I'll tell you all my secrets, but I lie about my past

[sovay]

And occasionally I just answer the questions. An interview Geoffrey Goodwin most generously did with me last month is now online at Bookslut: read and find out what I think of the New Weird, traditional narrative, the sea, and why on earth I wrote "When You Came to Troy" in the first place. I may even be reasonably coherent this time around.

Off to the library, to read about Gilgameš in his capacity as judge of the underworld . . .

Comments

[pnh.livejournal.com]

I like your comments about labels and classifications. I think there's a real distinction between labels that come into general use because they're handy ways for readers to make rough-and-ready distinctions among kinds of stories ("space opera" would be one such) and labels that are the project of a group of writers and critics with an agenda (in our field, "New Weird" is the current leading example).

Sometimes the latter become the former, but not usually.

Genre and subgenre labels are necessary for a very simple reason: because readers don't want to walk into a bookstore to find all the books piled up in a giant pyramid in the middle of the floor. It's understandable that writers resist this. It's often productive that writers resist this. I certainly understand wanting to avoid the further clutter of cultish agenda-driven labels that don't even help readers.

[sovay]

Sometimes the latter become the former, but not usually.

Which labels have made that jump? None came to mind immediately, but perhaps that's because I now think of them as descriptive rather than programmatic.

[pnh.livejournal.com]

I was thinking "New Wave" -- the SF movement, not the music. Originally applied to a small group of mostly British writers, it got retooled by readers to describe the broad front of experimentalism that flourished in the genre in the 1960s.

[ex-greythist387.livejournal.com]

You give difficult interview, I think :) in terms of turning and resetting the Usual Questions. It's a satisfying read. The phrasing of "Words must be set in order to generate meaning" is nudging thoughts in another window as I prepare today's class (terminals and Zelazny's "24 Views"). Thanks for that timely reminder as well as the link.

[debka-notion.livejournal.com]

Your mentioned Dhalgren- on a complete and utter tangent, can I ask what you thought of that book?

[nineweaving.livejournal.com]

That's spelled "Old Wyrd." They have a monstrous regimental tie, striped black on black.

Good interview.

Nine

[gwynnega]

Cool interview!