Subject: File: "FEMINISTSF LOG9708A" ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 13:48:30 +0000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: schant Subject: Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I'm currently half way through this on the grounds that I've paid for it and am damn' well gonna read it. A few questions spring to mind. Why is it always sunny in utopia-land? Why are all good-guys so sweeeeeet and lacking in individuality? How did they transform a major city into a garden paradise in only a few years without sewers collapsing, derelict buildings becoming unsafe, rats overrunning the place, etc? How do they manage to have all the useful bits of technology they want without the manufacturing side - inventing wonderful crystals that do all the difficult bits just wont cut it. In other words, is it a feminist utopia because its only about spirituality? Are there any feminst utopias that actually "like" technology and make an effort to incorporate it sensibly into the story? Are there any characters in a utopia who drink beer, play pool, and are rude to the neighbours now-and-again? Cheers SC -- "Take what you want", said God. "Take it - and pay for it." Old Spanish proverb, quoted in "South Riding" by Winifred Holtby ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 09:08:48 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Kate Bolin Subject: Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing In-Reply-To: <33E1E92E.6215@schant.demon.co.uk> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > I'm currently half way through this on the grounds that I've paid for it > and am damn' well gonna read it. > A few questions spring to mind. Why is it always sunny in utopia-land? > Why are all good-guys so sweeeeeet and lacking in individuality? How did > they transform a major city into a garden paradise in only a few years > without sewers collapsing, derelict buildings becoming unsafe, rats > overrunning the place, etc? How do they manage to have all the useful > bits of technology they want without the manufacturing side - inventing > wonderful crystals that do all the difficult bits just wont cut it. In > other words, is it a feminist utopia because its only about > spirituality? Are there any feminst utopias that actually "like" > technology and make an effort to incorporate it sensibly into the story? > Are there any characters in a utopia who drink beer, play pool, and are > rude to the neighbours now-and-again? Thank Gods.....someone else thought this book was just a little too....much. Now I add my complaints. Why is it that the gay men have their own little space (their "fairy section") but there isn't any separate women's space? Why do these people praise the Goddess in all her incarnations, but get queasy when it comes to violence? After all, the Goddess does have her violent, blood-sacrifice side. And why do all the white people down in Southern California seem to be perfectly okay when it comes to skin cancer, but every white person in the North is dying of it? And why does Southern California have to be the bad guys? (Okay....no La-La Land jokes now...) I should have just stuck to Octavia Butler. She may be optimistic, but she's also practical. Kate Bolin ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 11:27:52 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Joel VanLaven Subject: Dreaming Metal In-Reply-To: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Thu, 31 Jul 1997, Michael Marc Levy wrote: > > > > Also, I'd like to pose an earlier question that didn't garner much response > > last month -- I hope some new people on the list may be able to answer. Can > > anyone recommend any other good feminist science fiction that deals with > > issues of race and class? (I can HARDLY WAIT for Nalo's novel! Public > > kudos, I'm really thrilled.) > > > > Holly > > > Melissa Scott deals with class issues as well as anyone in science > fiction. See particularly Night Sky Mine and Dreaming Metal. I just read _Dreaming Metal_ and while I generally like her work, I found it lacking. I would rather recommend _Dreamships_ which deals with all the exact same issues (_Dreaming Metal_ is it's sequel (sort of)). If you really like _Dreamships_ and want to read something well written in the same universe that deals with many of the same underlaying ideas but with different details and largely different characters or you really want to know what happens "next" for them, then read _Dreaming Metal_. Of course that's all my own opinion. Perhaps Mike has a different opinion (he did recommend it). If so, I'd love to hear why I'm wrong because I'd like to get more out of it. -- Joel ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 16:59:33 +0100 Reply-To: joanharan@dial.pipex.com Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Joan Haran Subject: Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing (Long reply to SC and Kate) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit I really enjoyed The Fifth Sacred Thing, and I wonder sometimes just how much our own preconceptions blinker us to particular aspects of what we read - it is a cliche in certain circles that the reader constructs the text, but obviously we are trying here to create some common ground for discussion: SC said: > > I'm currently half way through this on the grounds that I've paid for it > > and am damn' well gonna read it. I'm sure there's some exaggeration for effect going on here, but is this really the spirit in which to approach a novel? If you're already feeling so negative towards it, is there really any hope that you will get anything positive from your reading, or are you just searching for ammunition to back up your original bad impression? > > A few questions spring to mind. Why is it always sunny in utopia-land? This did not particularly strike me - although in the context of a future where water is the most precious commodity - always sunny - does not seem like such a huge privilege. > > Why are all good-guys so sweeeeeet and lacking in individuality? I did not get this impression at all. Many of the most central characters are presented as flawed eg Madrone's pride about healing causes her to overreach herself, Madrone and Bird have terrible difficulties readjusting to each other on his return eg the fight over moving Sandy's plant, Madrone's lack of understanding about how sleeping with Hijohn would affect Katy and so on... I thought that the City Councils demonstrated how principled negotiation was an attempt to take account of individuality. How did > > they transform a major city into a garden paradise in only a few years > > without sewers collapsing, derelict buildings becoming unsafe, rats > > overrunning the place, etc? It's twenty years, not a few years. There is no sense of a paradise - they eat a very limited diet of food they grow themselves except on feast days and as water is such a big issue I would guess that sewers would be an item of the infrastructure on which they focused a great deal of attention. Perhaps this amount of "progress" would not be feasible, but this is a fiction, and its an interesting vision that Starhawk has created. How do they manage to have all the useful > > bits of technology they want without the manufacturing side - inventing > > wonderful crystals that do all the difficult bits just wont cut it. I agree that this is problematical, but I thought it was an interesting conceit - this is a novel by an ecofeminist after all, so we might expect a different take on science/sustainability etc. In > > other words, is it a feminist utopia because its only about > > spirituality? I don't actually understand this question. For me, the interweaving of spirituality was intriguing as for most of my adult years (lapsed Catholic!) I have been very anti-spirituality - "religion is the opium of the people" - and so on, but now I am prepared to think about what spirituality offers to people who believe in/hope for/work for a better world. As a socialist and a feminist, until very recently I took an extremely condescending attitude to people who were "still blinded by religion", but now consider that to be a position that I really had not thought through fully. (as an aside, you might like to look at the various websites associated with Starhawk and see how pagan eco-feminists are committed to activism) Are there any feminst utopias that actually "like" > > technology and make an effort to incorporate it sensibly into the story? Have you read _Body of Glass_ - not strictly a Utopia, but technology is a central issue? Piercy's earlier _Woman on the Edge of Time_ is frequently critiqued in such a way as to imply it is purely pastoral but technology is integrated into that utopia. I guess it depends on what you mean by liking technology and your definition of sensible. Feminists have done a great deal of ground-breaking work on critiquing science and technology which have tended to be at the service of and under the control of male, white, middle class scientists with all the potential abuses that that suggests. For that reason, I believe that feminist science fiction is probably more ambivalent about "liking" science or technology. > > Are there any characters in a utopia who drink beer, play pool, and are > > rude to the neighbours now-and-again? Finish the book - I don't promise pool-playing but there are plenty of arguments and also celebrations. Kate said: > Now I add my complaints. Why is it that the gay men have their > own little space (their "fairy section") but there isn't any separate > women's space? Sorry, this didn't jump up and hit me. I was more intrigued by the ideal of communal living in Maya/Madrone's house. Perhaps my heterosexuality blinding me here. Altho' from my recollection the "fairies" were only one particular group of gay men - not the entire SF population of gay men. Why do these people praise the Goddess in all her > incarnations, but get queasy when it comes to violence? After all, the > Goddess does have her violent, blood-sacrifice side. This is not a homogeneous population - some worship the Goddess, some like Madrone seem to think of her more metaphorically, some are atheists, some are Catholics... The dark side of the Goddess is referred to very early on in the novel when Madrone loses a patient in childbirth. I think the novel is an extremely interesting experiment with the idea of non-violent resistance and if Starhawk or her characters are "queasy about violence" I am on their side. I would have serious ethical problems with using violence in the pursuit or protection of any point of view/way of life and I am glad that some people are willing to experiment with another way (see Starhawk's non-fiction for testimony on non-violent direct action) And why do all the > white people down in Southern California seem to be perfectly okay when it > comes to skin cancer, but every white person in the North is dying of it? I'll need to re-read to check this out. Does it have anything to do with the wide-spread pharmaceutical abuse in SC? Or to do with the eco-system being differently affected? Can you point me to the relevant chapters where skin cancer is discussed? > And why does Southern California have to be the bad guys? (Okay....no > La-La Land jokes now...) I don't live in the US, but I thought it was perhaps an extrapolation for a tendency amongst some Southern Californians to exhibit extreme paranoia about the threat to their lifestyles posed by illegal immigrants from Mexico. > I should have just stuck to Octavia Butler. She may be > optimistic, but she's also practical. Do you mean optimistic? I find her work pessimistic. And what do you mean by practical? To which of her works are you referring? I'm going to have to read the novel again now. I certainly did not think it was perfect although the casual sharing of sexual partners without consequent jealousy was one of the things which I found less believable. And the apparent success of the non-violent direct action was undermined by the use of violence by the SC troops who changed sides. Overall, however, I found it inspiring, in the sense that it made me think about activism, about sustainable living, about collective responsibility and so on. Perhaps it needs to be read with a suspension of technophilia and spirituality-phobia. Joan ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 11:41:23 -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: Dreaming Metal In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII On Fri, 1 Aug 1997, Joel VanLaven wrote: > On Thu, 31 Jul 1997, Michael Marc Levy wrote: > > > Melissa Scott deals with class issues as well as anyone in science > > fiction. See particularly Night Sky Mine and Dreaming Metal. > > I just read _Dreaming Metal_ and while I generally like her work, I > found it lacking. I would rather recommend _Dreamships_ which deals with > all the exact same issues (_Dreaming Metal_ is it's sequel (sort of)). If > you really like _Dreamships_ and want to read something well written in > the same universe that deals with many of the same underlaying ideas but > with different details and largely different characters or you really want > to know what happens "next" for them, then read _Dreaming Metal_. Of > course that's all my own opinion. Perhaps Mike has a different opinion > (he did recommend it). If so, I'd love to hear why I'm wrong because I'd > like to get more out of it. > > -- Joel > I doubt that it's a matter of right or wrong, Joel, but rather, I suspect, one of personal taste. I haven't read Dreamships and thus can't judge whether or not it's a better book than Dreaming Metal. The latter does have faults. It's a bit slow going at times and the plotlines get a bit messy, but, for me, these weaknesses are outweighed by the intelligent political commentary, the neat take on theater, stage magic and puppetry, and the interesting characters. I would agree with you that one should probably read Dreamships first. I didn't discover Melissa Scott until Trouble and her Friends and haven't had time to go back the earlier novels. Mike ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 09:45:19 -1000 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Daniel L Krashin Subject: Re: suggestions for teaching a short course... >Date: Thu, 31 Jul 1997 15:10:45 -0400 >From: Jen Hill >Subject: suggestions for teaching a short novel or short stories? >I'm teaching a freshman writing seminar this autumn called "Science Writes >Women/Women Write Science" which will start off with Frankenstein, look at >19th c. theories of biology and evolution, look at careers, >autobiographies, and writing of/by women scientists of the early 20th c., >and finally end with "a look to the future" with Donna Haraway's "A >Manifesto for Cyborgs" and either a short novel or a few short stories by >(a) female sf writer(s) in which technology and gender are prominent issues. >My problem: I'm not terribly well read in sf and what I _have_ read (novels >by Octavia Butler, Piercy, & LeGuin) are too long to teach in the two weeks >left in my semester. Any suggestions? I have not read Elizabeth Vonarburg, >although I've read some criticism of her which suggests that her work might >be of interest for this class... (She's not represented in Cornell's >library, alas.) >[snip] >Jen Hill >jh85@cornell.edu I enthusiastically second the nomination of "Bloodchild" by Octavia Butler. This is a great story, and its biological theme of parasitism sounds as if it might fit in well with your course. In a similar vein, "James Tiptree"'s short story, "The Screwfly Solution" is based on a straightforward extrapolation of biological pest control measures projected onto the whole human race. To ask a question of my own, why did you decide to only include science up to the early 20C? It seems to me that you are missing a lot of good stuff that way. For one thing, there weren't that many women in science at that time. For another, a lot of fascinating work in the areas of gender, reproduction, and evolution has been done in the last twenty years or so. For example, why not include some more recent examples of evolutionary thought about the role of reproductive strategies in human evolution, and the implications that has for the meaning of gender? These ideas aren't hard to understand, and while they may infuriate some, they are bound to stimulate discussion. (I don't know any specific books on the subject, but you could excerpt some chapters from Robert Wright's _The Moral Animal_ for starters.) Your course plan sounds extremely interesting, but I feel a little concerned that your students will be left with a misleading picture of what science has to say about women. I hope you will forgive my boldness in discussing your course; the best of luck in teaching it. Dan Krashin ------------------------------------------------------------------------- These opinions do not represent the Federal Government's opinion about anything in particular. ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 08:46:19 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Neil Rest Subject: Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing In-Reply-To: <33E1E92E.6215@schant.demon.co.uk> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" schant asked: >I'm currently half way through this on the grounds that I've paid for it >and am damn' well gonna read it. >A few questions spring to mind. Why is it always sunny in utopia-land? >Why are all good-guys so sweeeeeet and lacking in individuality? How did >they transform a major city into a garden paradise in only a few years >without sewers collapsing, derelict buildings becoming unsafe, rats >overrunning the place, etc? How do they manage to have all the useful >bits of technology they want without the manufacturing side - inventing >wonderful crystals that do all the difficult bits just wont cut it. In >other words, is it a feminist utopia because its only about >spirituality? Are there any feminst utopias that actually "like" >technology and make an effort to incorporate it sensibly into the story? >Are there any characters in a utopia who drink beer, play pool, and are >rude to the neighbours now-and-again? Easy: it's fantasy, not science fiction. Neil Rest ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 15:26:12 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Neil Rest Subject: Kurt Vonnegut's commencement address at MIT. Comments: To: NeilRest@xochi.tezcat.com Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >To: silent-tristero@world.std.com >From: Dan Franklin >Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 13:17:09 -0400 >Subject: Kurt Vonnegut's commencement address at MIT. >Forwarded-by: mpersico@erols.com (Matt Persico) > >Kurt Vonnegut's commencement address at MIT. > >=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= >Ladies and gentlemen of the class of '97: > >Wear sunscreen. > >If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. >The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, >whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own >meandering experience. I will dispense this advice now. > >Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth. Oh, never mind. You will not >understand the power and beauty of your youth until they've faded. But >trust me, in 20 years, you'll look back at photos of yourself and recall >in a way you can't grasp now how much possibility lay before you and how >fabulous you really looked. You are not as fat as you imagine. > >Don't worry about the future. Or worry, but know that worrying is as >effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum. >The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed >your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4 pm on some idle >Tuesday. > >Do one thing every day that scares you. > >Sing. > >Don't be reckless with other people's hearts. Don't put up with people >who are reckless with yours. > >Floss. > >Don't waste your time on jealousy. Sometimes you're ahead, sometimes >you're behind. The race is long and, in the end, it's only with yourself. > >Remember compliments you receive. Forget the insults. If you succeed in >doing this, tell me how. > >Keep your old love letters. Throw away your old bank statements. > >Stretch. > >Don't feel guilty if you don't know what you want to do with your life. >The most interesting people I know didn't know at 22 what they wanted to >do with their lives. Some of the most interesting 40-year-olds I know >still don't. > >Get plenty of calcium. Be kind to your knees. You'll miss them when >they're gone. > >Maybe you'll marry, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll have children, maybe >you won't. Maybe you'll divorce at 40, maybe you'll dance the funky >chicken on your 75th wedding anniversary. Whatever you do, don't >congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either. Your choices >are half chance. So are everybody else's. > >Enjoy your body. Use it every way you can. Don't be afraid of it or of >what other people think of it. It's the greatest instrument you'll ever >own. > >Dance, even if you have nowhere to do it but your living room. > >Read the directions, even if you don't follow them. > >Do not read beauty magazines. They will only make you feel ugly. > >Get to know your parents. You never know when they'll be gone for good. >Be nice to your siblings. They're your best link to your past and the >people most likely to stick with you in the future. > >Understand that friends come and go, but with a precious few you should >hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle, because >the older you get, the more you need the people who knew you when you were >young. > >Live in New York City once, but leave before it makes you hard. Live in >Northern California once, but leave before it makes you soft. Travel. > >Accept certain inalienable truths: Prices will rise. Politicians will >philander. You, too, will get old. And when you do, you'll fantasize that >when you were young, prices were reasonable, politicians were noble, and >children respected their elders. > >Respect your elders. > >Don't expect anyone else to support you. Maybe you have a trust fund. >Maybe you'll have a wealthy spouse. But you never know when either one >might run out. > >Don't mess too much with your hair or by the time you're 40 it will look >85. > >Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it. >Advice is a form of nostalgia. Dispensing it is a way of fishing the past >from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and >recycling it for more than it's worth. > >But trust me on the sunscreen. > > > ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 16:54:46 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Emilie Falc Subject: Re: Issues of Race and Class. Was Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Other books dealing with race and class: Starfarers, Transition, Nautilus, Metaphase by Vonda McIntyre Emilie ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 16:06:28 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Kate Bolin Subject: Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970801084619.006b221c@tezcat.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > >Are there any characters in a utopia who drink beer, play pool, and are > >rude to the neighbours now-and-again? > > Easy: it's fantasy, not science fiction. I think we just found the answer to everything. What do you think? ;) Kate Bolin ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 17:19:46 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Ildiko Paulovitch Subject: Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing Hey there Holly, Yes the prequel is out, "Walking to Mercury". Takes a closer look at Maya who is part of the first book. Liked "Fifth Sacred Thing" better than this one. Generally I like books that concentrate on the personal growth of one character, still no matter how close to true Maya is in WTM I couldn't warm up to this book like I did with FST. Maybe it was the re-hashing of the sixties thing that I couldn't relate to in WTM. I seem to like Starhawk's writing better when she is being a visionary and less of the confessional stuff (Maya is turning 40 in the book if I am not mistaken about the age Starhawk is). Still anything Starhawk writes is worth a twirl. ildiko ========================================================================= Date: Fri, 1 Aug 1997 22:44:20 +0100 Reply-To: joanharan@dial.pipex.com Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Joan Haran Subject: Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Neil said: > Easy: it's fantasy, not science fiction. > Neil Rest Gosh Neil, if only everything were that simple! Joan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 01:39:49 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nicole Youngman Subject: Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing (Long reply to SC and Kate) << (as an aside, you might like to look at the various websites associated with Starhawk and see how pagan eco-feminists are committed to activism) >> Could I persuade you to post some url's if you have them handy? I thoroughly enjoyed 5th Sacred Thing but didn't enjoy Walking to Mercury as much--perhaps because it was too focused on "inner journey" type stuff, or perhaps because she got off on rants so often it got on my nerves. Every time Maya had a fight with someone it sounded like a rehash of all the current debates going on in Women's Studies departments (not that I didn't agree wih\th her though! ;-)). In any case I do think it was worth reading and I'll look forward to her next one. I'm also a big fan of Dreaming the Dark. Nicole ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 02:24:06 -0600 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Holly Yasui Subject: Re: Fifth Sacred Thing In-Reply-To: <199708011608.LAA63780@piglet.cc.uic.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" I've hestitated to participate in discussions here because I don't have access to my personal library to check out facts ... but, since I initiated the *Fifth Sacred Thing* discussion, I feel compelled to make some comments about the comments I've read. SC wrote: >> > Why are all good-guys so sweeeeeet and lacking in individuality? To me, the "good-guys" weren't like that; they were like many people I know and love (not always sweet and never lacking in individuality). What I noted, and appreciated, was that there were no self-indulgent jerks, slummers, or egotistical assholes in the FST utopia. Not only because it's "fantasy" ...there's a social/psychological reason, too. As Bruno Bettleheim noted, compassion, sharing, and the ability to cooperate were characteristics that most enabled Holocaust victims to survive (FST portrays a post-holocaust society created by the previously oppressed). This is also my take on the lack of "beer-drinking, pool-playing, rude neighbors." Joan wrote: >I thought that the City Councils demonstrated how principled negotiation >was an attempt to take account of individuality. I agree. Not the "oddball character"-type of individuality, but the kind of personal-rights individuality we want to protect within a democracy. SC wrote: >> > is it a feminist utopia because its only about spirituality? I don't think FST is "only about spirituality." To me, it's primarily about non-violent resistence, community, democracy, reconciliation and personal/social transcendence of barriers of race, class, and gender. It's a feminist utopia because women and men, in all their diversity, have equal rights and responsibilities. Regarding Kate's comment about "gay men and their 'fairy section'" ... I don't recall details either, but in a egalitarian society, women as a class don't need or necessarily want a "separate women's space." I too, however, would take exception to any homophobic implication ... but I just don't remember it: do ALL the gay men subscribe to this exclusivity? SC wrote: >How do they manage to have all the useful >> > bits of technology they want without the manufacturing side - inventing >> > wonderful crystals that do all the difficult bits just wont cut it. >Are there any feminst utopias that actually "like" >> > technology and make an effort to incorporate it sensibly into the >story? This brings to mind a Marian Zimmer Bradley story called, I think, "The Changing Wave" (I'm not sure of the title, please correct me if I'm wrong): Space sojourners return after many centuries to earth, expecting all sorts of high-tech advances but are disappointed to find a slow-paced, apparently pastoral low-tech society. It turns out that this society does have a highly advanced technology, but it's not in their faces all the time because they use it "appropriately" -- decentralized, non-commerical, as a tool and not an end in itself. They prefer a bucolic, personalized lifestyle (afforded by their advanced technology) to a high-tech lifestyle. As a sometimes computer consultant/teacher in a small town in central Mexico (I don't know that much about computers, just more than most of the folks I work with), I understand this preference. I appreciate science fiction ... or, excuse me, fantasy ... like FST that puts forth this possibility. It seems to me a far more sane direction of human development than the frantic, commericalized, impersonal and stressed-out high-tech environment that many friends who live in the U.S. complain about. Maybe FST is just the flip-side of the Linda Nagata society of *The Bohr Maker* (did someone call it nanotech or something? or is it cyberpunk? What is cyberpunk anyway?) Joan wrote: Feminists have done a great >deal of ground-breaking work on critiquing science and technology which >have tended to be at the service of and under the control of male, white, >middle class scientists with all the potential abuses that that suggests. >For that reason, I believe that feminist science fiction is probably more >ambivalent about "liking" science or technology. I think this is an excellent point and want to know more! Kate wrote: >Why do these people praise the Goddess in all her >> incarnations, but get queasy when it comes to violence? After all, the >> Goddess does have her violent, blood-sacrifice side. It seems to me that for the committed feminist pacifist community, any incarnation of the Goddess that includes "violent, blood-sacrifice" could not be taken as a true incarnation, but a warped militaristic, masculist appropriation. I'm not keen on many New Age goddess ideas, but I applaud Starhawk's rendition of a community that, holding to its spiritual and political principles, "wins" (i.e., survives) against the "might makes right" principle that in our bloody history of the conquerers always wins. Kate wrote:>> And why does Southern California have to be the bad guys? > Joan responded: >I don't live in the US, but I thought it was perhaps an extrapolation for a >tendency amongst some Southern Californians to exhibit extreme paranoia >about the threat to their lifestyles posed by illegal immigrants from >Mexico. I think Joan has absolutely hit the point. Not only "illegals," but also "legals," and other "lower-class" people of color. LA has more "minorities" -- Latino, Black and Asian -- than whites. When I lived there, I found the pervasiveness of ethnic ghettoization very striking (not that LA has a monopoly on racism and classism; it was just more apparent to me there than elsewhere). However, I think it's to Starhawk's credit that not all upper-class white Southern Californians are depicted as racist and militaristic ... there's a wealthy white woman who runs kind of an "underground railroad" that helps Madrone escape. >>I should have just stuck to Octavia Butler. She may be >>optimistic, but she's also practical. > >...I find her work pessimistic. And what do you mean >by practical? To which of her works are you referring? OK, let's talk about Butler! I found Xenogenesis neither optimistic nor pessimistic, but realistic about xenophobia (it will be extremely difficult to overcome, but it's possible, over generations; those who first "cross the line" may be reviled as traitors to their race but will in fact be saviors of another sort). Or have I opened another can of worms (bad joke). ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 04:28:51 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Arnett Subject: Re: Xena, Female Heroes (was Outer Limits) Comments: To: cynthia1960@home.com In a message dated 97-07-30 00:59:02 EDT, cynthia1960@home.com (Cynthia Gonsalves) writes: << I agree with Peggy, call a hero an hero. (I haven't gotten to the point where I start spitting bullets when the word heroine is used though). Cynthia >> Delurking to agree as wel....a female doctor is called Doctor not doctress. A female who performs heroic deeds is a hero. AJ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 04:28:56 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jane Arnett Subject: Re: what's selfish got to do with it? Comments: To: hwhipple@script.lib.indiana.edu In a message dated 97-07-30 13:53:07 EDT, hwhipple@script.lib.indiana.edu (Heather Whipple) writes: << The choice to not have children is as much a sacrifice of possibilities as the choice to have them--so why should one choice be considered more selfish than the other? Even for the "Tinks" in Melanie's story. How would they be less selfish if they added a child to all their belongings and extravagancies? If they *do not want children*, why is it selfish not to have them? *************** ******************** Heather Whipple Humanities Librarian hwhipple@script.lib.indiana.edu Swarthmore College >> I too have had difficulty in understanding how it could be considered selfish to choose not to have children. Your discussion shines a light where it was needed. I could never come up with a reason to have a child..except to see what kind of job I could do raising it and that did not seem like a good enough reason. I have asked a good many people why they chose to have children and so far the answers are less than adequate ( the worst among them...."so there would be someone to take care of me when I get old "). I would agree that it is a hugh sacrifice to raise children and bless those that choose to do so, but bless those that choose not to as well...the planet really doesn't need the strain. AJ ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 10:20:34 +0100 Reply-To: joanharan@dial.pipex.com Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Joan Haran Subject: Re: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing (Long reply to SC and Kate) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Nicole wrote: > << (as an aside, you might like to look at the various > websites associated with Starhawk and see how pagan eco-feminists are > committed to activism) >> > > Could I persuade you to post some url's if you have them handy? Starhawk's home page is at www.reclaiming.org/cauldron/starhawk/welcome The Reclaiming Collective (of which Starhawk is a member) home page is at www.reclaiming.org/cauldron/ Start at the Reclaiming page for some interesting links. > I thoroughly enjoyed 5th Sacred Thing but didn't enjoy Walking to Mercury as > much--perhaps because it was too focused on "inner journey" type stuff, or > perhaps because she got off on rants so often it got on my nerves. Every time > Maya had a fight with someone it sounded like a rehash of all the current > debates going on in Women's Studies departments (not that I didn't agree > wih\th her though! ;-)). In any case I do think it was worth reading and I'll > look forward to her next one. I'm also a big fan of Dreaming the Dark. > Walking to Mercury hasn't reached the UK yet, but I will be reading it once it does. By the way, on the web-site from which this list has arisen, Laura has some interesting personal thoughts on Fifth Sacred Thing which are well worth reading. Joan ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 11:33:22 -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: goddesses, Fifth Sacred Thing (Long reply to SC and Kate) Comments: To: Joan Haran In-Reply-To: <199708020927.EAA93890@piglet.cc.uic.edu> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I haven't read Fifth Sacred Thing. But there does sometimes seem to me to be a generic problem with feminist spirtuality novels. They can be just a little too goddamned nice! An exception is a novel I just read called "The Jigsaw Woman" by Kim Antineau (?). Its definitely post-modern in style, fragmented and non-linear. It contains a neat utopian past, before "Daddy" controlled all and spoiled all, but neatly avoids sentimentality because its protagonist is a smart assed, wise cracking and very witty woman. The book is about "a" woman who has been stitched together from various other (dead) women, and contains their memories and other memories of woman (usually suffering) through hsitory: dying in war, burning when accused of witchcraft, and suffering though sexual abuse. This novel deals only indirectly with technology: the Victor Frankenstein who stitches the woman together is trying to create a Barby Doll of other women's perfect parts (although moral absolutism and and stable grounds for judging others steadily retreats through the novel). The Female Man does deal with technology, but ambivilently (I think this may well be a charactistic of women's sf as another correspondant on this list neatly pointed out): its clear that it can be used for war in Jael's dystopia and in the pastoral post-industral world of Janet.Someone asked for a utopia where people are rude and fail- I can think of no better example than Delany's _Triton_, where the protagonist, Bron, definitely does not fit in, and the technical sophisication of this society (he can change sex at will) does not help at all.S/he is really a total prick: and what can any utopian society do about that? Tanya. ========================================================================= Date: Sat, 2 Aug 1997 18:30:47 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Comments: RFC822 error: Incorrect or incomplete address field found and ignored. From: Neil Rest Subject: hoax retraction [BURNED!!] In-Reply-To: <3.0.1.32.19970801181416.006c448c@pop.pipeline.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Once in a great while I spam my mailing list with something which I think is Really Neat. Like the "Kurt Vonnegut MIT Commencement Address". I was suckered. And to complicate matters, in trying to keep some useable room on my hard drive, I trash most outgoing mail as soon as it's sent (I usually have some idea of what I said, after all), so I have to reconstruct the list of addressees, which can't be done perfectly. *sigh* So here's what I was told: Dave Locke wrote: >Neil - > >A fast note to let you know the Vonnegut commencement address is a phony. >A good phony, but a phony. And it's getting sprayed all across the net. > >Yes, I'm positive. > >Bob Weide, Vonnegut's friend and the author & co-producer of the movie >rendition of "Mother Night", wrote: >:Yesterday I confirmed for the Vonnegut Newsgroup that the MIT address >:attributed to Kurt, and spread all over the Web, was a hoax. It was not >:written nor delivered by Kurt at MIT or anywhere. Copies of this thing were >:E-mailed to me from all corners -- even received one from Scotland. >: >:Well, it seems as though my response spread through the Internet almost as >:thoroughly as the speech itself. Today (8/1), my E-mailbox was full of >:letters from strangers, responding to my post. In any event, I can now >:clear up part of this mystery: >: >:There is a columnist for the Chicago Tribune named Mary Schmich. The words >:were hers, in her column from the June 1 issue of the Trib. She never >:passed it off as Vonnegut s, nor was his name ever evoked in the column. In >:fact, her column contained a prologue, missing on the Internet version, >:which I will reprint here... >: >:**************************************************************************** >: >:ADVICE, LIKE YOUTH, PROBABLY JUST WASTED ON THE YOUNG >: >: Inside every adult lurks a graduation speaker dying to get out, some >:world-weary pundit eager to pontificate on life to young people who'd >:rather be Rollerblading. Most of us, alas, will never be invited to sow >:our words of wisdom among an audience of caps and gowns, but there's no >:reason we can't entertain ourselves by composing a Guide to Life for >:Graduates. >: >: I encourage anyone over 26 to try this and thank you for indulging my >:attempt. >: >: Ladies and gentlemen of the Class of 97.... >: >:************************************************************************** **** >: >:The missing piece of this puzzle is: Who is Culprit Zero? That is, who >:originally placed it on the Internet, crediting it to Kurt? Mary Schmich, >:whom I spoke with today (a very nice woman, by the way), was horrified at >:the idea that anyone would think the deed was hers, or that she was trying >:to rip Kurt off. She told me she had read Cat s Cradle back in college, >:but that was about it. She s never heard him speak and couldn t consciously >:duplicate his style if she wanted to. She even tracked Kurt down on the >:phone today to explain what had happened and confirm her lack of >:culpability. Kurt was, of course, good natured about it. (Frankly, my fear >:is that this will be the new Venus on the Halfshell and that Kurt will be >:hounded over the next few years by people asking him about his MIT address.) >: >:One last point: Mary said that when her article originally appeared in the >:Tribune, she certainly received a favorable reaction and some nice phone >:calls, but that was all. Suddenly, the same words are credited to a >:well-known author, and it s being quoted and E-mailed all over the world >:within hours. Talk about the power of name recognition. Also, another >:lesson in individual responsibility, or lack thereof, in the computer age. >: >:I beleive Mary is now working on a column about all this for the weekend >: Tribune. John Gilmore sent me the same thing . . . Spider Robinson wrote: >Weirdly, this address, which I've been forwarded by 3 different people, has >been positively confirmed to be a forgery. By whom, and for what >conceivable purpose, I don't know...but Vonnegut stoutly maintains it's >totally bogus...though he admits to liking several of the lines. > >Who in his right mind would want to be mistaken for a WRITER? Even a >comparatively successful one? It's like that old joke about the starlet >who was so stupid she banged the writer... I suspect it's more "the folk process" . . . Neil ========================================================================= Date: Sun, 3 Aug 1997 01:00:07 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Nicole Youngman Subject: Re: hoax retraction [BURNED!!] This is hysterically funny. I sent it to a friend who's a bookstore mgr and he sent a note to tell me how wonderful it was...I suppose as a sociologist-in-training I should chalk this up to Urban Legend meets the 'net!! Nicole ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 09:59:50 +0100 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: F Mendlesohn Subject: Re: WARNING: horn toot In-Reply-To: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Congratulations Nalo, we will look out for it in the UK. Farah ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 08:54:16 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Jen Hill Subject: Re: suggestions for teaching a short course... In-Reply-To: <11980075@tamc.chcs.amedd.army.mil> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Dan (and everyone else who has been kind enough to respond!) -- Thanks for the suggestions! I'm busy checking all of them out and will let you know what I choose and how it fits. I think I didn't do such a hot course description on the list because I didn't want to bore... while we'll be reading primary texts, we will contextualize and counterpoint them with recent work by Evelyn Fox Keller, Londa Schiebinger, Sandra Harding, and others. And since this is a freshman writing course, we'll be doing a lot with how language functions re: gender, epistemology, etc. The late 19th/early 20th c. women in science section is designed to take advantage of Cornell's archives and teach research skills -- Cornell was the first US institution to grant science PhDs to women and they have a great collection of stuff from early students and female faculty. I expect my students to be primarily female engineering and science majors... and this will be one of the very few seminars they will take at college. In addition to teaching them certain interpretive models and getting them to think about issues, I want to provide a space where students can come to terms with their own identities as "scientific women". The Wright, etc. is a good suggestion... and I am compiling a a bibiliography for further readings. I'd appreciate any other suggestions. The good thing is that if any of these kids get hooked on this stuff, Cornell has a terrific Science & Technology (history/theory of science) Studies program and they can go on and learn much more. Thanks again. Jen ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 09:58:00 -0400 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Emilie Falc Subject: Re: suggestions for teaching a short course... In-Reply-To: MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Jen wrote: > we'll be doing a lot with how language functions re: >gender, epistemology, etc. A great film that delves into issues of science, ethics, epistemology, and language is Mindwalk. It's about three people who walk around Mont St. Michel and talk about Cartesian thought, the physics of an atom, ethical issues in science, politics, systems theory, and the inbalance of the masculine and feminine principles in Western society. It's very theoretical, but there are so many layers to it that bright students will appreciate the "heady" conversation. Even just a few clips from it will help spur discussion. Emilie ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 09:44:50 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Laura Quilter Subject: Brave Girls and Strong Women book list (fwd) Comments: To: feministsf@uic.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII FYI, y'all -- thought this might be of interest ... Laura Quilter / lauramd@uic.edu Electronic Services Librarian University of Illinois at Chicago ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 09:36:47 -0400 (EDT) From: Jyotsna64@aol.com To: progressive/alternative library community Subject: Brave Girls and Strong Women book list I have compiled a book list that others may be interested in. The Brave Girls and Strong Women Book list (http://members.aol.com/brvgirls) features over 40 little-known books (fiction and nonfiction) that empower girls. In other words, these books feature brave, intelligent, and/or resourceful girl characters who stand up for themselves, and/or strong women role models. The books are for ages 2-17, but the majority are for ages 4-14. The books are "little-known" because they are published by small publishers in the U.S. and Canada, and small publishers usually have small publicity budgets. I personally read over 100 books before selecting the books on my list, because I wanted to make sure they were interesting and fun to read, as well as empowering for girls. The books include collections of biographies, self-help books, history, folk tales, mysteried, and general fiction. I had a great time reading these books and felt like I was discovering "hidden treasure." You can find the list of books and descriptions on my Web site: http://members.aol.com/brvgirls, OR if you want a printed copy of the 6-page list and a handy bookmark, please send $1 and a self-addressed, stamped envelope to: Jyotsna Sreenivasan, P.O. Box 15481, Washington, DC 20003-0481. My Web site also lists about a dozen books for adults about girls' loss of self-esteem and what to do about this problem. As you may know, recent studies have shown that as girls approach adolescence their self-esteem tends to drop, leading to girls who do not try as hard, who do not take on leadership roles, and who can succumb to eating disorders and abusive relationships in later life. I hope this is helpful! Jyotsna Sreenivasan Writer/Editor jyotsna64@aol.com Brave Girls and Strong Women book list http://members.aol.com/brvgirls ========================================================================= Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 13:37:59 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: "Tamara K. Shaw" Organization: Silverhaven Productions Subject: Re: Brave Girls and Strong Women book list (fwd) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Laura Quilter wrote: > > FYI, y'all -- thought this might be of interest ... > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > Date: Mon, 4 Aug 1997 09:36:47 -0400 (EDT) > From: Jyotsna64@aol.com > To: progressive/alternative library community > Subject: Brave Girls and Strong Women book list > > I have compiled a book list that others may be interested in. The Brave > Girls and Strong Women Book list (http://members.aol.com/brvgirls) Thank you, Laura, for forwarding this. I went, I saw, I ordered...:-) My daughter will be twelve next month, because of this post she will now be receiving: The Moon Over Crete by Jyotsna Sreenivasan Behind the Bedroom Wall by Laura E. Williams and Happy Endings Are All Alike by Sandra Scoppettone Thanks Again!! Tamara tshaw@toolcity.net ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 5 Aug 1997 16:21:03 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Laura Quilter Subject: unimportant hooray from web-mistress Comments: To: feministsf@uic.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII We now have over 200 subscribers to the feministsf listserve! This is growing by leaps and bounds. I think it's clear that there's a great demand for an open discussion group on feministsf, and I'm really happy that there haven't been any problems with people getting on the list just to be jerks. Yeehah! Laura Quilter / lauramd@uic.edu Electronic Services Librarian University of Illinois at Chicago ========================================================================= Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 16:51:05 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Bonnie Gray Subject: Re: What to call those hero-ines? A hero is a hero. If the listener automatically assumes a male, and finds out s/he is wrong, all the better. Back from a 2 week vacation and non-lurking, Bonnie ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 21:43:16 -0500 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: DAVID CHRISTENSON Subject: Fortunate Fall MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii -- [ From: David Christenson * EMC.Ver #2.5.3 ] -- Just finished reading *The Fortunate Fall* by Raphael Carter. Some observations: A very ambitious first novel. Maybe too ambitious. Though it's never uninteresting or particularly confusing, and Carter manages to sift much background into the narrative, there are elements of the tale that seemed undeveloped. For example, my picture of the repressive society remained unclear through most of the book, as did the circumstances that led to that repressive society. It's quite dialogue-heavy, thus heavy on the info-dumping, particularly at the climax - nearly a hundred pages of dialogue, or rather characters exchanging monologues. But most of that final section is more or less in the form of a lengthy broadcast interview. (Elsewhere, the dialogue occasionally struck me as too-clever.) My reservations about the complexity and style aside, its gender-bending aspects are quite interesting. A lesbian reporter outlawed for lesbianism, artificially repressed, pursued in a romance via enhanced cyberspace while she investigates layered conspiracies. Meanwhile, the matter of gender equality is so taken for granted it never really seems to come up - perhaps an advantage to having a culture that's fully cyber -ized, where physical differences are moot? Any comments? -- David Christenson - ldqt79a@prodigy.com "The most merciful thing in the world is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents." - H.P. Lovecraft ========================================================================= Date: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 19:05:58 -0700 Reply-To: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" Sender: "For discussion of feminist SF, fantastic & utopian literature" From: Maryelizabeth Hart Subject: Two reviews Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The Moon and the Sun by Vonda McIntyre Pocket Books, $23.00. I don't use the word "compelling" often or lightly, but I found The Moon and the Sun compelling reading. Set in the court of Louis XIV, the Sun King, in a history which may or may not have been our own, McIntyre spins a tale of a king's quest for immortality and the "sea monsters" he looks to for the answers. A voyage to capture a sea monster yields both a deceased male and a live female, which are brought back to the court and the subject of studies to find a mystical organ granting immortality, directed by a young Jesuit priest. Admiring the "beasts" is all the rage, but no one but the priest's sister understands that these are sentient creatures, and that killing and eating them is tantamount to cannibalism. What drives this story is Marie's struggle to save her king from himself, in a court where perhaps the only creature with less power and position is the sea monster herself. McIntyre's vivid descriptions of court life and its excesses give the book both a fairy tale quality and a firm grounding in reality. Signed bookplates available while supplies last. --MeH The Misconceiver by Lucy Ferriss Simon & Schuster, $22.95. Comparisons to Margaret Atwood's Handmaid's Tale are inevitable, but this work stands on its own, not as an imitation. In the not-too-distant future, when the pendulum of reproductive rights has swung far back in the other direction from our current status, there is still a profession of women who bill themselves as "misconceivers." In a world without contraceptives, sexual harrassment laws, or protaction from incestuous abuse, these women continue their work in defiance of the law. What made this book work for me was that the main character, Phoebe, was not driven by politics, saving this from being a polemic. Instead, Phoebe is a misconceiver because her sister and her mother both were, and Phoebe saw the relief in the eyes of the women who came to them. A frightening and important book. --MeH 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: Thu, 7 Aug 1997 21:24:50 -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: Fortunate Fall In-Reply-To: <199708080143.VAA13672@mime3.prodigy.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII I liked Raphael Carter's novel a lot. In an article I wrote for a reference book last year I picked it as one of the two best first sf novels of the year, the other being Mary Doria Russell's Tiptree-Award winning The Sparrow. I really liked Carter's style; it's a bit ornate, but beautiful. And I also liked the way the various pop-in modules worked, particularly the African ones. The last part of the book is talky by conventional sf standards, but I saw it not so much as a narrative lump, but rather as a kind of "My Dinner with Andre"-style conversation or Platonic dialogue between a couple of fascinating people. The gender-bending material is interesting, particularly if you know something about Carter him/herself. Check out Carter's home page. It should be easy to find through any search engine. Mike