psc@lzwi.UUCP (Paul S. R. Chisholm) (08/01/85)
This is something that's been tried before: several SF writers
writing stories set in the same world. Ellison mentions Fletcher
Platt's THE PETRIFIED PLANET, and A WORLD NAMED CLEOPATRA, edited by
Roger Elwood; the success of the THIEVE'S WORLD books has spawned other
such fantasy anthologies.
It's been done before, but it's done well here. Hal Clement, Poul
Anderson, Larry Niven, and Frederik Pohl wrote some basic
specifications, Kelly Freas painted a pretty picture (enclosed in the
Bantam/Spectrum trade paperback; and used as the dust jacket of the hard
cover); Thomas Disch, Frank Herbert, Robert Silverberg, and Theodore
Sturgeon brainstormed other possibilities, under Ellison's loose
moderation, to an enthusiastic UCLA extension seminar. Then the nine
writers above, plus Jack Williamson and Kate Wilhelm, write eleven
stories of the planet.
So Medea has four suns and a superjovian to heat it, East and West
poles, foxes that cast off pairs of legs to give birth, sentient
balloons, and a patchwork of ecological niches. Similarly, MEDEA has
eleven different stories. Some are about the "fuxes", some about the
"balloons", some about the weather. Some are about the humans on Medea
(and Earth). And some are first and foremost about ideas.
Such an ecletic collection has at least one story you won't be too
fond of, but it'll be a different story for different readers. This
much variety also means you're likely to find at least one story you'll
like, and probably one you'll like quite a bit. Will it be Niven's
"Flare Time", when both the Medean ecology and the human settlement are
changed by life-as-they-don't-usually-know it? Or maybe Theodore
Sturgeon's tale (one of the last before he died, dammit) "Why Dolphin's
Don't Bite", of what it takes for one culture to accept another. Frank
Herbert has a story of Ship, with his typical "I know you know I think
you feel I'm lying" games; but "Songs of a Sentient Flute" is very much
a Medea tale.
These stories aren't parts of a single tale, they're not
necessarily set in chronological order, and they're not all externally
consistent. What they are is good stories by good writers. Themes and
tricks aside, isn't that what it's all about?
--
-Paul S. R. Chisholm The above opinions are my own,
{pegasus,vax135}!lzwi!psc not necessarily those of any
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(*sigh* ihnp4!lzwi!psc does *NOT* work!!! Use above paths.)
"Of *course* it's the murder weapon. Who would frame someone with a fake?"