Spotted in the wild: The obligatory paragraph

A while ago I blogged about the following comment by Cathy Young:

This is starting to remind me of how every Soviet essay on art or literature had the obligatory graph on Marxism-Leninism & the class struggle

She was commenting on an otherwise fine article that had an aside on how "problematic" the concept of genius is. It reminded her of the requirements placed on writers in the Soviet era.

Well, I found another example. A recent book review in the NYT starts off describing how the book's action grabbed the author, but then segues to this:

But another, different, fear had also crept in as I was reading: I was sure I was the wrong person to review this book. I could never speak to the accuracy of the book’s representation of Mexican culture or the plights of migrants; I have never been Mexican or a migrant. In contemporary literary circles, there is a serious and legitimate sensitivity to people writing about heritages that are not their own because, at its worst, this practice perpetuates the evils of colonization, stealing the stories of oppressed people for the profit of the dominant. I was further sunk into anxiety when I discovered that, although Cummins does have a personal stake in stories of migration, she herself is neither Mexican nor a migrant.

That throat clearing out of the way, the reviewer resumes her examination of the book. It's an interesting review, and I might consider reading the book. But I wish she hadn't included that paragraph. She has every qualification needed to review a literary work: She is a human who was moved by a story.

We are a storytelling species. There's a reason why Jesus deals in parables. There's a reason why children beg their parents and other relatives to re-read the same favorite story fifty million times.  My most cherished possession from childhood is the book that my grandmother used to read to me when I was sitting on her lap. Stories move us. If a story has moved that reviewer, then she is more than qualified to comment on it.

Of course, people in this era talk about "staying in our lanes" and not commenting outside of our experiences. There's a valid point there, particularly in matters of fact, of non-fiction, but stories are about expanding our horizons. Every book ever written is a book about somebody's experiences other than my own. And even if I write a book, unless I write an autobiography free of diversions into the experiences of people whom I've encountered, it will still be a book about somebody's experiences other than my own. And literary works are about experiences that technically didn't even happen. They reflect the deeper truths of story-telling, not the surfaces truths of factual knowledge.

And even if we stop short of the narrowest construal of what stories we can and can't comment on, we can still do great mischief with this notion. What is a homework essay in literature class if not an examination of somebody else's story? Should a white student decline to write an essay on a Ralph Ellison story because that student can't comment on the black experience? Should I refuse to comment on Hamlet because I'm not bipolar? Should I have demurred from commenting on The Farewell because I'm not Chinese, even though the story of a dying grandmother resonated with my own life?

It is sad to live in an era in which the most prestigious outlets feel the need to crowd their literary commentary with these obnoxious disclaimers about identity.