Sometimes I take a vacation from cyberspace and when I come back I do a lot of ‘bulk-blog-reading’. Well, I’ve been away from the blogosphere for a few days (blame the hectic pace of life), but since my return I’ve come across an interesting post at www.sheerspeculation.com/blog by JB Drydenco. It was a response to http://mundane-sf.blogspot.com/2007/10/why-do-science-fiction-writers-make.html .
The little I know about the HARDLINE mundane-sf people (I don’t want to call them a movement – hopefully, they’re not a movement yet) is that they want SF to be constrained by the science of today and yesterday but NOT be expanded by the science of tomorrow or possibility (OR extreme extrapolations of today’s knowledge).
I have to agree with most of Drydenco’s sentiments with regards to this group. I’d also like to read their Manifesto…Whichever way one slices their hard-to-pin-down stance, these Mundane-sf people seem to want to limit the scope of SF (one of the qualities that makes it appealing to both writers and readers). Some writers (mostly mainstream) say that there are only a few hundred original (untold) stories left to be told in Mainstream fiction (because they have to wait for the future and anything new to become the present), but several million original (untold) stories remain in Speculative fiction. If Mundane-SFers (new word) had their way the latter number would be greatly reduced.
We should probably start a counter-movement called ‘Imaginative-SF’J
I mean, really, what’s next?
- Mundane Heroic Fantasy; or
- Mundane High Fantasy; or
- Mundane Sword & Sorcery? J
I wonder what the Mundane-SF folks would make of a recent story of mine: It featured a Technological Singularity in a historical setting. They would probably not approve… J
Thanks for the kind words. I have a pretty set opinion on the “movement” of Mundane SF. I think it could be a class all on its own.
I do hope you come back to the blog on more than one occasion, and please do feel free to leave a comment or two on the site every now and again. Perhaps you’ll even find a bit of time to send in a story to the press.
JB Dryden