Tag Archives: LitCrit

New to the Stacks: Hugos and Theory

On Moral Fiction by John Gardner

On Moral Fiction by John Gardner- read
They’d Rather be Right by Mark Clifton and Frank Riley  ~ read
A Case of Conscience by James Blish –
The Iliad and the Odyssey by Alberto Manguel
The Big Time by Fritz Lieber
Girl Sleuth: Nancy Drew and the Women Who Created Her by Melanie Rehak
What Makes This Book So Great by Jo Walton – read

They’d Rather be Right by Mark Clifton and Frank Riley
A Case of Conscience by James Blish
The Iliad and the Odyssey by Alberto Manguel
The Big Time by Fritz Lieber
Girl Sleuth: Nancy Drew and the Women Who Created Her by Melanie Rehak
What Makes This Book so Great by Jo Walton

The Daily Communiqué – 14 April, 2019 – Week 2 Recap

Monday’s announcement of the Hugo nominees led me to write about my experiences with WorldCon and meeting authors.

I’ve been listening to a lot of different music at work, thanks to the global record collection, and shared some of my discoveries on Tuesday.

In the same vein, on Wednesday there were works by artists I found intriguing.

Some reflective writing on writing on Thursday.

A tiny bit of fiction for Friday night.  The monster is real!

And rounding out the week, my reaction to former pope Benedict’s letter about sex abuse in the Catholic Church.

Currently reading:  Black Leopard, Red Wolf by Marlon James.  I don’t know what I think about it yet, other than it’s weird.

The Daily Communiqué – 11 April, 2019 – On Writing

Mostly my writing doesn’t get read by anyone.  Writing so publicly in The Daily Communiqué is challenging on more levels than just publishing something, anything, on a daily basis.

There will be a discernible variance in quality as I find my public voice.  Critical reviews are one thing, I can hide behind the intellectual and LitCrit when writing those.

Getting more personal, staying away from the diary like posts requires a willingness to be vulnerable to a buncha “I don’t know who might be reading this types.”  To be clear, I chose this and I welcome the challenge it brings.  I want it to elevate my writing.

Reading M. Todd Gallowglas’ Stopwatch Chronicles recently shook something loose.  I’m not sure what yet, but it definitely changed my visceral thoughts about my writing.  Some of my daily communiqués will be working through these new ideas.

And since writing this in November, I’ve been thinking about memoir.  River Queens is a great example.  This needs more research, and careful study, but I think there’s some things I could write that wouldn’t be too cringe inducing right now.

Aside from the work with my mentor on metamodernism (yes, it’s a thing and yes, I dig nerding out about it), I have no other “assignments.”  What we’re reading is challenging, and will take some time to get through them thoughtfully.

There are memoir-ish ideas for very short pieces floating around.  I want to weigh where the boundaries are for what I want to say.  Stopwatch Chronicles will have a fundamental impact on how I approach these pieces.

How I’ve evolved as a writer since October leaves me a little befuddled some times.  More than ever I claim “writer” as a part of my self and I’m becoming even more dedicated to pursing the craft.  Bette Davis said it best, “Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy [ride].”

 

The Daily Communiqué: 8 April 2019 – Hugos

2019 Hugo nominations have been announced.  I’m so pleased to see at least one book I’ve read, and a fanzine I know well, nominated.

WorldCon 76 was almost literally in my backyard, someone helped me decide I HAD to go, and it’s the only time (so far) I’ve been able to vote for the Hugos.

One of my favorite authors Mary Robinette Kowal, and astronaut Kjell Lindberg hosted a “Koffee Klatch” to talk about their work, and answer questions.  There were ten of us, and we were enthused about meeting them.   We learned some pretty interesting stuff about writing and being in space, and carried out a good amount of signed swag.  (Kjell even signed the inside of the Canadarm hatch door on my model shuttle.)

Since I don’t anticipate going to WorldCon 77 in Dublin, sad doesn’t begin to cover how I feel about not being able to vote for at least these two nominees.

There’s such good stuff which has been nominated, and good lord how do people read it all?  I’m still working on last year’s packet!

Being a list making/keeping type of person, it’s tempting to download the list of all Hugo winners/nominees and see how many I can read, but that way lies madness.  There are two many other books to read, my apartment would explode with that large an influx of books.

Speaking of which, Marlon JamesBlack Leopard, Red Wolf just arrived.  Here’s a great long read from The New Yorker published just before the book was published.

Part of my assigned reading for LitCrit involves N. K. Jemisin’s The Broken Earth Trilogy, Toni Morrison’s Beloved, and James’ book.  To bring it back to the Hugos, Jemisin won three years in a row for Broken Earth, and with as much hype as there is about Black Leopard, Red Wolf, I won’t be surprised to see it nominated for a Hugo next year.

Review: Literary Theory: A Complete Introduction

Literary Theory: A Complete Introduction by Sara Upstone

Title: Literary Theory:  A Complete Introduction
Author: Sara Upstone
Published: 2017
ISBN: 9781473611924
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Twitter: @SaraUpstone
Publisher’s Blurb:  Literary theory has now become integral to how we produce literary criticism. When critics write about a text, they no longer think just about the biographical or historical contexts of the work, but also about the different approaches that literary theory offers. By making use of these, they create new interpretations of the text that would not otherwise be possible. In your own reading and writing, literary theory fosters new avenues into the text. It allows you to make informed comments about the language and form of literature, but also about the core themes – concepts such as gender, sexuality, the self, race, and class – which a text might explore.

“… criticism, then, is where we find the interpretation of literature.  Theory, in contrast, is where we find the tools to facilitate that interpretation.”  (p. xii)

This little book is packed with literary theory goodness.  In 260 pages, Sara Upstone covers 19 different schools of theory.  And while I don’t always agree with her assessments, or placement of movements within theories, Upstone’s overview is a great place for anyone to start learning about Literary Theory.

Having this at my fingertips has helped me figure out how Modernism and/or Post Modernism might apply to N. K. Jemisin’s Broken Earth Trilogy, an exercise assigned by my mentor.  If Modernism is trying to make sense of the chaotic changes in a book, then The Fifth Season and The Obelisk Gate offer a lot to be interpreted through that lens.  People of the Stillness must make sense of their new world as the rift and the coming of a Fifth Season wreak havoc.

Further, if Post Modernism is the questioning of reality itself, The Broken Earth Trilogy again offers an opportunity for that interpretation.  Is Alabaster turning into a Stone Eater a reality?  How it it possible he was taken into the middle of the planet by a Stone Eater and lived to come out the other side?

Mind you, these are just notions I’m playing with as I explore what both Modernism and Post Modernism mean to a critical reviewer and whatever book she happens to be reading.

My biggest quibbles with Literary Theory:  A Complete Guide have to do with the dates used to place each school in a context.  I will grant that cultural anchors must exist in order for events to have a context within the greater stories.  However, as a person with a background in history, I also know that dates aren’t hard and fast.  World War I may be marked as beginning the day Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated, but that’s not really what started it all.

I mention this only because I want to caution readers not to get stuck on the dates Upstone uses as absolutes.  Surrealism, sequestered in the Modernism school of theory, had its precursors in authors like Arthur Rimbaud and André Breton.

And while I’m at it, if anything, Surrealism belongs with Post Modernism if we are to take the definition of Post Modernism at face value.

But, those are of little import when it comes to the actual information contained within this small volume.  It’s best to consider the essence of the overviews of each school of theory.  And by all means, we should give consideration to our own thoughts about what we’re reading.

Sara Upstone’s Literary Theory:  A Complete Introduction has earned itself a permanent place on my reference shelf.  If, that is, I can ever get it to leave my desk.

New to the Stacks: Shadow Ops, Ta-Nehisi Coates and Other Goodness

They: A Biblical Tale of Secret Genders by Janet Mason

They by Janet Mason – Read
The Art of Fiction by John Gardner ~ #LitCrit ~ Read
Darkness Visible by William Styron
The Annotated Alice – annotated by Martin Gardner
Shadow Ops: Breach Zone by Myke Cole – Read
We Were Eight Years in Power by Ta-Nehisi Coates – read

The Art of Fiction by John Gardner
Darkness Visible by William Styron
Annotated Alice in Wonderland
Shadow Ops: Breach Zone by Myke Cole
We Were Eight Years in Power by Ta-Nehisi Coates