How to get the most out of Online Literary Slap-fights

Calvin Stevens
Jun 4
8 min read

“Heart of Darkness”, universities, Goodreads reviews, and collecting one’s thoughts.

Have you ever finished reading a book and, curiosity getting the better of you, turned to look at the reviews online? Perhaps you wanted to see what other people thought; would they validate your feelings, clarify your own thoughts, or make you scoff in disagreement?

What about all three?

Now that can be confusing.

When the reviews wage a relentless war between 1-star and 5-star ratings, it can be easy to fall into either of the two camps yourself. Polarising book views, much like polarising politics, are often overwhelming.

In those instances, it can be hard to maintain your own authentic thoughts on a piece of literature without feeling the tug of other opinions pull you to one side; and this occurs more often than you might think.

As a university student, one who has taken several English Literature classes over the last three years, this has been an ongoing frustration of mine. The online world always exacerbates things, but I’ve noticed a similar phenomenon within universities — real-world, academic spaces! A professor comes in — authoritative voice and all — lectures on a given piece of literature, invokes new ideas, and aids in moulding your thoughts thereof.

But in many cases — and this is no fault of the professor’s — I find that they often create your thoughts rather than mould them. The academic sphere is, ideally, supposed to get you to think, not think for you. Certain unintentional biproducts, however, cannot always be avoided.

The online world is no different and, likewise, it can be frustrating to have your thoughts effectively hijacked. Some people will tell you to hate a book while others will tell you to love it.

But there is a way to holistically pull from these clashing views.

Reading First

Admittedly, us university students are lazy and when we don’t read through the whole novel (or even start it!) naturally it becomes easier to have our thoughts entirely created by a lecturer, online summaries (hi SparkNotes!), or (God-forbid) an AI.

To our credit, the sheer amount of reading and impossible turn-over times doesn’t help; understandably, we must occasionally resort to skim-reading and the like.

Moreover, not all the books we are forced to read turn out to be to our liking.

So, even I have been guilty of “half-arsing” my way through one or two set-works throughout the past three years.

But if you simply read as a hobby or for enjoyment, then at least you don’t have to worry too much about all that. Hence, what I’m about to tell you might be useful (I hope!)

Some of you might say: “Don’t bother reading reviews! They’re all terrible anyway”; but, if you’re like me, reading reviews can be quite fun. Personally, it’s one of the best ways for me to engage with the larger reader community.

So, I’m not here to tell you to not read reviews — in fact, rather the opposite!

Indulge in all the fun you want!

But allow me to throw in a caveat…

Don’t read them before reading the book, not even a sneak peek.

“But how will I know if the book is worth reading?”

You won’t; but you’re going to have to trust yourself here. If you’re randomly browsing a bookstore or library and come across a book you might like — appealing cover, catchy title, a familiar author, or an enticing blurb — you need to have a bit of faith in your choice; have the confidence to pick it up and give it a try.

Not all the books you do pick up will be good but, over time, you will get better at identifying good books.

Having read so much, I find I generally have a pretty good intuition when it comes to discovering books I might like.

It’s a journey to know yourself better.

In other instances, you may have been recommended a book by a friend; again, don’t read the reviews; go with your gut. Hopefully you’ll know which of your friends give the best recommendations. If you don’t — a new friend maybe? — then consider it an exercise in getting to know them better.

Now you have the book. The best part begins.

Reading.

Collecting Thoughts

Once you’ve read the whole book (assuming you liked it enough to finish it), you enter what I like to call the “simmering” phase. You let your thoughts sit, simmer, and mellow.

Personally, I like to give myself two weeks to collect my own thoughts on the book I just read. This will, of course, vary from person to person.

And I don’t mean you have to sit and do nothing for two weeks; in fact, by then I’ve already picked up another book and have begun reading again.

What I find, however, is that a book stays with me for a while after its conclusion, lingering in my mind even in the face of me reading another book. In its conclusion, I finally get to see the book in its entirety; and that’s when my own thoughts on it begin to mature.

It’s actually my biggest grip with university literature classes: they don’t give you enough damn time to just sit and collect your own thoughts before a lecturer, an essay assignment, and online resources begin to invade.

There simply isn’t time to build your own house before the furnishers arrive.

And that’s what they should be: furnishers, not builders.

Thus, the notion can be applied to casual readers, hobbyists, too.

Build your house before you furnish it with those reviews online. My house takes about two weeks to build; your time-frame might be different.

Furnishing Reviews

Now that you’ve built your house, you want to furnish it, give it a bit of colour, make it fun, and diversify the interior.

The reason I don’t dismiss reading reviews (even if some of the write-ups on platforms like Goodreads are, indeed, garbage) is simply because I think it gives you multiple perspectives; it allows you to see what others thought and felt; and maybe you’ll find a cool titbit or two, who knows.

Plus, it can be fun!

You can find satisfaction in people ranting about the same problems you had with the book; relive moments and yell out “Exactly!” in agreement; or even laugh at all the reviews you vehemently disagree with (and which you think are downright stupid — we’ve all been there).

In essence, it helps spruce up your house just a little bit without destroying or replacing your authentically built foundation.

Polar Navigation

No, not those Poles unfortunately — how I wish!

We’re talking about the unabated lands of 1-star and 5-star ratings.

Perhaps you’re walking into the furniture store, unsure of the type of couch you want. Then the store provides you with two options: a black one, and a white one; and you still don’t know which one will fit best.

Maybe, then, something in-between would work? A grey couch, perhaps. Or a brown one. Something with more colour, possibly.

But that’s not always a necessary conclusion to jump too — maybe you will like either the black or white couch. Just because you’re unsure doesn’t mean you have to find a middle ground, but neither does it mean you have to pick a definitive side.

In fact, you don’t have to buy any couch at all. You can just browse.

The question, then, is: what can you get out of it?

Okay, so there was something those literature classes taught me, and it came about after reading one of the English Literary Canon’s most highly controversial, highly polarising books:

Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.

Literary Slap-fight

“Conrad is a bloody racist.”

Those are the famous words of Chinua Achebe in his essay, An Image of Africa; and ever since their utterance, they have thrown all reviews of Heart of Darkness into a confused slap-fight.

Of course, those words without context can be scathing — so I’d implore you to read Achebe’s full essay if you’d like to get a bit of foregrounding.

Nevertheless, it’s effect on academic scholarship has also poured over into the general public domain. As Achebe’s view has become more widespread, so have the reviews become more polarising.

Take Goodreads, for example. You can look for yourself, but these are just some of the top reviews (I haven’t stitched them together either; this is the actual progression as they appear):

5-stars. 1-star.

Black couch. White couch.

Everywhere.

In a way, just as Achebe’s statement does, a sort of “either-or” dualism is invoked.

Either Conrad is a racist, or he is not; either he is anti-colonial, or he is not; and likewise, that determines whether the book is either a 1-star or a 5-star rating.

Funnily enough, a lot of university lecturers also fall for this: they either walk in and preach the book like it’s the Bible, or they set it on fire in front of the class.

(Hopefully in a metaphorical sense).

Fortunately, the class I was in happened to be taught by a lecturer wiser than that, a lecturer who took a stance but was dynamic in his approach to it.

The problem, I remember him saying, very much is that “either-or” polarity when, in actuality, it should be more a matter of “and”. Heart of Darkness is racist and anti-colonial. The book is racist in a way that is strangely complex and not nearly as black and white as reviewers point it out to be.

I’m not here to stake my analysis or opinion of Heart of Darkness; that’s an entire article for another day.

What I am here to do is demonstrate how that “and-but” mindset can be a useful takeaway.

“And” gives room for added nuance. “But” helps further reasoning.

You can read a book, find it terrible overall, and rate it 1-star, all while still having an “and-but” component.

“It was terrible, and…”

“It was terrible, but…”

The same can be said vice versa.

Because when we inevitably want to buy that couch, there is a hidden component to it.

We’re not just buying a couch; we’re buying couch that must suit the house. I want a couch, but I know (at some point) I will need a lampshade too — and that will ultimately affect the decision.

I may be uncertain about which couch I want but maybe, given that I have a white lampshade in mind, the black couch begins to look more enticing. I’m buying a couch, but I’m also looking for a lampshade.

Oh, and curtains. Maybe a coffee table too. Picture frames, anyone?

You get the point.

Essentially, many reviews and sweeping online opinions (even academic journals!) focus too much on a singular aspect; that’s generally why books can become controversial. They are too worried about the couch and the couch alone.

Now, in some cases there will be elephants in rooms that cannot be avoided. Heart of Darkness has a fairly large, ugly couch (worn leather, dust, and all) that doesn’t afford much space for a coffee table; but there is always room for a picture frame and some curtains; so, while the couch invariably makes the house questionable, there is still nuance, details, lurking within.

It’s not just a house with a bad couch. It’s a house with a bad couch and some bizarre picture frames. It’s a house with a bad couch but it has some decent curtains.

My advice, hence, when navigating the back-and-forth world of literary opinions, is to go in with an “and-but” mindset rather than choosing between “either-or”.

First you want to give yourself time to build a house. Then you may want to furnish it. And when you do furnish it, keep in mind the larger picture; don’t limit yourself to a single room, a single nook or cranny.

If you truly want to find use in all those online book reviews, then take them piece by piece, and add them to your own authentic thoughts.

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