Posted on Daily Kos, 11:00:24 AM EDT April 17 2009
As a Kossack since 2003 or so and an online novelist for about a month, I naturally had Kos come immediately to mind when I was thinking about how to promote my work. The catch-sig-line "Fantasy fiction for Dems" popped into my head immediately.
I know intuitively what that means to me, but it occurred to me an explanation might be in order in case the line looks too much like pandering to the Kossack masses. So here it is.
First off, it certainly doesn't mean that Republicans aren't allowed to or shouldn't read my work. It's bipartisan in the sense that, in its world, there is no Repub or Dem party (it takes place in the fifth millennium A.D.) and Repubs of a thoughtful and non-utterly-wingnutty frame of mind might well enjoy it.
What I mean is that my personal values play out in my writing. (That's true of all writers; whatever your values are, they will come shining -- or oozing -- through in your work, whether you mean them to or not, and whether you are aware of it or not.) And they are "Dem" in an abstract way, meaning that many Democratic voters would hold them, with a leaning to the more progressive side. Egalitarianism, democracy, the recognition that power and responsibility are one and the same, tolerance for other cultures, sexual freedom, open-mindedness and a rationalism that doesn't preclude spirituality, especially the spirituality of personal experience (which is really the only valid spirituality to my mind), and probably more that I will think of later and add in a diary edit, are what I write about. (Tell the truth I'm finding it quite difficult to just declare them like this... I'm squirming.)
So if you're looking just for sweaty-thewed barbarians bashing each other over the head with swords (or "thud and blunder" as it's sometimes referred to in the sff world)... intrigues in which everyone's quest for power is mindless, vicious and unquestioning, in a dog-eat-dog world where everyone assumes that's as good as human nature allows... or freewheeling magical power without consideration as to what that would really imply... you'll be disappointed. If you're looking for a story that vindicates a belief in might-makes-right, as all too much sff work does, look elsewhere. I hate that shit. When I was much younger, I looked for an oasis of practical idealism in the tide of cynicism and indifference that dominated sff political discourse, and found it in a few works such as those of Ursula K. LeGuin and Joanna Russ... but there wasn't a big enough oasis, so I wrote more of it.
I am not cynical, and I try to make my work ultimately life-affirming and positive: about human nature, about the power of collaboration, community and love, and particularly about free will, emphasizing the power of choice.
So I've got things like a nation that runs by direct democracy, kind of like Switzerland... going through a soul-searching discourse when the possibility of conquering a slave-holding, tyrannical empire becomes real. Or a warrior-king trying (vainly so far) to put together a low-tech version of the United Nations. Or the female side of the spiritual culture of an oppressively-patriarchal society asserting itself the moment it becomes free to, and undertaking to rewrite that society's definitions of good and evil, and pain and pleasure.
My main character is a politician, and in the past few years my writing about him has been informed by things about politics that I've learned right here on Daily Kos... I can't help it. I am inspired, and heartened, always, by the intelligence mixed with compassion that I see in the discourse here, and I take that inspiration right back into my work.
So that's what I mean... I'm not sure the explanation does it justice, so I might come back and edit in the future.
Splash site for my online work here.
I love 'topic fiction, the whole spectrum: dystopia, utopia, and some others I've discovered along the way. I use "pseudotopia" to describe settings that purport to be utopic but are ghastly underneath. I use "eutopia" (accent on the first syllable) to describe settings that are not perfect, but are very good places -- about as good as can be done and still remain plausible. On that scale, the Yeolis have created a eutopia.
ReplyDeleteOne of these days, I'd love to do a convention panel, "Those Who Set Fire to Omelas," to explore the 'topic spectrum. The title is a riff off a classic story, "Those Who Walk Away from Omelas." A teacher once presented that story to class and asked whether we would stay in the city, knowing its perfect life was based on oppressing a helpless scapegoat; or leave. I allowed as to how I'd break the scapegoat out of the dungeon, spread some accelerant around, and throw a match behind us as we left. Effective 'topic fiction should make people think about whether what is described is desirable or not, and how they themselves would respond in a world like that.
One of the things I do on my LiveJournal, "The Wordsmith's Forge," is try to create a space where people of diverse political minds can talk safely. Sometimes it works, sometimes not, but I treasure the successes. Only when we can talk things over and see multiple sides of an issue are we likely to find the best solution.