Some literary fiction—by Marcel Proust, Henry James, etc.—is hard to read, because of the author’s multiple personality and failure to heed Toni Morrison.

Many people are “bored” with literature like that of Proust and James:

http://www.nytimes.com/1997/03/16/magazine/literature-bores-me.html

But these critics don’t have a good theory as to why such authors write that way and why other people think those authors are extraordinarily good.

My recent posts on Proust may explain what is going on. His writing involves the perspectives of multiple selves, who often come and go without each identity’s being identified. That’s difficult to follow.

Another difficulty is that the author’s alternate personalities are so autonomous that they ramble on in pursuit of their own interests. As quoted in a past post, Toni Morrison, who had been an editor, said that she could tell when a character had gotten away from a writer. She cautioned writers to control their characters and let them know whose novel it is. But since some of her own novels are as hard to read as James or Proust, it may be that she has not always taken her own advice.

Why do some readers love that kind of writing? It can be rewarding to find that something, which seems crazy at first, makes more and more sense the more you look into it.