As it's evolving on the NetCommentary on art forms (fiction) has been around for a long time. One of the things that delighted me about Chinese novels when I first discovered them was that people added their commentary into the text when copying them. In Western Europe, with the evolution of print, we didn't go that way--commentary developed in ( Read more... )

Yesterday's discussion about synopses led to this exchange, which I thought might be useful for further exploration.

green_knight made a response to a line from fashionista_35's comment, I fall firmly in the shooting myself in the foot category in that I refuse to compromise.

by saying: It's a continuum. I've looked at some of the things I've written on this topic ( ( Read more... )

I’m beginning with the assumption that before print, when few in Western Europe were literate, and most texts copied laboriously, there was a sense that texts were authoritative, or truth ( Read more... )

A lot of people have expressed a wish to be reading sf and f (in addition to other genres) in other settings besides western civ ( Read more... )

Wishing a wonderful seder celebration to all who celebrate ( Read more... )

cinda_cite asked what I thought an intriguing question: is there a moral obligation in fictionalizing real people? What questions of craft, consideration, etc, enter in ( Read more... )

A post made by raanve the other day has got me to thinking about the evolution of human behavior, specifically the changing nature of the net, and how for so many of us, it's become our primary site of social interaction.

Politically correct. What do we understand when we heard that? It was first defined to me decades ago, during the period when I ( Read more... )

I watched Lost in Austen while scribbling away at my project, a few days ago. I thoroughly enjoyed most of it--very clever twists on P&P--but thought the ending was an utter mess. If anyone wants to discuss it, I could do a spoiler post ( Read more... )

Last night I crossed town (that means a very considerable freeway drive in SoCal) for a nifty visit with old friends, during which I drank a lot of strong tea in order to stay alert for the return drive. The tea got me home just fine, but though I was physically pooped, my mind was ooo-eee, watch that hamster wheel whirl ( Read more... )

This morning I came across this riff on urban fantasy by jamesenge.

Here's the graph that caught my eye: The cultural stress that generates the flood of urban fantasy is different, but no less far-reaching. The women’s movement shattered traditional notions of what it is to be a woman-the roles and activities appropriate to women. And a good job, too: you ( Read more... )