Some theories about genre
Mar. 28th, 2005 09:19 pm- There isn't really any such thing as genre: as fantasy, or crime fiction, or SF... There is no pure, Platonic ideal of any of these things, to which each example can be compared and which permits us to classify it with any certainty. There is only a greater or lesser degree of consensus about how we will use these terms, and their main usefulness is to allow us to tell each other that if you like this kind of stuff, then this is the kind of stuff you will like.
- There is very little point in arguing about those books which are described as "too good to be..." whichever genre we are talking about. If it's a good book which is accessible to everyone, that's great. The usefulness of genre is in identifying those books which not everyone will enjoy, but which will work for genre readers by giving them their shot of whatever draws them to that genre - sensawunda, can you solve the mystery before the detective does, even saccharine romance - and whose flaws they will overlook in order to get that shot.
- The difference between fantasy and science fiction lies not in what happens, but in precise nature of the suspension of disbelief asked of the reader. SF tells you that in certain circumstances, the laws of nature could operate in certain way, and invites you to set aside your disbelief; fantasy concedes that the laws of nature do not operate in a certain way, and invites you to imagine how it might be if they did: the unnatural, or supernatural. The otherness of the unreal is essential to fantasy, the extraordinariness of the real is essential to SF.
- And a slightly different one to finish with: poetry is a genre in the same way that SF, or crime, is a genre: the same small press publications, the same devoted following, meeting in pubs and going to readings by authors whose names are unknown to the general reading public, the same sense that the books that do find commercial success outside the genre ("The Nation's Favourite Poems" etc.) are not a good representation of what it has to offer, the same sense of being marginalised, the same debates about definitions...