Icons and Classics
Alfvaen
Alfvaen stands up from the table where he's been having a quiet discussion
with Seawasp(well, hopefully quiet)and addresses the room in general.
"There's an interesting phenomenon that's been puzzling me for years now,
and a recent discussion on rec.arts.sf.written has made me want to bring
it up here.
"Somebody posted a request for 'bad' SF books--we're talking bad along the
lines of the movie 'Plan 9 From Outer Space' here, i.e. so bad it's good.
A lot of the responses were just book-bashing(so far I haven't seen any
Heinlein, so that's a good sign...), but some of them were rather serious.
A friend of mine recommended E.E. 'Doc' Smith's Skylark of Space books, or
whatever. She said they were bad, outdated, and filled with 'Americans
conquer the Universe' philosophy.
"What happened? She was flamed. One posted called her a 'benighted spawn
of a zwilnik', undoubtedly a pejorative term of some kind. And our own
Sea Wasp called her a 'blasphemer'.
"So I took Sea Wasp aside and we had a quiet discussion. His claim is
that Smith's writing and plots were a hell of a lot better than anything
else being written in SF at the time. The flaws that were in it were
shared by everything else being published in SF, the incredibly faulty
science was based on hypotheses that hadn't been contradicted(and
supposedly had been worked out thoroughly...), although they now seem
ludicrous to us(specifically, the belief that planets could only be
created in a galaxy-wide scale if two galaxies passed through each other,
so they could pull matter out of each other's stars to form the planets).
But anyway, it was a masterpiece considered in the context of its time, in
relative terms. So it was beyond reproach.
"My point of view is this: It may indeed have been better than anything
else in its field at the time. But much, much better stuff is being
written now. Sure, some years from now it may be considered old and
outdated, operating on scientific theories that seem reasonable now but
will look silly in terms of future discoveries, and making cultural
assumptions that are no longer made. But I still think that the vast
majority of work in my library is better than 'Doc' Smith's works. (From
hearsay--for honesty, I must admit to not having read any of his work.
And I'm not sure I want to do the penance of doing so...;-})
"Anyway, I believe that if a work is significant taken in the context of
its time, it's a breakthrough. If it's significant taken in the context
of modern times, it's a classic. I've read many 'classics', like the ones
they make you read in English courses. Well, not many, but I've been
making it a habit of reading more of them lately. Books like The Brothers
Karamazov, Les Miserables, Gulliver's Travels, etc. I found to have a lot
of statements of significance to them that make their historical context
near-irrelevant. Your mileage may have varied...
"But it got me thinking about such icons in general. What things are
respected on their own merits, and what things because of their historical
importance that now seems somewhat faded? Is it wrong to dislike those
things with historical importance that no longer seems relevant to today?
I like The Lord of The Rings quite a lot, and reread it regularly. I
consider it a classic of fantasy fiction. But lately I've encountered
more and more people who can't stand it, and can barely drag themselves
through it. So I've started to re-evaluate it. Does it really have all
the merits I imagined for it? Am I the enlightened one, and the others
only fit to read Eddings? Or am I deluded by it's historical
significance, blinding myself to the fact that Tolkien really wasn't a
very good writer? Which is right, if either?
"I have similar problems with music, only the other way around. I have
little respect for those who think that all the great music was made in
the '50's, or '60's, or '70's. I tend to think that great music is being
made today, and a lot of earlier music I can't stand, especially the
'early rock 'n' roll' like Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis, Buddy Holly, Chuck
Berry, Little Richard, etc. But I realize that for many people they were
significant because they represented a major change in the musical scene
over what had come before. I just can't stand most of their music. I try
to be open-minded, and not dislike them without a hearing, but I can't
find anything in them worth the respect they are given. I don't like to
limit myself, and I have been trying to explore earlier eras as well as
keeping up with the current one. I quite enjoy a lot of earlier bands.
Lately, too, I've been bemoaning the decreasing quality of music coming
out. Most of the new groups I've seen coming out in the past few months
have been fairly hard-rock bands like Mr. Big and Nirvana, it seems. I
wonder what happened to all the good music that was coming out in the
'80's. And then I catch myself. I don't want to be the '80's version of
one of those people who think that The Doobie Brothers, The Neville
Brothers, Traffic, Little Feat and Thin Lizzie were the pinnacle of
musical achievement, and bemoan the horrible music that came out
afterward.
"Can one avoid being tied to an era like that? Can one avoid being
attached to something because it's importance is related to something
other than intrinsic quality(if there such a thing)?"
--
---Alfvaen(a.k.a. Aaron V. Humphrey)
Canadian Network For Space Research, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Everybody wants prosthetic foreheads on their real heads.
Current Album--Pink Floyd:Dark Side of The Moon
"Everything under the sun is in tune, but the sun is eclipsed by the
moon."
Kateri/Mary Anne
I think you made a good distinction...in fact a crucial one, when
you distinguished 'classics' from other types of writing, music, etc.
We love books (and others...but I'll stick to books) for many
different reasons. Because they entertain, they illuminate, they explore,
etc...these are all perfectly good reasons to love something.
You can also love something because you get hooked....I know I tend
to go through the library by author rather than subject. In high school
I had to read Midsummer's....and I went to the library and swooped my way
through all of Shakespeare's comedies. Lest you think this is only true
for the classics...I've done the same with Dick Francis, Dorothy Gilman,
Anne McCaffrey..to name a few we've listed already.
Or you can love a subject - mystery, sf, travel, autobiography -
because that type of writing and what it does appeals to you - no matter
how badly it's written. I'm a hopeless romantic...and I read trashy
novels. Now, granted, I'd rather read a good romantic novel (when I'm
in the mood for such), but if a trashy is the only thing available...I'll
read it with pleasure.
I don't think there's anything inherently good or bad in whatever
your reasons are for reading...and the only thing that sets a 'classic'
off from other books is that it has endured. By that standard, the
Cinderella tale is a classic, whatever form it's told in...it's endured
a hell of a lot longer than Shakespeare or Dostoevsky so far.
- Kateri (who isn't sure if she
really made much of a point...oh well)
--
The autumn leaves are falling like rain.
Although my neighbors are all barbarians,
And you, you are a thousand miles away,
There are always two cups at my table. - A T'ang Dynasty poem
Ryk E Spoor
>A friend of mine recommended E.E. 'Doc' Smith's Skylark of Space books, or
>whatever. She said they were bad, outdated, and filled with 'Americans
>conquer the Universe' philosophy.
"I'm not sure if 'recommended' is the proper term when you're proposing
to 'honor' the book so chosen by condemning it to the literary equivalent of
the garbage heap..."
>"What happened? She was flamed. One posted called her a 'benighted spawn
>of a zwilnik', undoubtedly a pejorative term of some kind. And our own
>Sea Wasp called her a 'blasphemer'.
"FLAMED? She wasn't even exposed to temperatures above 90. I have
not yet begun to flame." :)
"I particularly LIKED the "benighted Spawn of a Zwilnik" line, though.
Obviously a fellow Doc Smith fan."
>"So I took Sea Wasp aside and we had a quiet discussion. His claim is
>that Smith's writing and plots were a hell of a lot better than anything
>else being written in SF at the time. The flaws that were in it were
>shared by everything else being published in SF, the incredibly faulty
>science was based on hypotheses that hadn't been contradicted(and
"And please don't forget that whenever he used science/tech that
was understandable by our standards, he was RIGOROUS in applying it. And
being an expert in a number of engineering and technical fields, he
was quite an authority. See Heinlein's tribute to Doc."
>"My point of view is this: It may indeed have been better than anything
>else in its field at the time. But much, much better stuff is being
>written now.
The Wasp shrugs. "This depends on what you consider BETTER, does
it not? For me, for example, the school of writing that started taking
the Heroes out and turning them into sniveling wimps or losers or even
evil that happened to do good was a step WAY down, and it would take a
monstrous amount of writing improvement to salvage it. (The Thomas
Covenant series salvaged itself only by the detail of the world and
the supporting cast. It was many years before I realized the Covenant
was actually a true Hero.)
"You can't write ANYTHING in the style of the 'classics' and get
it published today. It doesn't matter what the field of the classic is,
as long as it's 40 years old or more the stuff is unacceptable. Take
the Count of Monte Cristo. If Doc's prose is purple, Dumas' is VIOLET.
Or my favorite whipping whale, Moby Dick. If VERNE is considered long-
winded, Melville is the equivalent of a tornado.
"So by what STANDARD are you going to accept/reject books as
classics? I'm willing to accept Dickens as a classic even though he
bores me stiff. But then I'd hope that MY 'classics' would be acceptable
too. So WHAT IS A CLASSIC??"
>majority of work in my library is better than 'Doc' Smith's works. (From
>hearsay--for honesty, I must admit to not having read any of his work.
>And I'm not sure I want to do the penance of doing so...;-})
>"Anyway, I believe that if a work is significant taken in the context of
>its time, it's a breakthrough. If it's significant taken in the context
>of modern times, it's a classic.
"And what if that significance disappears in the next ten years?
Is it no longer a classic? What's 'significant' about Shakespeare? He doesn't
say one damn thing that anyone before him didn't say or that a lot of folks
since didn't say, his vocabulary and writing style aren't just outdated,
they are virtually incomprehensible without a glossary, and yet I will fight
viciously to keep him in the category 'classic'."
>the merits I imagined for it? Am I the enlightened one, and the others
>only fit to read Eddings?
"No, *I* am the Enlightened One. Trust me in all things.
>"I have similar problems with music, only the other way around. I have
>little respect for those who think that all the great music was made in
>the '50's, or '60's, or '70's.
"Personally, I agree. I can't stand the Beatles, Elvis, etc. Maybe
because a lot of them are idolized as gods. Silly people, don't they know
that the True Gods are the Holy Trinity: Alex, Geddy, and Neil?
"Maybe there are TWO KINDS of classics: Those which are classic
for the breakthrough they achieved and the influence they had, and those
which are classic because their content remains fresh even after taking
away the influence which they may not even have had before.
"The Beatles, for example, I think were what they were mostly
by chance. SOMEONE was going to do what they did - it was the right time
and place and THEY were the lucky ones. In another world it might have
been a group called The Mowntans. Their music mostly sounds like it was
recorded in a garage with steel walls and the vocals and instrumentals
are indifferent at best. They have a few really good songs, but percentwise
I think most of their stuff was indifferent fluff. They were just lucky.
"Nonetheless, they are classics. I just don't listen to them."
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
Speaker-to-Minerals
>"What happened? She was flamed. One posted called her a 'benighted spawn
>of a zwilnik', undoubtedly a pejorative term of some kind. And our own
>Sea Wasp called her a 'blasphemer'.
If I recall correctly (and I may very well not), the zwilniks were the drug
runners in the Lensman series.
>"My point of view is this: It may indeed have been better than anything
>else in its field at the time. But much, much better stuff is being
>written now. Sure, some years from now it may be considered old and
>outdated, operating on scientific theories that seem reasonable now but
>will look silly in terms of future discoveries, and making cultural
>assumptions that are no longer made. But I still think that the vast
>majority of work in my library is better than 'Doc' Smith's works. (From
>hearsay--for honesty, I must admit to not having read any of his work.
>And I'm not sure I want to do the penance of doing so...;-})
Actually, Smith's books were (and are) rather enjoyable reading.
>"Anyway, I believe that if a work is significant taken in the context of
>its time, it's a breakthrough. If it's significant taken in the context
>of modern times, it's a classic. I've read many 'classics', like the ones
>they make you read in English courses. Well, not many, but I've been
>making it a habit of reading more of them lately. Books like The Brothers
>Karamazov, Les Miserables, Gulliver's Travels, etc. I found to have a lot
>of statements of significance to them that make their historical context
>near-irrelevant. Your mileage may have varied...
Parts of the Lensman series continue to make statements of significance today
(compare Smith's war on drugs with the current war on drugs, for example).
Jim M. Pierce
In article <205...@unix.cis.pitt.edu>, seaw...@pitt.edu (Ryk E Spoor) writes:
|> In article <1992Apr24.1...@kakwa.ucs.ualberta.ca> aa...@space.ualberta.ca (Alfvaen) writes:
|>
|> >A friend of mine recommended E.E. 'Doc' Smith's Skylark of Space books, or
|> >whatever. She said they were bad, outdated, and filled with 'Americans
|> >conquer the Universe' philosophy.
"He wrote, based on what he knew to be true. We were in the later
stages of Manifest Destiny and had, at that time, very recently became
a world power."
|> "I'm not sure if 'recommended' is the proper term when you're proposing
|> to 'honor' the book so chosen by condemning it to the literary equivalent of
|> the garbage heap..."
|>
|> >"What happened? She was flamed. One posted called her a 'benighted spawn
|> >of a zwilnik', undoubtedly a pejorative term of some kind. And our own
|> >Sea Wasp called her a 'blasphemer'.
|>
|> "FLAMED? She wasn't even exposed to temperatures above 90. I have
|> not yet begun to flame." :)
|> "I particularly LIKED the "benighted Spawn of a Zwilnik" line, though.
|> Obviously a fellow Doc Smith fan."
|>
|> "And please don't forget that whenever he used science/tech that
|> was understandable by our standards, he was RIGOROUS in applying it. And
|> being an expert in a number of engineering and technical fields, he
|> was quite an authority. See Heinlein's tribute to Doc."
"Well since no one else seems to know about this, I'll post what I
remember of RAH's story of how Doc Smith helped him select a car,
just before WW II. { Cars were not built during that war, you had
to make do.. }
RAH and Doc were driving down a curving road. Doc has his forhead
on the left hand car door, Doc is driving, Doc can't see{!} the road !
RAH is hanging on for dear life { car is doing 70-90 mph ! } and trying
very hard not to disturb Doc in his concentration. No Lens in sight,
maybe the Master Lensman doesn't need one. The did this with several{!}
cars until Doc told RAH, buy this one. RAH said in the story that that
car lasted throughout WW II with no major problems, and was bought by
the mechanic, who did tuneups change oil etc., so it wouldn't be used
as a trade-in." NickD.
NickD. looks out at himself and the others in the meadow. They seem to
be having alot of fun. Sigh, maybe I'll join my other self directly.
|> Sea Wasp
|> /^\
|> ;;;
--
pie...@navo.navy.mil <- Saturday & Sunday (newsgroups)
* jmpierce%usmcp6...@vm.tcs.tulane.edu <- Wed. only *
* Disclaimer: Standard. "Puh-leeze ..." Roger Rabbit *
************************************************************
Speaker-to-Minerals
>because a lot of them are idolized as gods. Silly people, don't they know
>that the True Gods are the Holy Trinity: Alex, Geddy, and Neil?
Gee, and I thought the Holy Trinity were Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, and the
Big Bopper.
The Lamplighter
>"Can one avoid being tied to an era like that? Can one avoid being
>attached to something because it's importance is related to something
>other than intrinsic quality(if there such a thing)?"
"I feel like this, very often," says the Lamplighter. "When I
was in high school, I liked the music, but as I went through college I
started to dislike it more and more, and now it's hard for me to believe
that people buy the stuff."
"But don't you hear that from everybody? 'Music's no good
anymore,' while at the same time the high school kids are grooving to
the latest tunes. Sometimes I think that when you're young, you don't
know what good stuff is, and you learn to discriminate when you get
older."
"Is that true? I don't know. I think most everything has
things to like and dislike about it. Everything created has some
quality somewhere, and you can enjoy it if you look for it. Sure, the
looking might get hard sometimes, but you can always go looking for a
song you like better, or a radio station, or a book."
-----------------------<| "The embroidery of your life holds you in and keeps
<=|- Tom Lee -|=> -<| you out, but you survive,
tj...@iastate.edu -<| Imprisoned in your bones behind the isinglass
-----------------------<| windows of your eyes." -- sung by Judy Collins
Nancy Lebovitz
_An Experiment in Criticism_. The idea is that, instead of judging people's
taste by which books they like, judging books by whether they encourage
attentive reading. A book is worthy of respect if at least one person
is willing to read it repeatedly and wouldn't change a word. (I'd extend
it to say that they might have disagreements with a few passages but
mostly wouldn't change a word.)
While I've been thinking about it, a book I've been apt to reread in re-
cent years is _The Rainbow Cadenza_ by J. Neil Shulman.
----Nancy Lebovitz
Aaron Humphrey
>to 'honor' the book so chosen by condemning it to the literary equivalent of
>the garbage heap..."
"Decommended, then? The person in question was actually seeking books 'so
bad they were good'...so recommendation isn't as bad a word. Would you
'recommend' Plan 9 From Outer Space to someone who enjoyed bad movies?"
> "FLAMED? She wasn't even exposed to temperatures above 90. I have
>not yet begun to flame." :)
> "I particularly LIKED the "benighted Spawn of a Zwilnik" line, though.
>Obviously a fellow Doc Smith fan."
"Ah, so that >is< where that's from. Thought so."
> "And please don't forget that whenever he used science/tech that
>was understandable by our standards, he was RIGOROUS in applying it. And
>being an expert in a number of engineering and technical fields, he
>was quite an authority. See Heinlein's tribute to Doc."
"Well, I've never been of the opinion that scientific rigorosity was the
be-all and end-all of SF. I guess this does battle the specific point that
his science is outdated, but says nothing about its quality. Good science,
in fact, can be lost inside a horrible story."
> The Wasp shrugs. "This depends on what you consider BETTER, does
>it not? For me, for example, the school of writing that started taking
>the Heroes out and turning them into sniveling wimps or losers or even
>evil that happened to do good was a step WAY down, and it would take a
>monstrous amount of writing improvement to salvage it. (The Thomas
>Covenant series salvaged itself only by the detail of the world and
>the supporting cast. It was many years before I realized the Covenant
>was actually a true Hero.)
"One of the literary trends I've noticed the most this century is towards
realism. The characters are tending to be more realistic, more people that
one can identify with, instead of Heroes one can admire. Witness the recent
rewriting of Superman by John Byrne. Maybe you prefer the Norse sagas, but I
like more down-to-earth people. (That said, I enjoy Tanith Lee's novels
dealing with people given godlike powers and their inability to cope with
them.)
"Your parenthetical point about Covenant is very interesting. Does that not
show you something? Covenant had very few of the traits traditionally
associated with heroes. I won't go into great detail...but suffice it to say
he was extremely unsympathetic in many ways. And yet he was a true Hero,
even in Seawasp's eyes. Doesn't this say something about how even the most
unworthy of us can become a hero? Even if the Land was not real, it was a
crucible that made him a Hero. This is probably Donaldson's whole point. Or
a great portion of it."
> "You can't write ANYTHING in the style of the 'classics' and get
>it published today. It doesn't matter what the field of the classic is,
>as long as it's 40 years old or more the stuff is unacceptable. Take
>the Count of Monte Cristo. If Doc's prose is purple, Dumas' is VIOLET.
>Or my favorite whipping whale, Moby Dick. If VERNE is considered long-
>winded, Melville is the equivalent of a tornado.
Alfvaen shrugs. "I haven't read The Count of Monte Cristo, but I have read
The Man In The Iron Mask, and found it quite poignant, and purple is not how
I would have described the prose. Maybe Monte Cristo was just more of a
minor work, which was why there's a sandwich named after it...;-} And
Melville may be long-winded in Moby Dick, but if you read Billy Budd, or The
Encantadas(both fitting in one slim volume), you will encounter a masterpiece
of compactness.
"It's true that you probably couldn't get anything published written in the
style of the classics these days. Sad, but true. Counterexample: Antony
Swithin's series The Perilous Quest For Lyonesse. Reads just like a
nineteenth(or earlier) century adventure novel. Starts out in the time of
Henry V or so, and features a quest for a land called Lyonesse on the
Atlantic subcontinent of Rockall. (Yes, made up from whole cloth. That's
why it's SF.) And it got published. Sure, you may not have heard of
it...;-} In fact, if any such works could get published these days, it would
be in SF.
"That is an interesting point. Why, even when the literary classics are so
lauded by so many critics, are so few 'classical' works published? This
reminds me of Robertson Davies' What's Bred In The Bone--a story, among other
things, of a painter who painted in such an old style that he couldn't sell
his works without passing them off as works of an undiscovered
seventeenth-century master. No modern painter could get away with it."
> "So by what STANDARD are you going to accept/reject books as
>classics? I'm willing to accept Dickens as a classic even though he
>bores me stiff. But then I'd hope that MY 'classics' would be acceptable
>too. So WHAT IS A CLASSIC??"
"To be honest, when I go looking for classics, I look for a)Penguin Classics
books(if they published it, it must be a classic), b)books sold in the
university bookstore for English classes, and c)books by authors I know have
written classics. It's a very spurious definition, but then define science
fiction for me. Thought not. I can tell whether a specific work is a
classic, or whether it's SF, but I can't generalize. And I can always be
wrong, if I'm not familiar with the work."
> "And what if that significance disappears in the next ten years?
>Is it no longer a classic? What's 'significant' about Shakespeare? He doesn't
>say one damn thing that anyone before him didn't say or that a lot of folks
>since didn't say, his vocabulary and writing style aren't just outdated,
>they are virtually incomprehensible without a glossary, and yet I will fight
>viciously to keep him in the category 'classic'."
"I don't know if classicism can fade away like that. The significance is not
just limited to our modern era. The true essence of a classic is something
that is near timeless. Sure, a lot of opinions and basic assumptions made by
writers change radically over time. But there are some that don't, or at
least haven't yet--which says something for either the immutability or at
least lack of change in human nature.
"As for Shaxberd, he may not have said anything new, but he said it better.
If there's a scale of craftsmanship, Shakespear's at the top. And, as I
recently satisfied myself on rec.arts.sf.written, craftsmanship is one, and
perhaps the only, objective criterion for judging writing."
> "No, *I* am the Enlightened One. Trust me in all things.
Alfvaen makes the secret elven gesture of seriously hoping Seawasp was
joking. "I prefer the Socratic method, myself. I try not to assume
knowledge that I don't have. I don't always succeed, though. But who is
perfect? (Wizard has the answer to that...;-})"
> "Personally, I agree. I can't stand the Beatles, Elvis, etc. Maybe
>because a lot of them are idolized as gods. Silly people, don't they know
>that the True Gods are the Holy Trinity: Alex, Geddy, and Neil?
"The Beatles are good. They had some songwriting skill, if nothing else.
Their early stuff leaves me as cold as most Elvis does...and yes, the Holy
Trinity are among the best. But the size of my album collection, excluding
Rush, is to me sufficient to say that there are many others in the pantheon."
> "Maybe there are TWO KINDS of classics: Those which are classic
>for the breakthrough they achieved and the influence they had, and those
>which are classic because their content remains fresh even after taking
>away the influence which they may not even have had before.
"What I argue is more that only the latter are true classics. You would
include the former, which means that both Doc Smith and Elvis were classics.
I note also that you use 'content'. What about style? Earlier you were
talking about the stylistic difference between classics and modern works.
So, with a classic, the stylistic differences are irrelevant?
Interesting..."
> "The Beatles, for example, I think were what they were mostly
>by chance. SOMEONE was going to do what they did - it was the right time
>and place and THEY were the lucky ones. In another world it might have
>been a group called The Mowntans. Their music mostly sounds like it was
>recorded in a garage with steel walls and the vocals and instrumentals
>are indifferent at best. They have a few really good songs, but percentwise
>I think most of their stuff was indifferent fluff. They were just lucky.
"On the contrary, I would say that percentwise most of their stuff is good.
But it's heavily weighted in the chronologically forward direction.
"The Mowntans? Is that pronounced like Mountain, or like Mown-Tan? Good
name, natheless..."
> "Nonetheless, they are classics. I just don't listen to them."
Alfvaen shrugs. "Your choice. So what do you listen to, besides Rush? If
anything?"
> Sea Wasp
> /^\
> ;;;
--
---Alfvaen(a.k.a. Aaron V. Humphrey)
Canadian Network For Space Research, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Everybody wants prosthetic foreheads on their real heads.
Current Album--Heart:Little Queen
--
---Alfvaen(a.k.a. Aaron V. Humphrey)
Canadian Network For Space Research, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Everybody wants prosthetic foreheads on their real heads.
Current Album--Heart:Little Queen
Jane Beckman
collection, and several university libraries, cocks an eyebrow
at the rapidly-burgeoning shelves of books for Callahans'
library. "Mustn't forget the 40 tons of National
Geographics," she remarks cynically. "After all, the National
Geographic is considered "classic" by some folks."
She sighs and shakes her head. "Funny thing about books.
What, truly, is "classic?" The Decameron has survived because
it's a great dirty book. The Bible has survived because it's
a religious work. (And probably the most likely volume to
survive the End of Life as We Know It, simply because there
are so many copies in print.) Is a classic the equivalent of
an "Old Masters" painting? In that case, is there a good
reason why certain authors become lost or neglected? Did you
know that Shakespeare was rarely heard, in the 18th century?
And that a lot of Restoration Dramatists were totally
forgotten, because their works were not then politically or
morally correct? And that when they, and Shakespeare were
"rediscovered" later, they were censored? Rather like
painting draperies on nudes, I would suspect.
"But I diverge---what is "classic"? Something that survives?
Because if that is the test, a lot of Victorian authors are
going to be in trouble, come the 21st century, because they
are too wordy for the average person, nowadays. For that
matter, how many folks ever read "classics" for pleasure?
While I might argue that reading esoteric philosophy might be
rather deep, a lot of classics were actually trash literature,
in their own day. You should read the contemporary comments
about the works of Charles Dickens! Whooh! And as far as
information goes, I'm actually inclined to favor the National
Geographics, even if I do joke about them sinking continents.
And yet---how many of you have ever read a 1930's National
Geographic? The classics of one day, the lost literature of
the next. The trash literature of one day, the classic of
another. Personally, I think Callahans library should
specialize in those books which tend to vanish. Just a
thought. I could contribute some 1880's copies of Scientific
American..."
--
Jilara [ja...@swdc.stratus.com]
"Come the revolution, we will all eat peaches and cream---
and *LIKE* it!"
Ryk E Spoor
>> "And please don't forget that whenever he used science/tech that
>>was understandable by our standards, he was RIGOROUS in applying it. And
>be-all and end-all of SF. I guess this does battle the specific point that
>his science is outdated, but says nothing about its quality. Good science,
>in fact, can be lost inside a horrible story."
"That point was, in fact, only MEANT to battle the bit about outdated
science. He used what he had as best he could, and then when he went beyond
what we knew he at least maintained an internal consistency."
>>the supporting cast. It was many years before I realized the Covenant
>>was actually a true Hero.)
>"One of the literary trends I've noticed the most this century is towards
>realism. The characters are tending to be more realistic, more people that
>one can identify with, instead of Heroes one can admire.
The Wasp shrugs. "Funny. To me most of the more recent "heroes" are
LESS something I can identify with. I can identify with Captain America
or Dirk Pitt much more easily than with some noname who happens to get
put into a heroic position."
>rewriting of Superman by John Byrne. Maybe you prefer the Norse sagas, but I
>like more down-to-earth people.
"If I wanted down-to-earth, I wouldn't read SF and Fantasy, that's
for sure. If ordinary was what I liked, I'd read ordinary fiction."
>"Your parenthetical point about Covenant is very interesting. Does that not
>show you something? Covenant had very few of the traits traditionally
>associated with heroes.
"It doesn't really show me much, since the reason I decided he
was a Hero was that he met my own personal definition of Hero -- which may
differ from that of most other people. He followed what he believed was
right, cared about what happened to others, and allowed NO force or outside
will to impose itself on him. He was unbreakable, invincible in the arena
that really COUNTED in the Land: His own certainty. I don't think of him
as THE definitive Hero, but he was close enough to earn the right to the
title."
>unworthy of us can become a hero? Even if the Land was not real, it was a
>crucible that made him a Hero. This is probably Donaldson's whole point. Or
>a great portion of it."
"That's the point at which we part ways. I don't see the Land as
MAKING him a Hero. He simply WAS a Hero. The Land did not MAKE him a
hero, it simply allowed him to use what he was. Heroes are not made; they ARE."
>"To be honest, when I go looking for classics, I look for a)Penguin Classics
>books(if they published it, it must be a classic), b)books sold in the
>university bookstore for English classes, and c)books by authors I know have
>written classics. It's a very spurious definition, but then define science
>fiction for me.
"Fiction that focuses on conditions which are different than in this
"real" world, at least in part because of a change in scientific climate or
technology.
"Space Opera has more of an epic feel to it and pays less attention
to any appearance of scientific validity.
"Fantasy pays no attention to scientific validity, although GOOD
fantasy strives for strong internal logical consistency [i.e., it may use
wierd rules that contradict all laws of physics, but those rules are
consistently applied]."
"The difference between my definition of SF and yours of classic
is that 99% of your definition relies on some faceless outsider to tell you
what a classic is."
>"As for Shaxberd, he may not have said anything new, but he said it better.
>If there's a scale of craftsmanship, Shakespear's at the top. And, as I
>recently satisfied myself on rec.arts.sf.written, craftsmanship is one, and
>perhaps the only, objective criterion for judging writing."
"Once again... YOU say he said it better. But that's not necessarily
going to be the case for many other people. How can 'craftsmanship' be an
objective criterion? You're taking a word that can only be determined
subjectively and saying it's objective?"
>> "No, *I* am the Enlightened One. Trust me in all things.
>Alfvaen makes the secret elven gesture of seriously hoping Seawasp was
>joking. "I prefer the Socratic method, myself. I try not to assume
>knowledge that I don't have. I don't always succeed, though. But who is
>perfect? (Wizard has the answer to that...;-})"
"Who may be perfect; depends on which regeneration, though."
"Joking? Well... maybe for YOU. I trust MYSELF in all things, though."
>talking about the stylistic difference between classics and modern works.
>So, with a classic, the stylistic differences are irrelevant?
>Interesting..."
"One would certainly hope so. Otherwise we can just toss Shaksper
right into the dustbin, since his style certainly can't compare to, say,
Tom Stoppard (who I loathe). If you include style as a criterion, every
time the acceptable style changes, your classics change."
>Alfvaen shrugs. "Your choice. So what do you listen to, besides Rush? If
>anything?"
"Rush, Yes, Eagles, some Elton John, and after that it gets confusing
because I rarely listen to "groups"; just individual pieces of music. I've
liked some stuff by Madonna, Chicago, Queen, Styx, Michael Jackson, Chris
DeBourgh, Kenny Logins [*no logins at this time*], M.C. Hammer, Make-Up,
and... well, almost everyone has put out SOMETHING I liked. Maynard
Furguson... Queensryche...
"I have some PREFERENCES -- kinds of music which I tend to like
and others that I don't -- and I have some things that I like and can't even
INVENT a way to justify it [ ZZTop and AC/DC come to mind].
"I like a lot of classical music, and a lot of soundtrack themes.
John Williams is another God."
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
. .. . . * . .
. . : . _*_ . . . ..
. . . . @---====OOOOO====---@~/^\ . . . .
. * . .. ^*^ . . ;;; . . . *
: . . . . . .* . . .
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Interphase Accomplished.
Sea Wasp docked, Outring Sector 5.
Speaker-to-Minerals
>+---------------
>| I like The Lord of The Rings quite a lot, and reread it regularly. I
>| consider it a classic of fantasy fiction. But lately I've encountered
>| more and more people who can't stand it, and can barely drag themselves
>| through it. So I've started to re-evaluate it. Does it really have all
>Consider that Tolkien's writing exceeds most sound-bite types' attention
>spans. Put snidely, but there's a point hiding in there somewhere. Nor do I
>mean that is the *only* answer, but it's certainly a factor: people seem to
>be less and less willing to accept anything other than instantaneous
>gratification these days, at least in the U.S.
>There is also the fact that the real pleasure in LOtR is not so much the plot
>line, but the fine craftsmanship and detail of the world Tolkien created.
>Those who read only for plotline are likely to be disappointed by all the
>"extraneous" prose. Or by the fact that the basic plot is somewhat hackneyed
>(LOtR is yet another retelling of that "universal myth").
I suspect it's more a case of people who've read a few of the terrible
knockoffs of LoTR but haven't yet read LoTR starting the book and saying "Not
another of THOSE."
Doug Quarnstrom
> "One of the literary trends I've noticed the most this century is towards
> realism. The characters are tending to be more realistic, more people that
> one can identify with, instead of Heroes one can admire. Witness the recent
> rewriting of Superman by John Byrne. Maybe you prefer the Norse sagas, but I
> like more down-to-earth people. (That said, I enjoy Tanith Lee's novels
> dealing with people given godlike powers and their inability to cope with
> them.)
One might want to consider Hannibal Lecter in the Literary Trends (tm)
that you seak of.
>
> "Your parenthetical point about Covenant is very interesting. Does that not
> show you something? Covenant had very few of the traits traditionally
> associated with heroes. I won't go into great detail...but suffice it to say
> he was extremely unsympathetic in many ways. And yet he was a true Hero,
> even in Seawasp's eyes. Doesn't this say something about how even the most
> unworthy of us can become a hero?
I liked Covenant, but I would venture to say that the book said nothing
at all about any of us. Unless of course that is to say that a man
who is a rapist and who through inaction is directly responsible for
countless atrocities can be seen as a hero by casual book readers.
I would say that this might say something about US.
> "It's true that you probably couldn't get anything published written in the
> style of the classics these days. Sad, but true.
This statement misses the point that the word 'classic' merely
refers to books that stand the test of time. There are many classics
being written right now. We just don't know what they are, because,
by definition, we will be dead before they become classic.
But to imply that 'classic' imposes a given style is absurd.
> "That is an interesting point. Why, even when the literary classics are so
> lauded by so many critics, are so few 'classical' works published?
In the context you mean, it is because the style is dead. But who cares.
Today's 'classics' will add to the literary tradition and not repeat it
one would hope.
> This
> reminds me of Robertson Davies' What's Bred In The Bone--a story, among other
> things, of a painter who painted in such an old style that he couldn't sell
> his works without passing them off as works of an undiscovered
> seventeenth-century master. No modern painter could get away with it."
Don't be too sure.
> > "So by what STANDARD are you going to accept/reject books as
> >classics? I'm willing to accept Dickens as a classic even though he
> >bores me stiff. But then I'd hope that MY 'classics' would be acceptable
> >too. So WHAT IS A CLASSIC??"
A book that is accepted by the literary world as standing up to the
test of time. Nothing else.
>
> > "And what if that significance disappears in the next ten years?
> >Is it no longer a classic? What's 'significant' about Shakespeare? He doesn't
> >say one damn thing that anyone before him didn't say or that a lot of folks
> >since didn't say, his vocabulary and writing style aren't just outdated,
> >they are virtually incomprehensible without a glossary, and yet I will fight
> >viciously to keep him in the category 'classic'."
Shakespeare said nothing that noone said before. What a bold and
self-serving statement. I trust you are able to back up that
statement in a well thought out essay on the topic. I would venture
to say you could establish quite a literary reputation with this
information alone.
>
> > "Personally, I agree. I can't stand the Beatles, Elvis, etc. Maybe
> >because a lot of them are idolized as gods. Silly people, don't they know
> >that the True Gods are the Holy Trinity: Alex, Geddy, and Neil?
Geddy, of Rush fame. The author of some of the most hackneyed lyrics
in popular culture? Oh, yeah. Ok. I see.
>
> "The Beatles are good. They had some songwriting skill, if nothing else.
> Their early stuff leaves me as cold as most Elvis does...and yes, the Holy
> Trinity are among the best. But the size of my album collection, excluding
> Rush, is to me sufficient to say that there are many others in the pantheon."
This displays a distinct lack of understanding of the revolutionary
role the beatles played, not only in music, but in popular culture
in general.
Rush is just a rock band. The beatles were a social force of a type
not seen before. They were truly new regardless of their musical
talent.
>
> > "The Beatles, for example, I think were what they were mostly
> >by chance. SOMEONE was going to do what they did - it was the right time
> >and place and THEY were the lucky ones. In another world it might have
> >been a group called The Mowntans. Their music mostly sounds like it was
> >recorded in a garage with steel walls and the vocals and instrumentals
> >are indifferent at best. They have a few really good songs, but percentwise
> >I think most of their stuff was indifferent fluff. They were just lucky.
Certainly they were just lucky. But saying it was indifferent fluff,
is of course a fairly hostile OPINION and totally ignores the
completely new recording techniques they pioneered. Sgt Pepper is
a work of art. It certainly deserves consideration as the best
rock album ever recorded. And if it is not the best, it is certainly
one of the best and will become a musical classic in the fullness of
time.
>
> Alfvaen shrugs. "Your choice. So what do you listen to, besides Rush? If
> anything?"
doug
Alfvaen
> >"One of the literary trends I've noticed the most this century is
towards
> >realism. The characters are tending to be more realistic, more people
that
> >one can identify with, instead of Heroes one can admire.
>
> The Wasp shrugs. "Funny. To me most of the more recent "heroes"
are
> LESS something I can identify with. I can identify with Captain America
> or Dirk Pitt much more easily than with some noname who happens to get
> put into a heroic position."
"Some people like nonames put into heroic positions. My point about
Thomas Covenant is that he may have been a Hero, but he would >never< have
discovered he was a Hero without the Land. A lot of stories featuring
'nonames' put into the shoes of a hero are like that."
> "If I wanted down-to-earth, I wouldn't read SF and Fantasy, that's
> for sure. If ordinary was what I liked, I'd read ordinary fiction."
"So you're one of the ones who likes there to be a >very< sharp dividing
line between SF/fantasy and 'mainstream' fiction. I don't. And if the
trend towards a merging of the two has been occurring lately, it's because
'mainstream' people have discovered SF and want to put their fiction
there.
"Do you >want< SF to remain a ghetto, only good for escapism? Do you
>want< SF to remain out of touch with reality? Real people with real
faults have their place in SF as well as anywhere else, simply because
they will be there. Heroes may not. Some people like to read about
Heroes because they don't see them in real life. I'm the opposite--if
there's no Heroes in real life, then why should they be dime-a-dozen in
fiction?"
> "Fiction that focuses on conditions which are different than in
this
> "real" world, at least in part because of a change in scientific climate
or
> technology.
"What about an alien invasion? Is that considered a 'change in scientific
climate'? I agree, a lot of what I would consider SF features
technological change. But a lot of it has nothing to do with an overall
technological change. Perhaps you would brush that off as fantasy, but I
would not. What about societal change, with no technological background
to it, a la The Handmaid's Tale?"
> "Space Opera has more of an epic feel to it and pays less
attention
> to any appearance of scientific validity.
"Gee, I guess most of my problems are with Space Opera, then. Space Opera
today is a dead field, as far as I can tell. No-one's writing it,
no-one's buying it, except for the reprint market, perhaps. Somehow the
crowd it used to satisfy have turned elsewhere."
> "Fantasy pays no attention to scientific validity, although GOOD
> fantasy strives for strong internal logical consistency [i.e., it may
use
> wierd rules that contradict all laws of physics, but those rules are
> consistently applied]."
"I tend to use a definition more like that for 'speculative fiction', and
then SF and fantasy are specialized classes, which not all stories fit
into. I've seen sundry stories based on 'magic' a la Clarke's Nth Law,
where it was revealed at the end to be sufficiently advanced technology.
(Sheri S. Tepper's True Game tri-trilogy.)"
> "The difference between my definition of SF and yours of classic
> is that 99% of your definition relies on some faceless outsider to tell
you
> what a classic is."
"Not some faceless outsider. A long line of faceless outsiders who have
found >something< in these works that makes it worth reading them, even
out of cultural context, even N decades after they've been published. And
some of them aren't faceless, either. If an SF writer recommends a given
work of literature, odds are much higher that I'll end up reading it."
> "Once again... YOU say he said it better. But that's not
necessarily
> going to be the case for many other people. How can 'craftsmanship' be
an
> objective criterion? You're taking a word that can only be determined
> subjectively and saying it's objective?"
"Maybe craftsmanship isn't a totally objective criterion. But it's one
that can be agreed on more often than any other subjective one. And in a
lot of cases it's obvious when one book is better-written than another.
Compare Ursula Le Guin with David Eddings, for instance. Or Gene Wolfe
with Lin Carter. For many people, a book being well-written is not
enough--they want an exciting plot, lots of scientific/historical
accuracy, a good romance, etc. But if it's well-written, it's more likely
to be considered 'boring' than just plain bad."
> "Joking? Well... maybe for YOU. I trust MYSELF in all things,
though."
"You were asking >me< to trust you in all things. There were witnesses(if
anyone besides us is reading this thread)."
> "One would certainly hope so. Otherwise we can just toss Shaksper
> right into the dustbin, since his style certainly can't compare to, say,
> Tom Stoppard (who I loathe). If you include style as a criterion, every
> time the acceptable style changes, your classics change."
"I like Tom Stoppard, actually. He has the same quirky surreal nature to
his writing that I find in R.A. Lafferty's stories, or Dali's art, or the
music of They Might Be Giants. Or at least similar to the above.
"Style is different from craftsmanship. Writers have lots of individual
styles, although there are definite trends over time. But craftsmanship
is something other. It's how well your story is told."
> "Rush, Yes, Eagles, some Elton John, and after that it gets
confusing
> because I rarely listen to "groups"; just individual pieces of music.
I've
> liked some stuff by Madonna, Chicago, Queen, Styx, Michael Jackson,
Chris
> DeBurgh, Kenny Loggins [*no logins at this time*], M.C. Hammer, Make-Up,
> and... well, almost everyone has put out SOMETHING I liked. Maynard
> Furguson... Queensryche...
> "I have some PREFERENCES -- kinds of music which I tend to like
> and others that I don't -- and I have some things that I like and can't
even
> INVENT a way to justify it [ ZZTop and AC/DC come to mind].
> "I like a lot of classical music, and a lot of soundtrack themes.
> John Williams is another God."
"I'm probably a lot the same way, only multiplied a hundredfold. I have
some 650 tapes, 100 of which are assorted songs, 250-300 bought tapes, and
the rest having two or three albums per tape. I have something, a song if
not an individual album, by each of the people you mention(except for
Make-Up; never heard of them), and sundry others. John Williams is OK; I
get tired of his stuff after a while.
"So are your tastes in reading similar to that? Are there people you like
to read everything by, and the rest you like a story or a novel here and
there?"
> Sea Wasp
> /^\
> ;;;
--
---Alfvaen(a.k.a. Aaron V. Humphrey)
Canadian Network For Space Research, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Everybody wants prosthetic foreheads on their real heads.
Current Album--Mike Oldfield:Crises
Ryk E Spoor
>"Do you >want< SF to remain a ghetto, only good for escapism? Do you
>>want< SF to remain out of touch with reality? Real people with real
>faults have their place in SF as well as anywhere else, simply because
>they will be there. Heroes may not. Some people like to read about
>Heroes because they don't see them in real life. I'm the opposite--if
>there's no Heroes in real life, then why should they be dime-a-dozen in
>fiction?"
"You have it backwards. Why duplicate real life when you can already
pick up a newspaper or one of a trillion ordinary novels or stories and see
Real Life there? Why use ordinary people when you don't HAVE to invent them?
Why, in short, duplicate everything about the real world instead of doing
something DIFFERENT from the Real World, making something that isn't just a
duplicate of what you can find around you?
"And what's this ghetto stuff? Do I CARE what other people think
about SF? I read it in class from the time I was in elementary school onward.
I got beat up for being a wierdo. So? What is the point? I don't read ANYTHING
to make other people happy. I read because *I* enjoy it.
>"What about an alien invasion? Is that considered a 'change in scientific
>climate'?
"Well, we sure ain't star-travelling, and they're introducing a lot
of new technological imperatives..."
>would not. What about societal change, with no technological background
>to it, a la The Handmaid's Tale?"
"Still scientific change [sociology] and at least an attempt to
extrapolate."
>> "Space Opera has more of an epic feel to it and pays less
>attention
>> to any appearance of scientific validity.
>"Gee, I guess most of my problems are with Space Opera, then. Space Opera
>today is a dead field, as far as I can tell. No-one's writing it,
>no-one's buying it, except for the reprint market, perhaps. Somehow the
>crowd it used to satisfy have turned elsewhere."
"What have you been smoking lately? The resurgence of space opera
started with Star Wars and shows no sign of slowing down. The new books
on my shelves (as an example, Daley's Hobart Floyt/Alacrity Fitzhugh
series) demonstrate that..."
>"You were asking >me< to trust you in all things. There were witnesses(if
>anyone besides us is reading this thread)."
"Well you SHOULD! The Computer says so. And the Computer is your
Friend!" :)
>"I'm probably a lot the same way, only multiplied a hundredfold. I have
>some 650 tapes, 100 of which are assorted songs, 250-300 bought tapes, and
>the rest having two or three albums per tape. I have something, a song if
>not an individual album, by each of the people you mention(except for
>Make-Up; never heard of them), and sundry others. John Williams is OK; I
>get tired of his stuff after a while.
I can't afford that many tapes. I have a lot of "eclectic" tapes
which have stuff on them ranging from soundtrack selections to Rush
to Little Feat and Beethoven. Until about 5-6 years ago, I didn't have
a tape player and could only use a LP record player once in a while,
so I didn't have that many reasons to BUY recordings...
>"So are your tastes in reading similar to that? Are there people you like
>to read everything by, and the rest you like a story or a novel here and
>there?"
"Pretty much, although books are harder to get as samples. I mean,
there is no radio station broadcasting the various books by 50 different
authors..."
Speaker-to-Minerals
>pick up a newspaper or one of a trillion ordinary novels or stories and see
>Real Life there? Why use ordinary people when you don't HAVE to invent them?
>Why, in short, duplicate everything about the real world instead of doing
>something DIFFERENT from the Real World, making something that isn't just a
>duplicate of what you can find around you?
>
> "And what's this ghetto stuff? Do I CARE what other people think
>about SF? I read it in class from the time I was in elementary school onward.
>I got beat up for being a wierdo. So? What is the point? I don't read ANYTHING
>to make other people happy. I read because *I* enjoy it.
Well, I, for one, care what other people think about SF. Back in the Good Old
Days (TM), the science fiction sections of bookstores were much smaller. They
WERE there, though (of course, my experience is mostly from Pasadena, and in
particular in a handful of bookstores within a mile of Caltech; this may have
had some effect on the bookstore owners' decision to have science fiction
sections). You could walk into the store, and in a few minutes spot any new
titles, and, if you were familiar with the field, pick out which ones were
likely to be worth reading. These days the section is MUCH larger. Of course,
the number of books on the shelves worth reading hasn't changed very much. So
you spend quite a while trying to find those amid all the Thud and Blunder
novels (both low-tech [Fantasy] and high-tech [Science Fiction]), and other
such stuff. It used to be that, when someone disparaged science fiction, if
you could talk him into visiting the science fiction section of his local
bookstore, there was a good chance he'd revise his opinions (English majors,
teachers, and professors excepted, of course). These days, if you use that
strategy, he's likely to have his opinion of Science Fiction reinforced ("Not
only was the book poorly written, there weren't even any of the IDEAS you go on
and on about in it," he says, holding up a copy of one of the Gor novels, or
something very much like one). Shelf time for Science Fiction novels has
dropped, in part because of the sheer volume of junk that's being published.
By and large, I think I'd prefer the ghetto.
>>> "Space Opera has more of an epic feel to it and pays less
>>attention
>>> to any appearance of scientific validity.
>
>>"Gee, I guess most of my problems are with Space Opera, then. Space Opera
>>today is a dead field, as far as I can tell. No-one's writing it,
>>no-one's buying it, except for the reprint market, perhaps. Somehow the
>>crowd it used to satisfy have turned elsewhere."
>
> "What have you been smoking lately? The resurgence of space opera
>started with Star Wars and shows no sign of slowing down. The new books
>on my shelves (as an example, Daley's Hobart Floyt/Alacrity Fitzhugh
>series) demonstrate that..."
Not to mention the assorted high-tech future war novels.
Brandon S. Allbery KF8NH
+---------------
| "Well since no one else seems to know about this, I'll post what I
| remember of RAH's story of how Doc Smith helped him select a car,
| just before WW II. { Cars were not built during that war, you had
| to make do.. }
I know about it, and in fact have a copy around here somewhere. (It's in
EXPANDED UNIVERSE.)
+---------------
| RAH and Doc were driving down a curving road. Doc has his forhead
| on the left hand car door, Doc is driving, Doc can't see{!} the road !
|
| RAH is hanging on for dear life { car is doing 70-90 mph ! } and trying
| very hard not to disturb Doc in his concentration. No Lens in sight,
| maybe the Master Lensman doesn't need one. The did this with several{!}
| cars until Doc told RAH, buy this one. RAH said in the story that that
| car lasted throughout WW II with no major problems, and was bought by
| the mechanic, who did tuneups change oil etc., so it wouldn't be used
| as a trade-in." NickD.
+---------------
"The car's name? *Skylark* *Five*, of course." --R.A.H.
++Brandon
--
Brandon S. Allbery, KF8NH [44.70.4.88] all...@NCoast.ORG
Senior Programmer, Telotech, Inc. (if I may call myself that...)
Brandon S. Allbery KF8NH
+---------------
| Parts of the Lensman series continue to make statements of significance today
| (compare Smith's war on drugs with the current war on drugs, for example).
...albeit of somewhat limited significance: statements about the war on drugs
in the presence of readily identifiable incorruptible agents of justice have
marginal utility in the real world.
Although FIRST LENSMAN does take an interesting look at "pure --- or rather,
decidedly impure --- politics" (quoth Kinnison, if I recall)....
Brandon S. Allbery KF8NH
+---------------
| I suspect it's more a case of people who've read a few of the terrible
| knockoffs of LoTR but haven't yet read LoTR starting the book and saying "Not
| another of THOSE."
There's some of that in there, yes, but I've met several people (and other
Callahaners have written in the past of people they have met, or even of
themselves) who have tried to read LoTR but ended up shelving it because it
didn't say much once the fancy imagery was removed. Which is essentially true.
The major strength of LoTR is the sense of reality and detail that Tolkien put
into Middle-Earth; to those uninterested in scenery it's just a lot of
verbiage to pick through looking for the "actual story". (People who consider
scenery to be incidental must live in awful dull worlds, IMHO.)
Ryk E Spoor
>I liked Covenant, but I would venture to say that the book said nothing
>at all about any of us. Unless of course that is to say that a man
>who is a rapist and who through inaction is directly responsible for
>countless atrocities can be seen as a hero by casual book readers.
>I would say that this might say something about US.
"No, Covenant bore only a single responsibility: that of Lena's
violation. And that single action shattered HIM as well as Lena.
"His inaction was in its own way a heroic action. He simply had
not been able to find the key that would allow him to act by his own
code.
"Foul's actions were solely Foul's responsiblity.
"To blame Covenant for his inaction is to repeat the mistake that
I made when I first read the series at the age of 16-17. The whole point
was that ANY action he made would be, according to everything he knew,
a surrender to madness. If he took 'responsibility' for the Land, he was
as far as he knew actually ABANDONING his REAL responsibility -- to live
in the 'real world'. All of the atrocities of Foul perpetrated on the
Land were, in his view, attempts by his subconscious to force him to surrender
to a fantasy in which he had Power, rather than being helpless.
"In the end, of course, he found the key to action, but his actions
throughout were actually heroic. *I* would have done things differently in
his position... but I am nothing like Covenant, and perhaps I could not have
taken the stress he did."
>Shakespeare said nothing that noone said before. What a bold and
>self-serving statement. I trust you are able to back up that
>statement in a well thought out essay on the topic. I would venture
>to say you could establish quite a literary reputation with this
>information alone.
"A single counter-example would be simpler and would invalidate my
thesis. Name one thing Shakey said that wasn't said before. Romeo and
Juliet: "Feuds are very stupid things that hurt people for no reason."
"People in love do dramatic and sometimes stupid things."
The rest of his plays can in their essence be reduced to a series
of similarly banal statements. In fact, nearly all works by anyone can
be reduced similarly.
What Shakespeare said isn't half as important as the WAY he said it."
>Geddy, of Rush fame. The author of some of the most hackneyed lyrics
>in popular culture? Oh, yeah. Ok. I see.
"I don't even listen to the FIRST album. Geddy is not a lyricist.
He's not much of a singer, either, although he does try to get the notes.
He *IS* a damn good bass player.
"Neil Peart is the lyricist who counts. Starting with 'Fly by Night'
and continuing through '2112', and my favorite 'A Farewell to Kings',
he has written virtually everything they did since that first album. The
few songs written by the others stand out, rather painfully."
>This displays a distinct lack of understanding of the revolutionary
>role the beatles played, not only in music, but in popular culture
>in general.
"I don't really care about the role a group played. [prepare for
violation of net.taboo!] Adolf Hitler had a hell of an influence on
world culture and history. I still won't call him a 'classic' or assume
that he had something GOOD in his actions. At least one school of historians
believe that he was a phenomenon of the time -- that if it wasn't Herr
Schickelgruber some other demagogue would have taken his place. THAT is
my position on the Beatles."
>Certainly they were just lucky. But saying it was indifferent fluff,
>is of course a fairly hostile OPINION and totally ignores the
>completely new recording techniques they pioneered.
"Hostile? No. My hostile opinions are reserved for groups that plumb
the depths of the truly BAD.
"New recording techniques? Maybe so. But I have an LP of Frank Sinatra
from pre-1960 which has better sound than anything THEY put out. I could see
the tinny sound as excusable before they hit it big. Afterwards... ick."
Alfvaen
> "You have it backwards. Why duplicate real life when you can
already
> pick up a newspaper or one of a trillion ordinary novels or stories and
see
> Real Life there? Why use ordinary people when you don't HAVE to invent
them?
> Why, in short, duplicate everything about the real world instead of
doing
> something DIFFERENT from the Real World, making something that isn't
just a
> duplicate of what you can find around you?
"Real Life is something that a lot of people find very interesting. Few
people look at it quite the same way, and the way they do says something
about them. I contend that there are just as many interesting stories set
in the Real World as set in all the worlds of speculative fiction. Why
duplicate everything from the real world? It makes it easier to convey
your point, if you have one. And it hits a lot closer to home, because
the analogies with your own life are much clearer."
> "And what's this ghetto stuff? Do I CARE what other people think
> about SF? I read it in class from the time I was in elementary school
onward.
> I got beat up for being a wierdo. So? What is the point? I don't read
ANYTHING
> to make other people happy. I read because *I* enjoy it.
"And I think it's high time that public opinion of SF was changed for the
better. Of course, I think it's high time that public opinion of
>reading< was changed for the better, but that's a whole other thread.
There are a lot of people who don't read SF out there. I'd like to change
that, and one way of doing it is to make SF more real to them. A lot of
people don't care about stories about people on spaceships or fighting
dragons. What's needed is to show them what else lurketh in the genre."
> >"Gee, I guess most of my problems are with Space Opera, then. Space
Opera
> >today is a dead field, as far as I can tell. No-one's writing it,
> >no-one's buying it, except for the reprint market, perhaps. Somehow
the
> >crowd it used to satisfy have turned elsewhere."
>
> "What have you been smoking lately? The resurgence of space opera
> started with Star Wars and shows no sign of slowing down. The new books
> on my shelves (as an example, Daley's Hobart Floyt/Alacrity Fitzhugh
> series) demonstrate that..."
"I ain't been smokin' nothin' lately, thankew verra much. ;-} Okay, so
Space Opera is a revived and thriving field. But I still don't read any
of it, unless it sneaked up me without me noticing..."
> "Well you SHOULD! The Computer says so. And the Computer is your
> Friend!" :)
"Oh. Well, that's all right, then."
> I can't afford that many tapes. I have a lot of "eclectic" tapes
> which have stuff on them ranging from soundtrack selections to Rush
> to Little Feat and Beethoven. Until about 5-6 years ago, I didn't have
> a tape player and could only use a LP record player once in a while,
> so I didn't have that many reasons to BUY recordings...
I >do< buy most of my tapes cheaply, and pir*te the rest. Music is a very
major portion of my life, and a lot goes into it. Until about eight years
ago, I was in probably the same position you were. Apart from about half
a dozen tapes, everything I have was bought since then. Oh, well, my dad
and my brother have huge music collections too, so it's probably
hereditary."
> "Pretty much, although books are harder to get as samples. I mean,
> there is no radio station broadcasting the various books by 50 different
> authors..."
Alfvaen smiles. "Ah, now >that's< a concept for you."
> Sea Wasp
> /^\
> ;;;
--
---Alfvaen(a.k.a. Aaron V. Humphrey)
Canadian Network For Space Research, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Everybody wants a rock to wind a piece of string around.
Current Album--Yes:90125
Speaker-to-Minerals
>> This
>> reminds me of Robertson Davies' What's Bred In The Bone--a story, among other
>> things, of a painter who painted in such an old style that he couldn't sell
>> his works without passing them off as works of an undiscovered
>> seventeenth-century master. No modern painter could get away with it."
>
>Don't be too sure.
I suspect that sentence was intended to mean that no modern painter could sell
works painted in the older style. Not that forgery is now impossible.
>> > "So by what STANDARD are you going to accept/reject books as
>> >classics? I'm willing to accept Dickens as a classic even though he
>> >bores me stiff. But then I'd hope that MY 'classics' would be acceptable
>> >too. So WHAT IS A CLASSIC??"
>
>A book that is accepted by the literary world as standing up to the
>test of time. Nothing else.
How about one that's accepted by readers as standing up to the test of time?
>> > "And what if that significance disappears in the next ten years?
>> >Is it no longer a classic? What's 'significant' about Shakespeare? He doesn't
>> >say one damn thing that anyone before him didn't say or that a lot of folks
>> >since didn't say, his vocabulary and writing style aren't just outdated,
>> >they are virtually incomprehensible without a glossary, and yet I will fight
>> >viciously to keep him in the category 'classic'."
>
>Shakespeare said nothing that noone said before. What a bold and
>self-serving statement. I trust you are able to back up that
>statement in a well thought out essay on the topic. I would venture
>to say you could establish quite a literary reputation with this
>information alone.
I wouldn't make that sweeping a statement, but please do remember that much of
Shakespeare's work was the retelling of old stories.
Nancy Lebovitz
>
>> "One of the literary trends I've noticed the most this century is towards
>> realism. The characters are tending to be more realistic, more people that
>> one can identify with, instead of Heroes one can admire. Witness the recent
>> rewriting of Superman by John Byrne. Maybe you prefer the Norse sagas, but I
>> like more down-to-earth people. (That said, I enjoy Tanith Lee's novels
>> dealing with people given godlike powers and their inability to cope with
>> them.)
>
>One might want to consider Hannibal Lecter in the Literary Trends (tm)
>that you seak of.
>
>>
>> "Your parenthetical point about Covenant is very interesting. Does that not
>> show you something? Covenant had very few of the traits traditionally
>> associated with heroes. I won't go into great detail...but suffice it to say
>> he was extremely unsympathetic in many ways. And yet he was a true Hero,
>> even in Seawasp's eyes. Doesn't this say something about how even the most
>> unworthy of us can become a hero?
>
>I liked Covenant, but I would venture to say that the book said nothing
>at all about any of us. Unless of course that is to say that a man
>who is a rapist and who through inaction is directly responsible for
>countless atrocities can be seen as a hero by casual book readers.
>I would say that this might say something about US.
For what it's worth, I recall just about everyone who read the books
detesting Covenant, though more for his attitude than his actions.
I considered him rather a blot in the way of my enjoying the Land. On
the other hand, his dreary obsessiveness is a rather realistic de-
piction of what being neurotic is like, though I'm not as thorough
about it as he is. (In fact, I don't know that I've ever met anyone
who was that thoroughly fouled up.)
In that sense, the Covenant books were better than the kind of sf/fantasy
in which a character has A Psychological Problem which Gets Neatly Solved
without Getting in the Way of the Plot. I was irritated that he dies just
as he was getting his head together. This seemed as though Donaldson was
avoiding the challenge of seeing what Covenant would do once he wasn't
making himself miserable. On the other hand, I've never been so happy to
see a fictional character die, not even the Worm-Emperor of Dune.
>
>> "It's true that you probably couldn't get anything published written in the
>> style of the classics these days. Sad, but true.
I'm not sure what you count as "in the style of the classics", but I can think
of a couple of books, which though not popular, were published. One was the
prequel to _Dynteryx_ (I'm hoping that someone will supply title and author)
which had very old-fashioned ideas of honor and plotting. It reminded me of
Victor Hugo a little. Also, there's an sf novel called _Winter's Daughter_
which was very reminiscent of the sagas. If you mean something more like
space opera, have you checked out _Raft_ by Baxter, a very striking sf
novel about people trapped in an alternate universe where g is one billion
times what it is here? Also, there's _A Fire Upon Space_ by Vernor Vinge,
which is possibly the best sf novel I've ever read, and pretty heroic.
-----Whirlwind
[a lot of further argument deleted]
Nancy Lebovitz
>As quoted from <1992Apr29.1...@cco.caltech.edu> by lyd...@SOL1.GPS.CALTECH.EDU (Speaker-to-Minerals):
>+---------------
>| I suspect it's more a case of people who've read a few of the terrible
>| knockoffs of LoTR but haven't yet read LoTR starting the book and saying "Not
>| another of THOSE."
>+---------------
>
>There's some of that in there, yes, but I've met several people (and other
>Callahaners have written in the past of people they have met, or even of
>themselves) who have tried to read LoTR but ended up shelving it because it
>didn't say much once the fancy imagery was removed. Which is essentially true.
>The major strength of LoTR is the sense of reality and detail that Tolkien put
>into Middle-Earth; to those uninterested in scenery it's just a lot of
>verbiage to pick through looking for the "actual story". (People who consider
>scenery to be incidental must live in awful dull worlds, IMHO.)
>
>++Brandon
I can think of at least one idea that runs through LotR which is rare in
any fiction, let alone heroic fantasy--the value of living in a body in a
fairly ordinary way. It's not just that hobbits like comfort, and two
hobbits were the primary heros. Aragorn is only living rough because he
has to, and he's only too glad to get married and live in a castle. "The
hands of a king are the hands of a healer" and valuing skill in war above
healing is the sign of a degenerating civilization. (Compare this to
Robert E. Howard!) Characters are _afraid_ of getting hurt, and there
isn't that sequence, so common in modern fantasy, where a character
learns some skill at a superhuman level through enduring immense pain.
---whirlwind
Carole Parker
I have been called a form of hero, but I don't consider myself one. I have
been called courageous, but I don't think of myself as courageous.
This is frequently the attitude of a hero/courageous person. A common
quote is "I was only doing what was necessary..."
I found myself. See? I'm right here!
Carole Parker
e-mail: fa...@sun.com with a Subject line: Mail for Carole