Saul Bellow talks about the inspiration for his work, American society, academia and has some advice for young aspiring writers.
David Hanly travels to the University of Chicago to speak to the Nobel Prize and Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Saul Bellow.
Saul Bellow explains how life around him and his experience of it inspires his writing.
I discovered that everything that I was seeing about me, everything that I knew and experienced was a grist to my mill.
He feels that American society is not very interested in artists saying that it may enjoy them as celebrities but has no other use for them. He sees American society as strictly technological and commercial with little room for appreciation of the arts. Even in the world of academia, he feels there is little respect for the novelist as an artist.
They don't like him if he’s unsuccessful because they look down on him. They don’t like him if he’s successful because he threatens them.
Saul Bellow believes that for a time, American artists associated themselves with political movements such as Marxism in the hope of having some influence and making a change. In a democratic society, it is very difficult to escape the "didactic impulse" which was prevalent in both America and England in the nineteenth century. In the twentieth century, this function was taken over by Playboy magazine and other similar publications as influential sources of advice and information in society.
American society in itself is a sort of instructional system.
He points to a number of problems with the academic world which he believes has "covered literature with pedantry". He himself dropped out of literature courses when he discovered that the people teaching it did not seem to have anything to do with it. He thought it would be better to discover literature himself without the influence of the world of academia. He does acknowledge that there are good and bad academics.
There are good academics, those who like my books and bad academics, those who don’t.
Despite his criticisms of academia, Saul Bellow is currently teaching at the University of Chicago. He feels he represents modern literature something which was lacking at universities in the past. While he is not in favour of getting rid of all English departments, he is in favour of aspiring writers acquiring their skills on their own and would be in favour of removing all "deconstructionists".
His advice to young writers is to find their own way. Encouragement is more important than teaching for a writer.
'Hanly’s People’ broadcast on 19 May 1991. The presenter is David Hanly.
