When we look at the epic poems of old, such as Milton's Paradise Lost or Homer's The Odyssey, there are mixed feelings, to be sure, regarding the style, the form, the content, and the pieces of literature as a whole. Nevertheless, they are considered by the general literary world as classics, books to be stowed on the shelf with pride, and dusted off regularly for guests too ooh and ah at, even if never actually opened and read. The curious business of a piece of literature transitioning from an ordinary work into a classic is one I have long pondered and been fascinated by. What makes a book a classic? Who says that that particular novel or essay or collection of poems is worth my time. What makes a book renowned, timeless?
The question seems terribly relevant now, as I close the final pages of Derek Walcott's "masterpiece" Omeros. While I was certainly able to appreciate the beauty of the language used in the book, while the ebb and flow of the poetry was not lost on me; that's all that it seemed to be, at times. An ebb and flow. Pretty words, pouring from the mouth like tinkling notes to a jumbled incomplete symphony. Where was the meaning? Where the coherence? There was something wrong with Omeros and it certainly wasn't Walcott's inability to write. Perhaps, more aptly, the problem lay within his talent; Walcott attempted to do much in his book. He attempted to tell a story, a disjointed story, with many different characters, physical settings and times. The narrator was always ambiguous. He tried to pay tribute to the epic poems of Homer, with characters inserted such as Hector, Achille [losing the "s"] and Helen. Yet there is also an island called Helen. And we're actually back in the America, pre-revolution, circa the early 1600's. Oh wait we're on an island again. Hector is a taxi-driver who impregnates Helen and dies in a car crash. There's a medicine woman. There are mysterious wounds. The author inserts himself as a character. He often refers to his mother's death, comparing it to the death of characters in the book, working it out in the words of his "fictitious poem". All writers know that writing is the best form of therapy, but Walcott's issues over the loss of his mother weren't meant to be resolved in his epic poem/homage to Homer, Omeros. To say the least, the man is all over the place.
The question I originally posed to myself was, "what makes a book a classic," and furthermore, "what makes a book worth my time?" The answers to the first question are many and varied. Sometimes, books have become classics because of their relevance at the time, to the social, economic, and political situations that the world was in the throes of. Books such as anything written by Orwell, 1984, Uncle Tom's Cabin or Huckleberry Finn. Even the novels of Charles Dickens were something of a social commentary, more than necessarily just stories written with clever words to make us laugh and provide entertainment. They were incredibly revealing about many of the living conditions in America at the time, more specifically, the terrible living and working conditions of the poor. So that answers part of the question. Books that I personally hated, The Lord of the Flies, to name one, was another form of social commentary. This is human nature, this is male nature, this is the nature of youth; overall, this is how unbridled boys, sent to live together without rules, supervision or a sense of inner morality will act. The book was disgusting in many ways, but it was meant to say something about human nature and that is why it is still taught in schools today. It has a relevance.
Other classics aren't as easy to explain as that, but it is fairly safe to say that all books of great renown have served a greater purpose at one point or another, if they don't still. What makes a book a classic? Relevance, really. That's all that it takes. Or brilliant writing. And brilliant writing being such a subjective term, perhaps we must narrow that down. Writing that does something other writers haven't before. Writing that can be acknowledged by the greater population as genuinely good, meaningful and important. Indeed, not every reader will fall in love with every book that is considered to be a classic, but when we step back, we can at least hopefully see why they have earned a spot on that list, even if it isn't our particular cup of tea.
So now, back to the question of Omeros. It is truly something I have wrestled with and pondered on for some time now. Why has this book received the worldwide recognition it has, why Derek Walcott has actually won a Nobel Prize for his writing, is somewhat astounding to me. In fact, according to an article in The Guardian, "The girl who typed it [Omeros] was saying, 'This is going win the Nobel Prize,' Walcott was later to remark." So clearly, there is a population who think that Omeros is the stuff of pure brilliance. And I, a mere student of literature still in her teenage years- who am I to say otherwise?
But does Omeros meet the criterium of a classic that I have in this essay, I believe, duly established? It may be full of lovely metaphor, complex relationships, and a devotion to the epic poem format not seen since, well, since the originals. However, the question of whether the epic poem format was a wise choice for a work of this particular complexity aside, the book does very little, it seems, to earn itself a place on the list of world-wide classics, or even a place on the list of books that students, or literary connoisseurs ought to be reading. That is to say, it is not relevant. It does not give social commentary, nor is it crucial to the times. It does not do something that other works have not done before, save to chew off much more than one book can handle- and even that, in fact, is unfortunately, old hat.
Walcott's "masterpiece" as it has been referred to, might have been his epic work, the mecca of his writing pilgrimage, but for those of us reading it, it has little to offer in the way of meaning, goodness, or importance. It is simply not relevant to today's generation, nor do I think older generations will find much within it to relate to, to take to heart, to allow to change them, as truly good literature ought to. Instead, if I might be so bold, I would suggest Walcott's Omeros was more one man trying to get a lot of things off his chest and attempt to tackle complex forms of writing, such as parody/allusion/flashback/narrator and author immersion in a very show-offy way. In other words, Walcott crammed as much as he could into Omeros so that he could show off to the literary world, and for some reason, the literary world [or parts of it at least] bought it. And yet even so, this recognition does not a classic make.
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