From: andy@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Andrew Hackard)
Newsgroups: alt.config,news.groups
Subject: Re: rec.arts.fantasy
Date: 20 Dec 92 18:44:45 GMT
Followup-To: alt.config
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX

skwatkin@nyx.cs.du.edu (Steven Watkins) writes:

> I really see the need for an alt.fantasy news group.  I read the sf news 
>groups and the specific fantasy author groups.  I like sf, but I *love*
>fantasy.  I would like to be able to talk about many different authors
>with others who share my interest in fantasy.  I would rather not force 
>sf fans to read fantasy posts as I am forced to read theirs now. 
>  I do like sf, but I see a need for another group.
 
No one is *forcing* you to read anything.  Even on those news readers
that don't support kill files (and I doubt Nyx uses them), you can always
just skip messages you don't want to read.  Further, I doubt you were
around for the sf-lovers reorg, so I'll summarize the arguments for
keeping all speculative fiction in one group.

1) There's no clear line.  Take (with a tip of the hat) Crawford Kilian's
novel _Eyas_.  It's absolutely straight blood-and-sorcery fantasy...until
the last chapter.  Frankly, I don't think the weight of one chapter is
enough to sway the rest of the novel, so I think of _Eyas_ as a fantasy
novel.  But it has a spaceship, so some people will consider it a science
fiction novel.  And you know what?  They're right.  I'm right.  It has
elements of both, and forcing it into one category or the other does a
good novel a disservice.  I could easily come up with other examples, but
the matter remains that there are science fiction novels, and fantasy
novels, and a whole host of novels in the gray space between.

2) Many, many people read both science fiction AND fantasy, so the one
group has everything they want right there.  Those who detest fantasy
(apart from missing some great literature) simply don't have to read the
science fiction articles if they feel strongly about it.  Similarly,
those who abhor science fiction can skip it over.  I don't know of any
newsreader where skipping an article takes more than one keystroke.

3) Some authors write both -- where do we discuss the author's oevre as a
whole?  Orson Scott Card is a perfect example -- he's written several
straight science fiction novels, and a host of straight fantasy novels,
with a historical fiction and a contemporary horror novel thrown in, and
I've not even touched his short stories.  Where does the person go who
wants to compare Ansset to Ender?  or Justice to Valentine?

I"m not saying your idea is stupid -- it's natural not to want to have to
sift through conversations we don't like to get to one we do.  I'm merely
saying that *in* *this* *case*, I don't think it's workable.  There's too
much crossover, and too much connectivity, for a separate fantasy group
(and especially one in alt) to thrive independently of the sf hierarchy.

--
--Andrew Hackard                                 If I spoke for UT, this post
  andy@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu                        would make even less sense.

                    "Hallelujah, Noel, be it Heaven or Hell,
                        The Christmas we get we deserve."
Newsgroups: alt.config