Excuses, Excuses

[mrissa]

I got an e-mail note this afternoon from the historian who wrote one of the books I read earlier this month. She was googling on her book and found my mention of it on my journal, and she wrote to express her surprise and very politely inquire, "What does a young writer of sci fi find in a work of history?"

And I thought, heh, ohhhhh, lady, do you not know anything about this job.

I mean, seriously: for what other profession in the world could reading anything, anything at all, be considered professional development? And yet I am hard pressed to come up with a book that absolutely positively could not relate to my work either now or someday in the future. Whenever I need an excuse, I have one readily available at all times now.

And an Inquisition microhistory is not at all the most obscure volume of history ever read by a young SF writer. Not even by this young SF writer. Possibly not even this month. Why? Because we're geeks, the lot of us, geeks and intellectual magpies.

And it's so much fun.

Comments

[songwind.livejournal.com]

If you read what Eric Flint attributes as inspiration (or even models) for some of his novels.. whew.

His first novel was a sci-fi retelling of some Bantu war in South Africa. Pretty good stuff, actually :)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I haven't read any Flint yet -- or rather, not any Flint fiction, I've read his essays on distribution -- but SF Bantu, yesyes, exactly. Hell, Asimov started out talking about historical perspectives and empires.

You may be the only person on the friends list who doesn't know that my current fantasy novel project has vacuum-tube computing and Kalevala-inspired (-but-warped) mythology in Cold War Finland. Research? Yes, thanks....

[songwind.livejournal.com]

Sounds very cool

[merriehaskell.livejournal.com]

I remember (foolishly?) introducing myself in a historical anthropology class by saying that I wrote science fiction and fantasy. "Oh, are you majoring in creative writing?" "Uhm, no. Anthropology." "Well, that's... odd. I don't think you'll find much help here for that."

Beyond the obvious, uhm, (well, to use a Yoonism) sporkiness of that, I enjoyed the class a lot. Unfortunately, it took me half the semester of working my butt off to get the prof to like me after that admission. I've learned to be more circumspect since then...

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, my college history prof greeted the class on the first day with, "If any of you don't already read science fiction, I'd advise you to start, because that's the mindset you're going to need to cultivate for this class."

[merriehaskell.livejournal.com]

That's a much better attitude. (sigh)

For the record, I think I did convert him.

And I've had other profs with better attitudes. Particularly a linguistics professor who was totally sold on Octavia Butler and rec'd her to us practically every week.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Sad stereotyping of SF, there. Do set her straight. She really does have no idea.

B

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I intend to. Politely, as she was polite enough to me and there's no sense in alienating her. But yeah, a setting-straight is required.

[gaaneden.livejournal.com]

I love that! "Intellectual Magpie"!

[pameladean]

Every single book that David and I buy, unless it's a gift to somebody outside the household, counts towards my writing expenses. This is not fudging or a tax fiddle, it's the simple truth.

Pamela

[(Anonymous)]

Has the historian never read any sci fi? I'm not a writer, but I've read some sci fi and in many cases it involves many aspects of history or requires knowledge of the area, setting, etc. Apart from which, don't people just read to be informed? Again, I'm not a writer, but I love to read just so that there are new things to think about and new points of view to look at and in order to do this, there's sci fi, historical fiction, history, self help, sociology work, psychology work, etc, etc, etc. If you didn't read these, wouldn't your viewpoint get to be somewhat myopic? Just amazed that a person wouldn't see the value or interest someone in general, let alone a sci fi writer, would have in reading a particular book.

Heathah

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

You know, I think a lot of academics are used to their family members not being interested in their fields. There is such a thing as a writer of popular science or popular history books, but this person was clearly not one of them. So I can see where she might feel a little isolated from anyone who wasn't working in her sub-field of history.

[flewellyn.livejournal.com]

I know that, for example, J. Michael Straczynski, creator of Babylon 5, read voraciously on all kinds of subjects: classical myth and legend, history, theology, art and poetry, science and technology, mathematics, political science, you name it. It's part of what gave the show such a wonderfully textured feeling, like it was a real world.

Myself, I'm a writer as well, though not published; and I'm also a knowledge junkie. In college, I majored in history, political science, and computer science. I get addicted reading Wikipedia. And I really, really love Shakespeare. So, yeah, I know what you mean, about sci-fi writers being "intellectual magpies". I love that phrase.

(Oh, by the way, hi. I found you through a chain of journals starting with sunyata__.)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yeah, in some ways I don't think there's anything we can reasonably skip, which is kind of the down side. If the history/theology/economics/etc. is patchy in a long story or series, someone will spot it. Have you seen Pat Wrede's worldbuilding questions? They're pretty nifty.

(Hi and welcome!)

[flewellyn.livejournal.com]

No, I have not seen those. As I am working on building a world, I would be very interested. Could you link me?

Also, I see you live in St. Paul. I live in Moorhead. Hi, fellow Minnesotan!

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

It's here (http://www.sfwa.org/writing/worldbuilding1.htm).

I live in Eagan, which livejournal thinks is St. Paul even though it isn't. But I'm very happy to be a Minnesotan. I looked at going to Concordia-Moorhead, but it ultimately wasn't my kind of place.

[flewellyn.livejournal.com]

I have driven past Eagan, while going to the airport. Don't really know much about it, though.

I went to Concorida in Moorhead, actually. I found it to be quite fun. Of course, I'm Jewish, so I was different enough that nobody really knew what to do with me. I'm used to that. :-)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I think it's almost easier to go to a school like that if your differences from their average are obvious. Mine were obvious after one weekend's visit, but in a "stop that, you!" sort of way. I was, for example, the only girl in the group of people interviewing for scholarships who thought through and arranged to do something co-ed. A couple of other girls tagged along with me and a handful of boys, but mostly I got very strange looks.

They wouldn't let my dad walk through a dorm with my suitcase to get to the door closer to the parking lot at 3:00 p.m. in a blizzard, because it was not intervisitation hours. I looked at that and thought, "This is stupid. And I'd be the dorm whore without doing anything." So I went to Gustavus instead.

[flewellyn.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I didn't live on campus, so "intervisitation" was never an issue. That, and the rules were recently relaxed a bit, so it's not quite as bad. Still, I hear you; the "Happy Cobber Bubble" is something that many of the more sophisticated and non-mainstream students lament, as well as professors. The whole problem is that Concordia does not encourage students to go off-campus for, well, anything; the place becomes their whole world.

I never was in the bubble, so I didn't feel it, and I helped my friends escape whenever possible. Still, it was something that irritated many people.

Oh, and of course, there are no gay people on the campus (half the male population is gay), and there are no rapes or sexual assaults (the campus security folks discourage women who are attacked from reporting it).

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I was just-barely-17 when I left for college, so living off campus was not an option for me.

I'm appalled that the campus security people discourage women from reporting rape and sexual assault. I wish I was surprised, but mostly I'm just appalled.

[flewellyn.livejournal.com]

Oh hey! I just noticed...these questions are by the woman who did the "Dealing with Dragons" books! I love those books!

My sister even wrote to her a few times. She rocks.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

If you like those, try Sorcery and Cecelia and Mairelon the Magician. They're even better, to my way of thinking.

I met Pat Wrede once or maybe it was twice, but I wouldn't say I know her. Some of the people who read this lj do, though. She does indeed seem nifty.