Ever since Scott Hales announced his plans to edit a new anthology of Mormon literary criticism, I’ve been thinking off and on about my own past grapplings with Mormon literature and where I’d want to take them — had I world enough, time, money, and the requisite academic chops. What follows isn’t that essay, but comes about as close as I can manage at present. Consider this my submission!
Why do or should we — as readers, writers, and/or literary critics — care about whether a text is Mormon? Potential reasons are legion, as varied as readers themselves. Among the most typical and (it seems to me) important are the following:
- To understand Mormonism better — as a culture, religion, historical movement, or what have you
- To investigate specific elements of Mormon experience, thought, and culture through literary works
- To explore the purpose(s) and role(s) of literature in Mormon experience and worldview
- To articulate ways that literature has influenced Mormonism
- As a test case to investigate the interrelationships of literature and religion, literature and identity, literature and culture, and a host of other potential intersections
- To understand better particular literary works that incorporate manifestly Mormon elements
- To assert our own membership (or non-membership) in the Mormon community
- To explore what it means to be Mormon and a reader, Mormon and a writer, or Mormon and a critic
- To seek out and encourage literature we think is worthwhile, in whatever particular relationship to Mormonism we endorse: celebratory, investigatory, critical, or other[1. The purposes listed here include many I have seen explicitly or (mostly) implicitly pursued via published essays, blog posts, discussions on the email discussion list once sponsored by the Association for Mormon Letters, and a variety of other venues — plus a few I’ve not seen much of (such as the influence of literature on Mormonism) but that seem like logical and potentially interesting possibilities.]
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