SF/F Commentary

The Politicization of the SFWA? (A Mini-response to Michael Z. Williamson)

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I had intended to post the following as a response to this post by Michael Z. Williamson on the politicization of the SFWA.  I don’t know much about Mr. Williamson, nor his politics (frankly, I don’t care as long as those politics don’t involve shitting in my yard — reference!), but I do think he raises several interesting points.  Granted, he uses as examples people who, for the most part, couldn’t identify sexism, racism, or downright poor behavior if it bit them on the nose.  So it goes.  In any case, you should read his post to get a sense of what he’s talking about before you read farther. And here is my comment: While I agree with you that the SFWA should be as politics free as possible, this is a two way street.  It cannot remain politically neutral at the same time as members within it see fit to thrust their politics into the dialogue within the organization, and vice versa.  Many of the most recent “turf wars” are responses to behaviors from members who have used official SFWA channels to share their politically-charged opinions (even Reznick and Malzberg were anything but politically neutral, as their most recent column in the Bulletin was practically a petty screed against people who criticized them primarily *outside of official SFWA channels*).  So in order to cut all of this stuff out, that means everyone gets cut out, and all those “turf wars” will have to occur in entirely different arenas.  There’s probably something really good about doing this, but it won’t prevent attacks against the organization or between or against its members.  Understandably, you don’t have many methods for stopping such behavior, but you can remove such behaviors from the SFWA’s official channels.  In rare circumstances, you can (and should) remove members (and I honestly believe this should be for those circumstances when a member’s presence within the organization causes notable harm to the reputation to that organization — i.e., quite rare indeed).  I just don’t think that’s possible given the type of rhetoric being used in the most recent “turf war.”  Vox Day seems hell bent on pissing on the organization and the members within it (for which he holds a personal grudge).  He doesn’t really care to have a dialogue, in part because he is motivated by a supremacist’s mindset.  It would be lovely if we could ignore him, but he has intentionally used SFWA channels as a soapbox for his ideology.  And he likewise doesn’t seem to care if he breaks any rules doing it.  At some point, you pull the plug, I suppose.  It’s up to the SFWA board to figure that out. The other problem here is that the organization is supposed to represent as many people as it possibly can.  That means women, people of color, liberals, conservatives, mad scientists, and regular old doctors (provided they write genre, of course).  The official voice of the organization must therefore present a unified, reasonable, and respectful narrative.  To depoliticize the SFWA in the manner you seem to desire, you would have to excise anything that could reasonably offend or disrespect members of the organization (here I use “offend” in its malignant form; lots of people get offended for stupid reasons).  And that means something like the recent Reznick/Malzberg column shouldn’t have happened.  It was not a positive examination or discussion of something relevant to members; it was an irrational attack on people who didn’t like the direction of the Bulletin in the past couple of issues.  There’s nothing rational about crying censorship or what have you in an official document, particularly when no such action had occurred.  And that also means something like Scalzi’s post on race/gender difficulty settings, even if retooled for the writing market, wouldn’t belong either.   But I think we have to accept that the Bulletin cannot entirely avoid political issues (it can’t); it can remain neutral, but sometimes neutrality prevents action.  You can’t truly de-politicize the SFWA.  There are too many issues within the SF/F writing world that are political issues.  If the SFWA represents the writing interests of its members, that means addressing things like race or gender, which are factors that have and sometimes still do affect publishing and publicity prospects for members.  It also means addressing abuses against members within the writing world.  If Brad Torgersen really was denied the award by official staff of the organization (or if they tried to influence his nominations or wins so he wouldn’t receive either), then the SFWA must address that (I don’t know anything about this, so I will assume it’s false until I see otherwise).  Point is:  the politics aren’t going anywhere; the best we can hope for is lessening the hurt.  De-politicizing the SFWA is part of the process to make it a safe environment for everyone, but it doesn’t work, in my mind, by allowing some things, but refusing others.  Either it must become absolutely neutral, or it has to tread carefully and deliberately.  Lately, it simply hasn’t done that.  And that’s the real problem.  

SF/F Commentary

Orson Scott Card is a Yard Shitter (and a Note on Redeemability)

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This was making the rounds earlier this week, but since I was working on the Week of Joy, I chose to save my opinion on the matter until now. Basically, it comes down to the sad fact that Orson Scott Card is a Yard Shitter.  What is a Yard Shitter?  I shall explain by way of an OSC example.  OSC recently said the following: Now it will be interesting to see whether the victorious proponents of gay marriage will show tolerance toward those who disagreed with them when the issue was still in dispute. I don’t think he understands how tolerance works.  I don’t have a problem with his dislike for gay people.  I don’t even care that he thinks gays are a genetic defect.  If his beliefs were just his beliefs, we could all tolerate one another just fine.  But they’re not.  He has actively tried to push those beliefs on everyone else.  Sorry, but no. I don’t have to tolerate your desire to remove the rights of others.  I don’t.  And for you to ask me to tolerate your intolerance of others suggests that you don’t really understand how tolerance works.  Tolerance only works if what you believe doesn’t affect others.  If your neighbor has an outhouse and takes a shit in that outhouse every night, you can tolerate that because he’s not bothering you with his shitting.  But if your neighbor shits on your yard every night, you don’t have to tolerate that.  EVER.  At that point, he’s started sharing his shit with other people, at which point his belief in shitting outside of the house infringes on the ability of others to have nothing to do with said shitting.  The same thing is true for gay rights.  If you expressed your opinion and kept it at that, I could ignore you.  But you use your popularity to push your ideology on the rest of us.  You’re shitting in all of our yards, and you think we should have to put up with it.  Gay people don’t show up and shit on your doorstep, so why you feel you have a right to shit on theirs with impunity is beyond me.  (Translation:  gay people don’t say you have to like their gay marriages or engage in gay marriage or hang out with gay people, married or otherwise, and so on and so forth.  For the most part, they just want you to leave them the frak alone.) This is about shitting in yards.  Tolerance only works between parties who don’t shit on one another’s property.  If you want me to tolerate you, Mr. Card, then you have to stop shitting everywhere.  Take your shit to your outhouse and shit away.  But don’t pretend like you get special treatment for shitting on my yard simply because you think you’re right or because you have some sort of “moral authority” from a church.  You don’t.  When you shit on my yard, you get exactly what you deserve:  ridicule and verbal backlash.  That’s how tolerance works. ————————————————— None of this is to suggest that Card cannot “redeem” himself.  I believe fervently in redemption, not just as a narrative, but as a way of life.  If we didn’t allow redemption to exist, this world would fall to pieces.  People make mistakes.  In some cases, they make really horrible mistakes (and in still others, they make mistakes for which forgiveness is impossible).  Card falls within that horrible-but-forgivable-mistake category (I’ll explain that in a second).  As far as I can see, there are two main ways for him to redeem himself, if he chooses to do so. The first, and least likely, involves publicly apologizing for all the damage he has done to gay communities across the country, followed by admitting that, in most respects, he was wrong.  Posterity will recognize him both for the work he has produced and for holding out-dated and downright idiotic beliefs (just as most of us view the slave owners of the olden days).  He can change that, though.  By apologizing and admitting fault (followed by leaving most of the anti-gay organizations through which he has supported anti-gay policies and rhetoric), he can demonstrate that change is possible, and that all of us deserve a little slack when that time comes. But Card is highly unlikely to ever do that.  Why?  Because nothing so far indicates he has changed his mind on much of anything, save taking the U.S. government by force and preventing gay marriage by coup (he seems to have thrown in the towel).  The comment above — i.e., the main discussion point thus far — indicates that Card wants you to tolerate his intolerance.  In other words, he still believes most of what he has always said, but now he thinks he shouldn’t suffer financially for holding those beliefs, nor for using his popularity to push for legislation to force those beliefs on the rest of us.  Remember that gay rights activists have never advocated (except perhaps as a joke) for everyone to have gay marriages and gay rights.  They just want their gay marriages and gay rights. Even if we pass gay marriage laws in every state, straight people and anti-gay people will still get married just fine.  There’s a huge difference between the anti-gay and pro-gay stances.  The first wants to force everyone to follow its version of morality by removing or banning certain rights otherwise afforded to gays.  The second just wants all those gay folks to have the same rights as everyone else.  Huge difference. The second and more reasonable option for Card is to admit he was wrong about advocating for anti-gay positions on the legal level.  Basically, he’ll keep believing gays are degenerates and shouldn’t have rights, but he’ll stop actively working to deny them rights.  I don’t see this happening either, of course, and I wouldn’t ask him to do anything of the sort.  But it’s one of a handful of options available that will allow

SF/F Commentary

Week of Joy (Day Seven): “The Wonders of Whimsy” by Adam Callaway

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Whimsy is important to me. Most everything I love about art — music, movies, books — comes down to one aspect:  whimsy. I appreciate technical masterpieces like a Rachmaninoff concerto or a Joycean short story. I enjoy gritty realism like Law and Order or Lord of the Flies. However, my love lies with those pieces that make you wonder and smile, that turns the mundane into the fantastic with a turn of phrase or a splash of color. Whimsy is one of the most difficult aspects of art to quantify. It’s one of those “you know it when you see it” things. It’s a butterfly landing on the rim of a lemonade glass or a wind-up toy that never dies down. Whimsy is why Miyazaki movies are so compelling. Whimsy is the noise Totoro makes when he opens his mouth and the castle floating in the sky. Whimsy is the feeling of the uncanny when the mundane is melded with the fantastic. It’s the bright colors in The Yellow Submarine. It’s the surreal made comfortable. It’s what made Harry Potter a phenomenon. It’s the feeling you get when you look out on a lake and imagine a mermaid swimming right below the surface. Whimsy is the green apple in Rene Magritte paintings. It’s the extra-dimensions of Escher. Whimsy is reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, pretending you’re looking over the shoulder of Willy Wonka as he gazes out on his candy empire. Whimsy is one of the reasons we start reading and telling stories in the first place. It’s why children can have imaginary friends with no sense of self-consciousness. Whimsy allows us to believe in the unbelievable, to suspend our disbelief in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Whimsy is the reason why we can be scared by ghost stories. Even in the most different of secondary worlds, it’s why we can sympathize with characters that are nowhere near us. Whimsy is a powerful tool. A lot of adults lose it as they age. And that’s a real shame. Without whimsy, life becomes dull and gray. Without whimsy, the problems of how to pay a mortgage or hospital bills become the reason we wake up in the morning instead of looking forward to the new experiences a day will bring. Whimsy is important. I think most of us forget just how important it really is. —————————————— About the author: Adam Callaway is a science fiction and fantasy author who spends his days dreaming about tentacles and secondary fantasy worlds involving magic cooks and flying monkey overlords.  His work has appeared in Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Flurb, The Year’s Best Dark Fantasy and Horror and many other wonderful places.  You can find out more about him on his website. Editor’s note (i.e., Shaun): Go read his short stories.  They’re really good.

SF/F Commentary

Week of Joy (Day Seven): “The Genre Books That Influenced & Inspired Me to Read & Write” by Stina Leicht

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It’s funny. While I’ve always loved books, I don’t remember the moment when I decided I wanted to be a writer — not any longer. You see, originally I wanted to be an artist, but during seventh grade I decided that writing was what I wanted to do more than anything else. From the moment I forced myself through the process of learning to read[1] I loved books. Books were safe. Books were also adventure. So, I quickly found favorites. Zilpha Keatley Snyder was the first author that I actively tracked down in my local library. I read everything I could find: The Changeling, Season of Ponies, The Witches of Worm, The Headless Cupid, The Velvet Room, The Eyes in the Fishbowl — most are out of print now. Some were Newbery Honor Winners. I think she was the author that gave me that first spark, that first thought that I could be more than just a frightened little girl. I remember wanting to be ageless, free, and spritely like Ivy in The Changeling. I wanted to be mysterious like Amanda in The Headless Cupid. I wanted to ride standing on the backs of graceful, magical, cantering circus ponies like Pamela. It’s good that I found Zilpha Keatley Snyder’s books before I found Francesca Lia Block’s — otherwise, I’d have searched the world for a pair of cowboy boot roller-skates, wore layers of wispy mismatched skirts with fairy wings, played with glitter, pierced my nose, and painted my hair purple long before I reached voting age. And my mother would’ve killed me. A lot. Do you have any idea how hard it is to get glitter out of things? Then there was Joan Aiken. I still say Lemony Snicket wishes he were Joan Aiken. She totally and utterly rocked my world. The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, Blackhearts in Battersea, and Nightbirds in Nantucket combined fantasy and history — technically alternate history — and hapless orphans who triumph over e-vile caretakers out to do… well… evil, of course. It was heady stuff. Throw in A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle and I was gone, gone, gone. Meg’s mother was a scientist! It was the first time I’d come across such a thing. I remember thinking how awesome that was. I wanted to be a scientist for a whole month because I knew right then it was possible. I wanted to cook dinner on a hotplate in a laboratory while working on something really important. Something about that seemed so cool. The first book to spirit me away into the adult section of the public library, however, was Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury.[2] My father read it aloud to me when I was twelve. I remember being frightened that the Library Police™ would find me among the adult book shelves. Because surely there was some sort of alarm that sounded when kids wandered in there. You know, I’m not entirely sure what I thought they’d have done if they had found me. I lived in terror of librarians. To be honest, I pretty much lived in terror of everyone in those days. I was a very shy, very skinny kid with frizzy hair, after all. The main thing was that I didn’t want to be thrown out. The library was my world. I loved the smell and the feel of the books and the hushed consecrated ground. Now that I think back on it, The Sharpstown library in Houston wasn’t very big — one floor, a dozen long shelves in the center of the building, and a magazine section. They didn’t separate the SF novels from the rest of the books in the adult section either. (I’m sure it was because they didn’t have enough to warrant it.) I remember asking the librarian[3] where the SF books were and being overwhelmed by the concept of sorting through all of the books to find what I wanted. Unlike the children’s books, I’d have to rely on the card catalog. The book covers weren’t as much help. It wasn’t long before I’d read everything they had that Bradbury had written. Then I moved on to others: Joshua Son of None by Nancy Freedman, Dune by Frank Herbert, Childhood’s End by Arthur C. Clark, The Anything Box by Zenna Henderson, The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien — I wandered all over until I found Stephen King. Then I kind of parked there for years like I did with Zilpha Snyder. But really, I think it was the combination of Zilpha Snyder, Joan Aiken, Stephen King, and Ray Bradbury that made me think about writing my own stories. They were the first to open the doors of my imagination. The were the first to open up my mind to the possibilities. ————————————- [1] I’m dyslexic. [2] You should be sensing a theme here. If it was mildly spooky, off-beat, or magical, I was all over it. [3] When I finally got up my courage to do so. I was shocked to discover that the librarians were thrilled to death that I wanted to read adult books. Of course, by that time I’d already discovered Dickens and Twain. About the author: Stina Leicht is the author of Of Blood and Honey and And Blue Skies From Pain, urban fantasy novels set during the Troubles in Ireland.  She is a two-time Campbell Award nominee and lives in the great old state of Texas, where she actively causes trouble (because she’s awesome like that — love you, Stina! :P).  You can follow Stina on her blog and find out more about her work (such as where to buy it) on her profile. Note from the editor (i.e., Shaun): If you haven’t read Stina’s work before, you should do so immediately.  Her Ireland novels are bloody amazing.  We interviewed her twice about them on The Skiffy and Fanty Show.  You can find every episode she’s ever been on here.  But first…buy her books! Additionally, Stina

SF/F Commentary

Week of Joy (Day Six): Heart of Fire by J. Damask (A Mini Interview)

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J. Damask (a.k.a. Joyce Chng) was kind enough to answer a few questions about her new book, Heart of Fire, which hits digital shelves in September.  The book comes from Masque Books, a digital-only division of Prime Books, a notable small press genre publisher (notable most recently for releasing the absolutely amazing Yoon Ha Lee collection, Conservation of Shadows — check out the Skiffy and Fanty interview here).  In other words, Heart of Fire is sure to be damned good!  Though you’ll have to wait for a little while, you should bookmark this page and remember to buy it in a couple months! Now for the mini interview: If you had to describe your novel to someone who doesn’t read a lot of genre fiction, how would you describe it? It is set in Singapore, has a lot of mythological animals and creatures and Singapore food. And oh yes, it has werewolves. What do you think makes fantasy such a compelling genre for so many readers? I think it’s compelling, because it allows readers to slip into other worlds. You know, make-believe world. It’s like Narnia! How would you say Heart of Fire fits in with the rest of your work?  Does it share certain sensibilities or thematic concerns? It does, come to think of it. I tend to examine tropes of transformation and transfiguration, as well as motifs like family ties and relationships.  To me, the family is central and it does appear in many of my stories.  I often wonder if this is an Asian thing, to feature the family as an important motif/theme. As a Singaporean author writing in English, what would you say are your greatest challenges in terms of reaching audiences abroad (particularly in other English-speaking parts of the world — not just “the West,” mind you)? Authenticity? (Then again, what is authenticity?) I am Singaporean Chinese. So, I sometimes feel that people would want me to write in Mandarin Chinese (no, I couldn’t – and my last (and only) Mandarin spec fic story was written when I was a kid as a school composition). I think people want to see an “authentic” voice, so to speak. I think there are no such things as authentic voices. What one thing that you know now do you wish you’d known when you first started treating writing as a professional endeavor? That it couldn’t be a full-time job. That it won’t be easy for people from Southeast Asia? (Wait, that’s two things…) And, last, for a silly question:  If you had to choose an animal to write your next book for you, which animal would you choose and why? A wolf. Because it’s cool. (But hey, it doesn’t have opposable thumbs…) —————————————————— About the Book: Jan Xu, wolf and pack leader, faces more dangers when she saves a foreign male wolf in love with one of her ancient enemies, a jiang shi, a Chinese vampire. Throw in a love-struck drake—and Jan finds her situation suddenly precarious, with her reputation and health at stake. How much is a wolf going to take when everything is out of control again and her world thrown into disarray? How is she going to navigate the complexities of Myriad politics while keeping her pack and family intact without losing her mind? The third book of the Jan Xu Adventures will see Jan Xu’s continual fight as pack leader, her clan’s Eye (seer) and mother of three young children. Her mettle, courage and love for her family will be tested to her utmost limits.

SF/F Commentary

8 SF/F Writers Who Changed My Life (#WeekofJoy)

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Books change lives, right?  Well, they certainly changed mine.  Books have been a part of my life since I was a kid, though I honestly didn’t understand their true value until much later in life.  They were entertainment in my younger years.  I read Goosebumps and Hardy Boys because they provided quick, fun narratives (and some of the former were actually kinda scary at times — they seem ridiculous today, of course).  I even read comic books as a kid, for the same reasons everyone read comics in their youth:  fun!  But I wasn’t a literature nut in my younger years.  I wanted to play video games or do stupid things on my bike — I honestly don’t know how I survived childhood, because I used to do some monumentally stupid things on my bike. Despite all of that, books eventually smacked me upside the head and changed the way I viewed them and the way I viewed life in general.  I read or discovered these books during what I would consider to be pivotal moments of my life.  Some of those moments were dark times; others were quite happy and exciting.  But none of them were exactly same. In chronological order, here are the eight science fiction and fantasy writers who changed my life: Richard A. Knaak The first adult fantasy book I ever read was Richard A. Knaak’s Dragonlance novel, The Legend of Huma.  I won’t pretend it’s a great work of art, or a great piece of fantasy (well, it’s a fun piece of fantasy, but Dragonlance isn’t exactly known for the best writing in the universe).  I would later go on to read his DragonRealm series — a much more interesting and well-written set of relatively short fantasy novels.  I think it’s fair to say that I was always a reader or viewer of genre fiction, having watched Star Wars so many times as a child that I eventually had to justify owning three different VHS copies to prevent ruining my really good copy (the Leonard Maltin versions, which I still own).  But I had never really grown fond of SF/F literature.  That was until someone introduced me to Dragonlance.  The Legend of Huma introduced me to a whole new sea of stories, and reading that particular book would one day give me fuel for an interest in writing genre fiction (I’ve never wanted to write anything else, really).  Without that book, I don’t know what I would be like today.  A genre fan?  Probably. A scholar in the field and a wannabe writer of SF/F?  Probably not. (This is a familiar narrative, no?) George Orwell I also discovered the wonders of science fiction in high school.  However, rather than having George Orwell’s incredible and canonical novel 1984 thrust at me by my friends, I had the novel thrust on me by a teacher (duh).  And lucky me.  I attended two high schools as a teenager:  one in Oak Harbor, Washington, and another in Placerville, California.  Of all the English classes I took while in Oak Harbor, only one managed to make reading interesting.  That class had us reading things like Watership Down by Richard Adams, A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare, and, of course, 1984.  And since that class, I’ve re-read Orwell’s novel at least six times.  The book made me realized that literature could have depth, that re-reading a work could actually change your experience of it.  That book also helped turn me into a science fiction nut.  And every time I re-read the book (less frequently now than when I was in my early 20s), I discover something new.  That’s the mark of a good book, if you ask me!  I think it’s safe to say that my interest in literature as an academic subject began here. The Person Who Wrote Beowulf The short version of the story goes like this:  during my senior year of high school, my English teacher assigned Beowulf, as often happens in high school.  Instead of having us write straight literary analysis, however, she asked us to take the core themes of the story and come up with our own poetic versions.  Thus began a month-long journey to rewrite Beowulf (with a friend).  The weird part?  We actually took it quite seriously, while others in our class sort of dilly daddled the way a lot people do when it comes to these kinds of assignments.  We went to the library and looked up British history (the place where we intended to set our version of the story), dug up maps of the pre-Norman-invasion British Isles, and tried our best to fit our re-worked version into that new world (Grendel’s lair ended up on the Isle of Man).  We plotted the entire story, developed all of the characters, and then I started writing.  And then came the all-nighters. After a weekend of intense writing (in what I then thought was proper “Old English” style — heh), I strolled into class on Monday with a 31-page epic poem in tow.  I still have a vivid memory of my teacher’s eyes opening wider than should have been humanly possible at the sight of our work.  She had expected something like 5-10 pages, not 31.  And we got an A. You might be wondering how this changed my life.  Throughout my youth, I recall writing a lot of stories.  For the most part, these were horror stories (I still think that movie with the evil severed hand somehow stole my ideas); they weren’t very good.  But it wasn’t until that Beowulf assignment that I realized I really had the writing bug.  From that point on, I started writing with more fervor.  Clearly that bug never truly left, because I still write fiction as often as I can (not as much right now due to PhD work, though).  Without Beowulf, I’m not sure I’d be where I am right now:  an English major and a published writer. Alan Garner I’ve written about my experiences with cancer here,

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