The threatened petition denouncing the BBC's dismissive attitude toward SF, discussed below (dismissed by most as self-interested whining, if I recall), has been sent with eighty-five signatures, and covered in The Telegraph. You could do worse than use the list of signatories as a reading list: Michael Moorcock, Iain M. Banks, Ramsey Campbell, Ian MacDonald, Michael Shea, Charlie Stross, Mark Charan Newton, and, of course, Adam Roberts....
Monday, April 18, 2011
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Noone on this list has written a book that I've read all the way through -- partly because it's way heavy on Brits. So I can't embrace it with much enthusiasm as a populist gesture, not if I'm considered part of the vox pop. A larger problem may be the percentage of guys (almost all guys) here, ostensibly writing in a popular genre, who have also begun taking themselves and the enterprise a tad too seriously, regarding thsmelves as futuristes and profound social critics, adding ponderousness and leaching a lot of the fun and brio out of their work the process -- a mistake the "mysterary" thriller writers seem to have avoided.
I can't think of a single person on this list who regards himself as a 'futurist' or a profound social critic...
Your prejudices are showing.
Why aren't guys like Ian MacDonald more fun to read?
I blame the cyberpunks....
All that guys like Asimov had to do was to posit a Galactic Empire and then get on with the good stuff.
The introduction of more realistic world building into the genre has made a lot of SF more than a bit of a slog. You're right that MacDonald is a prime offender.
The grand-slam of combining SF "realism" with a sense of wonder and fun has proven elusive. (which is why I like China Mieville and Iain Banks so much).
If you think about it, the mysterary writers don't have the same burden, since instead of focusing on the creation of a workable economic system, all they need to do is to emphasize character, which is always fun. Even then, though, there are an awful lot of rule-breaking alcoholic loner cops out there.
The mysterary writers I like best (Vargas, Temple, Woodrell, Atkinson) have stayed well away from depressed alkie cops. I think of those guys (Rebus etc) as the tired offspring of Matthew Scudder -- the last gasp of the old school. (The alkie PIs of James Crumley are a more vivid.)
Here are some key authors that are either of high literary merit, or are just plain fun and pure populism that are on the list.
Iain Banks -- One of the best writers today...period.
David Brin -- He's in freakin' San Diego! He's a very entertaining writer.
Diane Duane -- Not only a great fiction writer, but she wrote the screenplay for a film that aired on SyFy.
Matt Forbeck -- A friend who writes entertaining media tie-in fiction and who just made the leap into entertaining original fiction.
Elizabeth Moon -- Her first fantasy series was inspired by a series of D&D modules and was excellent.
Michael Moorcock -- To me, he is fantasy. He, along with Burroughs, is why I read.
Mike Resnick -- Damn good writer.
Harry Turtledove -- Another SoCal writer who writes excellent fiction. The king of AltHist.
These are only highlights of authors that I deeply enjoy. There are others on the list as well, none I'd consider "profound social critics."
There are also fewer Brits than I'd expect in a British paper.
I've begun and discarded several draft comments about why, at this phase of my life, expending the energy needed to comprehend the details of an elaborately imagined fictional world seems less productive than some other ways the same amount of time could be spent. The anecdote posted earlier about spending a decade reading Finnegan's Wake may apply. You've grasped all the tangled details of Iain Banks' fictional universe and then what? A horrible sinking feeling of emptiness?
Ask me again when I'm not as tired.
You might enjoy reading Banks just as Williamson's (apocryphal) friend might actually have enjoyed reading James Joyce.
Many do.
But if you set the bar higher for popular fiction than you do for television series, you are very likely to be disappointed. Others have exactly the opposite problem and are used to being called snobs.
Yeah, funny about that.
Honestly, I think there's something puritanical in my make up. Pleasure alone isn't enough. Makes me feel guilty. I want to know what I'm learning, why something is worthwhile, how it will make me a better person. Not always, but frequently, there's a twinge of that.
And if that isn't leaving myself wide open...
On the other hand, TV is lots easier to consume. Just sort sit back and let your jaw go slack. Nothing like it after a hard day at the office.
I sympathize with all of that, of course... But your puritanism is selective
A guy who has, IIRC, watched all of Lost and X Files, most of Battlestar, and big chunks of Doctor Who is wondering whether it's worth it to read Iain Banks?
The answer is "yes".
Maybe as audio books.
Also, you don't get to look at Billie Piper when you're reading an Iain Banks novel. I suppose you could paste up a magazine picture. But that would be creepy.
At the most primitive level, people react to films and TV shows as encounters with actual people. In books, you only get descriptions of people. I admit to primitive responses in these matters as well as sophisticated ones.
I cannot imagine a world where I would rather watch Dr. Who than read a Culture novel. It just cannot be done, and I really like Dr. Who. I own the FASA and Cubicle 7 Dr. Who role playing games.
One of the things I love about novels is that I don't have to be a voyeur. I can project myself into the roles of characters I care about, they become proxy me. I know their inner thoughts and share them.
I cannot do that with television.
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