Shows like that upend your very sense of self, they immerse and they obliterate. But when you finish an episode of The Wire or Carnivale or The Sopranos, you aren’t quite sure who you ARE anymore. When you finish an episode of Parks and Recreation, or Scandal or Ru Paul’s Drag Race, you might feel like you simply HAVE to watch another episode. ![]() That is something only the best, purest examples of narrative form can do. Highbrow television taps into our deepest narrative impulses and drags us into alternate worlds, worlds we often find it hard to leave. It’s a form that appeals to something deep and intrinsic inside us. It’s no surprise that The Wire has inspired full-blown Dickensian reimaginings of the show as a Victorian serial novel. Human beings tell themselves into existence through narrative, through stories. There are psychologists and neurobiologists who believe that consciousness itself would not exist without narrative. Human beings perceive the world through the prism of narrative and we always have. The serial drama is the most beguiling, intelligent and enjoyable method of satisfying our addiction to narrative. These shows demonstrated the most perfect, most sublime use of the television medium: the serial drama. They fundamentally changed what television was. Not all of these shows have aged well (it is pretty hard to watch The West Wing in a post-Obama, post-Sorkinism, post-War on Terror world), but at the time they aired, they were revolutionary. ![]() We are still living through the Second Golden Age of Television, a period that began in 1999 with the premiere of The Sopranos and subsequently resulted in a slew of beloved TV dramas such as The Wire, The West Wing, Carnivale, The Shield, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, and my own personal favourite, Deadwood. True highbrow television transcends pleasure or entertainment. However, shows that do meet these criteria elevate the form above mere enjoyment. For the record, I don’t think Game of Thrones qualifies as highbrow, but that doesn’t mean I enjoy it any less. There aren’t many shows that meet all those criteria, and of course not every show has to be highbrow to be valuable. To be truly highbrow, a show must: be brilliantly written, genuinely insightful, deeply original, demonstrate longevity and be influential on the medium itself and culture generally. If we must come up with a definition of highbrow TV, I think the category should be reserved for those shows that really are in a class of their own. Is Game of Thrones highbrow because it’s complicated and expensive and people sometimes make long speeches? Or is it lowbrow because there are dragons and gratuitous sex and sometimes the CGI is a bit dodgy? Is Girls highbrow because it’s topical and edgy and on HBO? Or is it lowbrow because it’s trivial and exasperating and a comedy? The only thing that’s even vaguely in question, is how we decide which shows make it into the ‘highbrow’ category. ![]() Highbrow TV doesn’t need a defender! It’s a battle that has been won! Highbrow TV is downright fucking awesome and every single person reading this already knows it. It’s kind of like being asked to defend Muhammad Ali against Sonny Liston, or to defend pizza over kale, or cats over dogs. I feel a little guilty being gifted highbrow TV as a subject to defend. ![]() This week, we’re publishing their speeches in full for your edification. Last week at the Highbrow vs Lowbrow Cultural Showdown, six of our favourite writers faced off to defend their preferred cultural forms.
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