On Wed, 30 Apr 1997, Anastasia McPherson wrote:
> Hi Ladies (I assume)
There are many women, er womyn, er females or this list, but universals
and assumptions are generally dangerous enough apart, let alone together.
:)
> I was THRILLED to find this mailing list as I am working on a
> sci-fi novella and I love to read sci-fi as well. What are people
> reading these days? I am a big fan of the anthology and am waiting for
> the new Dozois Years Best to come out. I also just finished a new
> anthology called starlight which had women well represented, however, the
> quality of the selections was something less than memorable. Even
> Maureen McHugh's story was an obvious derivative of LeGuin's "Left Hand
> of Darkness".
As was I. Thrilled that is. I'm personally am reading the textbooks
assigned for class, the books for my book groups (e.g. _Celestis_), and
the messages on this mailing list. When I can, I read some sci-fi of my
choosing. I tend to look for certain authors. Currently, the authors
that I look for include: David Brin, Nicolla Griffith, Mellisa Scott,
Neal Stephenson, and Sheri S. Tepper.
> And here is a meaty question. I have always loved the
> utopia/dystopia dyad but find myself leaning toward creating dystopic
> futures by extrapolation and see this tendency in the other literature of
> the day. How much of this do you think is due to the millenialism abroad
> n the culture today and how much due to a real weighing of the facts of
> our near future?
Well, first of all, I don't see much millenialism abroad at all. So
there have been some cults and such, but there have always been kooks. So
there has been some popular millenial fiction, but then our culture seems
to sieze on anything and everything.
So, given only those two options, I would have to go with a real
weighing of the facts. However, perhaps what we are seeing is more of a
reaction to the overly-optimistic, techno-philic sci-fi of yesteryear.
Perhaps we are seeing a push towards evenness. (there should probably be
similar numbers of utopias and dystopias). Perhaps the incredible
feats of technology that we have seen in our own lives (computers and
all) and the fact that these far-reaching changes haven't really
seemed to affect us all that much has worn some of the wonder wore off of
technology. Perhaps the near complete failure of so many so-called
idealists of certain generations to retain their idealism and principles
as they aged has taught us too much about our own lack of fibre. I think
that we have become a more cynical people (sigh).
Anyway, welcome.
-- Joel VanLaven
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