Tor.com interview

[sartorias]

Went live yesterday. Sigh, as usual, I wince at my own incoherence--I wish I wasn't so visually oriented . . . ah well, we are what we are.

Anyway, if anyone makes it through the whole thing and wants to talk about any of it, well, here's the place.

Comments

[dichroic]

I didn't want to comment on this there because it's not about books, but what you said about clothing prompted some thinking.

The discussion gets muddied when it is pointed out that women choose to dress with a lot of bare skin. Look at bride gowns where the woman is bare from the bodice up, while the guy has two to three layers. Four, if you count the tie. One way to look at it is that women are either ahead of men or just didn't get stuck in the uncommon state of conservatism begun by Beau Brummel and his ilk that has restricted male fashion for the last two hundred years.. Before that fashion varied for both sexes and if women showed more chest, well then men showed more calf (and occasionally codpiece). Then men got landed with restrained mostly-monochrome layered outfits that changed, only slowly, slowly, into modern suits

[sartorias]

Beau Brummel, from my understanding, bridged the two--his contribution was twofold: one, perfectly fitted clothing that was still revealing (those tight pants, the tight coats) but yes, uniform in color--the blue coat with the bright gold buttons. His second contribution was his preoccupation with cleanliness. It was actually Bulwer-Lytton, in his insouciant novel Pelham who shifted the fashion to all black all the time for men, except for the hint of white linens.

The interesting thing for me, looking at Western fashion over the centuries, is that males never opted for showing flesh the way women did, though their clothing would enhance various portions of the anatony--either that, or be designed to make them look larger. (Ditto the lower half of women's dress, the upper half, except for some exceptions, to make them look smaller by contrast.)

[calenorn]

I haven't seen the interview but I did just stumble into the Book View Cafe. Wow! What a terrific idea!

[sartorias]

:-) I hope you'll take some time to look around!

[rachelmanija]

I would love to see you enlarge on what you like about the women writers you mentioned, and/or any women writers you forgot to mention.

[sartorias]

I picked each for different things--voice, worldbuilding, character, language, etc. Have to remember to discuss their books and stories more, as I read them. (That goes for ones I didn't mention, too!)

[rachelmanija]

I meant, if you have time, I'd love to hear what you like about them individually, whether now or later.

[laetificat]

I think it is a great interview. And it's high time you got on Tor.com!

[sartorias]

Thanks! I've actually been on there a couple of times, it's just that my name is about as big a draw as a passing gnat, what with all the elephants in the room.

[maribou]

This was delightful to read, thank you for linking to it. I don't often enjoy written interviews, so my pleasure was unexpected.

And you can add me to your mental list of people who are delighted that Emras is an asexual character. I hadn't read the book yet, and didn't know that, but my reaction was "ooh, excellent!" rather than wariness. I like variety in my protagonists.

[sartorias]

Thanks!