Adam Roberts on Hugo 2009 shortlists

[Father Jape]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Roberts_%28critic%29
http://www.thehugoawards.org/?p=260

http://punkadiddle.blogspot.com/2009/07/hugos-2009.html

Dear Science Fiction Fandom

I wanted to have a word about the Hugos. Science Fiction Fandom, these are your awards: the shortlists chosen and voted for by you. And because I too am a fan (though without Hugo voting privileges) they are my awards. They reflect upon us all. They remain one of the most prestigious awards for SF in the world. These lists say something about SF to the world.

Science Fiction Fandom: your shortlists aren't very good.

I'm not saying the works you have shortlisted are terrible. They're not terrible, mostly, as it goes. But they aren't exceptionally good either. They're in the middle. There's a word for that. The word is mediocre.

Widely publicised shortlists of mediocre art are a bad thing. What do these lists say about SF to the multitude in the world—to the people who don't know any better? It says that SF is old-fashioned, an aesthetically, stylistically and formally small-c conservative thing. It says that SF fans do not like works that are too challenging, or unnerving; that they prefer to stay inside their comfort zone.

This is bad because the very heart's-blood of literature is to draw people out of their comfort zone; to challenge and stimulate them, to wake and shake them; to present them with the new, and the unnerving, and the mind-blowing. And if this true of literature, it is doubly or trebly true of science fiction. For what is the point of SF if not to articulate the new, the wondrous, the mindblowing and the strange?

Take the novel shortlist. The novels on the novel shortlist are all mediocre novels, with the exception of Anathem, which isn't so much mediocre as enormous and deranged and so boring it goes through boring into some strange condition on the far side. They are not terrible hopeless novels; and they are not outstanding, excellent, life-changing, brilliant novels. They are somewhere in the middle. Fandom, I would like the blue-riband shortlist on the genre's most prestigious award to list some novels that are better than mediocre.

You've plumped for a list that's all YA. Nothing wrong with YA, of course; but is it really the case that all the best long fiction in our genre last year was YA? Does it seem likely to you that this could be the case? Now, I know the Stross title is a 'late period Heinlein' pastiche, that it's about a sexbot, that it has oodles of sex in it. But it's true enough to its Heinleinisch sources to be YA for all that; in the sense that its understanding of sexual desire and praxis at no point goes beyond that of a smart, randy teenager—which is as far as Heinlein's understanding of sexual desire and praxis ever went, of course. So, I'll call Saturn's Children YA; and I'll go on from there to note that everything on the novel list is YA. Here are a couple of paragraphs from blogs, one relating to this list, one not. Firstly, from Abigail Nussbaum, who has already said many of the things about the disappointing novel shortlist that I'd have liked to:

    Though it might be tempting to conclude that the shoddy state of this year's shortlist is the result of the infantilization of the genre, to my mind the problem isn't that YA books are being nominated, but that the wrong YA books have been. How much stronger would this year's best novel shortlist have been if Terry Pratchett's Nation, Margo Lanagan's Tender Morsels, or even Allegra Goodman's The Other Side of the Island had been on it? (This is not even to mention books that have received a great deal of critical attention ... Patrick Ness's The Knife of Never Letting Go, Kristin Cashore's Graceling, or Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games.)

And this, not specifically related to the Hugos, but a suggestive quotation nevertheless: the excellent Blogographia Literaria quotes Leslie Fiedler:

    There is a real sense in which our prose fiction is immediately distinguishable from that of Europe, though this is a fact that is difficult for Americans to confess. In this sense, our novels seem not primitive, perhaps, but innocent, unfallen in a disturbing way, almost juvenile. The great works of American fiction are notoriously at home in the children's section of the library, their level of sentimentality precisely that of a pre-adolescent. This is part of what we mean when we talk about the incapacity of the American novelist to develop; in a compulsive way he returns to a limited world of experience, usually associated with his childhood, writing the same book over and over again until he lapses into silence of self-parody.

Fandom, look at the 2009 Clarke novel shortlist. Do you know why that list is better than yours? It's not that its every novel is a masterpiece—far from it (although it seems to me regretable that you couldn't you vote books as good as The Quiet War, House of Sons or Song of Time onto your shortlist.) But some of the books on that list fail, no question. Martin Martin's on the Other Side, for instance, is a mediocre novel. But (and this is the crucial thing) it's a mediocre novel trying to do something a little new with the form of the novel. It's an experiment in voice and tone, and ambitious in its way. The novels on the Hugo shortlist—except Anathem, as I mentioned—try nothing new: they are all old-fashioned: formally, stylistically and conceptually unadventurous.

Let me put it this way: Fandom, when you voted Scalzi's mediocre Zoe's Tale onto the shortlist, did you really do so because you thought it one of the six best genre novels published in 2008? I mean—honestly? Or did you, on the contrary, think: 'I like Scalzi; I like Scalzi's blog; and although maybe his novel's not, you know, Tolstoy or anything, I enjoyed it plenty, and I reckon Scalzi deserves the egoboo.' Because I can believe the latter explanation much more readily than the former, and the problem with it is that none of those things are reasons to vote Zoe's Tale onto a best novel shortlist. Those are corrupting reasons, because every time you vote a mediocre book onto a shortlist that exists to celebrate the very best in our genre you devalue not only the award but the genre too. Please don't devalue my genre, fandom. I love my genre. Don't vote mediocre books onto the Hugo novel shortlist; vote good books; and excellent books. There's plenty of them about, you know.

Of course, there's always the possibility, of course, that you genuinely feel Zoe's Tale is one of the best novels published last year. If that's what you believe—if you actually think Zoe's Tale is the best the novel can aspire to—then you really, really, really, really, really need to broaden your aesthetic horizons. You need to read more widely, to look at a greater selection of writers and modes of writing; to stretch yourself; to venture out of your comfort zone. Not just for the health of this award, and SF; but for the sanity of your soul. Because if you can actually read the excellent The Quiet War and then read the pleasant but mediocre Zoe's Tale, and not see that the former is a much much better novel than the latter, there must be something wrong with you.

Little Brother? Part of me feels bad saying this, since Doctorow's novel is in the fullest sense a righteous book—it contains a whole bunch of stuff that people, especially young people, really ought to know. And it's been really successful, and a lot of young people are reading it, which is superb. And Doctorow is a lovely, lovely human being. But as a novel Little Brother is a mediocre piece of writing: stylistically dull; too formally stilted in execution; too monologic tonally. The novel's drama is construed in a fatally one-sided a manner, with nothing to suggest why the bad guys do what they do apart from the fact that they are bad guys. The torture sequence at the end pulls it punches. Orwell's Big-Bro bad guys are a thousand times nastier than anything here, no punches are pulled, and yet Orwell's villains have a comprehensible, if repellent, rationale. It's not good enough to say 'but this is a YA novel'. The best YA novels are more than capable of covering all this stuff; and most young adults know the world is not a 2-D cartoon. I read Nineteen Eighty-Four when I was a teenager, for instance, like a great many people. I loved it. So Little Brother's righteousness—and I'm not being snarky when I use that phrase—does not save it from being mediocre as a novel. Or—Gaiman's Jungle Book retread, The Graveyard Book. This is better-made than some of Gaiman's other novels, and it melts a little corner of my belief that Gaiman is a great writer of graphic novels but an indifferent novelist. But The Graveyard Book is too twee, too cosy, especially given that its theme is Death which is, in reality, neither twee or cosy, as some children, and all of us eventually, grievously discover. So that leaves Anathem, and it seems a strange thing to say given how little I like this book, but it's seems to me the only title here whose presence is deserved. I think it fails, but I think it fails in heroic, mad, reader-stretching, you've-never-come-across-anything-like-this-before ways. Saturn's Children is as scattershot a novel as any Stross has written, and the proportion of shot that hits the target is as it's always been. I suppose it could be argued that Saturn's Children's take on late Heinlein tries something new with the form of the novel, if rattling the form to pieces with a hail of bolts and screws counts as new. But it's pretty weak fare compared even to Anathem.

Guys, we can do better. Why not make next year's list a thing of excellence, rather than competence and mediocrity? Why not think about listing genuinely good books? Ursula Le Guin's Lavinia, Gwyneth Jones's Spirit; Lee Konstantinou's Pop Apocalypse, China Mieville, The City and The City;, Kim Stanley Robinson's Galileo's Dream, Catherynne M Valente, Palimpsest. [18 July 09: I'm wrong! Someone more clued-in than I reminds me that Lavinia won't be eligible for next year's Hugos; but adds that, with Pyr's reissue of The Quiet War, McAuley's novel will be ...] They're not all of them completely perfect; but they all of them, in various ways, push the envelope, try new stuff, shake you up. That's six titles right there better than the 09 shortlist, and the year's only half over. Who knows what genius, brilliant, startling, unnerving, wonderful fiction is coming in the next six months?

Fandom, the thing is that all your 2009 shortlists are like this: one or perhaps two choices that are not embarrassing, thrown in with four or five choices that are wincingly bad. Best related book? Two titles that deserve to be there (Mendelsohn, Kincaid) and three makeweights. Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form: is there any person not suffering serious imbalances in their brain chemistry who really thinks Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Iron Man and the when-I-go-to-hell-for-my-sins-this-will-be-being-played-on-continuous-loop-on-the-tannoy METAtropolis comes within a parsec of WALL-E and The Dark Knight in terms of beauty, cultural significance or quality? And given that this is so, what's the other stuff even doing on the shortlist?

Or take a look at the best professional artist shortlist. You see it, there? Daniel Dos Santos; Bob Eggleton; Donato Giancola; John Picacio; Shaun Tan. All of these artists produce work that is professional, technically accomplished, polished, brightly coloured, realist and jesus, dull, dull, dull. Dull—excepting only Shaun Tan (the only one name there that seems to me to deserve to be there). Conventional; all surface technique and no soul; artworks exactly like and in not one quarter-degree superior to pretty much every SFF novel or magazine cover printed since 1966. Remember, Fandom, my question is not: are these artists competent, because clearly they all are. But are they the best? What are they doing that is new? That stands out? That shakes or moves or inspires us? The moleskin-notebook doodlers on Skine-art produce more interesting art than this in their spare time every day. We can do better. Or—and this is the angle that worries me, Fandom: or you really think that these images are the best that visual art can be?

Here's what I'd like. If it isn't going to inconvenience you, I'd be enormously grateful, when it comes to next year's shortlists, if you could remember to come up with shortlists of excellent, brilliant and genius things; not shortlists of mediocre things. Because if you do that, it will be saying: SF is brilliant, which IT IS, instead of saying, as you are this year, with occasional exceptions SF is mediocre.

Sincerely &c.

[Nightflier]

Ma čovek je sasvim u pravu. Ja ovde mesecima kukam kako više nema dobre fantastike, pa čak ni zabavne. Retki su izuzeci.

[divča]

Ma čovek je sasvim u pravu. Ja ovde mesecima kukam kako više nema dobre fantastike, pa čak ni zabavne. Retki su izuzeci.

Pa ne kaže on nigde da dobre fantastike više nema, nego se žali na ukus prosečnih fanova koji uporno favorizuju osrednja dela...

[Mica Milovanovic]

Evo i nagrada za 2009:

Best Novel: The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman (HarperCollins; Bloomsbury UK)
Best Novella: "The Erdmann Nexus", Nancy Kress (Asimov's Oct/Nov 2008)
Best Novelette: "Shoggoths in Bloom", Elizabeth Bear (Asimov's Mar 2008)
Best Short Story: "Exhalation", Ted Chiang (Eclipse Two)
Best Related Book: Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008, John Scalzi (Subterranean Press)
Best Graphic Story: Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones, Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)
Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form: WALL-E Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton, director (Pixar/Walt Disney)
Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form: Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed Whedon, & Maurissa Tancharoen, writers; Joss Whedon, director (Mutant Enemy)
Best Editor Short Form: Ellen Datlow
Best Editor Long Form: David G. Hartwell
Best Professional Artist: Donato Giancola
Best Semiprozine: Weird Tales, edited by Ann VanderMeer & Stephen H. Segal
Best Fan Writer: Cheryl Morgan
Best Fanzine: Electric Velocipede edited by John Klima
Best Fan Artist: Frank Wu
John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer: David Anthony Durham

[krema]

Vidim da je Gejman opet dobio nagradu za roman...
Moram priznati da nesto i nisam odusevljen njegovim romanima koje sam procitao. Interesantne teme obradjuje, ali mi bespotrebno razvlaci pricu, ide previse u sirinu, tako da sam se smorio citajuci, pogotovo Americke bogove. Toliko sam se smorio tim romanom da sam Anansijeve momke drzao dugo u steku, prije nego sto sam se odlucio da procitam.
S druge strane, krace forme, cini mi se, bolje mu leze. Koralina, recimo, je sjajna novela, bez nekih suvisnih detalja, jednostavno napisana, a opet puna jeze, interesantna.
Nadam se da se varam, ali ne ocekujem mnogo ni od od ovog romana...

[Boban]

Hugo glasaju ljudi na konvenciji; tu uvek imaju prednost popularniji likovi jer oni koji možda nisu sve iščitali glasaju za imena koja se stalno vrte ili za ono što jesu pročitali, a to najčešće budu izvikane stvari.

[krema]

A znajuci koliko kritika voli Gejmana, nije ni cudo sto je uvijek u krugu favorita za osvajanje svih vaznih nagrada...

[Nightflier]

Gejman nije zaslužio Hugoa za ovaj roman. Zapravo, kad god vidim da je dobio neku nagradu... samo slegnem ramenima. Trenutno je dobro biti Nil Gejman, da parafraziram Mela Bruksa.

[Boban]

Tiraži Gejmanovih romana u USA su nekoliko desetina hiljada primeraka, a stripova nekoliko stotina hiljada primeraka, tako da on naprosto eksploatiše stečeni imidž na drugom polju.
To ti je kao kada bi Goran Bregović sada izdao zbirku pesama, nenormalno bi se prodala bez obzira na realnu vrednost.

[Nightflier]

Tiraži Gejmanovih romana u USA su nekoliko desetina hiljada primeraka, a stripova nekoliko stotina hiljada primeraka, tako da on naprosto eksploatiše stečeni imidž na drugom polju.
To ti je kao kada bi Goran Bregović sada izdao zbirku pesama, nenormalno bi se prodala bez obzira na realnu vrednost.

Tja. Bojim se da mi ovde imamo pogrešnu predstavu o američkom tržištu. Pre nekoliko godina pričao sam sa jednim od poznatijih pisaca alternativne istorije. Tada se njegov najbolje prodavani roman kretao oko 36000 primeraka. A čoveka smatraju poprilično komercijalnim.

[Mica Milovanovic]

Best Novelette: "Shoggoths in Bloom", Elizabeth Bear (Asimov's Mar 2008)

Pročitao. Nije loše. Možda bi Ghoulu moglo biti zanimljivo kako spisateljica koristi Lavkrafta da ispriča neku svoju priču...

http://www.elizabethbear.com/shoggoths.html

[Mica Milovanovic]

Best Short Story: "Exhalation", Ted Chiang (Eclipse Two)

http://www.nightshadebooks.com/Downloads/Exhalation%20-%20Ted%20Chiang.html

Takođe, najtoplija preporuka. Ted Chiang je od 1990 godine, kada je objavio sjajnu "Vavilonsku kulu", napisao samo 11 priča, od kojih je gotovo svaka ili bila nominovana za neku od nagrada ili je dobila.

"Tower of Babylon" (Omni, 1990) (Nebula Award winner)
"Division by Zero" (Full Spectrum 3, 1991)
"Understand" (Asimov's, 1991)
"Story of Your Life" (Starlight 2, 1998) (Nebula Award and Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award winner)
"The Evolution of Human Science" (a.k.a. "Catching Crumbs from the Table") (Nature, 2000)
"Seventy-Two Letters" (Vanishing Acts, 2000) (Sidewise Award winner)
"Hell Is the Absence of God" (Starlight 3, 2001) (Hugo Award, Locus Award and Nebula Award winner)
"Liking What You See: A Documentary" (Stories of Your Life and Others, 2002)
"What's Expected Of Us" (Nature, 2006)
The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate (Subterranean Press, 2007 and F&SF, 9/07) (Nebula Award winner, Hugo Award winner)
"Exhalation" (Eclipse 2, 2008) (BSFA winner, Locus Award for Short Story, 2009 Hugo Award winner)

[Nightflier]

Best Novelette: "Shoggoths in Bloom", Elizabeth Bear (Asimov's Mar 2008)

Pročitao. Nije loše. Možda bi Ghoulu moglo biti zanimljivo kako spisateljica koristi Lavkrafta da ispriča neku svoju priču...

http://www.elizabethbear.com/shoggoths.html


Berova je sjajna kao romanopisac, sa izuzetkom one travestije koju je radila sa Moneovom. Jako je maštovita, mada joj je stil malo teži nego što ja inače volim. Takođe je reč o piscu koji poprilično šara po žanrovima i podžanrovima.

[zakk]

Hehe. Yay za GirlGenius!

[krema]

Nisam znao da li ovo da ubacim na topik o Gejmenu ili ovdje, pa sam se odlucio za ovaj, kad je vec rijec o djelu koje je dobilo Huga...
Proocitao sam Graveyard book i to je samo potvrdilo ono sto sam ranije rekao za Gejmena / bolja djela su mu kraca i djecija (ovo jeste roman, ali nije nesto predug). Cini mi se da bi se najlakse mogla opisati kao Hari Poter srece Pinokija srece Alisu u zemlji cuda, vidljiv je uticaj nesto starije djecije literature na Gejmena. Kao da je uzimao atmosferu ili motive sa svih strana pomalo i napravio nesto sto i nije toliko lose kako zna napraviti (u odnosu na Bogove, recimo, ovo je roman koji se lako cita i nije nijednog momenta nezanimljiv).
Krace recenice mu mnogo bolje leze i izgledaju, sa vise dijaloga i manje onih dugih, smarajucih opisa. Kao i u Koralini, vise je paznje posvetio glavnoj radnji, bez nekih bespotrebnih meandriranja.
Ono sto mu mogu zamjeriti je cesta naivnost djela, sto se najvise ogleda u ponasanju djece, glavnih junaka u knjizi (koji se ponasaju, skoro u potpunosti, kao odrasli, pa su im razgovori, iako u jednom momentu imaju samo cetiri godine, liseni one djecije naivnosti i opustenosti) i u raspletu nekih od vaznijih dijelova knjige.
Sve u svemu, nakon citanja nisam ostao ubijedjen da bi ovo trebao biti najbolji roman godine, bez obzira sto ostale nominovane nisam procitao. Simpaticna knjiga (koja m i se mozda najvise svidjela zbog neke naglasene sjetne atmosfere kojom je nabijena), ali nista posebno. Standardni Gejmen. Na kraju se vracamo na to da ga publika i kritika vole vise nego sto realno zasluzuje.

[Boban]

Gejmen je jedan od najprecenjenijih pisaca na svetu.

[Ghoul]

to si reko samo zato što je to dexin omiljeni pisac!

istina, po ovom pitanju se slažem s tobom.
meni je taj gejmen savršeno nezanimljiv.

[Ygg]

Kako neko uopšte može da čita pisca koji se zove Gejmen?

[Berserker]

Gejmen je onaj koji mi je povratio veru u SF posle citanja kardinalno loseg Zelaznija i njegovog Ambera 2:smorne avanture Merlina... Americki bogovi su prvi ne-serijalni roman koji sam procitao posle duzeg vremena i delovao je neverovatno osvezavajuce. Tada sam se i primio na tog pisca. Iako sva njegova dela ne odgovaraju velikoj popularnosti, jos mi se nije desilo da se razocaram nijednim procitanim romanom (a procitao sam ih sve kod nas prevedene).
Recimo, ja bih pre Iana Mcdonalda nazvao precenjenim, jer ni Bespuce ni Nekrovil ni izdaleka me nisu zadovoljili, ali posto verujem Goranu uzecu jos i Brazil kao poslednju sansu da ga zavolim...

[Boban]

ljudi su različiti a gejman je popularan jer je pogodio žicu prosečnog čitaoca.

[Nightflier]

Gejmen piše meku fantastiku, da mekša ne može biti. Sve se da shvatiti kao nekakva alegorija. Ja ga prilično volim, ali opet - volim one stvari koje se obično smatraju njegovim slabijim radovima.

[Bab Jaga]

Best Novelette: "Shoggoths in Bloom", Elizabeth Bear (Asimov's Mar 2008)

Pročitao. Nije loše. Možda bi Ghoulu moglo biti zanimljivo kako spisateljica koristi Lavkrafta da ispriča neku svoju priču...

http://www.elizabethbear.com/shoggoths.html


Sa zakasnjenjem: Mica, ne znam za Ghoula, ali meni si baš uljepšao veče. Hvala za link!