While I don't have very long to post right now, I just thought I'd give kudos on the review of City of Saints and Madmen. Nice to see that it's still getting reviewed and positively too.
It's also nice to see that I'm not alone in picking up something of Gabriel Garcia Marquez in some of Jeff's writing. I'd also say there's a good bit of Jorge Luis Borges and Vladimir Nabokov in there as well.
Two questions:
1) Have you had a chance to check out the not-really-a-sequel, but-still-a-follow-up novel Shriek: An Afterword yet? It's the next major read on my list, so I can't say anything about it yet.
2) Your review says that you conducted an interview with Vandermeer, but I don't see a link or an attachment to such. Am I missing it somewhere?
Oops, nevermind #2 there. I just checked out your blog and see the interview there.
I actually started "Shriek" yesterday. I'll let you know if it's any good.
I had attempted to attach the file to the interview, but it looks like I goofed that one up. I'll just reprint it here.
Here goes:
What do you think of the state of fantastic fiction today? Is it living up to its potential?
That's a difficult question. Some writers still seem framed by the paradigm of fiction as product rather than art. Some writers still seem more interested in the trappings of being a writer than actually producing anything that will last more than 15 minutes. But that's always been the way it is. Writers are strange people, eccentric and sometimes very messed up. None of us are going to live up to our potential, in a way. That's the frustration. Of seeing something so clearly in your mind and then finding words to be a poor substitute, at times, for that initial vision. I do think there are many interesting and idiosyncratic writers traveling through the world today, and the best of them, to my mind, have absurdist, surrealist,fabulist, or experimental tendencies. Mark Danielewski, Jeffrey Ford, Leena Krohn, David Mitchell, Catherynne Valente, Theodora Goss, Stepan Chapman, Kelly Link, Shelley Jackson, Conrad Williams, Alan DeNiro, just to name a few that come to mind. There are many many more. Heck, even Dan Simmons, who comes from an older generation and may seem more "genre" than "cross genre"has just written The Terror, a surreal and terrifyingly strange novel that'scoming out in January.
If there's something that concerns me it is, in general, a sense from the younger generation of American writers that they are turning inward and notfacing or addressing in any meaningful way the issues of our times. Within genre, I mean.
Is genre a hindrance - a limitation of where a writer may go - or a foundation upon which limitless growth may be built?
Both at the same time. Genre institutions provide a safe playground as a beginner--a bay of calm from the sharks out in the deeper depths. So you can advance far in a short period of time. But, ultimately, I find that it can be a straitjacket. It's not about denying you're a fantasy writer. It's about saying "I'm a fiction writer." Period. And to accept all influences, no matter where they come from. And to never limit yourself because you are
working within a limited paradigm. Anything that keeps you from taking chances or allows you to enter a comfort level of sorts is bad for you as a writer. Genre is one of those things that can do this, even as it is helpful. The main thing is: do you leap? Or do you kind of crawl along? I'd rather leap and find I'm 20 stories up and falling fast than hug the ground.
You seem to enjoy appropriating the literary tools of researchers, such as manuscripts and footnotes. Is this an effort to lend to the verisimilitude of your creations, or do you advocate a scientific approach to plumbing the depth of one's imagination?
It's more that I think that much of the nonfiction we read is hopelessly partisan and distorted by the writer's personality and background. And that I therefore think we can use nonfiction forms in a fiction arena in a way that's interesting in terms of character, plot, and other things of that nature. It's also hard to deny the reality of an imaginary place if you're holding an artifact from it in your hands.
Are recurring elements such as squids, fungi and dwarves part of your own personal mythology? In essence, do you find something personally significant or totemic about these things?
I love the strange things about the world and the mundane things we take for granted that are still, in some ways, odd. That's all. I wouldn't say dwarves are a recurring theme, though, or that they are part of my response in the first sentence.
If you had to leave your home quickly, and could only save three books from your personal library, what would they be?
“Pale Fire” by Nabokov. “Jerusalem Poker” by Edward Whittemore. And then I'd be hard-pressed to decide. Crap. It'd be hard. If it came down to it, I suppose I would take “The Chess Garden” by Brooks Hansen. But tomorrow it might be a second Nabokov. Or “The World According to Garp”. Or “A Soldier of the Great War”. Or...I don't know. I would probably not be able to leave my home quickly.
Here Goes: