“People have compared me to Melville before, which, of course, is monumental praise, and there’s is the name thing. Turn my “i” into an “l” and change the place and we have the same name. I’m glad you think the values coexist. Several of the people on that symposium have said, “Look I admire your work, but you’re pulled in a pulp direction as a storyteller, and you’re also pulled in a more avant-garde ‘literary direction,’ and these are fundamentally pulling against each other.” I find that as a charge very interesting, and I’m not sure that I agree with it. I feel very confused about it, but it does seem to me to be a very interesting take. This has given me pause for thought. But I do retain this hope that you can actually have it both ways. And if you can have it both ways at all, fantasy is a uniquely powerful arena that would allow you to do that. So my aim would be precisely to write the ripping yarn that is also sociologically serious and stylistically avant-garde. I mean, that’s the Holy Grail right there!”

Meanwhile, see the latest Asimov’s “On Books” for a ver y interesting take on INFOQUAKE that dovetails with this discussion:
http://www.asimovs.com/_issue_0704/onbooks.shtml

The primary problem with this is that he tends to invest almost every place the novel takes you with the same level of detail, whether it’s necessary or not. This has an impact on the overall pacing. Still, it’s quite a worthwhile read, even if you come to conclude that it’s still speaking inward.

Speaking of inturning, if you ever get the time, I’d be interested to hear what you make of John Clute’s APPLESEED.

Lou, if you love Perdido for its exhaustive world-building, I think you’re crazy. If you love it for its *necessary* world-building, then I’ll still try to read the thing.

Can’t blame you for keeping the author to yourself. But if said author offends again, I do hope you’ll warn those of us who prefer to stay away from that kind of SF.

Lou: I never have a problem with minimal, if any, SF window dressing in futuristic worlds. In Children of Men, their computers were futuristic enough for me, and the premise is enough to remind us that on the brink of extinction, we aren’t exactly going to be making grand technological progress, except (in this case) in the research of fertilization.

Of course, P.D. James is a mystery writer, and the original book has even less SF in it than the movie, so that may be part of it too. BUT: I am not the kind of reader who minds. I’m too easily overwhelmed with futurizing, and often, I don’t buy the future that’s being handed to me or I view it more as “fantasy” than actual SF, no matter how plausible it might really be.

Evan, I read the Mike Harrison piece. Yes, this is definitely related to what I’m concerned with. This is interesting:

“Above all, worldbuilding is not technically neccessary. It is the great clomping foot of nerdism. It is the attempt to exhaustively survey a place that isn’t there. A good writer would never try to do that, even with a place that is there.” (emphasis my own)

Harrison really seems to be touching on the finesse of writing well. I agree with his thoughts, but the thing that really fascinates me about world-building in sf right now, is the idea that sf may — because it’s so obsessed with futurizing — be speaking to its navel.

The complaint is raised often enough that SF is ignored as a literature, and I can’t help wondering if its because we’re failing to lift our heads and speak outward.

We can point to lots of stories that steal sf tropes, without acknowledging their origin. And we can all say, “Well, that’s really sf.”

But I think outside readers know the difference. They know when we’re talking to our in crowd and flashing signs to each other instead of actually trying to communicate with them and I think our obsession with, as Darryl put it, “The Mutually Assured Destruction scenario” of trying to construct the coolest future furniture is a big part of this. We’re building some mighty high walls to scale if we actually want anyone to visit our playpen.

Forgot about Walter’s story. It is a good example of that.

D

I would cite Walter Jon Williams’ brilliant “The Green Leopard Plague” as a story that has layer upon layer of cool SFnal extrapolations in full support of story. I am wondering about the book that Paolo is reading too and have some possible candidates I’ll keep to myself.