BARD@MIT-XX.ARPA (09/24/85)
From: Bard Bloom <BARD@MIT-XX.ARPA> > Good writing can be about anything; great writing could > probably be about nothing - not that this is necessarily admirable > or desirable. Hoary plot devices must be discarded, wherever they > occur. These seem inconsistent. Unless predicate calculus doesn't apply to criticism, (Good writing can be about anything) ==> (good writing can use a hoary plot device.) Kind of like _Paradise_Lost_ and the writings of James Branch Cabell and lots of others. Perhaps Tucker meant, ``Hoary plot devices should be used with caution.'' > Real people don't expostulate for pages, like > Jubal Harshaw or Lazarus Long or Davis Tucker? I know several people who do expostulate for hours, and sound very much like Lazarus Long (except less competant). > As a concrete suggestion, I think more works > by South American surrealist authors, of whom there are many, should > be published in science fiction magazines and by science fiction > publishing houses - and don't condemn it as boring literature, or > highbrow, because much of it is exuberant, interesting, and > well-written. I only know of Borges, and would very much like names of others. Especially if their works are available in translation. Pax VAXque vobiscum, Bard -------
wfi@rti-sel.UUCP (William Ingogly) (09/29/85)
In article <3772@topaz.RUTGERS.EDU> BARD@MIT-XX.ARPA writes: >> As a concrete suggestion, I think more works >> by South American surrealist authors, of whom there are many, ... > >I only know of Borges, and would very much like names of others. >Especially if their works are available in translation. Also some Central American authors. Try Miguel Angel Asturias, Jose Donoso, Carlos Fuentes, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, or almost any Central or South American contemporary author. They all employ fantastic or surrealistic elements in their work. -- Cheers, Bill Ingogly