From: aaron@space.ualberta.ca (Aaron Humphrey)
Subject: The Anthony Thread
Reply-To: aaron@space.ualberta.ca
Organization: University Of Alberta, Edmonton Canada
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL4
Date: Tue, 15 Sep 1992 17:38:32 GMT

The main thing I noticed in the Anthony thread is that we're not exactly an
organized group.  Iain Banks, whose works I've heard mostly praised on this
group over the past few weeks, is totally unknown to most people, and perhaps
disliked by some.  The opinion of Heinlein's works is far from unified.  The
opinions of many others are certainly similar.  Nobody's tastes are the same,
so nobody's opinion will agree entirely with anyone else's.  Heck, even Sharyn
McCrumb has been defended.  (Yes, IMHO Bimbos of The Death Sun was drek, and a
horrible mystery.  But that's neither here nor there--that's why it's in
parentheses!)

And Piers Anthony is no different.  There isn't a unified opinion on him
either.  Sure, >most< of you think he's a hack(that have spoken up so far),
but there is a minority that likes him--just like there's a minority(I would
imagine)that dislike Heinlein.

At some point in the past, a discussion on Gene Wolfe led me to the conclusion
that there >was< some kind of objective criterion for fiction--craftsmanship.
The sheer facility with which words were arranged to provide an effect.  But I
should also say that this "objective" criterion is rarely a majority
contributor to subjective judgement of a book.  A book can be very poorly
written, like many hold that Anthony's are, yet still be judged good because it
hits other subjective buttons(so to speak).  To somebody who doesn't have those
buttons, it may be utter drek.

A recent example that occurs to me--Walter Jon Williams.  I loved his novella
in IASFM, "Surfacing", but mainly because it presented a character who was
exercising advanced lingustic theory.  Linguistics is one of my hobbies, and I
always like to see it utilized in science fiction--which also explains my love
of Janet Kagan's works.  But his story "No Spot of Ground" left me utterly
cold--it's basically an alternate history tale, saying "What if Edgar Allan Poe
had become a Confederate general in the Civil War?"  I said, "So what?"  But
someone more avid about Poe or the Civil War might have been a bit more
gratified to see the subjects treated.  (Or some of the subjective anti-buttons
may have been pressed--"This Williams guy doesn't know the Civil War from the
Punic!"  I can't judge, since I know dick-all about the Civil War.)  Somebody
commented recently that John Kessel's "Buffalo" had more meaning for them
because the main character's background was similar to theirs.  Etc.

Well, it's not like I can deny that this newsgroup is principally for exchange
of opinions.  Apart from facts like publishing dates for books, bibliographies,
and the like, that's what we're here to talk about.  I just can't help but wish
that we remember more often that these >are< opinions we're sharing.  (I may
have forgotten this myself in recent days--if so, I apologize.)  Let's all hold
hands and work together for greater understanding.  ;-}

--
---Alfvaen(Canadian SF Quasi-Activist)
"It was a feeling like camphor running through my tubes..."
Current Album--The Fixx:Walkabout
Current Read--Robert Heinlein:The Past Through Tomorrow
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written