From: rnjx@vax5.cit.cornell.edu
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written,alt.cyberpunk
Subject: Re: Diamond-hard SF
Date: 19 Nov 92 01:56:58 EST
Distribution: world,rec
Organization: Cornell University

In article <BxtJ4w.FDs@techbook.com>,
szabo@techbook.com (Nick Szabo) writes: 
 
> I second this, and go further.  Characters and plot are the
> exemplar components of mundane fiction.  I do not care to see them 
> at all, unless they are important to the technology or to the artistry 
> of the story -- and almost always these days the artistry of the story 
> is defecated upon by the introduction of mundane characters or plot 
> elements, polluting the potentially fertile vast tracts of the SF 
> landscape with the toxic reek of an inferiority complex to mundane 
> genres.
 
You've gotta be kidding me!  (Give me a moment to recover from the 
verbigeration...)  As a libertarian, I'm usually pretty flexible when
it comes to accommodating differences of opinion, but if I hear one 
more person get up on the soapbox and decry "mundane" SF I think I'm 
going to go out of my flipping gourd!  I'm at a loss as to what is meant 
by "artistry" in the above article.  Let's see, take away the characters,
and then take away the plot (not really necessary at that point!) and 
what do we have?  Surely it's not fiction.

 
> * Who out there like me reads SF for its original tech and
>   prose, not for the blather of "character development" and 
>   "plot" that can be found in mundance forms of fiction?

Blather.  Hmmm.  Mundane.  Hmmmm.  When value judgements creep in and
color the statement, "I don't like it," we should take notice.


> * What should be the minimum criteria for diamond-hard SF?
>   I would say for starters it should have at least one
>   interesting, original idea per page.  If the first nine
>   pages don't hit me upside the head nine times, I toss
>   the loser! 

Well, in keeping with the "oust the cliches" theme, I suggest we change
the title from "diamond-hard" to something like "boron-nitride hard"
or "autoclaved fiction".  Next, I should be allowed to peruse the work
in question.  I will certify it as guaranteed sterile (but interesting
nonetheless), and all persons of Nick's persuasion may then rest assured
that they won't be reminded that they're alive and human while reading it.
That is, you can have it when *I'm* done reading it, since I'll then be 
moving off to some Orson Scott Card or George Eliot.

-- 
##############################################################
#                                                            #
#  RNJX@vax5.cit.cornell.edu                                 #             
#  Jeff Wilson                                               #
#  Cornell University                                        #
#  Department of Chemistry                                   #
#  --SF author in the making--                               #
#                                                            #
#  Is what you're living for worth dying for?                #
#                                                            #
##############################################################
Organization: Computer Repair, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA