Monday, January 16, 2006

THE FUTURE?

Honestly, fuck SF as a predictive literature, and read this instead.

JeffV

7 Comments:

At 5:50 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Alas Babylon, redux - with apologies to Pat Frank.

Jonathan

 
At 6:01 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Well, fair enough. I don't think SF in general does a good job of being predictive or should, necessarily. I guess this kind of thing just depresses me so much it leads to an outburst like the one I made. I guess writing seems futile in the face of that, in some ways.

Jeff

 
At 6:40 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

It's cool, though. We weren't using that planet for anything.

--ebear

 
At 8:17 AM, Blogger Jason Erik Lundberg said...

Jesus. I just want to go cry in a corner now.

 
At 9:26 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

You folks should probably seek out a copy of GREENHOUSE SUMMER by Norman Spinrad. I'm not saying it's a great book (hold off on reading the Ballard until after the Spinrad, if you've read neither), but it gets into Condition Venus, and has some fun with the whole future (Siberia being the world's breadbasket, NYC still existing behind huge seawall, Paris reinvented as a pastiche of New Orleans, with weather to match, etc.). The sciffy speculation part is the most entertaining element of the book (or depressing). In terms of characterization and plot, YMMV.

--minz

 
At 4:55 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hey Jeff,

Further comment:

You said "I don't think SF in general does a good job of being predictive or should, necessarily."

I agree with that, but given the sheer number of stories being published, it's not surprising that some seem to be bang dead-on.

best,

Jonathan

 
At 11:12 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I couldn't read all of it - so utterly depressing. I am now going to bury my head in the sand with the rest of mankind - again. As a species I think it our great strength.

 

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