[Emma_Goldman]

I do think this is a crudely banausic perspective.

> Their novels are surely enjoyed by far fewer people than an only-relatively successful niche Youtube or TikTok content creator. Literary novels don't make money, and don't shape the culture, so what does it even mean to be a 'powerhouse'?

Mere numerical impressions is a poor standard of influence or staying power. Very many great works of culture, philosophy and history are little read by the standards of social media. I have no idea why you think that means they 'don't shape the culture'. I doubt that, each year, Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations is read even one hundredth the number of times that Mr Beast's videos are watched. I very much doubt that the future historian will take the Philosophical Investigations - by consensus the most influential work of philosophy in the twentieth century, whose effects on our intellectual culture are deep and pervasive - to be an incidental footnote when compared to Mr Beast.

But cultural value isn't just a function of influence, clearly. Knausgaard's books are to many people, myself included, simply great works of art, and should be celebrated for that fact. They show a level of cultural excellence, ingenuity and craft that the average trending YouTube video doesn't, whatever merit it might have besides.