Last winter, Steve and I immersed ourselves in several serialized BBC adaptations of Charles Dickens’s novels. We also watched as much of Dickensian as the BBC made (this was my second viewing), but Steve got extremely annoyed because I kept hitting “pause” and then explaining…”Ok. Remember Bleak House?” Because he read Bleak House years ago. He would impatiently nod, and I would continue, “Ok, this is the backstory of Esther’s mother, how she came to marry Lord Dedlock, and the circumstances of Esther’s birth…” and he would look at me, blankly. He clearly wanted to continue with Dickensian, uninterrupted, and I really can’t blame him because the BBC put together a plotline including an entertaining portrayal of Mr. Bucket along with characters from several of the Dickens oeuvre–all interacting with one another in the same section of London–impossibly but intriguingly (especially for a Dickens fan) put together. I don’t think the series got rave reviews, and it was canceled after the first season that ended with someone about to jump off the top of a building. 

Interruptions. The jarring and sudden imposed pause in someone’s focus and concentration. Interruptions like that annoy the viewer. My intention was to add another layer of understanding to my partner’s viewing. Or, at least, that is what I told myself each time I hit the pause button to articulate the connections between different Dickens narratives made by the screenwriters and “helpfully” provide insight about how the backstories they included fit with the texts as Dickens wrote them. 

Ah. But something else was going on here. Thus, my partner’s increasing annoyance with me. All of this was self-aggrandizement. I’ve spent time reading and analyzing the works of Charles Dickens, savoring each narrative, and relishing his penchant for creating a world full of cleverly named characters. I was showing off. And it was interfering with my partner’s enjoyment of the production we were viewing. 

I didn’t stop there, by the way. When we watched the BBC production of Bleak House, I hit the pause button again and pointed out, “Ok, remember in Dickensian…” and he managed to put up with me. 

The epiphany about my behavior occurred this winter while I was reading a book written by one of my colleagues. Increasingly annoyed by the many parenthetical asides this writer has included in the text, I began a “book review.” 

The book is Quarantine Life from Cholera to Covid-19, by Kari Nixon PhD. Kari is my colleague in the English Department at Whitworth University.

The introduction to her book recounts the scrupulous academic research Dr. Nixon put into writing this text. I didn’t set out to write a review of the book when I began reading it. Quite simply, my motivation for reading it was to understand my colleague just a bit more. Her research connects contagion with literature. And while I’m not someone who holds a PhD, I have a Master’s Degree in Literary studies that renders me more than just a little curious about how her research has connected the two. 

Dr. Nixon employs a narrative style and tone that make the reader feel as if they are participating in a conversation about the topic over coffee with a group of similarly interested friends. She manages to make what could be considered an unpleasant topic approachable and intriguing. Nixon obviously wants this text to appeal to a broad audience so that audience understands more about contagion and pandemics and the public response to them. It’s an important and complex topic she presents to the audience in a non-intimidating manner.

To be fair, not all of the asides the writer includes are distracting. Some of them add a dimension of empathy and understanding about the topic. One early aside that is especially helpful is her  inclusion of the fact that bleeding a patient was no longer a common practice at the time of one tragic narrative the writer includes. She goes on to suggest that had the woman about to lose her child known that, she might have realized that the doctor was all out of ideas. This highlights the tragedy of the child’s death and helps a 21st century audience to respond with empathy. It’s an effective strategy for keeping the writer’s audience engaged with the text.

At this point, I found myself offering the writer a high five for an excellent connection with the audience. And again, a few pages later, in the middle of another compelling narrative, the writer includes her own feelings–a response to what another mother must be feeling. In doing so, she personalizes the text, but then–BANG–the pause button. Briefly, yes. But she includes a parenthetical aside about creativity in “naming practices.” 

At this point, I had to close my copy of the book and place it firmly to one side. That intrusion was both distracting and dismissive. In the 21st century, in my partner’s family and my own, I could easily list half a dozen people who have the same first name. We often laugh about it. But it’s not something that belongs to people of a certain time. And certainly, an opposing argument could be made about “naming practices” that could be considered overly creative. 

Admittedly, that is one small aside, and maybe it’s more of a source of annoyance for me than it is for other people. But it is one of many in this text. One or two instances of “we’ll get into more about this later” or “I told you we’d get back to this” aren’t overly intrusive in a text of less than 220 pages. But this text contains quite a few “Hey, remember me? The writer?” moments.

Some of the more distracting asides that are sprinkled throughout the text involve the writer’s qualifications. Her ethos. As someone who teaches academic writing, I feel qualified to comment on this element of the book. As I remind my students when they assess a writer’s ethos: focus less on a writer’s academic credentials and scholarly publications and pay attention to what the writer seems to know and understand about the topic. Nixon’s qualifications shine through her careful inclusion of historical narratives and researched sources that connect with her topic and the arguments she is making. We, the readers, don’t need to be reminded of her qualifications by either footnote or parenthetical aside. We “get it.” Nixon is eminently qualified to write this text. 

Dickens was a master in the art of writer intrusion. My favorite moment occurs in the text of Bleak House when Jo dies. Dickens, the social reformer steps forward in the text and offers this commentary: “Dead, your Majesty. Dead, my lords and gentlemen. Dead, Right Reverends and Wrong Reverends of every order. Dead, men and women, born with Heavenly compassion in your hearts. And dying thus around us every day.” This commentary is not attributed to any character in that scene. It is Dickens’s own assessment and condemnation of what he was seeing everyday on the streets of London. And then he continues with the rest of the narrative. He doesn’t tell us he is qualified to offer this assessment. He just offers it. And it is left to the reader to pause and reflect a moment on how fiction amplifies life.

And yes, I just conflated a strategy from a fictional text with something a writer is doing in a nonfiction text. But both are concerned with engaging their audience. And one manages to do so without constantly reminding the reader of the writer’s qualifications.

I’m left with this overall thought about the book: it reads as a published work that can’t quite decide what it is. On one hand, It reads as the script of a presentation–one given to a fairly well-educated audience with a real interest in the topic. But it also reads as a trade publication that includes such scholarly moves as the  introduction of source material, explanations of that source material, and then footnotes attributing those ideas. In either case, I don’t believe  many of the parenthetical intrusions by the writer into the text add anything to audience appeal. They serve to distract the reader’s focus away from the topic at hand (here is a source, and oh, by the way, this source is my mentor) and undermine the writer’s appeal to ethos. I think the writer could have eliminated most of the asides, and then this book would read as a well-organized and readable trade publication about an important topic–well supported and researched. It is important enough that I believe she should take her text, condense its most important ideas, simplify sentence structure, include some well-chosen asides, and present a Ted Talk or a similar presentation.