========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 00:21:12 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jo Ann Rangel Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ Hello, I am doing a critical study of Parable of the Sower for a McNair scholar program project and am very interested in the development of the protagonist, particularly what you thought of her development into a self-empowered young woman from her beginnings as a teen in the novel... Jo Ann ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 00:04:46 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Re: BEAUTY In-Reply-To: <3349B718.3687@earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Beauty is a wonderful book, one of Tepper's best, but the scene where the trash chutes get clogged by dead bodies gave me nightmares! Mike Levy On Mon, 7 Apr 1997, Nomi Liron wrote: > Has anyone else read Sherri Tepper's "Beauty?" It is a wonderful > rewriting of some old fairy tales in a sci fi setting. I felt it was > almost a magical book. Anyone else? > nomi > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 00:12:19 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ In-Reply-To: <19970407.202453.10174.3.avs5@juno.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Mon, 7 Apr 1997, Anne V Stuecker wrote: > Hello, all. I just finished reading Octavia Butler's _Parable of the > Sower_ and would like to know everyone's thoughts or ideas on the book. > > Thanks. > > Anne Stuecker Washington, DC, USA > It's a fine novel, though very different from most of Butler's previous fiction. I just finished writing a paper on Parable and a somewhat similar novel by Jack Womack called Random Acts of Senseless Violence. Both books deal with teenaged girls on their own and surviving in near-future Americas that are going all to hell. I looked at both books in light of Mary Pipher's Reviving Ophelia, Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls. Although I liked Parable of the Sower a lot, I'm still not very comfortable with Lauren's Earthseed religion. The concept is either very profound or very shallow--I haven't made up my mind yet. Question, does Butler want us to see Earthseed as right? Interesting side point. Butler said in a recent interview which appeared in Science Fiction Studies that Lauren does not have any psychic ability to feel other peoples' pain, which is how I (and I think most people) first read it. What she has is a well developed delusion that she can feel other peoples' pain. Mike Levy ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 04:35:39 UT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Roberta Wolff Subject: Re: BEAUTY Yes, I read BEAUTY and I loved it. It is my sort of fantasy. In my book, that is a prose poem. Roberta's Cat-- onegreycat@msn.com greycat1@airmail.net Has anyone else read Sherri Tepper's "Beauty?" nomi ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 08:01:35 -0400 Reply-To: areuter@world.std.com Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Anne E. Reuter" Organization: iDirect Subject: Octavia Butler on race Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Laura Sells wrote: > And I also like how > she treats race, though I haven't thought it through quite clearly. I > wonder if anyone has any thoughts on that aspect of Butler's work? > Yes, that's what I like about Butler's books. First it's nice to see black people and black women in sci fi. Generally, we are invisible or just a balancing afterthought in a group scene. Race consciousness pervades the lives of racial minorities in any social system, unifying and dividing them in ways the dominant culture is largely unaware of. While many sci fi books are based on struggles between different races or species of individuals - from first contact novels to fantasies in which one group dominates another - few SF writers explore how being visibly identifiable with one group instead of another affects the consciousness and life decisions of the group members. And few SF writers explore the details of people's daily lives where two or more racially distinct groups live side by side, each occupying pretermined roles in their society. Some of Butler's earlier works, such as Wild Seed and Patternmaster, touch on this theme as well. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 08:06:08 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: sue hagedorn Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > And I also like how >she treats race, though I haven't thought it through quite clearly. I >wonder if anyone has any thoughts on that aspect of Butler's work? In the Afterword for "Bloodchild" she writes: "It amazes me that some people have seen "Bloodchild" as a story of slavery. It isn't. It's a number of other things, though. On one level, it's a love story between two very different beings. On another, it's a coming-of-age story in which a boy must absorb disturbing information and use it to make a decision that will affect the rest of his life. On a third level, "Bloodchild" is my pregnant man story." S. Hagedorn hagedors@vt.edu ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 10:34:12 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Stone Waters MD Subject: Re: delany Yes, absolutely, you can make great Sci-fi on small budget. But you have to concentrate on themes and issues and not special effects. Two films which come to mind that have feminist-female leads are 1. the original Terminator (low budget, and arguably one of the best sci-fi flicks ever made) and 2. the Alien movies. Stone Waters MD ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 11:04:35 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: lissa bloomer Subject: Re: THANK YOU Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" hello all. been out of town. nalo: what is Slipstream? -lissa if you're wearing pants, thank my great great great grandmother. elisabeth bloomer instructor, english virginia tech ebloomer@vt.edu 540.231.2445 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 11:08:10 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: lissa bloomer Subject: Re: delany & feminism Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ok, i know what allies are. then what's your definition of feminist? feminism? anyone? -lissa if you're wearing pants, thank my great great great grandmother. elisabeth bloomer instructor, english virginia tech ebloomer@vt.edu 540.231.2445 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 11:17:04 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Robin Gordon Subject: Re: feminist heroes in SF films In-Reply-To: <01IHFBOLQ17EE0LL3Q@MtRoyal.AB.CA> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I think there are a lot of interesting questions that could flow from a feminist analysis of the Aliens trilogy. Unfortunately I have to admit I only remember the third, which I've seen repeatedly as it has a certain status amongst many lesbians. The character of Ripley is, in many ways, coded as lesbian in that final film. The shaved head, baggy clothes and take no prisoners attitude, the way she refuses to be intimidated by the men/criminals. her entire appearnace and demeanor run counter to dominant notions of what men find attractive in women, and particularly hollywood's idea of an attractive woman, and yet she carries so much raw sexual energy through the film. But the most interesting question, I think, relates to the fact that both the villain/alien and the hero are female. The motherhood themes are strong throughout the entire series, but less the nurturing mother and more a fierce mother with a drive to procreate and protect her young. The alien-mother-as-villain is not so unusual for hollywood, but it is unusual to see this villain go up against a female hero. The combination allows for the curious identification that the hero develops with the Alien, particularly as she becomes the alien, or at least the alien-host(ie. mother). I think Ripley is a good example of an sf amazon-hero, which goes back to the discussion about women and the traditional idea of a hero. Happily, this amazon escapes the two worst stories for amazons - either the amazon is the villain to be conquered by men as proof of their supremacy, or she is conquered by some over-powering innate heterosexual desire and succumbs to a man, discovering that he's what she really needed all along. The men in Aliens 3 are quite secondary. Robin Gordon -------------------------------------- "I view it as something of a nightmare that the sodomites are so brazen." Bigot Jesse Helms ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 12:32:20 -0200 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Antonio Marcos da Silva Pereira Subject: slipstream In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII hi there - On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, lissa bloomer wrote: > hello all. been out of town. nalo: what is Slipstream? 1) afaik it's a label for work on the border between traditional contemporary fiction and sf. bruce sterling wrote about this in a text properly entitled "slipstream". which can be found at his directory on the well gopher. also, spinrad wrote about the term, but i'm not quite sure where. Antonio Marcos Pereira ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 12:27:12 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nicola Griffith Subject: Octavia Butler Mike, I'm intrigued by your interesting side point. I've read PARABLE OF THE SOWER three times now (trying to figure out what other readers have liked about the novel--but that's another story). In the text there is nothing, as far as I can see, to indicate Lauren is anything but a reliable narrator: she says she has hyperempathy; she *has* hyperempathy (the ability to feel others' physical sensations--not just pain). At what point do we disbelieve what is written and believe instead the author? At what point and to what extent should the text stand on its own? I don't know if Butler does or does not want us to see Earthseed as "right." Lauren's religion is one of my (many) problems with the book: we see, beautifully articulated, the beginnings of Lauren's philosophy (and I think it is a philosophy to begin with, rather than religion); we understand how she gets from A to B, and then, phhtt, she's suddenly thinks humankind's future is among the stars. She makes a leap of faith that I can't follow--a leap of faith that's not prefigured or explained or believable. At least I didn't find it so. Perhaps I'm simply misreading the text. If anyone has any pointers I'd be happy to hear them. Meanwhile, if anyone is interested I can post or email a review I wrote for the _New York Review of SF_ when the novel first came out. And Mike: I read RANDOM ACTS OF SENSELESS VIOLENCE and thought it was a terrific novel. Heartbreaking. Nicola Nicola Griffith http://www.america.net/~daves/ng/ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 14:07:20 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Mala Ghoshal (NC)" Subject: a bunch of things Comments: To: Tanya Wood In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII tanya--what did you focus on in your tiptree thesis? did you relate her work to any particular feminist theorists? re ecofeminism--i really like susan griffin's _woman and nature_. i've never read any butler but i plan to--what do you-all recommend starting with? nicola, i'd like to see your review of _parable of the sower_. has anyone looked at the haraway book that deals with _the female man_? in closing, this list makes my day. mala ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 11:24:14 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "L. Timmel Duchamp" Subject: sf movies Anybody seen "Cannibal Women of the Avocado Rainforest Jungle?" (At least I *think* that's the title-- but it could be "Amazon Women" or some other variant.) This is a film that was obviously made by feminists (academics, I feel certain) for feminists. It teems with a myriad details that anyone who isn't a feminist just don't get. (& there are plenty that would probably slide by feminists without at least graduate student experience.) I've watched videos of it numerous times, always with other people. A friend of mine who's a history professor shows it perhaps once a year at an all-women party of mixed students & faculty. Every time I see it I just howl-- & each viewing get more of the jokes. (Of course it also helps if you've read Conrad's _Heart of Darkness_ or-- so I'm told-- seen _Lost Raiders of the Ark_ & _Apocalpyse Now_ --neither of which I've seen.) I usually don't like slapstick-type roll-in-the-aisles humor, but I love this movie. (Yeah, I'm the kind of person men are always telling to "lighten up.") I suppose its magic for me lies in its outrageous premise: that there are two rival groups of militant feminists occupying a huge tract of land ("jungle") in California that the CIA, the marines, & every kind of corporate & government sabatour is powerless to eliminate. (All the marines & CIA agents sent in get eaten-- with either clam dip or guacamole, depending on which feminist faction captures them.) I must say that I've yet to meet a male "fellow traveller" who appreciates this film. The ones I've seen trying to watch it give up because they think it's boring & silly. (Just the way I feel about most movies that are "comedies.") Interesting to hear that I'm not the only person in existence who enjoyed _Until the End of the World._ I got so much pleasure from it that I saw it a second time less than a week after having seen it the first time. Everyone I know who's seen this movie thinks it's badly structured & boring. It does have an unwieldly shape-- but my understanding of the film sees that as inevitable. I didn't take any notes on my thoughts about it, but I do remember talking at length (to whomever would listen) about the insights I felt that film gave me into why the noir form cannot accommodate "role-reversed" female protagonists. The unwieldly shape of the film is the result of its opening with explicit cyber-type noir & later shifting into end-of-the-world sf. I once had some idea for why Wenders might have sutured two such incompatible forms together into one, but it escapes me at this late date. My favorite scene was the moment the EMP strikes, in the small airplane, when the world goes silent & there's just the small, spiraling shadow of the plane on the stark Australian outback below, & a beautiful silence & light all around it, as though the world were holding its breath... Timmi Duchamp ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 14:26:27 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: THANK YOU In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, lissa bloomer wrote: > hello all. been out of town. nalo: what is Slipstream? > > -lissa NH: Damn. Did I use the term? Probably. Not sure I can explain it, because I'm not sure what it means myself. I think it's work that won't be nailed down to genre categories, like Karen Joy Fowler's _Sarah Canary._ Is it a first contact story? Is it a story about a madwoman? No way to be sure. Anyone else have a more clear explanation? Or a correction? -nalo > "Would you trade your funk for what's behind the third door?" P-Funk, "Funkentelechy" ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 13:24:57 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Re: Octavia Butler In-Reply-To: <970408122628_-933372715@emout05.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Nicola, let me first say that it's a pleasure being in contact with you. I've loved both your novels (taught Ammonite last year in a course on SF and gender), On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, Nicola Griffith wrote: > Mike, I'm intrigued by your interesting side point. I've read PARABLE OF THE > SOWER three times now (trying to figure out what other readers have liked > about the novel--but that's another story). In the text there is nothing, as > far as I can see, to indicate Lauren is anything but a reliable narrator: she > says she has hyperempathy; she *has* hyperempathy (the ability to feel > others' physical sensations--not just pain). At what point do we disbelieve > what is written and believe instead the author? At what point and to what > extent should the text stand on its own? You've misread Butler's text slightly (and in exactly the same way that I and evidently just about everyone else misreads it, according to Butler. ) As defined in the text if you look very carefully, hyperempathy isn't actually the ability to feel other peoples' sensations. It's the ability to convince yourself that you're feeling them. Thus, Lauren feels pain when her brother fakes hurting himself if she thinks his pain is real. Similarly, she won't feel even the worst pain if she doesn't consciously realize that the other person or animal is in pain. Same for other emotions. If you have a heartattack right in front of her she won't notice if you're stoic enough. > I don't know if Butler does or does not want us to see Earthseed as "right." > Lauren's religion is one of my (many) problems with the book: we see, > beautifully articulated, the beginnings of Lauren's philosophy (and I think > it is a philosophy to begin with, rather than religion); we understand how > she gets from A to B, and then, phhtt, she's suddenly thinks humankind's > future is among the stars. She makes a leap of faith that I can't follow--a > leap of faith that's not prefigured or explained or believable. At least I > didn't find it so. > I'm glad you feel this way about the "humanity's future is among the stars" stuff. I don't necessarily disagree with the idea (on a gut level I'd like to agree with it I have to admit) , but I don't see its necessary or logical connection to Earthseed as previously presented in the book. Maybe it's just your standard, life-long science fiction fan's thing. The basic idea is common to much SF, particularly to the more conservative stuff written by people like Poul Anderson and Larry Niven, oddly enough. > Perhaps I'm simply misreading the text. If anyone has any pointers I'd be > happy to hear them. Meanwhile, if anyone is interested I can post or email a > review I wrote for the _New York Review of SF_ when the novel first came out. I'll have to check your review. I've got the complete run of the NYReview of SF. Can you give me a citation? > And Mike: I read RANDOM ACTS OF SENSELESS VIOLENCE and thought it was a > terrific novel. Heartbreaking. > > Nicola Again, I'm glad we're in agreement.The New York Times Book Review gave Random Acts the rare "honor" of a mainline review outside of Gerald Jonas's sf ghetto, and then Scott Bradfield (one of those slipstream guys) panned the book and said Womack's language (which I loved) was unreadable. > > Nicola Griffith > http://www.america.net/~daves/ng/ > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 15:06:03 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: sf movies In-Reply-To: <199704081824.AA13206@halcyon.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII NH: Toronto is a big town for film. In 1995 I attended an independent film festival there where I saw an independent feminist sf short called "Odds and Ends." Can't remember the director's name right now. It's a total spoof too, about a galaxy of Black lesbians at war with Zombies. I found it hilarious, down to the really cheesy special effects, but most people didn't share my view. And I don't know if "Daughters of the Dust" fits the definition of speculative fiction, with its pre-born baby ghost girl running as fast as she can to arrive in time to patch a rift between her parents, but that one has a special place in my heart too, as does "Jumping Jack Flash." I was too chicken to watch any of the Aliens movies, much to my chagrin. But horror leaves me sleepless and terrified for days. -nalo On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, L. Timmel Duchamp wrote: > Anybody seen "Cannibal Women of the Avocado Rainforest Jungle?" > (At least I *think* that's the title-- but it could be "Amazon > Women" or some other variant.) This is a film that was obviously > made by feminists (academics, I feel certain) for feminists. > It teems with a myriad details that anyone who isn't a feminist > just don't get. (& there are plenty that would probably slide > by feminists without at least graduate student experience.) I've > watched videos of it numerous times, always with other people. > A friend of mine who's a history professor shows it perhaps once > a year at an all-women party of mixed students & faculty. Every > time I see it I just howl-- & each viewing get more of the jokes. > (Of course it also helps if you've read Conrad's _Heart of Darkness_ > or-- so I'm told-- seen _Lost Raiders of the Ark_ & _Apocalpyse > Now_ --neither of which I've seen.) I usually don't like slapstick-type > roll-in-the-aisles humor, but I love this movie. (Yeah, I'm the > kind of person men are always telling to "lighten up.") I suppose > its magic for me lies in its outrageous premise: that there are > two rival groups of militant feminists occupying a huge tract > of land ("jungle") in California that the CIA, the marines, & > every kind of corporate & government sabatour is powerless to > eliminate. (All the marines & CIA agents sent in get eaten-- > with either clam dip or guacamole, depending on which feminist > faction captures them.) I must say that I've yet to meet a male > "fellow traveller" who appreciates this film. The ones I've seen > trying to watch it give up because they think it's boring & silly. > (Just the way I feel about most movies that are "comedies.") > > Interesting to hear that I'm not the only person in existence > who enjoyed _Until the End of the World._ I got so much pleasure > from it that I saw it a second time less than a week after having > seen it the first time. Everyone I know who's seen this movie > thinks it's badly structured & boring. It does have an unwieldly > shape-- but my understanding of the film sees that as inevitable. > I didn't take any notes on my thoughts about it, but I do remember > talking at length (to whomever would listen) about the insights > I felt that film gave me into why the noir form cannot accommodate > "role-reversed" female protagonists. The unwieldly shape of the > film is the result of its opening with explicit cyber-type noir > & later shifting into end-of-the-world sf. I once had some idea > for why Wenders might have sutured two such incompatible forms > together into one, but it escapes me at this late date. My favorite > scene was the moment the EMP strikes, in the small airplane, when > the world goes silent & there's just the small, spiraling shadow > of the plane on the stark Australian outback below, & a beautiful > silence & light all around it, as though the world were holding > its breath... > > Timmi Duchamp > "Would you trade your funk for what's behind the third door?" P-Funk, "Funkentelechy" ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 14:01:07 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Laura J. Perez" Subject: Re: sf movies Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I have seen that "Amazon Women of the Avacado Jungle" or whatever the title is. I once saw it on an afternoon movie and couldn't stop laughing for days. I'm dying to see it again, but haven't been able to find it. I thought it was interesting that it seemed to be a really cheap B movie, but had such intellectual content...at least in some ways. >Anybody seen "Cannibal Women of the Avocado Rainforest Jungle?" > (At least I *think* that's the title-- but it could be "Amazon >Women" or some other variant.) This is a film that was obviously >made by feminists (academics, I feel certain) for feminists. >It teems with a myriad details that anyone who isn't a feminist >just don't get. (& there are plenty that would probably slide >by feminists without at least graduate student experience.) I've >watched videos of it numerous times, always with other people. > A friend of mine who's a history professor shows it perhaps once >a year at an all-women party of mixed students & faculty. Every >time I see it I just howl-- & each viewing get more of the jokes. > (Of course it also helps if you've read Conrad's _Heart of Darkness_ >or-- so I'm told-- seen _Lost Raiders of the Ark_ & _Apocalpyse >Now_ --neither of which I've seen.) I usually don't like slapstick-type >roll-in-the-aisles humor, but I love this movie. (Yeah, I'm the >kind of person men are always telling to "lighten up.") I suppose >its magic for me lies in its outrageous premise: that there are >two rival groups of militant feminists occupying a huge tract >of land ("jungle") in California that the CIA, the marines, & >every kind of corporate & government sabatour is powerless to >eliminate. (All the marines & CIA agents sent in get eaten-- >with either clam dip or guacamole, depending on which feminist >faction captures them.) I must say that I've yet to meet a male >"fellow traveller" who appreciates this film. The ones I've seen >trying to watch it give up because they think it's boring & silly. > (Just the way I feel about most movies that are "comedies.") > ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 15:14:31 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Tanya Wood Subject: Re: a bunch of things In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Mala, My thesis on Tiptree was entitled "The Female Man: The Feminism and Utopianism of James Tiptree, Jr." This was a few years ago now, and its extraordinary how the memory fades....But I did (oddly enough) use Harraway (haven't read her new book yet but will) who considered Tiptree one of her cyborg theorists, mostly on the basis of Tiptree's masquerade as a man, ignoring Tiptree's own conviction that male and female are indeliably biologically differentiated. But on the other hand Tiptree did have a diffcult relationship with her own female identity- apparently considering herself both inside and outside the female species. I also used essentialist feminist theorists like Mary Daly- although they differ radically in many ways they still share an underlying biologism.What stuck me about Tiptree's utopian writing is how it had to exclude men to suceed (as in "Houston, Houston, Do You Read"), and is basically untenable in the real world which includes men ("Your Faces, Oh My Sisters...").Gloom. gloom. Even in Up the Walls of the World, happy utopian striving inside the space entity os only possible because all the entities within are disembodied. Incidently, Harraway also considers Octavia Butler as a cyborg theorist, and writes about Butler at lenght in her "Primate Visions" (the two do indeed have an affinity- although there are also many differences between them- Haraway would not share Butler's conviction that males are inherently violent as seen in the Xenogenesis trilogy, for example). Cheers! Tanya. PS I take the points about the Bujold series. Serves me right for commenting on them when I've only read 2 books and the summaries at the end of these two books detailing the rest of the series. None of the summaries mentioned Cordelia at all.It really did seem to me that the heroine completely vanished- and obviously she does not. But I do think Cordelia is a heroine- even if she (quite rationally) tries to refuse the label. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 15:17:29 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: Octavia Butler In-Reply-To: <970408122628_-933372715@emout05.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII NH: I read _Parable of the Sower_ when it first came out. In it, as I remember, Lauren says that people call what she suffers from "hyperempathy," but it's in fact a misnomer, since what she feels is what she *imagines* other people to be feeling, not their actual sensations. I'm pretty sure that that's in the novel. I think Lauren goes on to say that for her, it boils down to much of a muchness: they feel pain, and she feels pain too, even though it's triggered by her imagination of their pain, and not by real empathy. I admire and respect Octavia Butler's writing, but find it *really* depressing, even though I'm not one to demand that my reading be "positive" or "uplifting" (I once subsisted on a pretty much steady diet of Tanith Lee). When I first heard about Butler, I devoured everything I could find by her in a matter of days, it seemed, then walked around in a grim fog for the next month. -nalo On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, Nicola Griffith wrote: > Mike, I'm intrigued by your interesting side point. I've read PARABLE OF THE > SOWER three times now (trying to figure out what other readers have liked > about the novel--but that's another story). In the text there is nothing, as > far as I can see, to indicate Lauren is anything but a reliable narrator: she > says she has hyperempathy; she *has* hyperempathy (the ability to feel > others' physical sensations--not just pain). At what point do we disbelieve > what is written and believe instead the author? At what point and to what > extent should the text stand on its own? > > I don't know if Butler does or does not want us to see Earthseed as "right." > Lauren's religion is one of my (many) problems with the book: we see, > beautifully articulated, the beginnings of Lauren's philosophy (and I think > it is a philosophy to begin with, rather than religion); we understand how > she gets from A to B, and then, phhtt, she's suddenly thinks humankind's > future is among the stars. She makes a leap of faith that I can't follow--a > leap of faith that's not prefigured or explained or believable. At least I > didn't find it so. > > Perhaps I'm simply misreading the text. If anyone has any pointers I'd be > happy to hear them. Meanwhile, if anyone is interested I can post or email a > review I wrote for the _New York Review of SF_ when the novel first came out. > > And Mike: I read RANDOM ACTS OF SENSELESS VIOLENCE and thought it was a > terrific novel. Heartbreaking. > > Nicola > > Nicola Griffith > http://www.america.net/~daves/ng/ > "Would you trade your funk for what's behind the third door?" P-Funk, "Funkentelechy" ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 16:57:08 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: lissa bloomer Subject: Re: SF movies Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" i'm trying to think of fem-sf movies... i saw "TankGirl" and loved it... but i wonder why so many of the sf women are girls and silly (or, as someone said, of the "eat shit" kind of aloofness)? (can't we say "eat shit" and be serious?) we can't forget (well, maybe we can) "Terminator" -- the woman is the one who, as alexander the great's mama says, "rocks the cradle and rules the world." the woman in the terminator has a couple of overly coined feminist responses... which, when i first heard them sounded great... ("you men don't know what it's like to CREATE"...) and she is, after all, the one who saves the day. plus, she has amazing biceps. i'm not sure we could call the movie very literary, though. not much to study and ponder-- "Alien" -- the last one, had a strange feminist twist. but i became quickly tired of the sigorney weaver character calling the big ol' baby-producing monster a bitch. (there's a strange part of me, perhaps in the margins of my feminism, that can't stand any strong woman being called a bitch -- alein, human-eating, or otherwise.) i think, though, that we'll be seeing some really powerful movies soon--reason being that movie producers are just now able to begin to handle feminist issues- let alone sf issues. "Thelma and Louise" and "Fried Green Tomatoes" put so many men into intellectual overload... just think what adding sf into that genre would do. so, instead, we have a ridiculous plethora of "that-woman-has-more -than-me-so-i'm-going-to-kill-her-and-her-family-and-take-over-her-life" genre...which may be science fiction (in it's implausability). and that's what i can't stand: the putting a woman in the place of a man idea; assuming that it's going to make a fem story-- gad. it's kind like the black barbie doll: "maybe if we color the plastic dark brown, it'll be an african-american doll." i think not. -lissa if you're wearing pants, thank my great great great grandmother. elisabeth bloomer instructor, english virginia tech ebloomer@vt.edu 540.231.2445 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 17:05:47 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: lissa bloomer Subject: feminism & sf Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Robin Gordon wrote: >Happy Monday everyone. I would like to suggest that the tangential >discussion going on regarding the age old question "can men be >feminists"is a bottomless pit which threatens to consume this list. Of >course this is an, at times, interesting and potentially important >discussion, I'd like to suggest that this isn't really the place for it, >unless discussed with relation to sf (which is possible). While I can >only speak for myself I expect other women on this list who are >politically involved have been through this discussion more times than we >can count, like myself, and don't necessarily want to run through it again >here when there are so many interesting issues to discuss with relation to >the lists theme of sf and feminism. After reading Stone's post I could >have a lot to say in reaction, but just don't think this is the place. perhaps you can delete these posts and move onto the issues that you would like to read about -- because many of us who are new to these ideas would like to work through our thoughts. this is why i joined the list! i've been what you would call "politically involved" for the past 15 years... and i still find the subject of "what is feminism" -- no matter the tangentiality -- question wonderfully enlightening. i think that if we can't understand other's concerns and ideas on fem alone, how can we begin to complicate the issue by bringing sf into the picture? and surely, the realm of fem will change in the light of sf. -lissa bloomer if you're wearing pants, thank my great great great grandmother. elisabeth bloomer instructor, english virginia tech ebloomer@vt.edu 540.231.2445 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 14:13:56 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "L. Timmel Duchamp" Subject: Daughters of Dust Nalo Hopkinson wrote: >And I don't know if "Daughters of the Dust" fits the definition of >speculative fiction, with its pre-born baby ghost girl running as fast as >she can to arrive in time to patch a rift between herparents, but that >one has a special place in my heart, too Yes, Julie Dash's "Daughters of Dust" is breathtaking. Its fantasy elements and highly stylized photography and dialogue allow the visible elaboration of the theme of the survival of The Race. The voice and anxiety of the pre-born baby creates a teleology spanning generations that reminds me most of Margaret Walker's _Jubilee_-- which resorts to Providence (i.e., God) for creating the teleological drive that represents, thematically, the collective accomplishment of survival (& ultimate defeat of genocide). & the ghosts of the slaves who drowned resonate with Toni Morrison's _Beloved_ (which the pre-born baby's voice also calls to mind-- though Morrison's ghostly baby is a dead one, not one anxious to be conceived & brought to life). In both "Daughters of Dust" and _Beloved_ the fantasy elements are crucial for articulating an abstraction it would be otherwise hard to put into words. As for whether it can be considered "speculative"-- I guess it depends on whether one is willing to consider novels like _Beloved_ "speculative." "Daughters of Dust" is literary in the way _Beloved_ is literary. People who consider "speculative" a ghetto will deny they're anything but an art film in the case of Dash's film, & a high literary novel in the case of _Beloved._ Timmi Duchamp ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 17:39:48 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: lissa bloomer Subject: Butler's "Kindred" Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" nalo: did _Kindred_ depress you? just taught it in freshman english under my "escape" theme. it was the students' favorite of all. (taught it with Le Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" and Angelou's "..Caged Bird Sings" and Lowry's "The Giver") one of my students (an 18 yr old black female) wrote to me in a journal: "It seems to me that the only female hero this patriarchal world could take would be a science fiction female hero. Because she simply does not exist." wheew. now THAT is depressing. is this what you mean? -lissa bloomer if you're wearing pants, thank my great great great grandmother. elisabeth bloomer instructor, english virginia tech ebloomer@vt.edu 540.231.2445 ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 17:50:27 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: Butler's "Kindred" In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII NH: I don't remember _Kindred._ It's probably on my bookshelves; I'll have a look and see if it was one of the ones I read. No, I think I meant that so many of Butler's worlds seem so loveless, or if there is love, it's compelled by biology, against the characters' better judgement. They go into it kicking, screaming, resenting and hating the other person. That depressed hell out of me. Not all her stories are like that, by any means, but that was the overweening impression I came away with at the time. But as to your student's comment, women heroes/role models/triumphant (whatever you want to call them) do exist, and not only in fiction. -nalo On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, lissa bloomer wrote: > nalo: did _Kindred_ depress you? just taught it in freshman english under > my "escape" theme. it was the students' favorite of all. (taught it with Le > Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" and Angelou's "..Caged Bird > Sings" and Lowry's "The Giver") > > one of my students (an 18 yr old black female) wrote to me in a journal: > "It seems to me that the only female hero this patriarchal world could take > would be a science fiction female hero. Because she simply does not exist." > > wheew. now THAT is depressing. is this what you mean? > > -lissa bloomer > > > > > > if you're wearing pants, thank my great great great grandmother. > > elisabeth bloomer > instructor, english > virginia tech > ebloomer@vt.edu > 540.231.2445 > "Would you trade your funk for what's behind the third door?" P-Funk, "Funkentelechy" ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:06:28 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Barbara Harman Subject: Re: BEAUTY Though I haven't read Beauty, there are a number of anthologies edited by Teri Windling and Ellen Datlow which are also retellings of fairy tales. Most are published by Tor Books, which also published a series of novel-length books edited by Teri Windling under the rubris "The Fairy Tale Series." One of these, "Briar Rose" by Jane Yolen, is a chilling retelling of the Sleeping Beauty story set in Poland during the Holocaust. The anthologies are, by and large, spectacular, particularly "The Armless Maiden." Barbara ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:03:53 EDT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anne V Stuecker Subject: Re: Octavia Butler Nicola Griffith writes: > Meanwhile, if anyone is interested I can post or email a >review I wrote for the _New York Review of SF_ when the novel first >came out. Please do. I like what you have to say. Anne Stuecker Washington, DC, USA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Always remember the marketeer's philosophy: "If someone won't buy it, no one can have it." ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:03:54 EDT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anne V Stuecker Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ sue hagedorn writes: >In the Afterword for "Bloodchild" she writes: > > "It amazes me that some people have seen "Bloodchild" as a >story of slavery. It isn't." Wow, my professor's all wrong (Yes! I love it when that happens.). I read Bloodchild in an anthology that doesn't have this Afterword. Can you tell me where you found it? Anne Stuecker Washington, DC, USA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Always remember the marketeer's philosophy: "If someone won't buy it, no one can have it." ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:03:54 EDT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anne V Stuecker Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ Thanks, all, for replying to my posting. Here are my thoughts on Laura Sells' comments: 1) Please tell me more about Haraway's "affinity groups." 2) >I was somewhat disappointed in the "seed" >metaphor that Butler used, though. I totally agree. Besides, the use of the word "God" tends to scare me. It's too loaded. At one point, Lauren corrects 2 of her group who are arguing about whether Earthseed's "God" is male or female and Lauren points out that "Change has no sex," but I feel like that's a cop out on the real issue of the use of the word "God." I think I will analyze one of the Earthseed verses for a paper I'm writing, but as a whole I don't think the verses form a coherent basis for this spirituality. Anne Stuecker Washington, DC, USA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Always remember the marketeer's philosophy: "If someone won't buy it, no one can have it." ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:03:54 EDT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anne V Stuecker Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ Michael Marc Levy writes: >Although I liked Parable of the Sower a lot, I'm still not very >comfortable with Lauren's Earthseed religion. The concept is either >very profound or very shallow--I haven't made up my mind yet. I agree. If it is a matter of profundity, can anyone explain to me more about how and why it is so? >Question, does Butler want us to see Earthseed as right? Tomorrow I'll ask my professor what he thinks (I have no idea) and get back to you. >What she has is a well developed delusion that she can feel >other peoples' pain. Thanks for including that comment. That clears up some things for me. However, it's too bad that sometimes we must resort to asking the author when we can't figure something out. Anne Stuecker Washington, DC, USA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Always remember the marketeer's philosophy: "If someone won't buy it, no one can have it." ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:03:53 EDT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anne V Stuecker Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ Jo Ann Rangel writes: >very interested in the development of the >protagonist, particularly what you thought of her development into a self-empowered >young woman from her beginnings as a teen in the novel... My first thoughts on this regard Lauren as leader. Q: How was she able to convince 8 other adults to join her new religion? A: By promising them companionship and food on their dangerous journey. Would the religion have been strong enough to stand alone as a means to attract followers? Besides this aspect of Lauren's leadership, how about the fact that her authority was never questioned, except by latecomer Mora? I am reminded of Marge Piercy's first SF book (the title currently eludes me -- it's about teenagers who want to recreate the country as a commune) in which there are constant power struggles and control issues. Why do we see none of this in _Parable_? As _Parable_ is the first Butler I've read, I'd like to ask if all of her stories tend to be as underdeveloped. Or, is the underdevelopment a key point that I'm missing? I was also really bothered by the fact that Lauren seemed to have a pre-fab response to every newcomer's questions about Earthseed as well as about other things. For example, after Zahra has sex with Harry for the first time, Zahra asks Lauren if she's jealous. Lauren's immediate response is "I'm as human as you are...But I don't think I would have yielded to temptation out here with no prospects, no idea what's going to happen. The thought of getting pregnant would have stopped me cold" (183). First of all, is this woman supposed to be superhuman? Her cool rationality turns me off, and I have a hard time seeing an 18-year-old (or even someone older) saying this. Personally, I would have first said, "yes," even if I did continue with the above response. Secondly, how many of us can instantly rattle off such an eloquent and compact response to such an emotional question? Anne Stuecker Washington, DC, USA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Always remember the marketeer's philosophy: "If someone won't buy it, no one can have it." ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:50:30 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nicola Griffith Subject: Parable of the Sower--thanks Nalo and Mike, thanks for the correction. How embarrassing to read it wrongly not just once but twice. Aaargh. (However, if so many other readers also made this mistake, it makes me wonder if perhaps Butler should have been just a wee bit clearer.) Mike, I don't have the citation for the NYRSF review--all I have is the review itself on disk. I'll post it for you and Mala. (I'll label it clearly so that those who aren't interested can just delete the file.) You'll see that my misreading has led to a certain amount of dissatisfaction with the novel. Oh, well. Chalk it up to those of those bloody "learning experiences." Sigh. Nicola Nicola Griffith http://www.america.net/~daves/ng/ ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 18:49:31 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nicola Griffith Subject: Review: _Parable of the Sower_ (from NYRSF) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: multipart/mixed; boundary="PART.BOUNDARY.0.4227.emout11.mail.aol.com.860539608" --PART.BOUNDARY.0.4227.emout11.mail.aol.com.860539608 Content-ID: <0_4227_860539608@emout11.mail.aol.com.7364> Content-type: text/plain For those who asked, here is my review of _Parable_. I know now that I misread the text with regard to the hyperempathy question, so *please* don't point it out to me. Any other feedback, though, would be welcome. Nicola Nicola Griffith http://www.america.net/~daves/ng/ --PART.BOUNDARY.0.4227.emout11.mail.aol.com.860539608 Content-ID: <0_4227_860539608@emout11.mail.aol.com.7365> Content-type: text/plain; name="PARABLE.ASC" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable A gospel or a parable does not have to follow the same rules as a novel= in order to be successful. The point of the parable is the moral, not t= he tale itself. Read as a parable, Butler's latest book is powerful, tho= ught-provoking, and possessed of a definite agenda--keep adapting or die.= As a novel, however, it is curiously contradictory. It is 2024. Lauren Oya Olamina is about to turn fifteen. As is us= ual with the protagonists of science fiction Lauren is precocious, withou= t her biological mother, and different from everyone else. Her real moth= er took a designer drug called paracetco which damaged Lauren, leaving wi= th the trait of "hyperempathy." (More on which later--which is pretty mu= ch what Butler does: introduce the idea, then drop it like a hot potato u= ntil a lot later in the book.) Hyperempathy is not the only thing that m= akes her different. She is a self-conscious prophet, the originator of a= belief system she names Earthseed, a credo based on the ability to adapt= to change: =0D All that you touch You Change. =0D All that you Change Changes you. =0D The only lasting truth Is Change. =0D God Is Change. =0D The world *is* changing. California is running out of water; unemploymen= t is producing terrible poverty; the largely illiterate and homeless popu= lation is turning to crime and drugs, while those still fortunate enough = to have jobs are barricading off their communities. When they have to le= ave home to go work, they travel at dawn, when the desperate and the drug= -crazed are still asleep, and they carry guns they are not afraid to use.= While much of this is extrapolated beautifully from the present day= --the squeezing of the middle class: teachers, preachers and academics lo= sing out to drug-using criminals and anarchists, corrupt and ineffective = emergency services, and the corporate rich--there are some puzzling gaps.= For example, poverty has reduced the community to two computers, three = televisions and one "window," but everyone has radios and phones: Butler = sidesteps the probability that thirty years from now, a radio will *be* a= television will *be* a phone will *be* an interactive multimedia audio v= isual system. There is a Noah's Ark feel to things--everyone either pair= s up (hetero)sexually, or dies--and a curious 1950s attitude to gender ro= les and expectations. Lauren's bad boy younger brother, Keith, has defin= ite and contemptuous views of women, though we never find out where these= views might come from in a society where the parents are both equally we= ll-educated, the eldest sister is smart as a whip, and there is no televi= sion to pump received ideas of women's frailties into the impressionable = adolescent's mind. But all this is, ultimately, beside the point because the point of = PARABLE OF THE SOWER is Lauren's growth and maturation as a prophet, the = formulation and codification of her beliefs into _Earthseed: The Book of = Life_. Although nominally divided into four parts, PARABLE can be more eas= ily seen as two sections: the first, which includes the first three parts= of the book, when Lauren aged fifteen to seventeen and still living with= her family, covers the private origination and development of Earthseed = principles; the second details her flight from the destroyed neighborhood= , her adaptation of a prophet persona, and the formation of the nucleus o= f her Earthseed community. Initially, the formulation of Lauren's ideas, and the ideas themsel= ves, make sense. Lauren, like many science fictional readers and protago= nists, knows that Things Are Gonna Change For The Worse. She sees the gr= owing unemployment, the increasing scarcity of water, the growing futilit= y of politicians and emergency services, and understands that total break= down is inevitable. The only way to survive is to accept the change, rem= ain adaptable, learn to live with a different world. We learn along with= Lauren that "Intelligence is ongoing, individual adaptability," and that= "Civilization is to groups what intelligence is to individuals." We do = not disagree. But it is when she makes a conceptual leap, "The Destiny o= f Earthseed/Is to take roots among the stars," that we lose the thread. = It is at this point, we suspect, that what has once been to Lauren a meth= od of organizing her world actually becomes a religion. We are asked to = take it on faith. Lauren, unlike the heroines of such adventures as EMERGENCE and FAL= SE DAWN, is not alone in a hostile world where the Big Bang or the Horrid= Disease have already happened and the reconstruction can begin. She is = still in the middle of on-going change, and she is not free to do as she = wants/thinks best; there is her family to consider. Although she can see= clearly enough where it will lead, her family and friends are in denial;= ignore it and it will go away. Again, the story of Noah's Ark springs to mind, but instead of a bo= at, Lauren prepares a backpack. (The contents are lovingly described for= all of us who have dreamed and planned and longed for such an opportunit= y to battle adversity and win.) But this is not a simplistic adventure n= ovel for juveniles and Butler does not take the easy path. What Lauren k= nows conflicts with how she feels. She loves her family; she is only a t= eenager. Torn, she prepares the backpack then does nothing but write mor= e Earthseed verses. When Lauren is seventeen, Keith--aged fourteen--goes rogue: he leav= es what he perceives as the restrictive, sheeplike community and runs wit= h the wolves, those whose only rule appears to be survival of the fittest= =2E He survives quite well, for a while, paying furtive visits to the fa= mily home when his father is absent. It is here and in other close exami= nations of non-sexual relationships that Butler shows her extraordinary a= bility to delineate subtleties, detailing Lauren's gradual realization th= at her brother is a sociopath, a murderer--that she does not, in fact, li= ke him--while at the same time retaining the sense of love and family tha= t binds them. Perfectly done. But then Keith meets some leaner and meaner wolves and is tortured = and killed. And Lauren's father goes missing--probably murdered out of h= and by the drug-eating, fire-setting gangs--and Lauren senses the imminen= ce of disaster. Still she does nothing: her family needs her. When she is just eighteen, the community is finally overwhelmed: de= stroyed by a gang of drug-eating pyromaniacs who rape, then kill, then pl= under. The only survivors are Lauren, a boy her age called Harry, and Za= hra--the youngest wife of the community's polygynist. It is here that th= e book seems to lose its depth. Butler constantly raises issues or ideas, then drops them. For exa= mple, we are initially told that Lauren's hyperempathy--her ability or cu= rse to feel what she *thinks* others feel (her brother Keith once made he= r bleed by squirting himself with red ink)--allows her to share both plea= sure and pain, and we get a ten page burst of Lauren feeling the pain of = others, but then we hear nothing about it until the second half of the bo= ok. When Butler remembers about it, the effects of the hyperempathy are = peculiarly two dimensional. Lauren feels only the pain from others' phys= ical wounds and the pleasure from others' sexual activity. No details ab= out the vicarious enjoyment of food, the suffering of others' fear and so= on. Lauren decides she must travel as a man. No details on the more or= dinary difficulties she might face as a result, and then when Harry inadv= ertently reveals she's a woman, there doesn't seem to be any fallout. Mu= ch is made of there not being anywhere safe to settle in the California a= rea, and then the fledgling community promptly settles in northern Califo= rnia. The only time Butler reaches the kind of truth and clarity apparent= in the first half of the book is in certain beautifully drawn interactio= ns between people who have to learn about when to trust and when to suspe= nd that trust. But these incidents, no matter how illuminatingly observe= d, are not enough to sustain one hundred and fifty pages of a novel. Aft= er Lauren has formulated her religion and the Robledo neighborhood is des= troyed, the book reads almost as if Butler has lost interest. But while the second half of the book has a tendency towards fairly= typical skiffy After The Disaster novels, in the first half of PARABLE B= utler takes some of the givens of science fiction--change, preparedness, = survival of the fittest--and produces daring, bold and intellectually fas= cinating meta science fiction. With the devastatingly simple prose of he= r teenage protagonist, she does something none of the New Testament gospe= ls (or any other religious text I can think of, offhand) dares: she detai= ls not only the beliefs of a prophet but the birth of those beliefs. She= attempts to meld reason and religion. She almost succeeds.= --PART.BOUNDARY.0.4227.emout11.mail.aol.com.860539608-- ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 19:53:29 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: BEAUTY In-Reply-To: <970408180521_547288770@emout04.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII The Datlow/Windling collections are: _Snow White, Blood Red_ _Black Thorn, White Rose_ _Ruby Slippers, Golden Tears_ I've really enjoyed these too (though I sometimes wish that the editors didn't 'out' the original tale at the intro to each story so that I could guess what the inspiration is. Sometimes it's less than obvious, or it's a tale I don't know). The series has provided me with revenge on some tales that just made me bristle, or has re-interpreted them in ways that are very satisfying. _The Armless Maiden and Other Tales of Childhood's Survivors_ is a chilling collection, edited solely by Terri Windling. Windling's essay at the end of it chronicles her own history of being an abused child, and how she got from there to where she is now. And is it Jack Zipes who has a book that analyzes folk tales? Title: _Don't Bet on the Prince._ Hard to resist a title like that! -nalo On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, Barbara Harman wrote: > Though I haven't read Beauty, there are a number of anthologies edited by > Teri Windling and Ellen Datlow which are also retellings of fairy tales. Most > are published by Tor Books, which also published a series of novel-length > books edited by Teri Windling under the rubris "The Fairy Tale Series." One > of these, "Briar Rose" by Jane Yolen, is a chilling retelling of the Sleeping > Beauty story set in Poland during the Holocaust. The anthologies are, by and > large, spectacular, particularly "The Armless Maiden." > > Barbara > "Would you trade your funk for what's behind the third door?" P-Funk, "Funkentelechy" ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 19:56:40 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: Parable of the Sower--thanks In-Reply-To: <970408184223_-1536489333@emout01.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, Nicola Griffith wrote: > Nalo and Mike, thanks for the correction. How embarrassing to read it > wrongly not just once but twice. Aaargh. > You'll see that my misreading has led to a certain amount of dissatisfaction > with the novel. Oh, well. Chalk it up to those of those bloody "learning > experiences." Sigh. NH: :) Don't you just hate those? -nalo "Would you trade your funk for what's behind the third door?" P-Funk, "Funkentelechy" ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 20:14:18 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jo Ann Rangel Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ Hi, That was an intersting take on the issue of spirituality and the "Earthseed" philosophy...we must remember though that as readers and critics of this type of literature each interpretation may be vastly different from the author's intent...it is not a cop out to not assign a gender to "God" it could very well simply be Lauren's interpretation of her personal spirituality as she perceives it at that particular time in the novel. Look at the recent events with the Heaven's Gate cult they believed in asexuallity as a means to fufill an aspect of their personal search for spirituality from within their group...I know it is an unusual aspect to bring up but as a real life example versus the spirituality quest Lauren finds for herself, I believe more than ever than no one interpretation is the perfect one. ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 17:53:56 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Maryelizabeth Hart Subject: Re: BEAUTY Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I'm a HUGE Tepper fan. However, did anyone else have problems with her total and absolute condemnation of horror writers to Hell? Which she then followed with an incredibly horrorific scene in _Sideshow_? If every author has her ups and downs, _Beauty_ had a little of both. I think _A Plague of Angels_ and _Shadow's End_ were good Tepper without being great Tepper. However, I was very happy with _Gibbon's Decline and Fall_, and would love a discussion on what choice readers feel was made at the end. And I think her current book, _The Family Tree_, may end up being my favorite. Maryelizabeth Mysterious Galaxy 619-268-4747 3904 Convoy St, #107 800-811-4747 San Diego, CA 92111 619-268-4775 FAX http://www.mystgalaxy.com ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 22:02:58 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ In-Reply-To: <19970408.170042.12150.3.avs5@juno.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Although Parable of the Sower has its strengths, I think the Xenogenesis trilogy is Butler's masterpiece--Dawn, Imago, and Adulthood Rites. It's just been reissued in paperback in the U.S. by the way and--surprise, surprise--they actually put obviously black characters on the covers (which wasn't the case when the books first came out). Actually, I don't think Butler's written a book that isn't worth reading. Kindred, Clay's Ark, the early Patternmaster series are all worthwhile, although, as has been noted, rather grim. To tie into another thread, the Xenogenesis series also has a strong ecofeminist theme. Mike Levy ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 22:11:00 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Michael Marc Levy Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ In-Reply-To: <19970408.170042.12150.8.avs5@juno.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, Anne V Stuecker wrote: > sue hagedorn writes: > > >In the Afterword for "Bloodchild" she writes: > > > > "It amazes me that some people have seen "Bloodchild" as a > >story of slavery. It isn't." > > Wow, my professor's all wrong (Yes! I love it when that happens.). > > I read Bloodchild in an anthology that doesn't have this Afterword. Can > you tell me where you found it? > > > Anne Stuecker Washington, DC, USA > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- As Nicola Griffith said in an earlier post, more or less, how far can we trust an author when her statements about a story seem contradicted by the story itself? "Bloodchild" is about a human being forced to act as womb/first meal for an intelligent alien insect, but it's not about slavery? Well maybe not entirely, but... Actually this image of forced interspecies or inter-racial procreation occurs over and over again in Butler's work. It's the basic premis of Xenogenesis after all, which concerns a species whose primary biological imperative is to interbreed with other species whether they want to or not. It's also a concern in Kindred, where a 20th century African American woman discovers that she has a white ancestor, and also plays a role in the Patternmaster series. Mike Levy ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 8 Apr 1997 23:32:40 EDT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Anne V Stuecker Subject: _Parable of the Sower_ Here are several more criticisms I have of Butler's novel: 1) There is too much unrealistic dialogue. How else can I describe it? When I read a book (I try to refrain from "novel" because a novel-length SF piece isn't really a novel) I like to be able to image the characters' behavior and speech as being real and actually happening. I had a hard time doing that with this book. I already wrote of this a little bit when I discussed Lauren's pre-fab responses to people's intricate questions. 2) What is the deal with this planned marriage to Bankole? Lauren admits that she doesn't trust him fully, and then several lines later she reaffirms their marriage plans. Is this believable to anyone else? 3) I found myself wishing something really bad would happen to them while they were on their long and supposedly dangerous journey. Only one person died the whole time, and the group easily survived a fire at the end. It seemed to me like there would have been many more hardships to endure in such a situation (at least, one in the real world), but they were never out of food or water, they had no major medical incidents, and no one they invited to travel with them betrayed them. 4) The funeral at the end, involving the use of trees as memorials, reminded me of the same ending of Kim Stanley Robinson's _Pacific Edge_. This similarity is not a bad thing, necessarily, but since I just read _PE_ I found it rather repetitive. I liked the book because it made me really think about survivalism and defense, but I also have a lot of problems with it. Anne Stuecker Washington, DC, USA ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Don't mistake my kindness for a weakness. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 03:47:53 UT Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Roberta Wolff Subject: Re: BEAUTY Mary Elizabeth Hart wrote: I'm a HUGE Tepper fan. However, did anyone else have problems with her total and absolute condemnation of horror writers to Hell? Which she then followed with an incredibly horrorific scene in _Sideshow_? Yes! Roberta's Cat-- onegreycat@msn.com greycat1@airmail.net ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 09:08:36 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Laura Quilter Subject: Moderator commenting re: list purpose & feminism In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Well ... ahem. Moderator here. Just want to remind everyone that the list is about discussion of feminism with relation to SF. Not feminism per se. A little bit of tangentiality is cool, and I don't want to stifle debate, but this is a list for discussion of feminist sf, fantastic & utopian literature. There are plenty of resources available for discussion of feminism in general -- UseNet groups such as soc.feminism for instance -- and if someone wanted to post a list of other resources for discussion of feminism that would be great. In the meantime, I think we can respect that this list is open to a wide variety of people, some of whom will want to work through issues of feminism to get back to SF. Let's give a bit of latitude to people who want to discuss these issues. My principal reason for not having this be an entirely open arena for discussion of feminism per se is wanting to avoid anti-feminists coming on to the list and wasting the rest of our time. That doesn't seem to be happening. So let's be tolerant. It will also help if messages are CLEARLY labelled in the subject line. If you reply to a message, please check the subject line -- it may no longer be appropriate. If not, change it to: "New Topic; was re: old topic" or something like that. That will facilitate people deleting what they don't want to read. ------------------------------------------------------------- Subject: Welcome to Feminist SF/Fantasy & Utopia ! Welcome to FeministSF - a list for fans, writers, activists and scholars to discuss feminist science fiction. Your list owner is Laura Quilter (lauramd@uic.edu). To unsubscribe, mail a message to: listserv@listserv.uic.edu and in the body of the message type: unsubscribe feministsf If you have any problems contact the list-owner. For more information about Feminist Science Fiction, Fantasy & Utopian literature, please check out the femsf web pages at http://www.uic.edu/~lauramd/femsf/ -------------------------------------------------- ABOUT THE FEMINIST SF, FANTASY & UTOPIA LISTSERVE Interested in talking to other people about the works of Ursula Le Guin, Marge Piercy, Suzy McKee Charnas, Elisabeth Vonarburg, Joanna Russ, and many others? Want to find out more about these authors, and other writers like them? The Feminist Science Fiction, Fantasy & Utopia ListServe is a space for discussion of this literature. It is a mailing list, which means that every email will go to all subscribers mailboxes. It is a primarily unmoderated list, which means that I will not be selecting or censoring comments. People can ask whatever questions they want about the topic, with one broad exception. Because I have been on many listserves relating to feminism which have inspired anti-feminists to harass other members, or engage the entire listserve in discussions about the nature, purpose, etc., of feminism, I wish to make it clear from the outset that this listserve is for discussion of the literature. Discussion of feminism as a philosophy belong on a feminist discussion group. Discussion of feminism, as it pertains to literature or particular works of literature, is perfectly appropriate. I will remove people from the listserve who behave in an inappropriate manner after one warning. These rules are subject to change when we see how they work! This list began 3/2/97. -------------------------------------------------- Subscribing and Unsubscribing Use the online subscription request to subscribe only or send a message to: listserv@listserv.uic.edu and in the body of the message type: subscribe feministsf Your Name or unsubscribe feministsf Conversing with Fellow Participants To send a note to the discussion list and all its participants: send a message to: feministsf@listserv.uic.edu and in the body of the message type: Whatever your message is -------------------------------------------------- Please save this message for future reference, especially if this is the first time you subscribe to an electronic mailing list. If you ever need to leave the list, you will find the necessary instructions below. 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All commands must be sent to the "LISTSERV address", LISTSERV@LISTSERV.UIC.EDU. It is very important to understand the difference between the two, but fortunately it is not complicated. The LISTSERV address is like a FAX number that connects you to a machine, whereas the list address is like a normal voice line connecting you to a person. If you make a mistake and dial the FAX number when you wanted to talk to someone on the phone, you will quickly realize that you used the wrong number and call again. No harm will have been done. If on the other hand you accidentally make your FAX call someone's voice line, the person receiving the call will be inconvenienced, especially if your FAX then re-dials every 5 minutes. The fact that most people will eventually connect the FAX machine to the voice line to allow the FAX to go through and make the calls stop does not mean that you should continue to send FAXes to the voice number. People would just get mad at you. It works pretty much the same way with mailing lists, with the difference that you are calling hundreds or thousands of people at the same time, and consequently you can expect a lot of people to get upset if you consistently send commands to the list address. You may leave the list at any time by sending a "SIGNOFF FEMINISTSF" command to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.UIC.EDU. You can also tell LISTSERV how you want it to confirm the receipt of messages you send to the list. If you do not trust the system, send a "SET FEMINISTSF REPRO" command and LISTSERV will send you a copy of your own messages, so that you can see that the message was distributed and did not get damaged on the way. After a while you may find that this is getting annoying, especially if your mail program does not tell you that the message is from you when it informs you that new mail has arrived from FEMINISTSF. If you send a "SET FEMINISTSF ACK NOREPRO" command, LISTSERV will mail you a short acknowledgement instead, which will look different in your mailbox directory. With most mail programs you will know immediately that this is an acknowledgement you can read later. Finally, you can turn off acknowledgements completely with "SET FEMINISTSF NOACK NOREPRO". Following instructions from the list owner, your subscription options have been set to "MIME" rather than the usual LISTSERV defaults. For more information about subscription options, send a "QUERY FEMINISTSF" command to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.UIC.EDU. Contributions sent to this list are automatically archived. You can get a list of the available archive files by sending an "INDEX FEMINISTSF" command to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.UIC.EDU. You can then order these files with a "GET FEMINISTSF LOGxxxx" command, or using LISTSERV's database search facilities. Send an "INFO DATABASE" command for more information on the latter. This list is available in digest form. If you wish to receive the digested version of the postings, just issue a SET FEMINISTSF DIGEST command. Please note that it is presently possible for other people to determine that you are signed up to the list through the use of the "REVIEW" command, which returns the e-mail address and name of all the subscribers. If you do not want your name to be visible, just issue a "SET FEMINISTSF CONCEAL" command. More information on LISTSERV commands can be found in the LISTSERV reference card, which you can retrieve by sending an "INFO REFCARD" command to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.UIC.EDU. - updated 3/12/97 On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, lissa bloomer wrote: > Robin Gordon wrote: > > >Happy Monday everyone. I would like to suggest that the tangential > >discussion going on regarding the age old question "can men be > >feminists"is a bottomless pit which threatens to consume this list. Of > >course this is an, at times, interesting and potentially important > >discussion, I'd like to suggest that this isn't really the place for it, > >unless discussed with relation to sf (which is possible). While I can > >only speak for myself I expect other women on this list who are > >politically involved have been through this discussion more times than we > >can count, like myself, and don't necessarily want to run through it again > >here when there are so many interesting issues to discuss with relation to > >the lists theme of sf and feminism. After reading Stone's post I could > >have a lot to say in reaction, but just don't think this is the place. > > perhaps you can delete these posts and move onto the issues that you would > like to read about -- because many of us who are new to these ideas would > like to work through our thoughts. this is why i joined the list! i've been > what you would call "politically involved" for the past 15 years... and i > still find the subject of "what is feminism" -- no matter the tangentiality > -- question wonderfully enlightening. i think that if we can't understand > other's concerns and ideas on fem alone, how can we begin to complicate the > issue by bringing sf into the picture? and surely, the realm of fem will > change in the light of sf. > > -lissa bloomer > > > > > if you're wearing pants, thank my great great great grandmother. > > elisabeth bloomer > instructor, english > virginia tech > ebloomer@vt.edu > 540.231.2445 > Laura M. Quilter / lauramd@uic.edu Electronic Services Librarian University of Illinois at Chicago http://www.uic.edu/~lauramd/ "If I can't dance, I don't want to be in your revolution." -- Emma Goldman ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 09:16:37 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Laura Quilter Subject: "The Gothic, The Human, & The Inhuman." Comments: To: feministsf@uic.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > Date: Mon, 7 Apr 1997 16:10:14 -0600 > From: TERRY L. TAYLOR, CO-EDITOR, H-ALBION > To: Multiple recipients of list H-ALBION > Subject: CFP: "The Gothic, The Human, & The Inhuman." > > From: SMTP%"aschmidt@toto.csustan.edu" > "Arnold Schmidt" 7-APR-1997 15:50:54.41 > > PLEASE CROSS-LIST > > Call For Papers and Panels on > "The Gothic, The Human, & The Inhuman." > > I invite anyone interested in gothic themes to submit abstracts > for individual papers or panels which explore the gothic in relation to > "Constructions of the Human." Broadly, topics might include but are not > limited to gothic influences on identity in gender, race, or religion as > seen in gothic and horror fiction, television and films, the fine arts, or > poetry. > > More specific topics might treat "Frankenstein," "The Monk," > "Dracula," or other gothic novels and/or their adaptations; gothic poetry > (Young's "Night Thoughts" or other "Graveyard Poets," gothic ballads); the > gothic and the fine arts (Dore, Fuseli's "Nightmare"), roots of the gothic > (medieval archictecture, the slave and captivity narratives); postmodern > conceptions of the gothic (Sedgwick, et al); the female gothic > (Wollstonecraft's "Maria," Bronte's "Jane Eyre"); the Southern gothic > (O'Connor, Faulkner, etc.); the anti-gothic (Jackson's "The Lottery," > Stephen King's "Christine"); or the comic gothic ("Rocky Horror Picture > Show," "Young Frankenstein," "The Munsters," "The Adams Family.") > > For more information, please see the general CFP below. > > CONSTRUCTIONS OF THE HUMAN: > CONFLICTS IN CULTURE, IDENTITY, TECHNOLOGY > > First Annual Interdisciplinary Graduate Student Conference > CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, STANISLAUS October 17-19, 1997 > > We invite participants to explore "Constructions of the Human" in > American, British, and/or World literature from any disciplinary > perspective. Applicants working in such areas as Literature, Philosophy, > History, Sociology, Psychology, Law, the Sciences, and the Fine Arts > should submit abstracts of approximately 250 words for papers of 15 > minutes. > > Students might consider some aspect of the Human in relation to > Cyborg Theory, Film Theory, Technology and the Machine, Images of the > City, Identity, Gender/Sexuality, Reproductive Technology, The Monstrous, > Alterity, Class, Labor and Leisure, Authority, Childhood, the Sentimental, > Ethnicity, Personal/Public, and Literary vs. Nonliterary. > > Panels are especially welcome. > > A volume of essays arising from this conference is planned for virtual > publication. > > Conference Location: CSU, Stanislaus, in Northern California, is > situated midway between San Francisco and Yosemite. A day trip to > Yosemite for participants is planned. > > DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSION: April 18, 1997. > > > Send abstracts to: > > Interdisciplinary Conference Committee > English Department > c/o The Graduate Journal > California State University, Stanislaus > 801 W. Monte Vista Avenue > Turlock, CA 95382 > > Please direct questions and inquiries to: > > e-mail - gradjou@toto.csustan.edu > fax - (209) 667-3720 voice - (209) 667-3361 > > OR > Susan Campbell-Hartzell - schartze@toto.csustan.edu > schart@mlode.com > > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 11:16:05 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "L. Timmel Duchamp" Subject: Reading "errors" Nicola, when you talking about your "bloody learning experience," & Mike, when you talk about Butler's authorial unreliability, you may be both talking about how arbitrary a reader's relationship is to any fiction text. Readers often make mistakes of "fact" (i.e., missing material in the text that makes explicit a certain interpretation-- as in the case of Lauren's "hyperempathy"-- which I did pick up on in my reading, as a very telling detail that stuck in my mind-- or even changing the details in their memory, to accord with their own preconceptions & on-going [rather than after-the-fact] interpretation), & authors-- in an act of reading their own work, not writing it, though obviously "reading" is a necessary part of the total process of "writing"-- often insist on a simplicity of a single level-- the one they consciously intended-- to their work, denying that anything could be in the text but what they consciously intended. (Eudora Welty sticks in my mind as an author who becomes enraged at readers seeing anything but the surface of her stories.) I seriously wonder if anyone reads the same piece of fiction in the same way anyone else does. I'd be willing to bet any issue of _Locus_ you might pick up would manifest such errors in its reviews. (I catch such errors there constantly: & of course this holds true for other publications, & not just _Locus_.) It's not necessarily carelessness (though if the reviewer took the time to re-read the piece being reviewed, at least some of the mistakes might be caught-- often in deep puzzlement, that s/he could have been so grossly in error). It's just that all sorts of things-- from previous reading experiences, previous conceptions of the author's work, & all sorts of personal experiences in the life of the reader-- kick in when we read, sometimes even from the very first sentence. (Which is why I don't think the author has the responsibility to hit the reader over the head with a fact: showing, not telling, is always appropriate, except in political tracts.) In my experience, even when three people who are socially close and share the same political attitudes read the same book, they discover when they talk to one another about it that they've read three different books. [I don't say "completely" different books, but *substantially* different books. They almost never remember all of the same details. They weight themes differently. They are disappointed or excited for different reasons.] & then, in the process of discussion, the person who has the most forceful & structured articulations of what s/he read ends up shaping the other two readers' memories of what *they* read.) I myself have been through this process-- with the same two other people-- with many, many books. It might not be totally off-the-wall to hypothesize that people develop a consensus about what any given piece of fiction is about strictly through public discussion (meant broadly). If so, public discussion then becomes the lens through which a particular work is read. And "public discussion," of course, includes lists like this one. Timmi Duchamp ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 08:02:29 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: sue hagedorn Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" --surprise, >surprise--they actually put obviously black characters on the covers >(which wasn't the case when the books first came out). Yes--It's very interesting, too, that when I had a class of freshmen read Dawn, they were at first oblivious to any mention of race (that book illustrator too obviously had not read the book itself)--when it was pointed out to them, they changed some of their perceptions about the story line. That helped me make a point (my "theme" was "What Does it Mean to be Human?")--but I was a bit surprised at the reaction. (I guess I've been reading SF too long--since my first Ace double back in the '50s!) Sue ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 07:45:56 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: _Parable of the Sower_ In-Reply-To: <19970408.222922.20046.0.avs5@juno.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, Anne V Stuecker wrote: > When I read a book (I try to refrain from "novel" because a > novel-length SF piece isn't really a novel) NH: Anne, can you talk about this part a little more? -nalo "Starchild here. Put a glide in your stride, and a dip in your hip, and come on over to the Mothership." P-Funk, "Mothership Connection" ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 07:43:03 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, Michael Marc Levy wrote: > As Nicola Griffith said in an earlier post, more or less, how far can we > trust an author when her statements about a story seem contradicted by > the story itself? NH: I see this happening often, with all kinds of artmaking. Sometimes the artist is not the best person to ask for an analysis of her work; a lot of it happens on an unconscious level. -nalo -nalo "Starchild here. Put a glide in your stride, and a dip in your hip, and come on over to the Mothership." P-Funk, "Mothership Connection" ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 10:45:52 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Edrie Sobstyl Subject: Re: BEAUTY Comments: To: Maryelizabeth Hart In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII It's great to be on a list where people recognize the greatness of Tepper!! I'm currently working on an article on _Women's Country_, and hope to post the citation to the list if/when I get one. To respond to Maryelizabeth's post, there's a certain irony in Tepper condemning horror writers to Hell - since she is herself a horror writer and a damn good one! She has two novels (sorry can't remember the titles, they're on the home shelf) under her own name and one published pseudonymously as E. E. Horlak called _Still Life_. All three of them left me unable to sleep for quite some time. So it's fitting that she writes such horrific scenes as those in _Side Show_ and elsewhere, as she definitely places herself in the text. Just as in _Women's Country_, the sentiment is clear: we *are* in Hell!! Edrie Sobstyl School of Arts and Humanities JO 31 University of Texas at Dallas P.O. Box 830688 Richardson Tx 75083-0688 USA (972) 883-2365 esobstyl@utdallas.edu On Tue, 8 Apr 1997, Maryelizabeth Hart wrote: > I'm a HUGE Tepper fan. However, did anyone else have problems with her > total and absolute condemnation of horror writers to Hell? Which she then > followed with an incredibly horrorific scene in _Sideshow_? > > If every author has her ups and downs, _Beauty_ had a little of both. I > think _A Plague of Angels_ and _Shadow's End_ were good Tepper without > being great Tepper. However, I was very happy with _Gibbon's Decline and > Fall_, and would love a discussion on what choice readers feel was made at > the end. And I think her current book, _The Family Tree_, may end up being > my favorite. > > > Maryelizabeth > Mysterious Galaxy 619-268-4747 > 3904 Convoy St, #107 800-811-4747 > San Diego, CA 92111 619-268-4775 FAX > http://www.mystgalaxy.com > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 12:20:19 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Maryelizabeth Hart Subject: _Beauty_ and more Tepper (long) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Tepper's horror, written under her own name, rather than the one novel already mentioned as E.E. Horlak (_Still Life_) included two novels -- _The Bones_ and _Blood Heritage_ -- and a stunning vampire novella, "The Gardener", published in _Night Visions 6_, aka _The Bone Yard_. Her SF novels include (more or less chronologically): _The Revenants_ _King's Blood Four_* _Necromancer Nine_* _Wizard's Eleven_* _The Song of Mavin Manyshaped_* _The Flight of MM_* _The Search of MM_* _Jinian Footseer_* _Devrish Daughter_* _Jinian Star-Eye_* * a trio of trilogies set in the same fantastic world _The Awakeners_ (_Northshore, Vol. I_; _Southshore, Vol. II_) _Marianne, the Magus, and the Manticore_ _Marianne, the Madame, and the Momentary Gods_ _Marianne, the Matchbox, and the Malachite Mouse_ _After Long Silence_ _The Gate to Women's Country_ _Beauty_ _Grass_ \ _Raising the Stones_ loose trilogy _Sideshow_ / _A Plague of Angels_ _Shadow's End_ _Gibbon's Decline and Fall_ _The Family Tree_ She also writes mysteries under two psuedonyms: The Jason Lynx mysteries by A.J. Orde: _A Little Neighborhood Murder_ _Death and the Dogwalker_ _Death for Old Time's Sake_ _Dead on Sunday_ (aka _Looking for the Aardvark_) _A Long Time Dead_ The Shirley McClintock mysteries by B.J. Oliphant: _Dead in the Scrub_ _The Unexpected Corpse_ _Deservedly Dead_ _Death and the Delinquent_ _Death Served up Cold_ Not that I'm an obsessive completist, or anything. But I thought folks might like to know. A lot of people I speak with feel she is too strident, and that her message gets in the way of her writing.(At least with works post _Gate..._) Any thoughts? Maryelizabeth Mysterious Galaxy 619-268-4747 3904 Convoy St, #107 800-811-4747 San Diego, CA 92111 619-268-4775 FAX http://www.mystgalaxy.com ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 13:23:43 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nomi Liron Organization: Bay Area Frog Kingdom/Royal Palace Subject: Tepper's feelings against homosexuality MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I am a great fan of Tepper, but one thing that really bothers me is her implied stance against homosexuality. It is really apparent in passages in "Gate to Women's Country" where "gay syndrome" is explained as having originated from abnormal hormone levels during pregnancy. In the new society the women build and create from the ashes of the old, "gay syndrome" was identified and corrected at birth. I have generally found Sci Fi writers to be more open to alternative forms of sexuality, so the sentiment puzzles me. Does anyone else have difficulties with this issue? drink water, nomi ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 16:41:32 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Edrie Sobstyl Subject: Re: Octavia Butler:_Parable of the Sower_ Comments: To: sue hagedorn In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sue, what a joy to find someone else teaching _Dawn_ in a class on what it means to be human!! I tried it out for the first time last semester and it was a rousing success. The bookstore bought up the last of the "old" covers with the buxom white brunette featured prominently (of course with jumpsuit open to reveal cleavage), and many of my (145) students also missed the mention of race. Since race and sex are problematized throughout the course (along with class), this object lesson made my claims more striking to the students. A number of students who dreaded being "forced" to read sf, which they expressed a hatred for without having read before, had their minds changed and began to devour the rest of the trilogy, and a number of African-American women students were particularly pleased, delighted, and inspired to have been introduced to Butler. Any other comments on *teaching* Butler? edrie *********************************** Edrie Sobstyl School of Arts and Humanities JO 31 University of Texas at Dallas P.O. Box 830688 Richardson Tx 75083-0688 USA (972) 883-2365 esobstyl@utdallas.edu On Wed, 9 Apr 1997, sue hagedorn wrote: > --surprise> >surprise--they actually put obviously black characters on the covers > >(which wasn't the case when the books first came out). > > Yes--It's very interesting, too, that when I had a class of freshmen read > Dawn, they were at first oblivious to any mention of race (that book > illustrator too obviously had not read the book itself)--when it was > pointed out to them, they changed some of their perceptions about the story > line. That helped me make a point (my "theme" was "What Does it Mean to be > Human?")--but I was a bit surprised at the reaction. (I guess I've been > reading SF too long--since my first Ace double back in the '50s!) > > Sue > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 16:46:20 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Edrie Sobstyl Subject: Re: Tepper's feelings against homosexuality In-Reply-To: <334BFACF.37B9@earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Hi Nomi, I am currently working through the anti-homosexual stance of _Women's Country_ in my article, although it's not central to my discussion. I would like to recommend Wendy Pearson's article "After the (Homo)Sexual: A Queer Analysis of Anti-Sexuality in Sheri S. Tepper's _The Gate to Women's Country_" published in Science-Fiction Studies Volume 23 1996 pp. 199-226 for a thorough discussion. edrie *********************************** Edrie Sobstyl School of Arts and Humanities JO 31 University of Texas at Dallas P.O. Box 830688 Richardson Tx 75083-0688 USA (972) 883-2365 esobstyl@utdallas.edu On Wed, 9 Apr 1997, Nomi Liron wrote: > I am a great fan of Tepper, but one thing that really bothers me is > her implied stance against homosexuality. It is really apparent in passages > in "Gate to Women's Country" where "gay syndrome" is explained as having > originated from abnormal hormone levels during pregnancy. In the new society > the women build and create from the ashes of the old, "gay syndrome" was > identified and corrected at birth. > I have generally found Sci Fi writers to be more open to alternative > forms of sexuality, so the sentiment puzzles me. > Does anyone else have difficulties with this issue? > > drink water, nomi > ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 12:21:05 +0200 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jason Griffin Subject: Re: Reading "errors" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit L. Timmel Duchamp wrote: > > Nicola, when you talking about your "bloody learning experience," > & Mike, when you talk about Butler's authorial unreliability, > you may be both talking about how arbitrary a reader's relationship > is to any fiction text. Readers often make mistakes of "fact" > (i.e., missing material in the text that makes explicit a certain > interpretation-- as in the case of Lauren's "hyperempathy"-- which > I did pick up on in my reading, as a very telling detail that > stuck in my mind-- or even changing the details in their memory, > to accord with their own preconceptions & on-going [rather than > after-the-fact] interpretation), & authors-- in an act of reading > their own work, not writing it, though obviously "reading" is > a necessary part of the total process of "writing"-- often insist > on a simplicity of a single level-- the one they consciously intended-- > to their work, denying that anything could be in the text but > what they consciously intended. (Eudora Welty sticks in my mind > as an author who becomes enraged at readers seeing anything but > the surface of her stories.) I seriously wonder if anyone reads > the same piece of fiction in the same way anyone else does. I'd > be willing to bet any issue of _Locus_ you might pick up would > manifest such errors in its reviews. (I catch such errors there > constantly: & of course this holds true for other publications, > & not just _Locus_.) It's not necessarily carelessness (though > if the reviewer took the time to re-read the piece being reviewed, > at least some of the mistakes might be caught-- often in deep > puzzlement, that s/he could have been so grossly in error). It's > just that all sorts of things-- from previous reading experiences, > previous conceptions of the author's work, & all sorts of personal > experiences in the life of the reader-- kick in when we read, > sometimes even from the very first sentence. (Which is why I > don't think the author has the responsibility to hit the reader > over the head with a fact: showing, not telling, is always appropriate, > except in political tracts.) In my experience, even when three > people who are socially close and share the same political attitudes > read the same book, they discover when they talk to one another > about it that they've read three different books. [I don't say > "completely" different books, but *substantially* different books. > They almost never remember all of the same details. They weight > themes differently. They are disappointed or excited for different > reasons.] & then, in the process of discussion, the person who > has the most forceful & structured articulations of what s/he > read ends up shaping the other two readers' memories of what *they* > read.) I myself have been through this process-- with the same > two other people-- with many, many books. > > It might not be totally off-the-wall to hypothesize that people > develop a consensus about what any given piece of fiction is about > strictly through public discussion (meant broadly). If so, public > discussion then becomes the lens through which a particular work > is read. > > And "public discussion," of course, includes lists like this one. > > Timmi Duchamp People a book is to be enjoyed, have fun. When I read a book buy Margerat Weis I don't sit there thinking about why she wrote about something. Or with Robert Johnson's book one of the Lightbringer trilogy who brings in the theme of vampires..OOO Gothic and vapirism. It's just a book for crying out loud, somebodies imagination. When I was at school one of my subjects was English, of course we studied poetry and mostly South African poets since I live in South Africa. One day we had a interview with one of the poets Sipho Sipambla. About 80% of the teachers interpretations of the poems made him either laugh your sigh. Humans read too much into things. That's all I can say. We take ourselves to seriously and must learn to laugh at ourselves. Try it sometime it might be refreshing. Jay Dragonheart. ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 12:27:05 +0200 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jason Griffin Subject: Re: Tepper's feelings against homosexuality MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Nomi Liron wrote: > > I am a great fan of Tepper, but one thing that really bothers me is > her implied stance against homosexuality. It is really apparent in passages > in "Gate to Women's Country" where "gay syndrome" is explained as having > originated from abnormal hormone levels during pregnancy. In the new society > the women build and create from the ashes of the old, "gay syndrome" was > identified and corrected at birth. > I have generally found Sci Fi writers to be more open to alternative > forms of sexuality, so the sentiment puzzles me. > Does anyone else have difficulties with this issue? > > drink water, nomi Nomi I must say it depends greatly on individuals. I for one am uncomfortble with gays[ doesn't mean I'll go gay bashing], it's just the way I am but I'm fine with lesbians. I have noticed that a lot, most people are fine with homosexuality in the opposite sex. I agree though usually authors are a little more open but then it also depends on the section of SF aimed at. Jay ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 17:31:41 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Laura Quilter Subject: Re: Tepper's feelings against homosexuality In-Reply-To: <334BFACF.37B9@earthlink.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII This is interesting to me too. Actually, in her most recent work (FAMILY TREE) she has one character go off on a tirade about discrimination (just as casually as she mentions the gay thing in GTWC). The character rants about all the various forms of discrimination and treating people as inferior, and she includes homosexuality as a form of discrimination. The only thing in Tepper's works that I've ever considered homophobic was that passage in GTWC. And what I've concluded was that GTWC was a thought experiment in the grand style. It was NOT her ideal utopia. She posited some people, a situation, and decisions they might take. I think it is reasonable to guess that people who found a specific cause for homosexuality might eliminate that. Is that just or even a good idea? I don't think so and for personal reasons certainly hope no such thing ever comes to pass. But it's a possible decision. The leaders of Women's Country made a lot of decisions that *I* find ethically questionable. I think Tepper does, too, which is why the matriarch figure (using the term loosely) calls the leaders "the damned few." Of course, one could also assume that she is, or has been, somewhat "homophobic," but believes (at least now) that economic / political discrimination against queers is wrong. On Wed, 9 Apr 1997, Nomi Liron wrote: > I am a great fan of Tepper, but one thing that really bothers me is > her implied stance against homosexuality. It is really apparent in passages > in "Gate to Women's Country" where "gay syndrome" is explained as having > originated from abnormal hormone levels during pregnancy. In the new society > the women build and create from the ashes of the old, "gay syndrome" was > identified and corrected at birth. > I have generally found Sci Fi writers to be more open to alternative > forms of sexuality, so the sentiment puzzles me. > Does anyone else have difficulties with this issue? > > drink water, nomi > Laura M. Quilter / lauramd@uic.edu Electronic Services Librarian University of Illinois at Chicago http://www.uic.edu/~lauramd/ "If I can't dance, I don't want to be in your revolution." -- Emma Goldman ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 02:37:24 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Barbara Harman Subject: Re: BEAUTY Jack Zipes is a local (Minnesotan) who teaches at the University of Minnesota. "Don't Bet on the Prince" sounds like one of his. He also did a collection of all the different variations on Little Red Riding Hood. Though I don't remember the title, I'm sure it was provocative as well. Thanks for the correction on "The Armless Maiden." I have not made it to the end of the book yet (chilling indeed!) so was not aware of Windling's more personal association. Barbara ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 19:07:54 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nalo Hopkinson Subject: Re: BEAUTY In-Reply-To: <970409023723_-1603209112@emout09.mail.aol.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 9 Apr 1997, Barbara Harman wrote: > Jack Zipes is a local (Minnesotan) who teaches at the University of > Minnesota. "Don't Bet on the Prince" sounds like one of his. He also did a > collection of all the different variations on Little Red Riding Hood. NH: I'd really be interested in reading this, if anyone knows the title. I'll try looking it up on my public library database too. Though > I don't remember the title, I'm sure it was provocative as well. Thanks for > the correction on "The Armless Maiden." I have not made it to the end of the > book yet (chilling indeed!) so was not aware of Windling's more personal > association. NH: Oops. Sorry, Barbara, and anyone else for whom I may have revealed too much too soon. -nalo "Starchild here. Put a glide in your stride, and a dip in your hip, and come on over to the Mothership." P-Funk, "Mothership Connection" ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 16:13:46 -0800 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Laura Wigod Subject: Re: Tepper's feelings against homosexuality In-Reply-To: <334B6EF9.E52@griffin.co.za> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Nomi I must say it depends greatly on individuals. I for one am >uncomfortble with gays[ doesn't mean I'll go gay bashing], it's just the >way I am but I'm fine with lesbians. I have noticed that a lot, most >people are fine with homosexuality in the opposite sex. I agree though >usually authors are a little more open but then it also depends on the >section of SF aimed at. > >Jay Hahaha! Forgive me for posting off-topic, but I just couldn't let this one slide. "People" aren't fine with homosexuality in the opposite sex - MEN are ok with _women_ having sex with each other, and only because they envision lesbian sex to be the type they see in straight guy pornography - you know - lots of peach satin and long red nails and wishing "if only a man would join us" kinda crap. I think the reason men feel threatened by male homosexuality is because they know better than anyone how sexually agressive men can be (this is not entirely their fault, BTW - a lot of it is pure socialization - ever been to a lesbian bar? You get to watch dozens of women standing around wishing someone would ask them to dance! :-D) - it never _occurs_ to them that women could be sexually agressive at all. So men get creepy when they think _they_ could get hit on with the same fervor they hit on women with! I don't think most straight men take lesbianism very seriously - there's a tendency to think "if they just met the right guy." The concept of lesbianism has historically been so difficult for men to wrap their minds around that, while there are thousands of anti-sodomy laws on the books throughout the world, there are very few anti-lesbian-sex laws. Getting off my soapbox now.........with a promise to reply on-topic next time! Laura ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 19:22:16 -0400 Reply-To: Joel VanLaven Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Joel VanLaven Subject: Re: Tepper's feelings against homosexuality In-Reply-To: <334BFACF.37B9@earthlink.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Wed, 9 Apr 1997, Nomi Liron wrote: > I am a great fan of Tepper, but one thing that really bothers me is > her implied stance against homosexuality. It is really apparent in passages > in "Gate to Women's Country" where "gay syndrome" is explained as having > originated from abnormal hormone levels during pregnancy. In the new society > the women build and create from the ashes of the old, "gay syndrome" was > identified and corrected at birth. > I have generally found Sci Fi writers to be more open to alternative > forms of sexuality, so the sentiment puzzles me. > Does anyone else have difficulties with this issue? > > drink water, nomi > Yes. I too have some problems with Tepper in that regard among others. I really apreciate some of her ideas and like her writing style sometimes as well. However, she seems harsh and angry. She repeatedly comes back to religion as an all-encompassing evil. I'm not much of a supporter of most organized religions, but I feel like she takes it a bit too far. I had noticed mostly a distinct lack of homosexuality in her work. (though _Gibbon's_Decline_and_Fall_ has a little bit). I suppose we must read her writing with salt and wariness as we should everything. About sexuality and feminism. I think my personal feminist philosophy might best be described as "Queer Theory." I am of the opinion that we must examine and quite probably replace the societal distinctions that we now make. What is more, I think that as a society and as individuals we must always be conciously examining everything that we can. I don't think we can ever rest on our laurels. I don't think that Sexuality and Gender mean much. Also, they are very tightly tied together. Is there even such a thing as sexuality? In a world where gender is motly irrelevant would there even be questions about sexuality? In my experience there has rarely (perhaps never) been a time when someone's specific sexuality and/or sex/gender mattered much except as determined by society. There are a myriad different kinds of people, actually the same number as there are people. The person who is perfectly normal in every way is the real freak. It seems like many books that explore Queer ideas almost have to be sci-fi (that or non-fiction). How better to explore these ideas than imagining worlds where things are different. On a side note, has anyone else read much David Brin? I love his books. In many ways they seem feminist/queer. (Though perhaps not with as much of a focus on that aspect as other writers). In particular, _Glory_Season_ is an interesting look into feminist issues without being overly utopian or overly critical. (In my opinion). In some of his other books he refers to humans as "fems" and "mels" (women and men). This breaks the male domination of the general term for human (can't remember what he used for that). I thought that was neat. Love the list, just too much a bad writer to say much (sigh). -- Joel VanLaven ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 20:32:31 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: lissa bloomer Subject: Zipes Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" yes, the book is called _Don't Bet on the Prince: Contemporary Feminist Fairy Tales in North America and England_ by Jack Zipes. Routledge... ISBN 0-415-90263-0 for those of you who want to order it. his other one you guys mentioned is _The Trials and Tribulations of Little Red Riding Hood_ (1983). -lissa if you're wearing pants, thank my great great great grandmother. elisabeth bloomer instructor, english virginia tech ebloomer@vt.edu 540.231.2445 ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 9 Apr 1997 21:02:43 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: