Genre Lit Fic

[prusik]

avocadovpx had an interesting entry about Not Science Fiction. There's a favorable review in today's Washington Post of Soon I Will Be Invincible. The review says that it "takes the genre of the superheroic into the realm of literary fiction, where navel-gazing is an established art form." The review also references Michael Chabon and Jonathan Letham. So, my question is that is this Science Fiction, or is it Not Science Fiction?

Clearly, it's being marketed as Not Science Fiction. But review makes it sound like the more the book explores genre, the more literary it is. I'm left with this weird conclusion that exploring genre "within its traditional limits" is literary. Well, if the review insists. (But this makes me wonder is there any writing within genre then that isn't also literary?)

I feel like instead of categorizing books, we ought to be tagging them instead. If someone thinks of a book as literary fiction, that shouldn't mean it can't also be genre fiction at the same time. And the review shouldn't give the impression that this is taking something from the realm of children and making it appropriate for adults. *sigh*

Comments

[krylyr.livejournal.com]

I remember talking a little bit to JPK about this at VP. There is a huge sense of snobbery from literary fiction writers toward SF/F/Horror writers. He reckoned that's why genre writers became so tight with everyone else, because the other group wouldn't let us back in the day and so we said screw them. We'll start our own club.

The whole thing is silly. I bet people who say we "pound out crap about dragons" haven't read "Burn" or "American Gods." And even if they had read "Her Majesty's Dragon," hopefully they'd realize having fun isn't such a bad thing.

Alright, I'm channeling Dru's mini-rant. Sorry, the snobbery of the whole thing annoys me.

[orogeny.livejournal.com]

It was JPK who pointed about the bit about 'transcending genre'.

One of our poet friends was in a class with a lot of lit fic people, and one of them referred to us as "our dragon-loving brethren." When he found out the person next to him was in genre fic, he apparently blushed scarlet.