Comments on: New Review: Nick Harkaway http://www.edrants.com/new-review-nick-harkaway/ a cultural website in ever-shifting standing Wed, 08 Feb 2012 18:01:24 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Essential SF Criticism « Torque Control http://www.edrants.com/new-review-nick-harkaway/comment-page-1/#comment-250219 Essential SF Criticism « Torque Control Wed, 14 Jan 2009 08:14:59 +0000 http://www.edrants.com/?p=8949#comment-250219 [...] At the moment, I think I would find a discussion about whether or not literary taxonomy is a useful practice, never mind whether it is somehow a distinctively British practice, tedious in the extreme, so I’ll skate over that; and because it’s a posted email discussion, I’ll try not to be too judgmental about the “just” in front of “historiography”, though I am mildly offended on behalf of historiographers of my acquaintance. Later in the post there’s a deal of stuff about sf-the-publishing-category, too, which I’ll also avoid, except to say that I don’t think Nick Harkaway is wary of the sf label because he thinks the interesting things are happening outside sf, more that he’s concerned the label will stop people reading his book. [...] [...] At the moment, I think I would find a discussion about whether or not literary taxonomy is a useful practice, never mind whether it is somehow a distinctively British practice, tedious in the extreme, so I’ll skate over that; and because it’s a posted email discussion, I’ll try not to be too judgmental about the “just” in front of “historiography”, though I am mildly offended on behalf of historiographers of my acquaintance. Later in the post there’s a deal of stuff about sf-the-publishing-category, too, which I’ll also avoid, except to say that I don’t think Nick Harkaway is wary of the sf label because he thinks the interesting things are happening outside sf, more that he’s concerned the label will stop people reading his book. [...]

]]> By: Nick Harkaway http://www.edrants.com/new-review-nick-harkaway/comment-page-1/#comment-248262 Nick Harkaway Mon, 13 Oct 2008 07:14:17 +0000 http://www.edrants.com/?p=8949#comment-248262 I think probably any book which doesn't fit recognised genre shapes and isn't starkly realist gets shunted towards the science fiction. It's a lot like the story of an English public school in 1935 which hired a French teacher to teach French, Russian, Japanese, and Greek, on the basis that he was 'a foreigner' and these were all 'foreign' languages... Glad you had fun, though, and thanks for pointing up the fact that it isn't all rocket ships and silver suits. It always makes me nervy when someone uses the term science fiction to describe TGAW, because although I personally enjoy SF, lots of people flat out will not read anything they think is in that category - and yet I know some of them would enjoy my book. Ah, well. I think probably any book which doesn’t fit recognised genre shapes and isn’t starkly realist gets shunted towards the science fiction. It’s a lot like the story of an English public school in 1935 which hired a French teacher to teach French, Russian, Japanese, and Greek, on the basis that he was ‘a foreigner’ and these were all ‘foreign’ languages…

Glad you had fun, though, and thanks for pointing up the fact that it isn’t all rocket ships and silver suits. It always makes me nervy when someone uses the term science fiction to describe TGAW, because although I personally enjoy SF, lots of people flat out will not read anything they think is in that category – and yet I know some of them would enjoy my book. Ah, well.

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