http://www.themillions.com/2009/02/inter-alia-15-toward-phenomenology-of.html
Do we need to define snark? I would argue that we do. Ever since Heidi Julavits popularized the term, in her March 2003 Believer manifesto, the word "snark" has been used as a cudgel against all manner of populist tomfoolery (Julavits singles out The New York Post), even as it has proven useless against the pungent attitudinizing of Gawker and its discontents...Moreover, the pejorative overtones of the floating signifier "snark" imply that equally fatuous but positive commentary is somehow less damaging to "the national conversation." If we're going to have a conversation about that conversation, it seems worth knowing what we're talking about when we talk about snark. So here, tendered with love and humility, are some notes toward a phenomenology of snark.
- Snark is, above all, a tone, and this is what makes it so difficult to pin down. Julavits calls it a "hostile, knowing, bitter tone of contempt," but forecloses the possibility that hostility and bitterness might be legitimate critical positions. And again, for some reason, online text often reads as more hostile than it actually is. (Think of the phenomenon of the misunderstood email.) No, it's not negativity, but been-there, seen-that "knowingness," that is the call-note of snark. (It is impossible to surprise a Snark.) However, allowance must be made for the fact that some people actually know things. Perhaps snark, properly understood, involves a tone of knowingness that doesn't correspond to actual knowledge. (Truly great snark would thus be impossible to identify: persuading us of its authority, it would be ignorance that leaves no fingerprints.)
- A related point: snark is a response disproportionate to the offense, a comment that outshouts the original post. The Snark expends more emotional and intellectual energy formulating his aphorisms than he did consuming, or skimming, their subject. Otherwise, we would have to recognize his hostility, bitterness, or contempt as legitimate. (We carp because we care.) Currently, the perfect object of snark for me is Benjamin Button; it's a movie I'll never see, but have put a great deal of thought into making fun of. This lack of regard is more deeply wounding to Benjamin Button fans than it would be if I actually had a legitimate grievance against the film.
- The true Snark, perhaps by virtue of his reflexive contempt, cannot be bothered to understand the object of his snark - to expand the compass of his sympathies, to assume good faith. Thus James Wood, even at his most trenchant, does not get accused of snark, whereas Lee Siegel, for all his anti-web fulminations, often seems to be writing from the very heart of snarkness. Siegel believes the length of his essays, and their appearance in print, indemnifies him against his own charges, but is wrong (see numbers 1 and 2 above). Brevity is the soul of wit, but not necessarily of snark.
- Snark is a kind of show of plumage, almost a mating ritual. As such, snark always calls more attention to the Snark than to snarked. But again, just because the dagger is driven in with a flourish does not mean it is done snarkily. The thoughtful, the passionate, and the justly aggrieved - Nietzsche, Oscar Wilde, Anthony Lane - are entitled to be stylish, without being shouted down for snark.
- Morally, snark is no better or worse than genial puffery; indeed, it is its dark twin, its complement, an advertisement for the self. Snark is more aesthetically pleasing than puff, however, by virtue of the complexity of its defense mechanisms. It reduces criticism of itself to a negation of a negation - that is, to mere snark. Hence: Denby.
I was the first and only person to comment on Hallberg's excellent post, a fact which puzzled me then and puzzles me now:
I am rather surprised that no one seems to have commented on this excellent post. I haven't read Denby's book, but based on what I have read about it, it wouldn't surprise me if Mr. Hallberg's single page got to the heart of the matter more efficiently than Denby's 150 pages.
I am divided on snark, as many of us seem to be. On the one hand, robust satire can indeed perform a hygienic function in a craptastic media culture. The Onion often fulfills that function, South Park often does, the underrated sports commentator Jim Rome at his best does as well. But unearned snark (which Rome was frequently guilty of in his younger days) is simply annoying and a waste of time. Perhaps, as with any form, there is 10-25% that is passable to superior (I am being more generous than Sturgeon's Law), and 75% that is unworthy. Since all snark involves identifying the unworthy in other formats, unworthy snark is perhaps especially annoying because it pretends a superiority it has not itself demonstrated.
All said, I am more anti-snark than pro-snark, for reasons brilliantly elucidated by Charlotte Bronte in a chapter of Shirley I read just yesterday; those 19th century novelists always have something profitable to add to the conversation!
Sincerity is never ludicrous; it is always respectable. Whether truth - be it religious or moral truth - speak eloquently and in well-chosen language or not, its voice should be heard with reverence. Let those who cannot nicely, and with certainty, discern the difference between the tones of hypocrisy and those of sincerity, never presume to laugh at all, lest they should have the miserable misfortune to laugh in the wrong place, and commit impiety when they think they are achieving wit.
Bronte's point is well-taken, although sometimes stupidity has to be assaulted, whether it is sincere or not.
POSTSCRIPT: Bronte, it is clear a couple of chapters on, has nothing against merited scorn:
[Shirley and Caroline] held many aversions too in common, and could have the comfort of laughing together over works of false sentimentality and pompous pretension.
UPDATE (6/1/2009): You can't trust reviews; I eventually read Denby's book, and it's excellent. You especially can't trust reviews in this case, because Denby calls out so many specific people and publications, as well as media types, that the chance of the book getting a fair hearing was nil. Therefore, my speculative comment that "it wouldn't surprise me if Mr. Hallberg's single page got to the heart of the matter more efficiently than Denby's 150 pages" was unfair. Hallberg does a fine job in one page; Denby does a fine (and obviously more detailed) job in 150 pages. I should also note that Hallberg's comments on Denby at the link are also unfair, since he bases them on a radio interview rather than a reading of the book itself; thus, he expresses amazement that Denby didn't mention Juvenal in the interview, but trust me, Denby discusses Juvenal at length in the book.
I like Denby's sharp prose style in Snark:
I will also ignore the legions of anguished, lost people on Web sites and the social networking site Facebook who are convinced that, say, Barack Obama is the Antichrist...and who fly about wildly, like bats trapped in a country living room, looking for a way to release fear.
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A snarky insult, embedded in a story or post, quickly gets traffic; it gets linked to other blogs; and soon it has spread like a sneezy cold through the vast kindergarten of the Web.
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[Ancient] invective was a mode of poetry, a genre requiring certain metrical patterns and rhetorical modes, just like an elegy or a love lyric. You didn't just drop your turds in the street if you wanted to be taken seriously.
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Irony assumes that God is laughing at you; snark assumes that your frat brothers are laughing with you.
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The writers for Gawker or other gossip sites hear some accusation from a tipster or sorehead...and then, after spicing the salad with dropwort, lay it out on the table, where it will remain forever (the Internet does not clear away its dirty dishes).
