Re: Just a little way into _Spiders_, and...

This discussion reminds me of how non-science fiction readers talk
about sf -- "if it weren't for all the never-ending stuff about
rockets and aliens and science and stuff, I could just enjoy the story
and characters."

I can't help but think this is (at least part of) Delany's point with
this new book. Genre is about indulging fetishes, whether they be
technological or sexual (or in other instances romantic or criminal,
etc.)?

--Ron Henry


On Thu, May 17, 2012 at 11:55 AM, Jorge Rapalo <[email protected]> wrote:
> I personally share your position.
>
> However, this begs the question, should literature have a "target audience"?
>
> Is the narrowed focus of such book, with its emphasis in mechanical
> details, even if supported by a larger ideological intent, not
> restricting it as "genre"?
>
> I always agreed with Chip's desire to do for pornography/erotica what
> in a sense he and others did for space opera, but may this be actually
> be reductive instead of expanding or challenging boundaries?
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, May 17, 2012 at 8:16 AM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> ...I've realized that I'm no longer (if I ever was) the "target audience" for Delany's fiction.
>>
>> I've only read one major sex scene -- the mini-orgy in the truck stop -- and I realized: this not only doesn't turn me on, it doesn't even turn me _off_! It doesn't bore me, exactly, but it has no emotional or erotic effect on me. Granted, I'm about as straight as they come, but some of Delany's previous scenes (I mind me of one in the third Neveryon book...) have done it for me.
>>
>> This one was ... mechanical? Perhaps that's too harsh; but certainly _choreographed_ would not be far off the mark. There is nothing that seems spontaneous about the scene, and nobody seems to be doing more than going through their motions -- even Eric, to whom this scene is new.
>>
>> I'm going to continue, but if the whole book is like this, I think I'm out of Delany's fiction (unless he miraculously produces _Splendor_). Which is a damn shame, because I thought his last few books, and especially _Dark Reflections_, were the best things he's ever written.
>>
>>
>> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>>
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------
>>
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>>
>>
>>
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>
> ------------------------------------
>
> == Posted to delany-list, hosted at yahoo groups ==
> == A mailing list for the discussion of the works of Samuel R. Delany. ==Yahoo! Groups Links
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>
>