This week (episode 3 of season 13) we return to our tradition of almost entirely unstructured rambling. Jonathan and Gary consider such questions as to whether a novel can be good SF, but not much good in literary terms, or a good literary novel not much good as SF.
While we recognize that many popular subgenres, from military SF to heroic fantasy, have plenty of readers loyal to the old traditions, we muse about whether many of today’s writers feel some pressure to meet both traditional literary and SF standards, and Jonathan namechecks R.F. Kuang. Some writers we mention, such as Arkady Martine, seem to effortlessly do both. On the other hand, why were several genre mystery readers of the 1930s and 1940s, like Hammett and Chandler, were later recognized as major literary figures, the same didn’t seem to have to SF writers of the same period.
Toward the end, we touch upon Paul Kincaid's provocative new essay, "A Taxonomy of Reviewing" and his book on Brian W. Aldiss, amongst other things.
As always, we hope you enjoy the episode.
Episode 356: Space opera, WorldCon, Campbell, and other unicorns
Episode 355: A short one
Episode 354: Influence, impact, the sense of wonder, and other critical missions
Episode 353: New projects and old books
Episode 352: A Surplus of Us
Episode 351: A Quick One
Episode 350: Hey, well how about that?
Episode 349: Sarah Pinsker on the road
Episode 348: Nebulas, Hugos, ereading and more
Episode 347: Charlie Jane Anders and The City in the Middle of the Night
Episode 346: Neil Clarke and the State of Short Fiction in 2018
Episode 345: Liza Trombi, Locus, and the Year in Review
Episode 344: Time, Cities and Moving to the Poles
Episode 343: Grand Masters and other Awards...
Episode 342: The Books of 2019
Episode 341: 2018 Year in Review
Episode 340: Andy Duncan and the Road to Utopia
REPOST - Episode 339 - The Road to Baltimore
Episode 339: The Road to Baltimore
Episode 338: Alec Nevala-Lee, Andy Duncan, and the Astounding Legacy
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