The discussion about the New Wave that sprang from my post on "Doc" Smith caused me to remember this post, originally on Usenet's rec.arts.sf.written, regarding Litcritters and their main product
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There's a certain element of truth to this of course. There's also a certain element to which it isn't true. I would refine it to say that what lasts as fine work are writers who are equally skilled in the craft of literature as they are in writing damned good pot-boilers. You have to have both to last.
(Which is likely why JK Rowling won't, I suspect.)
I don't know -- the Harry Potter books were very good, even by character-based standards, and you should remember that they were her first works. JK Rowling is still young, and could live for decades, and continue to improve as a writer. Her full corpus of books may prove highly enduring.
You're right. Although I will point out that most people think she's gotten worse as the series has gone on, because her editors have become less strict with her. (Afraid to spoil the soup.)
I find her actual writing skills to be extremely weak. I'm in the minority about this though.
Skywaterblue, you and I are in the same minority. Don't get me wrong: I like her books, even love them. But as crafted works of the wordsmith's art? She has no memorable phrase, suffers from dropped plot threads, cannot seem to remember what her magic powers can and cannot do, cannot write a fight scene or a love scene to save her life....
Ah, Usenet...it refused to change with the times. :/
I noticed that a lot of my posts (literally tens of thousands of them) have disappeared from Google Groups. I'm not sure whether that is due to Google paring their database of old posts or people forging remove requests (which has happened in the past).
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(Which is likely why JK Rowling won't, I suspect.)
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I find her actual writing skills to be extremely weak. I'm in the minority about this though.
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The books are great and the writing is mediocre.
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I noticed that a lot of my posts (literally tens of thousands of them) have disappeared from Google Groups. I'm not sure whether that is due to Google paring their database of old posts or people forging remove requests (which has happened in the past).
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