Two Quotes about Our Upside-Down Society

I reckoned I'd pass along a couple of quotes that struck me over the weekend. They both somehow get to the underlying craziness that seems to be growing in our society.

The first comes from Scarlett Johansson in the November issue of Glamour:

I can’t look at somebody who is 6 feet tall and 120 pounds and say, ‘I’m going to get that body.’ That’s just never going to happen. You have to work with what you’ve got.

This is like Shaquille O'Neal saying, "I'll never really be big enough to play in the NBA."

I'm sure I could significantly boost my Google hit count by posting a few photos of Scarlett at this point. But you all know how to use Google Image Search as well as I. Suffice it to say that if Scarlett Johansson is somehow being made to feel inadequate about her body, this whole "distorted body images in the media" thing has really gone much farther off the deep end than I ever realized.

Sheer craziness.

The other quote is an item that I really liked from a post on writing science fiction by Arsen Darnay on his Ghulf Genes blog:

Real literature broke away from its encrustations somewhere along the line and made a new home for itself, indeed glorying in its tawdry reputation and laughing at the dour faces looking down from the proud tower of the past, the faces that dismissed it and did not deign to call it literature.

I heartily agree with this sentiment. One oddity that has struck me over the years is that there always seemed to be a lot more literary creativity, innovation, fun, and sheer life in the sci-fi ghetto than in the more respectable literary neighborhoods.

For some reason sci-fi has struck me as a bit more bound and constrained the last few years. (That may just be my own science-fiction reading habits, which haven't been all that adventurous lately.) But these days it seems to me that graphic novels, comic books, and web comics are also unleashing a brilliant blaze of creativity and literary invention. Admittedly, those brilliant blazes can be obscured by a lot of dreck, as is always the case when you sort through current creation as it comes out in any field.

It all makes me wonder why it is that I have felt throughout my life as if I see the highest level of literary innovation and accomplishment in areas that literary academia almost completely shuns. What's going on out there in mainstream literary academia these days, anyway? Are they still picking through the bones of long-dead poets and fawning over Baby Boomer navel-gazing?

I must hasten to point out the notable exception that proves the rule. Not only does Michigan State University have the world's largest comic collection, but they've been genuinely expanding some of their comics-related course offerings in the past couple of years. Still, though, from the discussions I heard at their comics forum this year I feel as if this sort of thing is taking place on the fringes of academia, with respectable literary academics sniffing huffily at the whole thing.

Now, gentle reader, I strain to find a suitable end for this post. Indeed, I strain. But despite the strain we have arrived at the end of our bloggish journey. So here it comes. Prepare yourself. This is it:

And why aren't there more science-fiction graphic novels featuring Scarlett Johansson as a naughty "academic" anyway?