Mandatory Science Fiction Reading

Hello Gentle Reader

It’s all over the internet. This bill is all over the internet. News reports popping right left and centre. Some cheer at the thought; others scoff. For so long authors like Ursula K Le Guin, have remarked that Science Fiction and Fantasy – genre fiction in general; have always been placed in the literary ghetto, unfairly and unjustly. Yet now, a politician in West Virginia seeks to change this alienation – well at least for science fiction. Ray Canterbury a Republican delegate (I know what you’re thinking Republican promoting science!) hopes that the promotion of science fiction will allow for a further interest in mathematics and science in general.

“I'm primarily interested in things where advanced technology is a key component of the storyline, both in terms of the problems that it presents and the solutions that it offers.”

In other words:

“I'm not interested in fantasy novels about dragons.”

Take a hike Tolkien! All your elves and furry footed vertically challenged gardening and smoking bastards, need to pack up and move out! Of course does this also mean that the works of Gabriel Garcia Marquez are also of no use? Do they even read that in school? Does that mean that other works like “Catcher in the Rye,” and authors like Virginia Woolf and Fitzgerald will be put on hold, or shelved alongside with the dusty old volumes of Shakespeare, which is taken down periodically with the countless moans of students? Will it all be replaced by Asimov, Jules Verne, and H.G. Wells? What about more softer or social science fiction like Samuel R Delany – highly inappropriate I suppose; or Ursula K Le Guin or even William Gibson? What about the fables and parables of such authors like Andrei Platonov, or Angela Carter or Franz Kafka or Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky?

Alvin Toffler, David Brin, James Gunn and others are applauding this decision. Why shouldn’t they be applauding this decision? If it comes to pass they will be taken out of the literary ghetto, and will be placed alongside their friends and co-workers George Orwell for his novel “1984,” and Aldous Huxley and even Margaret Atwood for her novel and controversial school taught one as well “The Handmaid’s Tale.” Yet other less known works like Lois Lowry “The Giver,” have slide by the literary police and have allowed them to be taught in schools. Yet there is always a sense of trepidation when it comes to this, kind of business.

Reading should be encouraged. It should be enforced, and meant to be pushed in order to help others, in their adult lives, when reading is not just some pass time it’s an essential skill. With the crucial ability of reading comes writing. Yet, if people do not like literary works like “The Great Gatsby,” and other novels (Shakespeare is understandable) than why do we think that students would be any more keen on reading science fiction? Then again the world is changing. It evolves every day. Technology becomes more advance. The rise of space tourism. Just the other day I read about a one way mission to Mars for life! – Of course it’ll become a reality television program to help fund this six billion dollar venture. It comes to reason that to a degree some works of science fiction; like Kim Stanley-Robinson’s “Mars Trilogy,” are coming to take shape. Perhaps there are merits.

I am left feeling rather skeptical on the matter. If science fiction gets into the school system, is it going to be required reading in English class, or is it going to be an option or extra credited class? Being forced read Shakespeare is bad enough. Being forced to read Fitzgerald or Woolf or Joyce (if you’re teacher really hates you!) is all bad enough. Now we want these students to read science fiction, and then hold a straight face when we talk about space squids? I understand where Mister Canterbury is coming from. But there just feels like there should be, better wars fought. Perhaps if a student wrote a book report on a science fiction novel, and its relevance, in the language arts, than perhaps that, is one aspect that one can be a little more liberal and open minded about; but to teach these works – and which ones at that; alongside the work of some great classic works of literature and contemporary literature as well, is still a bit of a touchy issue. Not because one is denying that science fiction has no literary merit, it’s just what merit does planet O’ona have to that of earth – if it is supposed to be allegorical representation of earth, why didn’t the author just make it a future earth?

So many questions not enough answers. I understand that Mister Canterbury wants to help students and young people broaden their minds, and realize that with imagination the possibility of technology can be shaped – or the world can be changed. Yet science fiction is an acquired taste. It is an acquired taste like wine or scotch or cigarette’s – and more importantly like poetry. I have read science fiction, most of it a bore on me and at times sparkling understanding comes through.

In the end I am both on the fence and leaning backwards, falling into the already traveled route of where English class has come from and has been going. Yet I am willing to listen.

Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*

M. Mary

Women’s Prize for Fiction Shortlist

Hello Gentle Reader

Hilary Mantel has been shortlisted again for another major award. Ms. Mantel finds herself once again shortlisted this time for the Women’s Prize for Fiction (formerly the Orange Prize). It’s been a good year for Hilary Mantel. First she wins the Booker Prize for the second time, being the first woman to do so, and being the first English author to do so as well. Then she won the Costa Book Award in the categories of Novel and Best Book of the Year; for her second novel in the Thomas Cromwell trilogy “Bringing Up the Bodies.” The judges, who are awarding the Women’s Prize for Fiction, need to decide if they are going to give the award to Hilary Mantel and in an essence give her a Royal Flush. Though it would be the icing on the cake; and truly it would be a profitable year for Hilary Mantel. All she would need to do in order to top this kind of achievement would be win The Nobel Prize for Literature – who may or may not be in her future – anything is possible truly. Others who have been shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction are past winners Barbra Kingsolver and Zadie Smith. The full shortlist is as follows:

Kate Atkinson “Life After Life,”
A.M. “May We Be Forgotten,”
Maria Semple “Where’d You Go, Bernadette,”
Babara Kingsolver “Flight Behaviour,”
Hilary Mantel “Bringing up The Bodies,”
Zadie Smith “NW,”

This is a bold shortlist; not because of its innovation or its almost surprising authors that have been chosen, but innovative in the fact that it follows what some have called, a rather predictable outcome. Hilary Mantel has been showered with awards, in the recent years. She has had a great success with her trilogy of novels that trace the life of Thomas Cromwell and the Tudor Era. Many have stated that she deserves the awards, and prizes because her work is great. Miranda Richardson chair of the Women’s Prize for Fiction has said the following in regards to Mantel being shortlisted:

“I was very keen to keep a balanced approach about Hilary Mantel, because we have in the UK this tall-poppy syndrome: 'You've already had too much; you can't have any more. Go away and die now.' It's disgusting, frankly, because this competition is about excellence for writing.”

Many agree with this argument. That the prize is to be awarded to the book that deserves it; it’s the integrity of the award itself. It should not be bias to past winners or to new authors. Some feel that the prize should be given to someone new. That there must be a certain sense of kindness and inclusiveness placed on up and coming and younger authors, as they compete with older and more established writers. Personally, some new fresh air never hurts; and some new blood, often defeats predictability. If Mantel does win this prize, certainly one needs to raise a glass to her achievement, and hope that she can top it again with the final book in her trilogy “The Mirror and The Light.” Great literature should be awarded based on their literary merits alone.

Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*

M. Mary

The Best Translated Book Award Shortlist

Hello Gentle Reader

Three Percent has announced its own Shortlist for The Best Translated Book Award. Over the course of just a little over a month, it had announced its longlist, and had paid equal attention to each of the books that had made it on the longlist. Each book was described and given an argument of why it should win. Each novel was given care and attention, and was individually held up to the readers and spectators as not just an amazing book, because they said so – but proven why. Along with the fiction shortlist is the poetry shortlist as well. Past winners include Kiwao Nomura, Elena Fanailova and Aleš Šteger.

The Fiction longlist, is made up of authors known, and unknown. It contains the Poet of the Apocalypse László Krasznahorkai for his metaphysical novel; as well as a Nobel Laureate in Literature Herta Müller for her documentary like novel; and poetic hybrid that shows the undying spirit of being a human being; others include the Brazilian novelist and short story writer, who has a passion for the void Clarice Lispector; but also one of Russia’s greatest contemporary authors but also uneasy with his home country Mikhail Shishkin.

The Fiction shortlist:

The Planets by Sergio Chejfec (Argentina)
Prehistoric Times by Eric Chevillard (France)
The Colonel by Mahmoud Dowlatabadi (Iran)
Satantango by László Krasznahorkai (Hungary)
Autoportrait by Edouard Levé (France)
A Breath of Life: Pulsations by Clarice Lispector (Brazil)
The Hunger Angel by Herta Müller (Romania/Germany)
Maidenhair by Mikhail Shishkin (Russia/Switzerland)
Transit by Abdourahman A. Waberi (Djibouti)
My Father’s Book by Urs Widmer (Switzerland)

For equal good measure one must include the Poetry shortlist as well. Admittedly I only recognize two authors and their collections of the shortlist; they being Nichita Stanescu and Xi Chuan.

Transfer Fat by Aase Berg (Sweden)
pH Neutral History by Lidija Dimkovska (Macedonia)
The Invention of Glass by Emmanuel Hocquard (France)
Wheel with a Single Spoke by Nichita Stanescu (Romania)
Notes on the Mosquito by Xi Chuan (China)
Almost 1 Book / Almost 1 Life by Elfriede Czurda (Austria)

There you have it Gentle Reader, the shortlists for the Best Translated Book Award. It will be very interesting to see which author wins, in which category. It is safe to say that the judges have their work cut out for them.

Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*

M. Mary

IMPAC Literary Dublin Award Short List Announced

Hello Gentle Reader

The IMPAC Literary Dublin Award has announced its Short List. Consisting of ten novels, by ten different authors from around the world, the list is both exciting and diverse in its exploration of literature from around the world, translated into English. The short list includes a Pulitzer Prize Shortlisted author; the French bad boy of letters; and Icelandic poet turned novelist and fiction writer, who has collaborated with Bjork; and the European Union Prize for Literature winner; also the most popular Japanese writer in recent history.

This is as follows:

City of Bohane by Kevin Barry (Irish)
The Map and the Territory by Michel Houellebecq (French)
Pure by Andrew Miller (British)
1Q84 by Haruki Murakami (Japanese)
The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka (Japanese American)
The Tragedy of Arthur by Arthur Phillips (American)
Swamplandia! by Karen Russell (American)
From the Mouth of the Whale by Sjón (Icelandic)
The Faster I Walk, The Smaller I Am by Kjersti Skomsvold (Norwegian)
Caesarion by Tommy Wieringa (Dutch)

Good luck to all the authors!

Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*

M. Mary

Satantango

Hello Gentle Reader

In the United Kingdom newspaper “The Guardian,” last year, there was an article, about the New York Literary Crowd, of well-educated and young aspiring authors; who had stopped looking for their literary fixes in their home country; but had started looking abroad for new and exciting works of literature. Perhaps the days of John Updike, Philip Roth, and Raymond Carver has all passed. Their less than uniquely ‘American,’ fiction – was nothing out of the extraordinary. Their attempts at bringing beauty and aesthetically pleasing concepts to the mundane have either passed or failed; the same old imitations and hacking off Hemingway’s style have become at best a bad joke, and a repetitive bore; and now days just simple entertainment fluff as some put it; of over budgeted and over paid authors who simply repeat the same formula over and over again; have all but come to play the same chord on the same old piano; and the old tune has since died out, and the listeners have moved on. As Hari Kunzru, writing for “The Guardian,” put it:

“The thing about New York (and, a fortiori, the gentrified bits of Brooklyn, where writers go when their Manhattan apartments are expropriated by the One Percent) is that it doesn't have a "contemporary master of the apocalypse" [László Krasznahorkai]. It has post-Ivy relationship anatomists, adderall-enhanced pop culture essayists, dirty realist white-guy novelists and hipster poets who transcribe their sexts and cut them up with Wikipedia entries on HPV and Jersey Shore. It has, at the last count, 247 trillion recent MFA graduates, at least a dozen of which are to be found, on any given morning, abseiling down the glassy exterior of the Random House publishing building, in an attempt to get Sonny Mehta to read their collection of short stories modelled on Denis Johnson's Jesus's Son.”

This may be why the young and upbeat and chic readers are looking for something more, away from their own shores. It may come to a surprise to many readers and people there are other countries that produce their own cultural exhibits and interpretations of the human condition. Some may feel that, because the world is now globalised there is no real ‘country bound,’ literature; and that it is all the same. Every country is now overrun with McDonald’s fast food restaurants, people from Japan to Romania to Germany to Bulgaria and Russia and so on, all surely must have drink Coca-Cola or Pepsi at some time or another. Though these experiences like eating chemically processed extremely thin burger patties that are overpriced, and carbonated sugar loaded beverages, are common experiences at best, they do not define globalization, and it most certainly does not characterize this suspected, united human experience and the entire spectrum that it itself encompasses. Eating or drinking these commercialised products (or their readily availability) does not mean that this world is unified; globalised sure; but not unified; any more than the simple acts of breathing or running unifies people or transcends cultural barriers. For that reason, I personally condemn the thought that because the world is globalised that as a Westerner of a Western Culture, does that mean I can be so repugnant and deem other countries literary abilities or talents – however miniscule; as unimportant or without value because the world is globalised, and therefore whatever they produce or write about has no value to me of any kind, because someone else over ‘here,’ can and most likely will state the same. That itself is ignorance. No one over ‘here,’ could produce the works of Ko Un, and his momentous ambition of depicting the lives of all the people he has met or crossed paths with. Nor could anyone reproduce the work of Herta Müller, who by firsthand experience has written about the oppression and abuse of language and fall of Communism and alienation under an oppressive regime and that of being an émigré in a democratic society. At the same time, no one could possibly write or imitate Alice Munro or Shakespeare. – The problem comes from the insular attitude, which works of great merit, can only be found in Western Countries. The West has become saturated in its own repetitive forms and nostalgia. Once ground breaking works of what was then called ‘post-modernism,’ have all but now become cliché formulas that younger generations are trying to re-work and call it once again innovative. Can one blame them though for a society drenched in its own nostalgia of the good’ ol‘days of Fitzgerald, Hemmingway, Ezra Pound, Thomas Pychon, Updike and Roth – all of which either were revolutionary of their times, and became sour jokes; or those attempts at bring back the Victorian nineteenth century realism, in modern ‘suburban,’ landscapes; as in a way (once again) a reaction against post-modernism and modernism. In the end however it has ended up being pop culture drenched references, colloquial conversations that orbit the same subject, and similar images that are not ground breaking. In the words of the former Permanent Secretary of the Swedish Academy Horace Engdhal “too insular and ignorant,” and for those reasons are unable to “participate in the dialogue of world literature,” because of our lack of translation.

However there is hope. With awards and publishers like The Best Translated Book Award, and Archipelago Press; there is serious recognition of the problem; and there are actions being taken place, to correct it. As well as an honourable mention of the Rochester University Press magazine Three Percent Review, which has dedicated itself to problem of translation.

László Krasznahorkai maybe better known in the film community, because of his collaboration with fellow Hungarian film director Bela Tarr; and for the cult classic film adaption of “Satantango,” which ran for a whole seven hours. Uncompromising is certainly the word to come to mind. One could say the film imitates the novel of Krasznahorkai itself. A dense piece of work, with no paragraph breaks; and long winding sentences. As the translator and poet George Szirtes put it; this one of the hardest translations he has ever done. The greatest reason though is because of the “slow lava flow of narrative, a vast black river of type,” which is what the narrative is composed of. It took Szirtes four years to translate the novel; and it took Krasznahorkai six years to write it. Yet with sentences like the following; which in themselves appear like prose poems – it is no wonder it would take so long; but the precision of the writing itself is wonderful:

“He gazed sadly at the threatening sky, at the burned-out remnants of a locust-plagued summer, and suddenly saw on the twig of an acacia, as in a vision, the progress of spring, summer, fall and winter, as if the whole of time were a frivolous interlude in the much greater spaces of eternity, a brilliant conjuring trick to produce something apparently orderly out of chaos, to establish a vantage point from which chance might begin to look like necessity ... and he saw himself nailed to the cross of his own cradle and coffin, painfully trying to tear his body away, only, eventually, to deliver himself--utterly naked, without identifying mark, stripped down to essentials--into the care of the people whose duty it was to wash the corpses, people obeying an order snapped out in the dry air against a background loud with torturers and flayers of skin, where he was obliged to regard the human condition without a trace of pity, without a single possibility of any way back to life, because by then he would know for certain that all his life he had been playing with cheaters who had marked the cards and who would, in the end, strip him even of his last means of defense, of that hope of someday finding his way back home.”

This is a demanding novel. It is not flexible like a branch, and does not bow to the wind. It is deeply pessimistic; to the point that the everyday is filled with feelings of apocalyptic doom. These are reason why László Krasznahorkai earned the title of the Poet of the Apocalypse; and often referred to as a master of the apocalypse. His work is deeply pessimistic with impending sensation of doom.

“The two clocks say different times, but it could be that neither of them is right, our clock,” he continues pointing to one above them with, his long, slender and refined index finger, “is very late, while that one there measure not so much as, well, the eternal reality of the exploited, and we do it as are as the bough of a tree to the rain that falls upon it: in other words we are helpless.”

If you wanted a summary of “Satantango,” it is the collective collapse of an “estate,” or a collective farm. After the factory (mill) had since run to ruin, the entire hamlet has since fallen into an endless cycle of dilapidation. Ruin upon ruin. Obsessive rain soaked fantasy of escape, always falling into endless pools of slippery mud, collapsing in on itself. All the inhabitants of this rain drenched, slippery mud landscape do their best to survive. Failed lives; and broken dreams, and now simply drowning themselves in nothing more than alcohol and spirits – and surveillance as if to validate their own existences; this poor little hamlet is nothing but in shambles and ruin. The world of these inhabitants is incredibly small. A tiny universe of melancholy and failure. They are forced into repetitive actions that are unique to their cosmos. Though they’re attempts at keeping the black dogs at bay has done nothing, but to further solidify their own place in their landscape of mud; a slippery earthly hell.

This world that Krasznahorkai depicts is without hope. When hope does arrive, cynically it becomes a question of whether or not it is hope; and more precisely speaking the fact it may be a con, comes to be a more than likely explanation of this almost heavenly altruistic man. Yet despite the premise, of this novel being claustrophobic and a relentless sea of black text. It is surprisingly light hearted at times. Who would have thought there would have been so much nose picking – and the occasional fart to boot?

There is certainly nothing like Krasznahorkai. Who has defamalarised everything about the world that we so happily walk into. One of the best examples is that in the second chapter, we find two men, who are lost in a bureaucratic hell hole (a staple of the former communist Eastern Europe – but this is not a novel with any real political connotations; Krasznahorkai himself, is dealing with metaphysical problems, and could not truly be bothered with the political problems of the time.), and for nine pages, these two people are not named or identified, leaving the reader, with a sense of alienation and confusion, and being lost in an endless world, that has no hope and certainly no meaning.

“The stench of sewers mixed with mud, puddles, the smell of the odd crack of lightning, wind tugging at tiles, power, empty nests, the stifling heat behind low ill-fitting windows . . . impatient, annoyed half-words of lovers embracing . . . demanding wails of babies, their cries sliding off into the tin – smell of dusk; streets pliable, parks soaked to their roots lying obedient to the rain, bare oaks, half-beaten dry flowers, scorched grass all prostate, humbled by the storm, sacrifices strewn at the executioners feet.”

This is truly a spectacular novel. Written in a high modernist style, with postmodernist tendencies. It’s opaque and abstract. Difficult for its own sake; and a classic all in itself. The merit is there. But it is foreboding; and for those reasons will most likely – and quite frankly; will never be a success. It is grandeur is palpable (as one reviewer put it) and it will be enjoyed by those who have the time and the patience, to read and re-read this book over and over again. Though admittedly one can certainly say that Krasznahorkai has certainly done something good. He has written an opaque and difficult novel; at the same time, he has written in a way that it is also accessible. It is not immovably long that it would bore one to death, to the point that one’s eyes would set aflame in their eyes socket, from both boredom and the sheer lack of progress, that one comes to realize they are making. This novels dance like structure, and interesting if only bare bone plot, is supported on the shoulders of the inadequate characters, who themselves are desperate peasants, and the lowest of the low. The forgotten and the deserted; and with the caustic and sarcastic humour, it can become a less tedious read. Personally I give Krasznahorkai kudos for his work on this novel. It is truly something. With his use of a bare bone plot, and some eccentric and interesting characters, he is able to persuade and eventually trap one into this work; of intellectual existential angst.

It is a visionary novel, and there is no surprise why it is called a classic in today’s world in regards to its publication back in nineteen-eighty five. If there was ever a doubt that experimental fiction was dying out or was a slim breed on its own, I’d have to disagree. As long as authors from all over the world like Krasznahorkai are around, it is never dying out.

Thank-you For Reading Gentle Reader
Take Care
And As Always
Stay Well Read
*And Remember: Downloading Books Illegally is Thievery and Wrong.*

M. Mary

(link for “The Guardian,” article)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/jul/13/hari-kunzru-new-york-literary-hipsters