Black and White Question

In reply to Grumpyteacher101's question

"With this in mind do you, as the Koob's, believe their is a definite black and white (evil or good) in modern literature or does modern literature deal more with the what if's.. (the grey's)?"

I think it is becoming more prevalent for literature at this period in time to deal with the what if's? Whether this is due to it being more acceptable now than it was in earlier years, I can't say. In times gone by a lot of people saw the world in black and white, due to what beliefs and morals people had been taught. It could also be because we have a better understanding of how the human psyche works and we think more about character motivations and backgrounds than they did in the past.

You can't limit the what if's to this time though, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is a good example of a what if text from earlier times. The creation of Victor Frankenstein is complex, he is seen as a horrible person, a monster and after being labeled this for all his life that is what he becomes. He is abandoned by his creator when he wakes up, he has no one to teach him about morals and what is right or wrong, he learns from how other people treat him. We ultimately feel sorry for the creation, even after all of the wrong things that he did.

So I think there has been an increase in what if literature, but I think this is because times have changed and people are more easy going about subjects that would have caused outrage. We have a right to our opinion something that people didn't have in the past, they couldn't write things that would cause controversy, depending on the subject, they could have been killed for expressing their opinion.

You may think that this hasn't happened for a long time, but you would be wrong. 20 years ago Salman Rushdie wrote a novel called The Satanic Verses, this novel was seen as blasphemous as it spoke against the muslim god. Salman Rushdie received many death threats afterwards and was given a death sentence.

So if you place a situation like this in a time where eight year olds could be killed for the smallest of things, do you think people are going to risk their lives to make money?

Blue Haired Girl