http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word Wed, 08 Sep 2010 03:51:04 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.4 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-53758 Fri, 23 Jan 2009 16:45:13 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-53758 [...] Best Non-Fiction Physics for Amnesia by John Clute Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn (Wesleyan) Superheroes!: Capes and Crusaders in Comics and Films by Roz Kaveney (I.B. Tauris). What is it we do When we Read Science Fiction? by Paul Kincaid (Beccon) [...] […] Best Non-Fiction Physics for Amnesia by John Clute Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn (Wesleyan) Superheroes!: Capes and Crusaders in Comics and Films by Roz Kaveney (I.B. Tauris). What is it we do When we Read Science Fiction? by Paul Kincaid (Beccon) […]

]]> http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-53695 Thu, 22 Jan 2009 14:22:31 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-53695 [...] “Physics for Amnesia” by John Clute (talk given at the Gresham College Symposium “Science Fiction as a Literary Genre”) Superheroes!: Capes and Crusaders in Comics and Films by Roz Kaveney (I.B. Tauris) What It Is We Do When We Read Science Fiction by Paul Kincaid (Beccon) Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn (Wesleyan) [...] […] “Physics for Amnesia” by John Clute (talk given at the Gresham College Symposium “Science Fiction as a Literary Genre”) Superheroes!: Capes and Crusaders in Comics and Films by Roz Kaveney (I.B. Tauris) What It Is We Do When We Read Science Fiction by Paul Kincaid (Beccon) Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn (Wesleyan) […]

]]> http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-53622 Wed, 21 Jan 2009 15:51:32 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-53622 [...] Best Non-Fiction “Physics for Amnesia” by John Clute Superheroes!: Capes and Crusaders in Comics and Films by Roz Kaveney (I.B. Tauris) What Is It We Do When We Read Science Fiction? by Paul Kincaid (Beccon) Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn (Wesleyan) [...] […] Best Non-Fiction “Physics for Amnesia” by John Clute Superheroes!: Capes and Crusaders in Comics and Films by Roz Kaveney (I.B. Tauris) What Is It We Do When We Read Science Fiction? by Paul Kincaid (Beccon) Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn (Wesleyan) […]

]]> http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-38522 Wed, 09 Jul 2008 03:33:09 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-38522 [...] 6 - Physics for Amnesia: Horror Motifs in SF “To rationalize horror is to tolerate it.” Clute’s Gresham Symposium keynote. (tags: criticism genre literature motifs horror fiction science SF) [...] […] 6 - Physics for Amnesia: Horror Motifs in SF “To rationalize horror is to tolerate it.” Clute’s Gresham Symposium keynote. (tags: criticism genre literature motifs horror fiction science SF) […]

]]> http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-38417 Mon, 07 Jul 2008 10:13:27 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=19#comment-38417 [...] John Clute’s talk from the Gresham symposium, “Physics for Amnesia”, is now online here; also, SF Signal have found video of Neal Stephenson’s talk [...] […] John Clute’s talk from the Gresham symposium, “Physics for Amnesia”, is now online here; also, SF Signal have found video of Neal Stephenson’s talk […]

]]> http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-25938 Thu, 24 Jan 2008 22:00:46 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-25938 [...] So, Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist points over to author Hal Duncan’s blog Notes From the Geek Show, where Hal has written a very in-depth article about the ongoing discussion of the relationship between science fiction, fantasy, and other related genres and literature in general. The article is primarily a response to a lecture by John Clute, in which Clute proposes a single blanket genre that includes science fiction, fantasy, and horror in which they are differentiated by their narrative structures/grammars. [...] […] So, Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist points over to author Hal Duncan’s blog Notes From the Geek Show, where Hal has written a very in-depth article about the ongoing discussion of the relationship between science fiction, fantasy, and other related genres and literature in general. The article is primarily a response to a lecture by John Clute, in which Clute proposes a single blanket genre that includes science fiction, fantasy, and horror in which they are differentiated by their narrative structures/grammars. […]

]]> http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-25463 Sat, 19 Jan 2008 16:24:49 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-25463 [...] . . . is that this John Clute lecture from last September (h/t Hal), “Fantastika in the World Storm,” pretty much just makes me want to write nothing but strict mimetic realism without any content that could be understood to be fantastic in any way whatsoever. [...] […] . . . is that this John Clute lecture from last September (h/t Hal), “Fantastika in the World Storm,” pretty much just makes me want to write nothing but strict mimetic realism without any content that could be understood to be fantastic in any way whatsoever. […]

]]> http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-25410 Sat, 19 Jan 2008 01:41:16 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-25410 [...] In the process of reading Hal Duncan’s latest essay on his blog, and the accompanying linked speech by John Clute on narrative grammars; it being late at night, and Hal’s post being incredibly long as usual, my mind has wandered a little from the post itself. I’ve been thinking of two stories that have been floating around in my head for quite some time now, the ones I think of vaguely as “operation” and “machines”–both of which I think of as belonging to “the City” setting, and for both of which I’ve in the past written brief opening scenes. I tried to first think of them in terms of Clute’s narrative grammars, and how the “phases” he provides might be used in those stories; and though I couldn’t seem to come up with much for it, it returned to mind the desire I’d had in the past to find a way to move “operation” out of its initial setting, to go out of its tone of mundane SF-ness into something wider in scope and more ephemeral in tone. So while one part of my mind is considering the ideas behind these stories, another is thinking of the kinds of narrative flow described by Clute, the types of feeling evoked, and a third about genre and tropes and subsets of subsets. And halfway through reading, it hits me, suddenly, that the two stories are complimentary. The first begins when the protagonist is damaged (or altered) voluntarily; the second when its protagonist is altered (or damaged) against his will. The second story begins on the outskirts, and would involve the protagonist returning to the City, and eventually working his way deep into the heart. The first begins in the City, and if I let my urges have their way, it would wander outwards beyond the boundaries and into entirely unknown territory. These are, I realised, two beginnings in the same story. It’s an interesting feeling. An entire thematic structure has appeared in my mind between one thought and the next. It’s not something I’ve had insight into before–structure and theme on such a macro scale. Decent ideas don’t come to me all that easily. [...] […] In the process of reading Hal Duncan’s latest essay on his blog, and the accompanying linked speech by John Clute on narrative grammars; it being late at night, and Hal’s post being incredibly long as usual, my mind has wandered a little from the post itself. I’ve been thinking of two stories that have been floating around in my head for quite some time now, the ones I think of vaguely as “operation” and “machines”–both of which I think of as belonging to “the City” setting, and for both of which I’ve in the past written brief opening scenes. I tried to first think of them in terms of Clute’s narrative grammars, and how the “phases” he provides might be used in those stories; and though I couldn’t seem to come up with much for it, it returned to mind the desire I’d had in the past to find a way to move “operation” out of its initial setting, to go out of its tone of mundane SF-ness into something wider in scope and more ephemeral in tone. So while one part of my mind is considering the ideas behind these stories, another is thinking of the kinds of narrative flow described by Clute, the types of feeling evoked, and a third about genre and tropes and subsets of subsets. And halfway through reading, it hits me, suddenly, that the two stories are complimentary. The first begins when the protagonist is damaged (or altered) voluntarily; the second when its protagonist is altered (or damaged) against his will. The second story begins on the outskirts, and would involve the protagonist returning to the City, and eventually working his way deep into the heart. The first begins in the City, and if I let my urges have their way, it would wander outwards beyond the boundaries and into entirely unknown territory. These are, I realised, two beginnings in the same story. It’s an interesting feeling. An entire thematic structure has appeared in my mind between one thought and the next. It’s not something I’ve had insight into before–structure and theme on such a macro scale. Decent ideas don’t come to me all that easily. […]

]]> http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-15114 Sun, 30 Sep 2007 08:39:06 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-15114 [...] John Clute’s “Fantastika in the World Storm“, a lecture delivered in Prague earlier this month. Possibly notable for including a four-stage model of sf to go with the models of fantasy and horror outlined in the Encyclopedia of Fantasy and The Darkening Garden, respectively; at least, I think it’s the first time I’ve seen such a model written down: Science Fiction. The basic premise is that the world depicted has an arguable relation to the history of the real world. The underlying impulse of twentieth century SF has been to view the world in this manner in order to see what’s wrong; and then fixing it. SF is the most optimisitc of genres. SF bronco-busts the world. It rides the world storm. I’ve cobbled a narrative model for SF out of other writers’ work. Though it uses a different terminology, this model closely resembles an earlier model constructed by Farah Mendlesohn for similar reasons in her essay, Is There Any Such a Thing as Children’s Fiction: A Position Piece (2004): [...] […] John Clute’s “Fantastika in the World Storm“, a lecture delivered in Prague earlier this month. Possibly notable for including a four-stage model of sf to go with the models of fantasy and horror outlined in the Encyclopedia of Fantasy and The Darkening Garden, respectively; at least, I think it’s the first time I’ve seen such a model written down: Science Fiction. The basic premise is that the world depicted has an arguable relation to the history of the real world. The underlying impulse of twentieth century SF has been to view the world in this manner in order to see what’s wrong; and then fixing it. SF is the most optimisitc of genres. SF bronco-busts the world. It rides the world storm. I’ve cobbled a narrative model for SF out of other writers’ work. Though it uses a different terminology, this model closely resembles an earlier model constructed by Farah Mendlesohn for similar reasons in her essay, Is There Any Such a Thing as Children’s Fiction: A Position Piece (2004): […]

]]> http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-14951 Fri, 28 Sep 2007 11:14:30 +0000 http://www.johnclute.co.uk/word/?p=15#comment-14951 [...] oh, and Clute’s talk on Fantastika is on his website. How are you going to resist something that introduces itself as: [...] […] oh, and Clute’s talk on Fantastika is on his website. How are you going to resist something that introduces itself as: […]

]]>