correct: we often recognize bad writing because it's ugly. Is it also consistently true? Did original audiences find Ovid or Keats, say, ugly? Is beauty always "minor"?
Quote Tweet
From Adam Kirsch's 2008 Slate review of Roberto Bolano's 2666:
Image
19
11
62
I have been thinking about it for quite a while. I agree with Proust's quote, but I think the use of the words "ugly" and "beautiful" isn't exactly right, but I can't come up with better one word descriptors!
3
11
Show replies
Show replies
From Adam Kirsch: “It's been many years since that review and I don't remember exactly where in Proust I found the idea, but it was probably when he talks about reading Bergotte, I think in Vol. 2 or 3. It wasn't a direct quote, more a paraphrase of the idea. All the best...”
1
2
"...as all novelty depends upon the elimination, first, of the stereotyped attitude to which we have grown accustomed, and which has seemed to us to be reality itself, every new conversation, as well as all original painting and music, must always appear laboured and tedious."