1. Regarding the categorization of writers, etc. in Vonda McIntyre's rant
about publishing and SFWA membership (controversy about Crichton and
LeGuin): I am currently the Area Chair for Science Fiction/Fantasy for the
national Popular Culture Association (if you write about SF/F in any media,
and don't know about this conference, let me know and I'll send you some
information). Anyway, a few years back, the year before I became chair, I
remember the "Ray Bradbury" group pulling out to establish their separate
Area because "Ray Bradbury was too good a writer to be considered SF/F." To
my sneaky joy, they haven't had many panels at all--joy NOT because I don't
like Bradbury (I do, and LOVE some of his work), but because they were just
so darn snooty about "their" writer being too good to be considered with the
rest of us down in the gutter writing about SF/F writers.
I have been occupying this marginally bizarre place in the last few years:
I was active in Trek fandom for years (remember hearing Vonda read a chapter
from _Barbary_ at one of the cons a few years back--**wonderful book**) but
my fan friends didn't like it when I started writing papers about SF for my
graduate seminars. The terms "nitpicky" and "hypercritical" were tossed
about (I found the nitpicky accusation from FEN to be hilarious!!!!!) And
academia isn't so sure about that popular culture stuff....my position in
the department here is technically "Creative Writing and Critical Theory,"
and I basically get to work with all the "weird stuff" that our graduate
students and honors students come up with that my senior colleagues are a
bit, ahem, unfamiliar with (this includes, recently Alice Walker on the one
hand and feminist theory/vampires on the other hand--what fun).
So I get to be shunned by some fen for being academic and snooted by some
academics for being into popular culture....thank goodness for PCA and
listservs like this one!
2. Nalo replied to a comment I made about Atwood/Handmaid's Tale by noting:
"NH: Hang on--didn't Suzette herself tell us many posts back that Atwood
has been known to haul out a copy of _Native Tongue_ and acknowledge her
debt to it?"
Then I owe Atwood a profound apology: I should have said, more accurately,
that I was not aware of any acknowledgement; I had read interviews at the
time the movie came out (a very limited time) without seeing any
acknowledgement of Elgin's novel. I love Atwood's work overall (THT is not
a very successful SF novel in my mind, though a nice shocker of a tale),
especially _Cat's Eye_, and was frustrated at the time (late eighties? I
was in Seattle, but am not sure of the year, it was in the middle of my
Ph.D. program, so my brain was fried) because of reading an inteview with
Elgin about her problems getting the third novel published. With the movie
(which I never saw--did anyone? The promos for it sure seemed to present an
eroticized view of Offred's sexual slavery) and wide media acknowledgement
of Atwood's novel plus interviews that seemed to quote her as denying it was
SF, I was just grumpy about the whole thing. I'm glad to hear this--thanks!
3. Cannot resist noting that in _The Moon is a Harsh Mistress_, Manny ends
up arrested in the South while he and Prof are on Earth pushing for
diplomatic recognition of Luna's claim to independence. He mentions that
it's the range of colors in the extended family (multiple husbands and
wives) that was part of getting arrested--mentions old laws on the books.
Heinlein and Clarke (two of the Big Three SF writers) both often wrote
novels which described future cultures in which racism was not known. In
Clarke's novel, (1976) _Imperial Earth_ the protagonist Duncan Makenzie is a
very "black" man--although since he lives on the colony Titan, he does not
identify himself to himself or to readers as "African American." There's a
scene at the quincentennial celebration of the US where some interesting
comments are made about "race" in this future world.
Argh--this listserv is terribly seductive! Back to reading papers! (Oh, I
teach creative writing, and can say I'm not at all surprised to hear about
the magnitude of Bad Stuff in the slush pile. All I can say is that if
you're only seeing stories/novels you're lucky--the
BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAD poetry is even worse, IMHO!)
Blessed Be!
Robin
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu May 25 2000 - 19:07:28 PDT