Fahrenheit 91
I wrote this a couple of days ago but I’m finally putting it up.
I wasn’t sure whether to write a blog about the passing of Ray Bradbury but the Sydney Morning Herald online tipped my hand. Bradbury was without a doubt a master storyteller and a prolific one. He created worlds and ideas with clarity and precision. It’s not stretching anything to say he was one of the greats of SF – by which I mean Speculative Fiction, not just science fiction.
What drives me to write this however is not simple memoriam but an element of disgust with SMH for its reporting of Bradbury’s death; a brief paragraph followed by a reprint of an opinion piece arguing that Bradbury was not a ‘literary’ SF author but the king of ‘pulp’. A simple short obituary would’ve sufficed but to spare the effort they rerun something that ends by saying “The king of pulp [Bradbury] lives.” I ask you, is that appropriate?
Now, the piece was not disparaging of Bradbury overall but it did seem to argue against his skills in writing while explaining how brilliant a writer he was. Regardless, it was not a way to report the death of a writer, pulp or otherwise.
This brings me to the other thing this piece made me want to write about, the whole premise of ‘literary’ and ‘pulp’ as opposite ends of some sort of spectrum. It seems to be a polemic SF is cursed to suffer from for all eternity. Even within the genre there are levels of snobbery demarcating the ‘escapist pulp’ with the ‘heavy’ or ‘literary’ works. Applying such things to Ray Bradbury just seems wrong and, if anything, the piece SMH has deigned to run on the day of his death simply shows that the polemic is an artificial construct – one Bradbury broke.
A piece of fiction should be judged primarily on its own terms. Yes, it needs to be well written. Beyond that it could serve any purpose the author and reader agree between them. For me, the main thing is for there to be a good story told well. My experience of ‘literary’ fiction is of no or limited banal story told with overdone language. My experience of ‘pulp’ or ‘escapist’ stories is stories where things happen. Not all are well told and not all are good – but that will depend on who’s reading them. Bradbury told good stories and told them excellently. So the ‘literary’ side claimed him and the ‘pulp’ side did too. He was neither, they don’t exist. He was Bradbury, the storyteller. Let’s remember that and read the stories and enjoy them. That’s what really matters.
Keep dreaming!
I wasn’t sure whether to write a blog about the passing of Ray Bradbury but the Sydney Morning Herald online tipped my hand. Bradbury was without a doubt a master storyteller and a prolific one. He created worlds and ideas with clarity and precision. It’s not stretching anything to say he was one of the greats of SF – by which I mean Speculative Fiction, not just science fiction.
What drives me to write this however is not simple memoriam but an element of disgust with SMH for its reporting of Bradbury’s death; a brief paragraph followed by a reprint of an opinion piece arguing that Bradbury was not a ‘literary’ SF author but the king of ‘pulp’. A simple short obituary would’ve sufficed but to spare the effort they rerun something that ends by saying “The king of pulp [Bradbury] lives.” I ask you, is that appropriate?
Now, the piece was not disparaging of Bradbury overall but it did seem to argue against his skills in writing while explaining how brilliant a writer he was. Regardless, it was not a way to report the death of a writer, pulp or otherwise.
This brings me to the other thing this piece made me want to write about, the whole premise of ‘literary’ and ‘pulp’ as opposite ends of some sort of spectrum. It seems to be a polemic SF is cursed to suffer from for all eternity. Even within the genre there are levels of snobbery demarcating the ‘escapist pulp’ with the ‘heavy’ or ‘literary’ works. Applying such things to Ray Bradbury just seems wrong and, if anything, the piece SMH has deigned to run on the day of his death simply shows that the polemic is an artificial construct – one Bradbury broke.
A piece of fiction should be judged primarily on its own terms. Yes, it needs to be well written. Beyond that it could serve any purpose the author and reader agree between them. For me, the main thing is for there to be a good story told well. My experience of ‘literary’ fiction is of no or limited banal story told with overdone language. My experience of ‘pulp’ or ‘escapist’ stories is stories where things happen. Not all are well told and not all are good – but that will depend on who’s reading them. Bradbury told good stories and told them excellently. So the ‘literary’ side claimed him and the ‘pulp’ side did too. He was neither, they don’t exist. He was Bradbury, the storyteller. Let’s remember that and read the stories and enjoy them. That’s what really matters.
Keep dreaming!
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