With Gary about to leave for the World Fantasy Convention to be held in New Orleans next week, and with Jonathan in the process of assembling anthologies on the most recent iterations of space opera, we spend most of our time discussing the characteristics, history, and too-common misuse of that venerable term.
While we do touch briefly on the etymology of 'space opera', and on the pulp-era adventures that Wilson Tucker had in mind when he rather contemptuously coined the term in 1941, most of the discussion focuses on how the idea has evolved since M. John Harrison set out to demolish the old-school space opera with The Centauri Device in 1974, the efforts of Paul J. McAuley and others to define a new space opera in the 1980s (and Jonathan and Gardner Dozois’s The New Space Opera anthologies of 2007 and 2010), the influence of media, and more recent examples ranging from James S.A. Corey’s Expanse series to Aliette de Bodard’s Xuya universe, Nnedi Okorafor’s Binti series, and other authors who have energetically begun to reclaim space opera for a more diverse cast of characters. We fully expect enthusiastic disagreements.
As always, we hope you enjoy the episode. See you all again after World Fantasy!
Episode 550: P. Djèlí Clark and A Master of Djinn
Episode 549: Lockdown, science fiction, and more
Episode 548: Kelly Robson and Alias Space
Episode 547: Nominating for the World Fantasy Awards
Episode 546:Veronica Schanoes and Burning Girls and Other Stories
Episode 545: Aliette de Bodard and Fireheart Tiger
Episode 544: Ten Minutes with Max Gladstone
Episode 543: The Year in Review and Other Digressions
Episode 542: Ten Minutes with Jason Sizemore
Episode 541: John Clute and Science Fiction Repeating the Future
Episode 540: The Last Official One for 2020
Episode 539: A Very Coode Street Gift Guide
Episode 538: Sheree Renée Thomas, Charles Coleman Finlay and F&SF
Episode 537: Ten Minutes with Charlie Jane Anders
Episode 536: Time for another list
Episode 535: Ten Minutes with Rebecca Roanhorse
Episode 534: Ten Minutes with Sheila Williams
Episode 533: Ten Minutes with Paul Park
Episode 532: Ten Minutes with S. Qiouyi Lu
Episode 531: On reading and re-reading speculative fiction
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