ELMO KEEP

The same accusations of cultural waste were once laid at the feet of television, but that was before the dawning of the current age of the “novelisation” of TV, when we’re now free to enjoy critically revered shows — Mad Men, The Wire and The Sopranos — on an intellectual level because they have been bestowed with a sufficiently literary point of reference, safely elevating them above the level of pop culture dreck in the eyes of cultural arbiters. Even novelist and technophobe Jonathan Franzen has okayed the television adaptation of The Corrections with HBO. Yet for Franzen, new-fangled technology Twitter poses an unmitigated threat to literature, labelling it the “ultimate irresponsible medium. People I care about are readers… particularly serious readers and writers, these are my people.” One can only imagine the grave disappointment Franzen may now be feeling in Martin Amis, knowing he once deigned to write a book about video games.