tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7000915267979691397.post2190509574390051464..comments2023-08-21T18:12:17.758-07:00Comments on Cosmic Antipodes: Genre and SubgenreRaphael Ordoñezhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17991011024942623986noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7000915267979691397.post-9489505849782505002014-01-25T07:52:53.637-08:002014-01-25T07:52:53.637-08:00Like I said, I haven't read them, so I'm n...Like I said, I haven't read them, so I'm not qualified to condemn them. I recently passed up a chance to buy a big stack for $1, as I don't really want them on my shelf. It's slightly bizarre (or perhaps not?) that he's a philosophy professor with a Princeton doctorate; this alone, and the fact that the books supposedly contain philosophical ruminations, have made me want to look into the first few, but I'm not sure that I ever shall.Raphael Ordoñezhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17991011024942623986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7000915267979691397.post-2040725406897295782014-01-25T07:34:43.890-08:002014-01-25T07:34:43.890-08:00I like that quote, which very well describes what ...I like that quote, which very well describes what I'm about here, and will take a look at your response; thank you for taking the time to think about my musings.Raphael Ordoñezhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17991011024942623986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7000915267979691397.post-37237890046967953442014-01-24T22:54:58.777-08:002014-01-24T22:54:58.777-08:00These musings about sci-fi/fantasy genres pricked ...These musings about sci-fi/fantasy genres pricked my interest, so I wrote a fairly lengthy response, which you in turn might find interesting. Apologies if the tone is abrasive at times; as W.H. Auden said, "the critical opinions of a writer should always be taken with a large grain of salt. For the most part, they are manifestations of his debate with himself as to what he should do next and what he should avoid."<br /><br />http://ironicalcoincidings.wordpress.com/2014/01/25/notes-on-genre-the-ontology-of-sci-fi-and-fantasy/Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7000915267979691397.post-28861380401581141802014-01-19T23:48:38.266-08:002014-01-19T23:48:38.266-08:00I loved the early Gor books because Tarl Cabot ret...I loved the early Gor books because Tarl Cabot retained his "earthly everyman" quality. In that brutal world, he regularly won the love of women and men by being kind! Then, the ugly weirdness that lurked within, like a ringworm inn the heart, flowered into hideous life (particularly with Hunters of Gor, the first Gor book published by DAW rather than Ballantine). The sheer sick-making quality of reading that book, and realizing that its author had utterly squandered precisely the appeal of the hero--that he was Gor's greatest swordsman AND a sweet innocent guy from Earth--stays with me to this day. All of the ugliness and sickness--to say nothing of the sheer unreadableness, the self-parodying style taken to the point of near word salad--kept under control in the first five or six books, metastasized and destroyed a truly great planetary romance series. I've never met a devoted reader of the later books (Thank God!) but if I did, I'd say to him that he loves something shriveled, sick, warped, confined, crippled and small. And above all, mechanical. The later Gor books are to the early as perversion is to romance. PatrickHhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04864910409538457529noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7000915267979691397.post-9975285528135284892014-01-19T16:39:36.543-08:002014-01-19T16:39:36.543-08:00Thank you for taking the time to give my questions...Thank you for taking the time to give my questions such thorough and well thought-out answers. You and Mr. Wright are lending credence to my intuition that the dominant view of genre fiction has misinterpreted some basic aspect of fantasy.<br /><br />Another commenter on Mr. Wright's blog told me that currently popular genre writers excel at telling stories about who we are and where we come from. They falter when it comes to telling us what we are in relation to the Great What-Is. You seem to give much the same assessment.Brian Niemeierhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15276948258089365826noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7000915267979691397.post-50569449294718526482014-01-19T09:45:55.580-08:002014-01-19T09:45:55.580-08:00I read your post and, for the record, agree with i...I read your post and, for the record, agree with it, especially concerning the traditional understanding of magic vs. what we see in a lot of genre fiction.<br /><br />As I've looked around on the Internet, I've find that agents and publishers often say things like, don't send us your fantasy unless it has a rigorous, consistent magic system. I have nothing against writers and readers who like such things but to me it's extraneous to fantasy; not necessarily inimical, you understand, but not particularly important either. I've read Mr. Sanderson's essay on the topic, and, tentatively, I would disagree with him, and also with Orson Scott Card, whose book (cited in the essay) I've read and profited from in other ways. It's true that consistency is crucial to secondary world-building. But I would say that the extent to which a work is a fantasy is inversely proportional to the importance of a magic "system" as a formal element. You can have a fine fantasy with such a system; I happen to think Hart's Hope (Card) is a powerful example. It can even play a major role in a material sense. It's just not what makes a fantasy a fantasy, and, as a matter of personal taste, I prefer fantasies that use such "magic" rather sparingly. Because it can become a truss, allowing the author to write commercial fiction with fantastic elements but lacking the more elusive keynotes of true fantasy. Though not necessarily, of course.<br /><br />What a lot of people call fantasy is really to me a kind of science fiction (or action thriller), and the fact that Mr. Sanderson applies his rule to sci-fi as well as fantasy underscores this. I don't think that "hard vs. soft" applies to fantasy as it does to sci-fi; imposing this spectrum really makes fantasy into a kind of sci-fi. He says that fantasy has come a long way since the sixties but I'm not so sure about that. Certainly it has a clearer set of rules and reader expectations, but that just makes it kind of boring to me. Like Tolkien, I'm personally much more interested in grace and providence, and those are trickier things to nail down. Sanderson calls Tolkien's magic vague and mysterious; mysterious it may be, in the sense of the traditional meaning of "mystery," but it certainly isn't vague.<br /><br />Well anyway I don't want to dogmatize but that pretty well describes my personal preferences. Thanks for you wishes; same to you.Raphael Ordoñezhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17991011024942623986noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7000915267979691397.post-34682474041955906282014-01-19T02:20:40.701-08:002014-01-19T02:20:40.701-08:00Well written, sir! You've pointed out that the...Well written, sir! You've pointed out that the arbiters of literary fashion wear no clothes.<br /><br />I wrote my own treatment of Clarke's Third Law on my old blog. Our views seem quite complementary. http://soulsagabooks.blogspot.com/2013/06/faustian-bargaining.html<br /><br />Your post also brought to mind Sanderson's Law: "An author’s ability to solve conflict with magic is directly proportional to how well the reader understands said magic." I'm interested to know your opinion of this guideline.<br /><br />Your novel sounds refreshingly...well, novel. I'm glad that pre-Tolkien fantasy still has champions today. I've read less from that era than I'd like, but I intend to fix my oversight.<br /><br />I wish you success in selling your book. Genre bending is frowned upon these days, sad to say. Keep trying! My own work also defies easy classification, though it leans closer to Arrakis than Barsoom.<br /><br />Best of luck drafting your sequel. <br />Brian Niemeierhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15276948258089365826noreply@blogger.com