{"id":429,"date":"2009-11-15T08:34:33","date_gmt":"2009-11-15T14:34:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/?p=429"},"modified":"2009-11-15T08:34:33","modified_gmt":"2009-11-15T14:34:33","slug":"links-to-things-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/2009\/11\/15\/links-to-things-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Links to Things"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li>This is <a href=\"http:\/\/edgeofthewest.wordpress.com\/2009\/11\/09\/how-to-get-paid\/\">my new favorite quote of the week<\/a>:<br \/>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Being able to write is a remarkable gift. There\u2019s none better, if you can also think.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;Edward M. Bernstein<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/community.livejournal.com\/theinferior4\/564000.html\">Paul Witcover reviews <cite>The Secret History of Science Fiction<\/cite><\/a>, and has some interesting observations about the difference between SF as practiced by genre writers and SF in mainstream literary writing.<br \/>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Speculative fiction writers are apt to treat the subjects of their speculations as if they were real, no matter how outlandish and unlikely; thus, speculative fiction of the highest quality often has a unique reality to it.\u00c2\u00a0It employs the tools of mimetic fiction to ground and particularize its flights of fancy, whether they be technological or magical.\u00c2\u00a0It takes them literally.\u00c2\u00a0It concretizes metaphors.\u00c2\u00a0But when mainstream writers venture into speculative fiction, it\u2019s all too often either a day at the playground, during which they feel free to cast aside the mimetic conventions they normally hold to in regard to plot, character, setting, etc., or a trip to the Olde Curiosity Shoppe, where they can pick and choose among exotic settings, objects, atmospheres, etc. to use as symbols and such in their own stories, which remain highly mimetic in a traditional sense.\u00c2\u00a0I don\u2019t mean to suggest that this distinction holds for every story published by a mainstream or speculative fiction writer, only that it expresses something true and important about the unique quality of speculative fiction.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>(I don&#8217;t think the latter approach is wrong or inferior, but I&#8217;m glad it&#8217;s not the <em>only<\/em> approach to speculative fiction.)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>Wow, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.tor.com\/index.php?option=com_content&amp;view=blog&amp;id=58284#comments\">Joss Whedon fans are <em>delicate<\/em><\/a>. (I especially like the guy who compares a show getting cancelled to someone&#8217;s best friend dying: &#8220;Show some respect for the recently departed, or at least show some respect for the recently departed&#8217;s grieving friends.&#8221;)<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.npr.org\/blogs\/monitormix\/2009\/11\/the_death_of_mistakes_means_th.html\">Douglas Wolk says &#8220;The Death of Mistakes Means the Death of Rock.&#8221;<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nielsenhayden.com\/electroside\/archives\/2009_11.html#011875\">(via)<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>Mightygodking posts <a href=\"http:\/\/mightygodking.com\/index.php\/2009\/11\/10\/scenes-from-an-alternate-universe-where-the-beatles-accepted-lorne-michaels-generous-offer\/\">a great short SF story<\/a>. <a href=\"http:\/\/andrewhickey.info\/2009\/11\/10\/linkblogging-for-101109\/\">(via)<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is my new favorite quote of the week: Being able to write is a remarkable gift. There\u2019s none better, if you can also think. &#8211;Edward M. Bernstein Paul Witcover reviews The Secret History of Science Fiction, and has some interesting observations about the difference between SF as practiced by genre writers and SF in &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/2009\/11\/15\/links-to-things-2\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Links to Things<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,8,9],"tags":[198,35],"class_list":["post-429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-music","category-speculative-fiction","tag-books","tag-science-fiction"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.superdoomedplanet.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}