Confederacy of Dunces, overrated or genius?
Genius, but still overrated by some, like every cult novel. It's hard for people whose lives are changed by this or that book to ever acknowledge the book's flaws, after all.
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What pop song has got you waggin' that ass of yours these days?
I missed your LitReactor class! Any plans to offer it again? Any other LR classes you'd recommend?
Yup! I usually get to teach twice a year, so I hope November.
People seem to like the Craig Clevenger (sp? Sorry am on phone) classes a lot. Anything on grammar is ALWAYS worth it.
People seem to like the Craig Clevenger (sp? Sorry am on phone) classes a lot. Anything on grammar is ALWAYS worth it.
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What's with the weird cult around Roger Ebert ?
When Ebert was alive I'd joke that I didn't need to follow him on Twitter because his every tweet ended up in my timeline anyway. It is weird, but basically it is this:
1. longevity—he spent decades on TV; people grew up with him
2. nerdity—he knew his way around the Internet and social media early
3. populism—everyone has an opinion on movies and Ebert would interact with all sorts of goons
4. politics—social media came to the fore after 9/11, so more or less clueless people were looking for someone with reasonably coherent political opinions to glom on to
5. tragedy—when he got sick, he soldiered on amazingly well.
He was basically a less ridiculous Michael Moore, and with the benefit of knowing a lot about movies. His base in Chicago taught him how to fight with rhetoric early on too, so he wasn't shocked or appalled at the usual Internet chatter (e.g., "You're too fat to like movies, you fat faggot!"). He accreted an audience that would shield him from the worst of that, and the audience was pleased to have a discursive space away from the "I WISH I WAS A FAT FAGGOT WHO GOT PAID TO SEE MOVIES TO YOU FAT FAGGOT LOL" crowd.
1. longevity—he spent decades on TV; people grew up with him
2. nerdity—he knew his way around the Internet and social media early
3. populism—everyone has an opinion on movies and Ebert would interact with all sorts of goons
4. politics—social media came to the fore after 9/11, so more or less clueless people were looking for someone with reasonably coherent political opinions to glom on to
5. tragedy—when he got sick, he soldiered on amazingly well.
He was basically a less ridiculous Michael Moore, and with the benefit of knowing a lot about movies. His base in Chicago taught him how to fight with rhetoric early on too, so he wasn't shocked or appalled at the usual Internet chatter (e.g., "You're too fat to like movies, you fat faggot!"). He accreted an audience that would shield him from the worst of that, and the audience was pleased to have a discursive space away from the "I WISH I WAS A FAT FAGGOT WHO GOT PAID TO SEE MOVIES TO YOU FAT FAGGOT LOL" crowd.
Have you ever written a romance?
"Slice of Life", which appears in GARGOYLE #61, might count as one.
http://www.gargoylemagazine.com/gargoyle/Issues/Issue61.php
http://www.gargoylemagazine.com/gargoyle/Issues/Issue61.php
Can you recommend any Japanese horror novels in the vein of Ring or Out?
Yes! Otsuichi's SUMMER, FIREWORKS, AND MY CORPSE. It's actually a novella, a novellete and a short novel collected in one volume. One of the three stories will scratch your itch.
Does anything distinguish A Song of Ice and Fire series from standard (low or high) fantasy fare, beyond the boobs and blood of Horseclans proportions?
It is difficult to predict who will die. Or it was, when the books first came out. So it retained the genre setting but messed with the expectations. Specifically, the characters readers focused on to identify with ("heroes") were often were killed, and then the story just moved on, which was shocking. Now, of course, everyone knows not to get too attached.
What is it about Wolfe that makes him so good? I hit the reef of the first book of the New Sun and never quite went back. Is that an example of his best writing or do you consider his later work better?
I prefer his Latro series of three books, partially for the ancient Greek theme. I think it's more accessible than some of his stuff, and very engaging. I also liked his contemporary novel THERE ARE DOORS, and any of his short fiction collections are good places to start. I tend to dislike long, intricate series, so never finished New Sun either.
Followup question. Have you read a good epic fantasy? What did it do different to not suck?
The only thing that might count that I've read in recent years was Wolfe's THE KNIGHT and THE WIZARD, which had the hard-to-reproduce advantage of being written by Gene Wolfe.
In one of your recent posts you reference the Chicago Manual of Style. Is this preferred for fiction writers over the AP style manual?
For fiction writers publishing in the US, yes.
Thanks. Mostly I was wondering why a lot of epic fantasy authors seemed to have a grudge against writing even a halfway decent sentence?
Oh! Well, that's easier. They've never read one.
Why is epic fantasy trash?
I'm sure that some of it isn't, but Dungeons and Dragons has much to answer for. There's also a great contradiction between the massive emphasis on worldbuilding, which should imply some form of naturalism, and the individual hero who saves the world.
There is a secondary problem of using magic as a stand-in for the technological base we're familiar with under capitalism while retaining an otherwise completely feudal economy. Once you introduce teleportation, flying machines (or creatures), or even instantaneous long-distance communication, the feudal economy would start looking a lot different.
There is a secondary problem of using magic as a stand-in for the technological base we're familiar with under capitalism while retaining an otherwise completely feudal economy. Once you introduce teleportation, flying machines (or creatures), or even instantaneous long-distance communication, the feudal economy would start looking a lot different.
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Mel
Do you have a good definition/essay/short story example on what is "contemporary noir"? (Other than "Read The Big Click.")
UNCLE DUST by Rob Pierce is where I'd go. Of course, DOPE by Sara Gran was amazing, but it was a historical and trafficked in a lot of the baggage of noir. But UD is the hot stuff.
It's a novel, not a short story, but it really is what you're asking for. ALL DUE RESPECT has a magazine of its own, and many of its short stories are good. The two extant issues of MURDALAND, which still might be findable used in online retailers, are also essential.
It's a novel, not a short story, but it really is what you're asking for. ALL DUE RESPECT has a magazine of its own, and many of its short stories are good. The two extant issues of MURDALAND, which still might be findable used in online retailers, are also essential.
Why is it that everyone who writes a tolkien pastiche novel (even if they claim it isn't) really just write a brooks pastiche?
They lack Tolkien's education and academic interest in language, plus they lack the mission of creating a real foundational national myth. Also, overexposure to Dungeons and Dragons.
If Tom Kratman engaged in introspection and doubted his own integrity, would he punch himself?
I think people who don't engage in introspection are more likely to hit themselves.
If Vince Russo were booking the Hugo's, how to do think WorldCon would play out? Would there be any literary swerves?
If Vince Russo were booking the Hugo's, how to do think WorldCon would play out? Would there be any literary swerves? George R R Martin would end up winning a Hugo despite not being on the ballot, then he'd be stripped of his Hugo and join with the Analog Mafia to get it back by invading the World Fantasy Awards but first we'd find out that Connie Willis was impregnated by a Hugo rocket and gave birth to a Nebula Award, while I'm stuck in the midcard crying over the Shirley Jackson title and anyway, somehow Vince Russo himself ends up on television and hires Emily Blunt to kiss him while she wears her full EDGE OF TOMORROW battle outfit. Then he gives himself the Fan Writer Hugo.
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Chrysoula Tzavelas
Screw real politics, what about the hugo's? Torgersen write anymore slash or did Correia just cry for like the twentieth time about how life is unfair and everyone was so mean to him at worldcon?
Brad made a mildly homophobic remark regarding Scalzi, which half the planet had to blog about because it was just soooo awful and apparently now the US will fall to ISIS because how can Brad's soldiers trust him now?
Anyway, under Sharia law, launching politicized slates for the Hugos is barred, so I guess the problem has solved itself!
Anyway, under Sharia law, launching politicized slates for the Hugos is barred, so I guess the problem has solved itself!
Do you know much about Canadian politics? What do you think of NDP sweeping the Alberta election?
I suppose it is an interesting, almost amazing event that will undoubtedly involve the NDP in office moving solidly to the right.
Got any irons in the fire?
Sure.
In the UK we're being asked once again to choose between the usual pro-austerity, anti-Post-war settlement parties. Did you ever get "The Case Against Voting" published?
Nope—I was told by a major left political publisher that the book proposal was good and the chapters strong, but that he would want to wait until after Kerry defeated Bush in 2004 (lol) to release it. The book was for the US context: two major parties that represent industrial and finance capital respectively, with a winner-take-all system. The arguments in the UK are not at all the same, though of course Labour abandoned Clause Four and thus pretty much any reason to vote for it yeeeears ago. Out of sheer perversion, were I in the UK now I would not be in England and I probably would vote SNP to help provoke some sort of crisis.
What's your hot take on Bernie Sanders running for prez?
Don't get too excited. One, he is just a social democrat, and has been selling out on the issue of war for decades—Vermont even has a party called the Liberty Union which is a left-wing split from Sanders over these issues (an example: http://www.libertyunionparty.org/?page_id=363). Practically speaking, a social democrat from a small state with no infrastructure who was not a member of the Democratic Party isn't going anywhere near the nomination. I doubt there will be debates, I doubt he'll get a speech at the DNC, etc. If anything, Sanders will help move Clinton to the right, and she now can catch swing voters by pointing to Sanders and saying, "See what a lunatic he is! I'm in the center!"
Sanders could have made a decent run as Green/Peace Freedom, but the Dems caucuses with would never forgive him.
Sanders could have made a decent run as Green/Peace Freedom, but the Dems caucuses with would never forgive him.
How's Brad's book doing? Has all this drama hurt or helped his sales?
Not great. Sales are marginal on Bookscan: 4-12 copies per week. I'm sure he's doing much better in ebook, as is typical of Baen when compared to their trade paperbacks.
Regarding your answer about writers stealing from others, the process you described is "cryptomnesia" while some edgy types call it "kleptomnesia".
Neat! (This wasn't really a question though.)
As a baby writer I've never really understood how the falling action works. Why wouldn't you just go straight to the denoument after overcoming the main obstacle of the story?
Falling action and dénouement can be the same thing—the un-knotting of the emotional tension created by the climax. When the climax is huge and simple, like the destruction of the Death Star in STAR WARS or the ten-count in ROCKY, the dénouement can be as simple: Luke and Han gets medals, Rocky climbs to his feet and shouts "Yo, Adrian!"
When the climax is more emotionally and narratively complex, it'll take a bit longer to effectively unwind the emotional tension via falling action.
When the climax is more emotionally and narratively complex, it'll take a bit longer to effectively unwind the emotional tension via falling action.
How do you keep improving as a writer? And do you think you still are?
As I write a lot of short stories, I get more chances to "experiment" than a novelist might, I think. So I try to push myself, at least sometimes. I also try to push *in* more—that is, dig stuff up from my own internal life, rather than simply write about external experiences. I finished a story a couple of weeks ago that I think went very well: it's a Carnacki story, but I hope more than a pastiche, and it also deals with my continuing interest in Eastern Orthodoxy, a sharper climax than I usually put in to my stories and at more of a midpoint (I tend to put the climax in then a slight coda for dénouement, so I was looking for more of an equilateral triangle, but I still had a slight coda at the end), and a more interesting set of sentences than I've been using lately.
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