{"id":162,"date":"2006-03-03T04:15:10","date_gmt":"2006-03-03T09:15:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/s265039441.onlinehome.us\/philpaine\/?p=162"},"modified":"2018-08-23T15:01:14","modified_gmt":"2018-08-23T19:01:14","slug":"14612-%c2%a0%c2%a0-michael-cunningham-at-home-at-the-end-of-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=162","title":{"rendered":"14612. (Michael Cunningham) At Home at the End of the World"},"content":{"rendered":"

This nov\u00adel pleased me. It\u2019s well-writ\u00adten, the char\u00adac\u00adters come alive, and the author doesn\u2019t pussy-foot. Cun\u00adning\u00adham takes three char\u00adac\u00adters from child\u00adhood, bring\u00ading them up to youth\u00adful adult\u00adhood. They end up form\u00ading a pre\u00adcar\u00adi\u00adous fam\u00adily and raise a shild. Noth\u00ading very extra\u00ador\u00addi\u00adnary hap\u00adpens. But it is all done with great skill.<\/span> The book is grown-up. As I turned the pages, I was remind\u00aded of my pro\u00adtracted strug\u00adgle with the cur\u00adrent situ\u00adation in Sci\u00adence Fic\u00adtion pub\u00adlish\u00ading. I grew up with Sci\u00adence Fic\u00adtion, and I would rather write in that genre than write the sort of thing that Michael Cun\u00adning\u00adham does.<\/span><\/p>\n

Unfor\u00adtu\u00adnately, the field of Sci\u00adence Fic\u00adtion has so pro\u00adfoundly degen\u00ader\u00adated in the last few years that there seems no point to even try\u00ading. The Sci\u00adence Fic\u00adtion com\u00admu\u00adnity is sim\u00adply not com\u00adposed of grown-up peo\u00adple. I am not refer\u00adring to chrono\u00adlog\u00adi\u00adcal age \u2014 I know many peo\u00adple who were grown-up at the age of thir\u00adteen. But the Sci\u00adence Fic\u00adtion com\u00admu\u00adnity no longer seems to be peo\u00adpled with intel\u00adlec\u00adtual adults. If Mr. Cun\u00adning\u00adham were writ\u00ading SF<\/span>, and sub\u00admit\u00adting a work of this qual\u00adity, tone, and tech\u00adnique to SF<\/span> pub\u00adlish\u00aders, he would get nowhere. He would be con\u00adfronted by moron\u00adic taboos, self-cen\u00adsor\u00ading cow\u00adardice, and idi\u00adotic social val\u00adues. In short, he would be enter\u00ading an infan\u00adtile world that sim\u00adply can\u2019t be grown-up enough to per\u00admit lit\u00ader\u00ada\u00adture, or to cre\u00adate it.<\/span><\/p>\n

This has not always been the case. There was a time when Sci\u00adence Fic\u00adtion was quite the oppo\u00adsite. It was where the action was. It was writ\u00adten and pub\u00adlished by grown-up peo\u00adple to be read by grown-up peo\u00adple, who did not cringe in ter\u00adror at the pos\u00adsi\u00adbil\u00adity of offend\u00ading illit\u00ader\u00adate yokels who plant corn by the moon. Many of those grown-up peo\u00adple hap\u00adpened to be teenagers. The SF<\/span> com\u00admu\u00adnity is now con\u00adsid\u00ader\u00adably old\u00ader in bio\u00adlog\u00adi\u00adcal age, on aver\u00adage, than it was when I entered it. But it has rock\u00adeted from the uni\u00adver\u00adsity to kinder\u00adgar\u00adden in a sin\u00adgle generation.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I turned the pages of this nov\u00adel with a mix\u00adture of plea\u00adsure, and envy. My inter\u00adests and imagery are such that I will nev\u00ader feel called to write a nov\u00adel like this. I want to be able write with\u00adin the broad and spec\u00adtac\u00adu\u00adlar can\u00advas of Sci\u00adence Fic\u00adtion, unbound by time or space. I could prob\u00ada\u00adbly nev\u00ader write a nov\u00adel about three peo\u00adple work\u00ading out a rela\u00adtion\u00adship in upstate New York. But damn it<\/em>, I would like to be able to write in lib\u00aderty, for a think\u00ading audi\u00adence, with some seri\u00adous expec\u00adta\u00adtion of mak\u00ading a liv\u00ading from it.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This nov\u00adel pleased me. It\u2019s well-writ\u00adten, the char\u00adac\u00adters come alive, and the author doesn\u2019t pussy-foot. Cun\u00adning\u00adham takes three char\u00adac\u00adters from child\u00adhood, bring\u00ading them up to youth\u00adful adult\u00adhood. They end up form\u00ading a pre\u00adcar\u00adi\u00adous fam\u00adily and raise a shild. Noth\u00ading very \u2026<\/p>\n

Read more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[946,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-b-reading","category-bu-reading-2006"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=162"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9693,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162\/revisions\/9693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}