Tempus Fugit

So, I've been meaning to post for a while about We3, Civil War and my post man, but it's been a busy week, with the Clarke Awards on Wednesday night and lovely big gobs of day job stuff to deal with.

Now, I hate link posts (although, of course, some of my favourite sites a just link sites, like Arts & Letters Daily) but, well, here's a couple interesting links (erm, vai Arts & Letters Daily).

First off, this nifty review of Nonsense on Stilts: How to Tell Science From Bunk by Massimo Pigliucci. I used to describe myself as a skeptic, until the likes of Pigliucci infested the scene with a kind of agressively triumphalist scientism that rubs me the wrong way. I think skepticism is about doubt, and Pigliucci's stuff has always had insufficient doubt in it for my liking.

As I get older, I think of myself as increasingly Fortean, partly because I am interested in the social phenomenon of wierd phenomena, and partly because I have doubts about the non-reality of both spirtism and the ETH UFO thing. I mean, they're both highly unlikey, and I don't think either is true in anything like the popular conception, but from time to time, I get the notion of explanations that don't cntradict known science or the available evidence.

Second link is a depressing article about the US national debt, and, by extenstion, the debt of all dveeloped nations (the developing world has its own hair-raising problems).

I take some comfort in the fact that money and value are entirely social constructs, that don't have any objective reality outside that which we care to give them. Regardless of the mind-boggling levels of debts that modern nation states accrue, people still live and work and trade and things are okay for most people most of the time.

Whatever disaster awaits, I think that we can, we the time comes, define our way out of the corner. Although, some rich people might end up less rich than they thought they were (by whom I mean the lower middle classes and above of all the western nations who are - often without understanding it - a global financial elite that most of the world's population couldn't even dream of joining). The question is, can we manage the redefinitions without a global war? I hope so!

Finally, take a look at my new blog, State of Change. This is going to get cracking next week (perhaps not 1 May as planned, as it's a ballet day etc) but expect weekly episodes of my amazing first novel coming soon!

It's Miéville!

No great surprise to me, it's China Miéville who picked up the bookend last night. What a practical prize it is, so much better than an ugly statuette.

Sources close to the committee tell me that the final choice was a close one between this and another book. I wonder what the other contender was? It could have been any of them!

Ah well, that's that for another year. Now I can go back to randomly finding books at jumble sales and second hand shops.

Arthur C Clarke Awards - decision time!

It's the night of the Arthur C Clarke Awards, and those of us with an interest in such things now face the Ultimate Decision: what to wear?

My tweedy-jacket-and-bowtie look is very dapper but has been colonised by the eleventh Dr Who. Still good look for me, by and large, all avuncular, donnish umbers and earth-toned checks, but I don't wish to be mistaken as a cosplayer at an event like this. Not that anyone could possibly mistake my distinguished (shall we say) phiz for the young and handsome Mr Smith; that would make it worse, in many ways - not just a cosplayer, but a remarkably rubbish one.

New suit? Well, new suit also equals cheap suit. Not bad, but after a drink or two the posture slumps and the Designers At Debenhams structure doesn't have the wherewithal to provide back up.

So, good suit then, even though I appear to have had a very well-catered Christmas between when I bought it and today.

Next - shirt and tie. I mean the next thing to consider, not that I bought my shirt and tie at Next! Just what do you think I am?

The good suit's a little too structured to rock the bow tie look, and I'd ironed a couple of good shirts in preparation. I lost my nerve over the John Francombe liquorice all sort strips, and the Duffer of St George is good for job interviews but a bit business bland. Despite the cuffs beginning to show its age, I opted for my black and white Reiss shirt and black silk tie.

Combined with my silver converse, the whole ensemble has a pleasing unity of colour (grays, blacks, silver with a hint of blue) and if I keep my shoulders back and button done up, no one will even notice the alpha male belly poking out over the waist band.

Ah, well, I suppose I should say something about the books, too.

Let's start out in the territory of the unknown - I haven't read Gallileo's Dream. Only available in hardback and what with all those bills to pay... So, that one might win, might be the best of all but I can't comment.

Moving up, we come to Retribution Falls, which would not be my pick and will not, I think, be the pick of the committee. It's a fine adventure story, but I felt it was pretty thin, thematically, and I wasn't as swept away with it as I might have hoped. The bar to meet here, to my mind, is Jack Vance stuff like Big Planet and The Demon Princes, and this felt half-hearted in comparison, with a rather linear plot and no real gut punches, IMO.

Next, Yellow Blue Tibia, which is delightfully wry and has a lot of well-turned farce, but once again I felt the thematic material was a bit unsatisfying. It seemed to exist independent of the comic elements and the finale felt shoe-horned in. Aside from Konstantin, none of the other characters was especially believable or sympathetic (although the Asperger's guy was excellent comic material). I also had my doubts about the setting - particularly the way that some of the gags could only possibly work in English, that were articulated nicely in this blog post from Rules for Anchorites. I wouldn't choose this one, but my reservations appear to put me at odds with the critical consensus, so the committee may go for it, who knows? It seems kind of unlikely to me, though.

That's half the list disposed of. Next up, Spirit. I read this one about this time last year, and hadn't started blogging back then, but I discuss it in passing in my post of the year from January. This kind of big space opera isn't really my bag, and I struggled somewhat with the political machinations of the setting. With benefit of many months hindsight, however, the middle section where Bibi is imprisoned still haunts me. The scene where the little baby alien thing dies was like a kick in the guts to me (reminded me a little of the death of Grofinet in Vance's Lyonesse in that regard) and I'm thus inclined to feel that there was definitely some very strong writing here. I wouldn't pick this one, but there's big dollop of prejudice in that opinion. I suspect, though, that I'm not the only one that scratched their head of the setting, and the climax did not quite pay off, so Im don't think it's going to be Spirit.

We come now to the final two books, and this is where I really think the competition is. I have been confidently predicting a win for The City & The City, which I enjoyed a great deal both as a reader and in a more detached critical way. I vacilate on whether the split is a psychological or a supernatural effect, and have recently decided that Miéville leaves it deliberately - and deliciously - ambiguous, a move I admire and applaud. It's let down by the flaccid thriller plot, but the central metaphor is so compelling and beautifully achieved that all other considerations seem like grousing. This one seemed like a shoe in.

However, I am now a third of the the way through Far North and my socks have been knocked entirely off (black, NB, to co-ordinate with the rest of the outfit). Here is a novel firing on all cylinders. The effortless prose is laded with nuggets of insight that shoot from the setting like sparks. The central voice is steady and consistent, believable, likable and wise. Already we've had heartbreak and breath-taking danger. Already we've been moved and unsettled. I'm a long way from the end, so it's a bit early to say whether it will all come together, but right now, I'm just loving this book!

So, I think it's a toss up between those two. If it was me I'd go for Far North, assuming it continues as it's begun. I feel that Méiville is a very fine writer in the SF/F context, but I'm less convinced by his chops in the wider literary scene. Theroux, on the evidence so far, seems like the real thing - intelligent, careful, wise, spurning gimmicks while unafraid of the new. It could be that the sublimity of Méiville's broken city will win through, but it could equally be Far North.

Short Fiction Wednesday

This week, we've got two stories that demonstrate contrasting approaches to fantasy.

Knowing Neither Kin Nor Foe by Nancy Fulda, from Beneath Ceaseless Skies, is shaped like a traditional hero's journey, and maps to Campbell almost exactly – a call to action, the denial, the journey into the underworld and all. Fulda focuses on the “denial” phase of the hero's journey here and Kitjaya's conflicted feelings about being "the chosen one", but plot isn't the focus of the story. The main thrust of this story - it seems to me - is the exactingly realised alien society and, while it's published as fantasy, there's nothing here that doesn't fit within the bounds of science fiction.

K J Bishop's Saving the Gleeful Horse, published at Fantasy Magazine, on the other hand, takes place in a psychedelic Gaimanesque fantasy of a world that overlaps between the material and the numinous. Bishop's sideways portrayal of ordinary objects infuses them with magical powers, and portents. I say psychedelic deliberately because I thought it caught the hyper-real details of life and they way they get infused with meaning by mind altering substances. Molimus the Great, the story's protagonist, is one of those wise fools who is perhaps always living in an altered state, and the local whitch woman White Ma'at tells him as much. The story occupies that curious place where it could just be a fantasy, a hallucination projected on the world by deranged minds, or perhaps a vision of the true world, with its opaque robe of materialistic vision swept away.

Fulda's story reminded me a little of the planetary romances of Jack Vance, with a well-imagined society and distinctly alien aliens. In general, he keeps these creatures relatively remote, as in The Fetish Makers (or whatever) but Fulda goes right into their world. I always have a bit of a problem with these kinds of non-human societies, and Fulda doesn't entirely win me over. While Kitjaya's world is convincingly created, Kitjaya never seems anything other than human on the inside (which can be taken as a compliment or a criticism, I suppose). The insecty elements don't really seem to interact with the nature of her quest, and they are perhaps too exactly mapped to matters of human kinship, to the point where they cease to be metaphors and become alien analogues. However, it's written with a sharp eye for the telling detail that creates a very vivid picture of the world.

By contrast, Bishop's is a more metaphorical approach. If a world of magical influence existed, how would it be perceived? She imagines a fantasy where magic isn't a psuedo science – all cauldrons and alembics, and huge tomes of ancient knowledge. Instead, it's a perception of meaning and pattern between objects. It's a world where thoughts can become real and reality can be changed through metaphor. If I have a problem with this approach, it can appear to be a bit random, because it depends on the author making the thematic connections clear without allowing them to crystalise into the gross matter of the other approach. It demands a lot of the reader, too, to puzzle out the skein of symbolism and metaphor, and in this regard I think you need to let it settle a while before deciding if it works or not.

For all people complain about vanilla fantasy, the genre has acquired quite a breadth of approaches over the years. Writers like M John Harrison and Mervyn Peake are no longer obscure or cultish, and the mainstream fantasy has a strong enough hold on the public imagination to attract writers of real ambition like Joe Abercrombie and Richard Morgan. I think the explosion of fantasy in them last couple of decades has produced a space this more thoughtful material can thrive. On the one hand you have a maturing audience looking for a new take on the old ideas, while at the same time a generation of writers fed on the good, bad and indifferent fantasy of decade gone by ready are ready to take up the challenge.

Peppa Pig is a capitalist running dog: Part 2

Further to my thoughts on the ways Peppa Pig seeks to separate five year olds from their money, I see that she has withdrawn from a Labour-backed event to celebrate Sure Start.

We've all read Animal Farm and I think we all know which way Mummy and Daddy Pig vote, right readers?

(NB - This post intended for satirical purposes only. I avoid politics here, but in these heated times (and in the interests of full exposure) I'll just say thay I'm an old fashioned lefty, by and large, but you should vote according to your own conscience. (Unless you're a Tory.) (Only joking!))

Fungus the Bogeyman

While thinking about something else entirely, I happened across this interesting academic article about Fungus the Bogeyman from the Australian Journal of Comedy (hilarious wisecracks on a post-card to the usual address, please).

Fungus the Bogeyman is probably the book I remember most fondly from my childhood. I got for my eleventh or twelfth birthday, having seen it in a bookshop and known immediately that I had to have it. I think I was already familiar with Brigg's witty Father Christmas books, and so was primed to love this flowering of his deliciously subversive sense of humour.

It still resonates with me, thirty years later and I still find Fungus's search for meaning incredibly moving. As Andrew Casson says here:

"In its highly inventive and disrespectful way, it is one of the few books that takes children seriously by refusing to accept the conventional image of the child, by highlighting with its gentle satire our most strange society, and by treating the most serious issues of tolerance and, ultimately, the meaning of life with the humour they deserve and need if they are to be taken seriously."

Briggs's work fit precisely in the same irreverent space as 2000AD, which was then just entering its classic period. Interestingly, I remember catching an arts documentary about him in the 80s which showed him working with some of his art school students, discussing pieces for an exhibition: it was Brett Ewins!

Less happily, it was turned into an utterly repulsive TV show in the 2000s. The problems are amply demonstrated by comparing the cover image above with this publicity still from the show:

Why the hell is that Bogey smiling!?!?

Here is another great link, an appreciation by illustrator Joanna Carey.

Moxyland by Lauren Beukes

One of the horrible glimpses of mortality that mid-life crisis has brought me, is the realisation that I am not as cool as my parents.

Mum and Dad lived in London during the swinging sixties, when Dad was a groovy young newsreader at the BBC. They were never what you'd call ravers. Rock music was never their thing – Dad's fond of George Melly and Humphrey Littleton; Mum likes show tunes – and they are, despite when they lived, somewhat naïve as regards drugs. Their taste in art and culture is that of bright a undergraduate circa 1959, all post-impressionists, Leonard Bernstein and middle-brow writers. But, they really lived life. They had trendy BBC friends, went to all the latest shows and concerts, and took holidays to exotic destinations in the Med.

I've hung out with arty people and taken drugs and liked the right sorts of music, movies and books, but well, what does it all amount to, really? Mum and Dad got enormously into amateur theatre in Porirua, which seemed like the lamest thing ever when I was in my twenties, and yet they both eventually received Queen's Service Medals for their efforts and are quite highly regarded among a particular demographic. And what have I done to compare with that?

For many years, I assumed that my superiority to Mum and Dad was self-evident, a thing as natural as being young itself. That's the trap of youth, I think. When they say “youth is wasted on the young” that's surely one of the things they mean, the wasteful impatient arrogance of the young that drives them out of the nest to urgently re-invent a world that, generation after generation, refuses to change.

It's this desperate arrogance that drives the characters in Moxyland. I recognise their ambitions, because at one stage or another I have felt them all. Moxyland is a tragedy, in the classical sense, as the good are undone by their better nature while evil exults. Kendra is killed by choosing ambition before art; Tendenka dies when his idealism curdles into self-importance. In the meantime, if Kendra and Tendenka are the world's creative spirit and it's conscience, then Lerato and Toby represent the forces of vacuous self-gratification and cold-hearted corporate control. Both are the product of damaged societies. Toby has been spoiled and indulged until there is nothing decent left in him, while Lerato has been deracinated by the horror and disease of the previous century. Between them, they represent the future of Afirca.

Although Moxyland is full of racy cutting-edge culture, it's message is ultimately that of grumpy old men everywhere. The short-view of youth sees only the waves crashing in, while from the long view of decades one begins to see that these have nothing against the power of the tides. Instead of being a frightening possibility of the future, it becomes a description of the eternal way of the world.

But what do I know? This is a dystopian satire for the BoingBoing generation, what some people call post-cyberpunk, but – come on! - it's straight cyberpunk, through and through, bristling with Sterlingesque futurism and a plot reminiscent of Rainbows End. In fact, all those writers and all those books are still working away at the issues first raised by the likes of John Brunner and Norman Spinrad in the sixties. So, the New Wave keeps crashing and you keep getting knocked over by it until eventually you get tired of it and get out of the water altogether, and sit in the dunes up the beach waiting for the sunset.