Many of the posts so far have explored the “So?” question of House of Leaves.\u00a0 The “what’s the point?” question.\u00a0 But I think that a lot of this question is coming from the way that HoL breaks genre conventions.\u00a0 Why don’t we ask “what’s the point?” of any literature we read?\u00a0 Because we’re accustomed to genre conventions, we automatically accept normal genres of literature as fulfilling the functions of education and\/or entertainment.\u00a0 I think what HoL is doing is forcing us to reexamine our own genre assumptions and conventions.\u00a0 This process of reexamination forces us to ask the questions: “What is the purpose of literature?” and “How do we determine and construct that purpose?”<\/p>\n
By foregrounding the process of the construction of the text, HoL does not allow us to fall back into our normal mode of reading literature along genre conventions.\u00a0 Some of the conventions I mean are: a book has a clear and authoritative narrative voice; there is one overarching story arc; characterization is consistent; there is a demarcated line between fiction and nonfiction; there is one font used throughout; there are chapters; there are page numbers; footnotes are denoted with numbers; text is arranged in a rectangular block and read all in the same direction and orientation; there are paragraphs, and they are indented and spaced; except for dialogue, spelling and punctuation are standard; illustrations are pertinent to the story; the text aims to enlighten or entertain the reader.\u00a0 I’m just spelling out a random few, mostly determined by what conventions HoL has broken.\u00a0 Perhaps it is this last one that is so disturbing.\u00a0 HoL doesn’t seem to care much about the reader. Indeed, the anti-dedication warns us away.\u00a0 Yet for a text that seems to ignore the reader’s desires and frustrate her expectations, it encourages great participation on the part of the reader.\u00a0 The fact that the forum and the album were released along with the book contributes to the view of HoL as encouraging active reading.\u00a0 But to what end?\u00a0 Why bother to shake us up?<\/p>\n
By highlighting different aspects of “what makes a book a book”, HoL exposes the fact that any book is merely a house of leaves – the sum of its component parts.\u00a0 The concept of “book” itself is a kind of constructed cultural narrative.\u00a0 Perhaps by becoming aware of the constructed nature of “book” and not taking its existence as a naturally coherent whole, readers will be able to participate more actively in the construction of meaning around them.\u00a0 By viewing critically and strategically the various sites of cultural construction, readers can then learn to influence the reiteration of those constructs toward an iteration more favorable to themselves.<\/p>\n
I would have to read more of Danielewski’s interviews on his own motivations (if indeed he reveals them), but this type of awakening agents of political change could be one answer to the “So?” question.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Many of the posts so far have explored the “So?” question of House of Leaves.\u00a0 The “what’s the point?” question.\u00a0 But I think that a lot of this question is coming from the way that HoL breaks genre conventions.\u00a0 Why don’t we ask “what’s the point?” of any literature we read?\u00a0 Because we’re accustomed to … Continue reading Expectations and Disintegrations<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[39,32,34],"class_list":["post-363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-week-6-mzd","tag-danielewski","tag-house-of-leaves","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=363"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":364,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363\/revisions\/364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samplereality.com\/gmu\/spring2009\/660\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}